Notes from the Edge

Avsnitt

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  I Worked It. But It Didn’t Work. Why Didn’t You Tell Me? 28.07.2026 8min

  When doing everything “right” in recovery leaves you smaller, sicker, and further away from yourself.For two years, I did exactly what I was told.Six days a week. Sometimes two meetings a day. Inpatient rehabilitation. Outpatient rehabilitation. Sponsors. Step work. Inventories. Confessions. Amends.I stayed sober.But I was not becoming healthier.I was becoming smaller.In this deeply personal episode of Notes From the Edge, I explore what happens when a recovery model fails to recognize the person sitting in front of it, especially when that person is also carrying childhood trauma, sexual assault, domestic violence, psychiatric diagnoses, shame, and a profoundly dysregulated nervous system.This is not an attack on AA.If AA saved your life, I celebrate that. Truly. Keep going.This is a grief story about realizing that the map I had been given was never designed for the terrain I was walking.We will talk about:• The difference between staying sober and actually healing• When “sharing” becomes uncontained trauma dumping• Why powerlessness, defect language, and submission may affect traumatized women differently• The importance of nervous system regulation, boundaries, safety, and co-regulation• Modern trauma approaches such as EMDR, Internal Family Systems, and somatic therapy• The evolving science of addiction and neuroplasticity• Alternatives including SMART Recovery, Women for Sobriety, LifeRing, medication-assisted treatment, recovery coaching, therapy, purpose, community, and connection• Why informed choice should be part of every recovery conversationMy nervous system did not need another moral inventory.It needed safety.Recovery should not require abandoning your intuition or becoming less yourself. It should help you become more yourself.And if one approach is not helping you heal, that does not automatically mean you are broken.Maybe you simply need a different map.This episode reflects personal experience and is intended for education and conversation. It is not a substitute for individualized medical or mental health care.Learn more about Lisa Lacy and her work at www.lisalacy.comAnd before we leave, I want to ask you the question I ask every guest:What did you perform in order to survive?Welcome to the Edge.
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  You Can't Automate Relationships with Beth Granger 27.07.2026 24min

  Beth Granger on visibility, digital trust, critical conversations, and staying human in an increasingly automated worldTechnology can help us reach thousands of people, write polished messages, and build impressive networks.But it cannot create trust for us.Beth Granger is a speaker, consultant, trainer, emcee, and LinkedIn and networking strategist who helps professionals communicate more confidently, navigate critical conversations, and turn online connections into meaningful relationships.Her message is simple and increasingly urgent:You can’t automate relationships.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Beth and Lisa explore the fear beneath professional visibility, why people hesitate to post or speak honestly online, and what separates a connection from an actual relationship.They also discuss:• How to become visible without performing a polished professional persona• The difference between listening and simply waiting to speak• What artificial intelligence can support, and what should never be outsourced• Why critical conversations either strengthen trust or quietly destroy it• How leaders, sales professionals, and teams can communicate with greater clarity and humanity• Why connection, curiosity, kindness, and community still matter in an algorithm-driven worldThis is a conversation about reputation, belonging, confidence, digital communication, and the human work required to make relationships mean something.Learn more about Beth Granger:https://www.bethgranger.comLearn more about Lisa Lacy:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  How Chronic Devaluation Shapes Confidence, Relationships, and Ambition 27.07.2026 23min

  What happens when nothing you accomplish ever seems to be enough?In this solo episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy explores the long-term impact of chronic devaluation, especially when it begins in childhood. She shares personal stories of earning straight A’s, leading teams, serving on committees, excelling in performance, and still feeling as though the finish line kept moving.When you are told to go left and then criticized for not going right, you may stop trusting your own direction. Over time, that confusion can shape your confidence, your relationships, your ambition, and your ability to fully receive your own success.This conversation explores:Why devaluation can create overachievement and overfunctioningHow moving standards teach children to distrust themselvesWhy accomplished adults may still struggle to feel successfulHow early devaluation can affect romantic and professional relationshipsThe difference between creating from self-expression and performing for approvalHow to receive feedback without turning it into a verdict on your worthDevaluation did not stop Lisa from becoming a leader, performer, entrepreneur, writer, and creator.She accomplished it anyway.But the deeper work is learning to accomplish without still carrying the need to prove that she deserves to be valued.What have you spent your life accomplishing in the hope that someone would finally recognize your value?And what might you create next if you no longer needed their permission?Welcome to the Edge.www.lisalacy.com
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  Clawing Back From the Bottom with Bryan Blackmon 27.07.2026 44min

  Bryan Blackmon left Texas for California chasing a dream. Instead, he found himself homeless, sleeping in his car, and drowning in alcohol and addiction.Then an elderly landlord named Elaine chose not to give up on him.Her belief became a turning point, but Bryan still had to do the work of becoming someone he could believe in, too.Today, Bryan is sober, a recovery advocate, transformation coach, and the creator of Crab Crew Life, a community built around recovery, resilience, adaptability, accountability, and belief.Bryan says the crab does not swim. It does not fly. It claws its way forward from the bottom of the ocean floor.And so did he.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Bryan and Lisa explore:• What homelessness and addiction look like from the inside• The difference between getting sober and rebuilding your identity• Why redemption is not a moment, but a daily routine• The ordinary habits that restore dignity and self-respect• How one person’s belief can help rewrite a life• Why community can carry us when willpower is no longer enough• Who we become when survival is no longer our only identityThis is a conversation about second chances, accountability, human connection, and the courage required to keep clawing forward when life has taken you all the way to the bottom.Learn more about Bryan Blackmon and Crab Crew Life:https://crabcrewlif​​e.comLearn more about Lisa Lacy:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  I Was Wounded… and Slightly Feral 27.07.2026 12min

  It is exactly midnight, I am editing Notes From a Certified Madwoman, and I have finally realized something:Maybe I was never crazy.Maybe I was wounded, dysregulated, surviving, and just slightly feral.In this solo episode of Midnight Menopausal Meanderings, I talk about what happens when trauma is mistaken for personality, survival responses are reduced to mental illness, and the context of a person’s life disappears beneath the diagnosis.This is not an argument against therapy, psychiatry, medication, recovery, or mental health treatment. Those things save lives, including mine.It is an invitation to ask a fuller question.Not only:What is wrong with you?But also:What happened to you?I also share why some details were intentionally left out of my book, why telling the whole truth can sometimes bring consequences from the very people who benefited from your silence, and why this book is not an attempt to explain or defend myself.It is an exploration of what happens when we forget that context matters.Because trauma may explain behavior without excusing harm.Because a diagnosis may describe symptoms without telling the whole story.And because sometimes the woman everyone called crazy was carrying more than one nervous system should ever have had to carry alone.Notes From a Certified Madwoman is coming Fall 2026.Welcome to the edge.www.lisalacy.com
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  WATCH ME with Renee Carbone Fleming 27.07.2026 38min

  The Price of Waiting for Permission and the Power of Becoming Visible AnywayWhat happens when a woman stops waiting to feel confident, stops explaining every decision, and starts building the life she knows she is capable of creating?In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with award-winning entrepreneur, author, podcast host, and founder of the Badass Queen™ movement, Renee Carbone Fleming.Renee filed for bankruptcy. Her marriage ended. She found herself rebuilding from the ground up and made a two-word decision that would shape everything that followed:Watch me.That decision became a philosophy, a movement, and the foundation of the WATCH ME Method™, Renee’s five-principle operating system for women who are done seeking permission, shrinking their ambitions, and waiting for approval before taking action.Renee went on to build a direct-sales organization that generated more than $13 million, lead a team of over 400 people, create a multimillion-dollar brand empire, publish three books, launch the Unapologetically Badass podcast, and see her brand featured on the NASDAQ billboard in Times Square.In this bold and honest conversation, Lisa and Renee explore:• What reinvention really looks like before the success story becomes polished• Why overexplaining quietly weakens a woman’s authority• The hidden emotional and financial cost of waiting for approval• Why confidence is the result of execution, not the requirement for it• How women can become visible before they feel completely ready• What Renee had to survive, release, and rebuild between bankruptcy and success• How to stop asking others to approve the future you are creatingThis is a conversation for every woman who has ever known she was capable of more but kept waiting for permission to prove it.Connect with Renee Carbone Fleming:https://badassqueen.coConnect with Lisa Lacy:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  People Were More Comfortable With My Suffering When I Carried It Quietly 26.07.2026 26min

  Female Anger, Menopause, and What Happens When the Manageable Woman DisappearsPeople celebrate strong women until those women get angry, set boundaries, stop apologizing, or remove access.In this episode of Midnight Menopausal Meanderings, Lisa Lacy explores female anger, menopause, nervous-system overload, and what happens when the emotionally manageable woman begins to disappear. Menopause may not create a new, irrational woman. It may reveal the woman who spent decades swallowing betrayal, exhaustion, grief, emotional labor, and uncomfortable truths to keep everyone else comfortable.This conversation also holds the harder truth: anger can carry important information, but justified rage can still cause harm. Trauma explains behavior. It does not excuse it. Healing is not about silencing anger or worshipping it. It is about learning to hold truth without destruction, boundaries without cruelty, and power without abandoning our humanity.This episode draws from Lisa’s upcoming book, Notes of a Certified Madwoman, an exploration of trauma, survival, identity, nervous-system adaptation, and the women we became in order to survive.Who benefited from the version of you who carried her suffering quietly?Welcome to the edge.www,lisalacy.com
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  The Last Rocketman: Fear Is Information Not Instruction with Dan Schlund 25.07.2026 44min

  What happens when the thing that made you feel most alive nearly kills you?“Rocketman” Dan Schlund is one of the last professionally trained Rocketbelt pilots in the world. For a decade, he flew jet packs at events across 25 countries and six continents, performing hundreds of flights without a parachute and with only seconds of fuel strapped to his back.But Dan’s most extraordinary story began after the spectacle ended.Following devastating burns, extensive skin-graft surgeries, and a crash that left him with a broken neck, Dan lost far more than his ability to fly. He lost his income, his marriage, and the identity he had built around being the Rocketman. He also became dependent on pain medication and had to rebuild his life from the ground up.Dan eventually founded National Set Medics, growing it into a multimillion-dollar company that provides medical professionals for film and television productions nationwide. Ten years after his final flight, he purchased the Rocketbelt and training hangar and returned to the air one more time for his memoir and documentary, The Last Rocketman.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy and Dan explore:• What happens when your identity disappears overnight• The difference between courage and fearlessness• How the nervous system responds after catastrophic injury• Addiction, recovery, and the invisible work behind a comeback• Calculated risk and decision-making under pressure• Why Dan believes fear is information, not instruction• What it took to strap the Rocketbelt on one final timeDan’s message is not that we should become fearless. It is that courage can be practiced, preparation can change our relationship with fear, and our worst experience does not have to become our final one.Learn more about Dan, his book, and the documentary:https://rocketman.tv/Learn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.com/Welcome to the Edge.
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  When Your Diagnosis Enters the Room Before You Do 24.07.2026 23min

  Psychiatric labels, medical dismissal, and what happens when a human being becomes paperworkWhat happens when a provider sees your psychiatric history before they truly see you?In this deeply personal solo episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy explores the dangerous gap between being treated as a medically complex human being and being reduced to “the psychiatric patient.”Drawing from her lived experience inside mental health facilities, jail, addiction recovery, emergency rooms, and repeated life-threatening medical crises, Lisa examines how quickly dignity, autonomy, and credibility can disappear once a diagnosis enters the room.This episode explores institutionalization, medical gaslighting, hospital trauma, psychiatric bias, and the devastating consequences of being labeled emotional instead of symptomatic, anxious instead of endangered, and crazy instead of sick.It also offers an early look into Lisa’s forthcoming memoir, Notes From a Certified Madwoman, releasing in October. Part memoir, part cultural critique, and part nervous-system conversation, the book asks a question that could change how we understand trauma and mental illness:What if the diagnosis was sometimes describing survival?Mental illness should never cancel physical illness.A psychiatric record should never erase a patient’s credibility.Institutionalization should never require the surrender of human dignity.Learn more about Lisa, the podcast, and her upcoming work at:https://lisa-lacy.comNotes From a Certified Madwoman releases in October.See you at the edge.
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  What the Hell is Love? 24.07.2026 22min

  What happens when you grow up without hearing “I love you,” without being held, and without learning what safe, enduring affection feels like?In this deeply personal solo episode of Midnight Menopausal Meanderings, I explore the difference between loving someone and knowing how to experience love.My parents never told me they loved me. My father wrote the words in letters I would not open until decades later, after he died. My mother never said them. I learned touch through violation rather than comfort, and when I became a mother, I had to consciously teach myself how to hug my daughter and say, “I love you.”For years, I believed love meant providing. I became the financial provider, the problem-solver, the rescuer, and eventually a workaholic driven by survival.Now, with the help of transformational coach Steve Barton, I am exploring a different idea:Love can be wisdom.Love can be trust.And love can simply be love.We also talk about menopause, the disappearing bullshit filter, and the challenge of setting boundaries that are loving, direct, and final. Because you can love someone, understand them, forgive them, and still decide they no longer have access to you.This next chapter is not about performing love.It is about finally learning what love feels like when it does not require self-abandonment.What did you perform in order to survive?Learn more at lisalacy.comSee you at the edge.
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  The Competence Trap with Loren Silverman 24.07.2026 37min

  Burnout, Boundaries, and Why the Most Capable Person in the Room May Be Closest to the EdgeWhat happens when competence becomes a survival strategy?In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with life coach and former technology leader Loren Silverman for an honest conversation about burnout, overthinking, boundaries, self-abandonment, and the hidden cost of always being the capable one.After nearly two decades working in technology, program management, and digital transformation, Loren realized that the part of his career that mattered most was not the technology. It was helping the people behind it.He also recognized a difficult truth: persistence can look admirable from the outside while quietly costing us our satisfaction, health, and connection to ourselves.Today, Loren is the founder of Silverman Coach and the creator of Life Reboot: Nerd Edition, a coaching experience for nerds, geeks, overthinkers, and overwhelmed professionals who are ready to trade chaos for clarity, build meaningful boundaries, and finally follow through on what matters.Together, Lisa and Loren explore why the most capable person in the room may also be the person closest to the edge, how competence becomes a performance, and why real transformation is often built through small, repeatable choices rather than dramatic overhauls.They also discuss the difference between persistence and self-abandonment, the role values play in decision-making, and what it takes to stop treating yourself like a problem that needs to be optimized.Learn more about Loren Silverman and Silverman Coach:http://silverman.coachLearn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  Before the First Hit with Dave Kopeny 23.07.2026 53min

  How Parents Can Recognize Risk, Interrupt Addiction, and Become Their Child’s Strongest Protective ForceEvery parent wants to believe their child will know how to recognize danger, make the right decision, and walk away when drugs enter the picture.But today’s drug landscape is more accessible, potent, and aggressively marketed than many families realize. By the time a parent knows something is wrong, the problem may already be much larger than anyone understood.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with author, educator, private investigator, and addiction prevention advocate Dave Kopeny.Dave grew up in a home consumed by addiction. He was given LSD at eight years old, knew how to roll a joint by nine, and later lost his father, brother, and sister-in-law to alcohol and drug use.Those experiences became the foundation for more than 30 years of work with adolescents, young adults, and families navigating addiction and other high-risk behaviors. Throughout his career, Dave has served as a school counselor, teacher, probation officer, law enforcement officer, gang investigator, and private investigator specializing in teen addiction and intervention.Together, Lisa and Dave explore:• Why the “war on drugs” failed• How parents can recognize the early warning signs of substance use• The difference between healthy supervision and destructive surveillance• How social media and modern drug markets target young people• What parents should do when they suspect their child is using drugs• How families can replace fear and helplessness with awareness, action, and hopeDave is the author of Tip of the Spear: How to Educate, Supervise, and Monitor Your Child in a World of Increasing Drug Abuse and Addiction and the founder of ASAP Community, where he provides parents with practical tools to protect and support their children.Connect with Dave Kopeny:https://asapcommunity.orgConnect with Lisa Lacy:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  Who Got You Here Won't Get You There 23.07.2026 46min

  Jim Hughes on Identity, Fear, Self-Judgment, and Becoming the Person Beneath the PerformanceThe person who got you here may have been exactly who you needed to become.The achiever. The problem-solver. The founder who never stops moving. The leader who learned how to carry the pressure, meet the expectations, and become whatever the moment required.But what happens when that identity begins keeping you from where you want to go next?In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with coach, author, speaker, and Untamed founder Jim Hughes for a conversation about the stories, fears, and deeply rooted beliefs that quietly shape who we become.Jim has lived in 12 countries, built and led a multimillion-dollar engineering business in Australia, explored an extraordinary range of careers, and even skied the world’s longest giant slalom race wearing only a G-string. For the past decade, he has helped high-achieving founders and leaders stop living as the people they believe they should be and begin becoming the people they genuinely want to be.Together, Lisa and Jim explore:• The hidden ways founders and high performers waste energy• Why motivation may be overrated• How fear disguises itself as ambition and growth• Why changing what you do is not enough without examining who is doing it• The role self-judgment plays in keeping people stuck• How voices from our past continue influencing decisions they are no longer entitled to make• What it takes to release the identity that helped you surviveThis is a conversation about success, identity, performance, and the courage required to stop obeying the person you once needed to be.Connect with Jim Hughes and Untamed:https://www.becomeuntamed.comConnect with Lisa Lacy:https://www.lisalacy.comNotes From the Edge is where we explore trauma, identity, recovery, reinvention, and the deeply human stories underneath the roles we perform.Welcome to the edge.
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  When Leadership Stops Developing People with Dr. Katie Trowbridge 23.07.2026 47min

  Curiosity, Compliance, and Teams That Think.Why do capable, intelligent teams stop taking initiative?Sometimes it is not because people are lazy, disengaged, or unwilling to contribute. Sometimes they have learned that following directions is safer than asking questions, challenging assumptions, or offering an original idea.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with Dr. Katie Trowbridge, an award-winning educator, TEDx speaker, leadership strategist, author, and CEO of Curiosity 2 Create.After more than 25 years in the classroom, Katie began bringing the principles of curiosity, trust, and thoughtful questioning into organizations. Her work helps leaders move beyond managing behavior and toward creating cultures where people think deeply, contribute ideas, take ownership, and lead with purpose.Together, Lisa and Katie explore:• Why leadership shifted from developing people to managing compliance• Why capable teams sometimes stop taking initiative• The leadership habits that unintentionally silence good ideas• What great teachers understand about human development• How curiosity and trust create stronger workplace cultures• The CREATE Method™ and how leaders can build teams that think for themselvesDr. Katie Trowbridge is the author of Lead Boldly, Think Deeply and the creator of the CREATE Method™, a framework designed to help leaders develop stronger thinkers and more sustainable organizational cultures.Learn more about Dr. Katie Trowbridge and Curiosity 2 Create:https://curiosity2create.orgLearn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.comJoin us for a human conversation about leadership, curiosity, and what becomes possible when people are trusted to think.See you at the edge.
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  When Compassion Is Not Enough 22.07.2026 59min

  What happens when someone you love is in crisis, refuses help, and waiting for them to become “ready” may cost them their life?In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with attorney, former prosecutor, and family crisis advocate Mark Astor for a necessary and deeply human conversation about addiction, severe mental illness, involuntary treatment, family trauma, and the difficult line between compassion and enabling.Mark is a partner at Astor Simovitch Law, where he helps families navigate crises involving psychiatric instability, substance use, failed treatment efforts, medical complexity, and resistance to care. His work includes emergency guardianships, recovery planning, and legal intervention through Florida laws such as the Baker Act and Marchman Act.This work is not theoretical for Mark.Two days after burying his father, he stood beside police and paramedics as a member of his own family was involuntarily transported for psychiatric evaluation. That experience gave him a perspective no courtroom ever could and ultimately shaped his mission to help families take informed, lawful, and compassionate action before irreversible harm occurs.Together, Lisa and Mark explore why “waiting until they are ready” can sometimes be deadly, how cognitive impairment affects a person’s ability to recognize that they need help, and when legal intervention may become an act of love rather than punishment or control.They also examine the emotional burden carried by parents, spouses, and siblings, the civil-rights questions surrounding involuntary treatment, and how families can preserve a loved one’s dignity while still acting to protect their life.Behind every diagnosis, arrest, psychiatric hold, or involuntary commitment is a human being trying to survive and a family desperately trying not to lose them.Learn more about Mark Astor and his work:https://x.com/AstorSimovitchhttps://www.instagram.com/https://www.tiktok.com/@astorsimovitchlawLearn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  The Confidence Beneath the Craving 21.07.2026 48min

  Addiction, Bipolar Disorder, and Rebuilding a Life with the S.O.B.E.R. MethodWhat happens when you remove the substance, but the pain, pressure, and survival patterns underneath it remain?In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with author, entrepreneur, podcast host, and addiction recovery advocate Massimo Rigotti for an honest conversation about addiction, bipolar disorder, grief, confidence, and the complicated work of rebuilding a life in recovery.After navigating addiction, mental-health challenges, professional upheaval, and devastating personal loss, Massimo created the S.O.B.E.R. Method™, a framework combining Stoic principles, self-observation, behavior modification, the execution of positive habits, and holistic restoration.Together, Lisa and Massimo explore why abstinence may be only the beginning, what traditional recovery models can sometimes overlook, and how shame, identity, self-trust, and confidence influence a person’s ability to create lasting change.They also examine the hidden dependencies of high-achieving professionals, the difference between looking functional and genuinely being well, and what it takes to stop escaping yourself and begin building a life you no longer need to numb.Learn more about Massimo Rigotti and the S.O.B.E.R. Method:Digital S.O.B.E.R. Method: Beat Phone Addiction and Reclaim Your Attention in 5 Stoic Steps — Available now!  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0H93ZTVS9/ Free gift! Want the tools I use with clients?  https://sobermethod.com/5tools Your Future is S.O.B.E.R.™Website: https://sobermethod.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/sobermethod/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@sobermethodTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sobermethodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/sobermethodLearn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the edge.
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  THE MONSTERS WE CARRY 21.07.2026 48min

  Richard Spegal on Dark Fantasy, Mental Health, and the Battles WithinAuthor Richard Spegal returns to Notes From the Edge for a deeper conversation about the profoundly human truths hiding inside dark fantasy.Richard creates supernatural worlds filled with danger, moral complexity, and characters who are anything but one-dimensional. Beneath the monsters, battles, curses, and impossible choices are people wrestling with grief, trauma, isolation, identity, loyalty, responsibility, and the war taking place inside their own minds.Drawing from 21 years of service in the United States Army, including the 82nd Airborne Division and the Pennsylvania National Guard, Richard brings an uncommon understanding of discipline, leadership, sacrifice, survival, and the emotional cost of always being expected to remain strong.In this conversation, we explore:• Why fantasy can reveal truths that realism sometimes cannot• How invisible mental health struggles become visible through monsters, curses, and supernatural transformations• The influence of military service on Richard’s portrayal of trauma and moral injury• Why flawed, emotionally complicated characters feel more genuinely human• What readers may be searching for when they enter darker fictional worlds• Whether the parts of ourselves we fear most are truly monsters or simply wounded places asking to be understoodRichard is the author of the Wolves and Ravens trilogy and the Eternal Nights series, where paranormal danger collides with questions about humanity, survival, love, and the choices we make when there are no easy answers.Explore Richard Spegal’s books and work:https://richardspegal.comLearn more about Lisa Lacy and Notes From the Edge:https://www.lisalacy.comWelcome to the Edge.
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  Living With an Invisible Illness: The Unbearable Fear and Loneliness 20.07.2026 26min

  In this deeply personal solo episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy records at 3 a.m., during the hour when the world grows quiet and every unfamiliar sensation in the body becomes impossible to ignore.Lisa lives with hereditary antithrombin deficiency, a rare congenital blood disorder that allows her blood to clot even while she is taking medication designed to prevent it. After surviving multiple pulmonary embolisms, permanent lung damage, years of medical dismissal, and surgical menopause, she knows what it means to live inside a body that cannot be completely trusted.But this episode is about more than illness.It is about the unbearable loneliness of carrying something no one else can see.It is about looking capable while quietly monitoring every cramp, pressure, breath, and unfamiliar sensation. It is about needing accommodations without appearing visibly sick, explaining limitations other people cannot understand, and constantly trying to determine whether the danger is physical, hormonal, psychological, or all three.Invisible illness can turn a person into the patient, investigator, advocate, and frightened witness of their own body. It can make ordinary life feel like a continuous negotiation between vigilance and joy.Lisa explores medical trauma, mortality, menopause, fear, purpose, and the exhausting expectation that people living with chronic illness should perform strength simply to remain worthy of care.This is not a story about becoming fearless.It is a conversation about learning to live fully while acknowledging that fear is sometimes reasonable, uncertainty is real, and invisible does not mean imaginary.Learn more about Lisa and Notes From the Edge at:https://www.lisalacy.comSee you at the edge.
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  The Call That Cannot Go Unanswered 19.07.2026 24min

  Recovery, AI, and the Human Cost of a Missed Moment in Addiction TreatmentWhat happens when someone finally finds the courage to ask for help, calls a treatment center, and no one answers?To an organization, it may look like a missed call or a dead lead. But on the other end of that phone is a human being standing inside a brief and potentially life-changing moment of willingness.In this episode of Notes From the Edge, Lisa Lacy sits down with David Sichel, founder of Blueshirt Media and a person in long-term recovery who understands this experience personally.Before entering recovery, David reached out for help with his addiction and never heard back. Today, he has built a HIPAA-compliant AI platform designed specifically for addiction treatment centers, helping them answer calls around the clock, reconnect with people who previously asked for help, and transfer qualified callers directly to admissions professionals. Together, Lisa and David explore:The performance of appearing okay while actively drowningWhat silence communicates when someone finally asks for helpThe human being behind every so-called “dead lead”Whether AI can protect human connection rather than replace itWhere technology must stop and trained professionals must step inThe ethical, emotional, and human cost of an unanswered callThis is not simply a conversation about technology. It is a conversation about timing, shame, recovery, responsibility, and what can happen when someone answers at exactly the right moment.Host: Lisa Lacyhttps://www.lisalacy.comGuest: David Sichel, Blueshirt Mediahttps://www.blueshirtmedia.comWhat did you perform in order to survive?Welcome to the edge.
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  Mother of 6 Found Slain: For Cletha 18.07.2026 24min

  On August 9, 1969, while the world’s attention turned toward the Manson murders across town, another woman was killed on what society considered the wrong side of Los Angeles.Her name was Cletha, and she was my grandmother.She was a poor mother of six whose injuries left her face unrecognizable, yet her death was recorded as natural causes. The man responsible never faced a courtroom. There was no justice, no public outrage, and no lasting headline to make sure the world remembered her.But her story did not end there.In this deeply personal episode, I honor my grandmother and confront the generational trauma, domestic violence, silence, and survival that traveled through the women in my family. This is a conversation about what happens when pain is inherited, when women are denied justice, and when one generation finally decides the cycle will end with them.Cletha, you are the reason I teach trauma-informed martial arts in domestic violence shelters. I cannot help but believe that if you had been given the skills I have today, you might still be here with us.I pass those skills on to other women so they do not suffer the same fate and so they know how to defend themselves, their bodies, and their lives.My grandmother may never have received justice, but she will not be forgotten.Her legacy lives in every woman who learns to protect herself, reclaim her voice, and refuse to disappear quietly.This one is for Cletha. Welcome to the Edge.