Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever you are in the world. It’s Dr. Jan Fortman with Relationship Matters TV. I hope everyone is having a beautiful blessed morning, afternoon, or evening wherever you are in the world. Well, today is a wonderful day. It’s a good day. I’m feeling wonderful today and I’m here in Chicago and the weather, you know what, we don’t even know what to say about the weather. It’s been in the 40s, the 30s, but we’re expecting snow. But I really feel for the people in California with all of that snow. You know, I talked to someone the other day who’s in LA and she was telling me how it was raining every day where she is. They’re not getting rain, but they’re getting, I mean, they’re not getting snow, but they’re getting rain. And she said here in Southern California. So I reminded her of that song, “It never rains in sunny California,” so we just both laughed. But anyway, so I’m happy to see all of you here today and I have this wonderful guest. She’s wonderful and I just love her. Let me tell you a little bit about her before I bring her on. Her name is Vanessa Donaldson and she is a life coach. She coaches military spouses, and guess what, she’s a, I guess you could call her a digital nomad, but she can explain all of that. So I’m gonna bring her on and we’re going to talk about where she is right now and I’m jealous in a way, but then not jealous in a way. But I’m gonna bring Vanessa on right now. Hey Vanessa.
Vanessa Donaldson
Hello, thank you Dr. Jan. Thanks for having me today. It’s wonderful to see you and your bright smile and your flower on the side of your head.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yes, because I help military spouses bloom.
Vanessa Donaldson
Oh yeah, you know what, we had a little talk before you came on and tell us about number one where you are and how you had to get here for the show today.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yes, overcoming.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, the military lifestyle. I call myself Semper Gumby life too because number five, my husband’s Marine, so Semper Gumby, always flexible. So where I am, I thought you were talking about me before when you were talking about you’re talking to a friend in Southern California and she’s complaining about the rain because that was me about, I don’t know, like a month ago. So it’s still raining there, I don’t know, but I was complaining. So we were there and I’m like, what is this rain? We’re visiting my brother in Southern California, this gray is here, like what is this? So I turned to my husband and I said, what are we doing here? We have a van, we have a digital nomadic life. I think we’re gonna go to the sunny weather. And he was kind of looking at me like, oh Vanessa with her ideas, you know, it’s part of living with me, 26 years of marriage.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Vanessa, move closer to your mic, closer to the light.
Vanessa Donaldson
Oh boy, okay, okay, no, no, okay. So, well, you can move back a little bit. Yeah, look at my nostrils. Um, yeah, can you hear me?
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yeah, that’s clearer.
Vanessa Donaldson
Okay, so I gotta be right here. Okay, so yeah, so we are in Baja, Mexico. You know, I was on my group telegram group of all these groups because I’m a van life consultant and somebody was nice enough to put in the chat, hey, do you know about this van life event going on in Baja? I said, what is this? I don’t know, but I clicked on it. It sounded warmer than rainy California, so that was it. I clicked on it and then the negotiation, you know, this is a show, Relationship Matters, communication. So I’m like, okay, now I got to bring this up to my husband that I want to cross the border with our two little pups and their little vaccination card with no plan and just head to this little dot where it shows a beach where everybody’s meeting. And he was like, do what, go where, who are these people? And I said, listen, you know, we just gotta go explore. That’s why we have the van. Let’s not talk ourselves out of it. And he’s like, well, what about this, what if that, what if that, how are we gonna cross the border? I said, you know what, if they don’t take us at the border, we’ll just turn around, figure out what we need to get and come back the next day. But we need to step into it and experience it and go for it. So we did and we were very prepared. We had our two little pug, our pups, a Chihuahua and a Pug, and my brother’s dog hopped in the van too, a little husky. So we took him to my brother, was literally printing the vaccination paper because I need your dog’s paperwork if I’m taking them. We did a little power of attorney too, just to make sure in case they’re like, are you kidnapping this dog? So off we went and we went through one of the borders crossing the quieter side, not Tijuana. You got to join my van life community, get all those tidbits on how to camp around here. But yeah, we went right across, minimal problem, paid a little visa thing. The guy looked at our passports, he said, these are expired. You know, this is like, you were in Mexico City like a year ago or something and it’s expired. I said, okay, well, what do we have to do to renew? And that was it. We renewed and we were through the border and we have been in Baja for over a month. I thought I would be doing the show with you back in the U.S. side because I thought, oh, getting to the beginning of March, we’ll be heading back to from California back to our home in Florida. But no, the van life has a lot of twists and turns and windy roads and one-way trips. But yeah, today was quite a shocker. We are like in the middle of the Baja desert. There’s nothing for probably 400 kilometers. I started driving and took over the wheel from my husband and I was speeding like crazy. He’s like, what are you doing? The van is swerving. He’s prepping our dinner in the back. He’s got our chicken right here and the pot marinated for dinner and fresh cilantro from the local market. I love the fruits and veggies here. And he just kept saying, slow down, slow down. I said, he said, what is your deal? I said, I have an appointment with Dr. Jay today and I need some internet. And I thought we would, you know, ping, ping, I thought we would hit that mark. It never came. So I apologize. I tried to log on a few minutes early, but I was literally running around this truck stop. It’s like a ranch truck stop and talking to people in Spanish. I don’t even speak Spanish and I’m holding up my phone, internet, internet. And she said, 20 pesos. I’m like, take my money. So yeah, I paid for some internet. I gave her my phone. They don’t even give you the login because I guess they realize, you know, it’ll like, you know, screenshot it to the world or something. So she had to take my phone, you know, punch it in. I said, just as long as it works, please. So yeah, you just have to be open to whatever. But thank you so much for having me and I hope the connection stays. We have actually like 40 minutes because it cuts off after. It’s all part of the adventure. But we’ve had so much fun. We had to extend here. We were not ready to head to that rainy weather you’re talking about. So we would just stay on a beach, stay a little longer. You can camp on any public beach in Mexico for free. So you find a nice spot and you just put out that awning. My husband’s on the paddle board fishing, catching our dinner. And you know, every afternoon, should we leave tomorrow? We’ll see you tomorrow. We’ll figure it out. It says that on my website, we’ll figure it out. And the next day we look up, the waves are calm, the sun is out. We’re like, should we stay another day here? Uh-huh. And that’s how we roll. Roll, I’d say rolling with Russ and Vanessa, rolling with RV.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Have you been doing the van life? What made you, you know, like what made you all just give up stationary house or apartment or whatever and start, you know, like living in a van?
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, that’s a good question. And if you talk to a lot of van life people, there’s usually a lot of, you know, some traumatic or something big happened in their life probably to do it. You know, for other people, like I’ve run into a lot of single female solo campers and they’re in the middle of a divorce. They might have had a death in the family, a child died, like they are kind of resetting themselves, reinventing, getting out into nature, just decompressing from everything, which you can do in nature. And so, you know, that’s why I’m the reset coach too, like reset things. So for us, it was the pandemic kind of spurred it on a little quicker. You know, we were settled in in California with our kids out of the house, but we had always said one day, you know, we want to try this adventure thing and move around in the van. And in California, like everybody, it seems like every other car going by is a sprinter van, like it’s already in your face getting manifested. A lot of people because surfaces sprinter van. So, you know, those Amazon trucks that go around zipping and dropping off your packages for you, maybe you’ve seen the Amazon, it looks like an Amazon truck. It’s that kind of size, but it’s all built out. Some people actually buy shelves like that from Mercedes or from wherever. You can buy an empty shell and you build it your configuration how you want it. The one we got was just ready-made, kind of like turnkey. We just went to look at it from another owner, you know, got a good deal. We were happy to find it on a phone app. I mean, it was just serendipity. So yeah, we got the van and ended up renting our house to a military family all within the same time around the pandemic. And then when California said lockdown, close your doors, put your mask on, don’t leave, we were like, you know, I personally felt like some of my freedom was taken away. I felt like I was hyperventilating, like how long am I going to be stuck in a house? Like how long is this gonna go on? And we said, we have the van, we have the house rented, what are we waiting for? And literally our neighbors were watching us. I did 10 trips to the thrift store. So I can talk to you about decluttering the mind, decluttering your physical space because you have to let go of a lot in order to, you know, make room for something else. The shoes were still negotiating, you know, I’ve gotten rid of some shoes, but my husband, I’m not going to put them on because he’ll, it will trigger him talking about my shoe bag in the shower that’s taking up space. But you know, when we go in the van, I don’t know when we’re coming back in a one week could turn into two weeks, could turn into a month, you know, and we go through different states. I have to pack for different seasons, different climates. I always have my Tennessee boots in there in case we go through Tennessee, I’m putting my Tennessee boots on. So yeah, that’s the van life, that’s our role, but that’s what spurred us on. So once that happened, the restaurants were closed, hotels were, everything was shut down. So the only place we could think to go was nature. We said, let’s at least go just regroup in nature. So we, neither of us have traveled much in the U.S. So we just started one step at a time and that’s how it works, baby steps. We didn’t know where we’re going from one day to the next, but I started to get phone apps, talk to people in the van community, you know, you learn as you go kind of thing. And we saw the most beautiful parts of America, went to all kinds of national forests, national parks that we didn’t even know existed. You know, we had a little off the beaten path, but hard copy book I was going through and we’re just highlighting through the book, basically just zigzagging our way across America. Neither of us have seen America. We’ve been more overseas, both of us between his career and my upbringing that it was time to see America. So we said, you know what, while the rest of the world is shut down and no one’s moving, we can at least move around in nature. And it was, it was a, you know, one of those moments, a defining moment in time. You know, we, we did the van thing. We’d have probably put it off a year or two, stepped into it slower, but a pandemic kind of launched a lot of people into just doing something completely different. So we did it. It just worked out the timing of it and no regrets. And it just opened up all kinds of other doors to things that, you know, we want to do, where we want to settle next, my life coaching, working with military, and then the consulting with the van. I mean, it’s just, everything just started coming together, but you have to step into the unknown. I mean, the neighbors were chasing us down. Where are you going now? We’re literally with my window down, like, I don’t know, I’ll send you a message. And they’re like literally just standing there watching us pull out of our neighborhood, like they’ve lost it. They’ve completely, where did the, where did the Donaldson go? Where’d they go? It was full of, full of life, full of energy, full of adventure, just with hopeful anticipation of what’s around the corner. And we’ve just met the most incredible people on the road too, the more we do it. So it’s kind of addictive, like the more you do it, the more you want to see and have FOMO a little bit, like what am I, I gotta go to that part. We gotta go check out that state, you know, so still more to see, but that’s how it happened.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Well, you know, good evening, Jacqueline Roger. She said decluttering is so about that life now. And Anita Dixon says that sounds, what you’re talking about sounds so free.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yes, it is about freedom, freedom of the mind, freedom of your space, you know, and you forget about the stuff that you’ve had in your closet and at home that you haven’t touched in forever. And it’s at a thrift store now and, you know, bringing someone else joy or something. And again, you have to let go to open up for bigger things. So you just forget about that stuff and bring in more and more positivity, more yummy, juicy stuff to your life. And it’s a beautiful thing. But yeah, we get stuck. We get stuck hanging on to this and that and this gadget, you know, and it’s just like people have hired me to declutter. Like I struggled with one lady with her kitchen. We literally went through all her drawers through the Zoom phone because, you know, she had three spatulas, eight spoons, and she was like, will you help me? I would love, I want to hire you to help me clean my kitchen out. And, you know, and when a parent dies too, that’s a whole other level. Like, you know, if you’re hanging on to treasures from a deceased parent, that’s another, there’s a lot of emotional attachment, emotional baggage with the stuff we hang on to. So working your way through that on, you know, what you can keep, what you can let go, it’s a process, but it can be done.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
You know, I might have to hire you because I feel my mom passed in 2017. And I was just telling someone the other day that I have two big garment bags with her, I can’t wear them, with her clothes. And I was saying to them that I’m not going to unzip the bags because if I unzip them, I’m gonna, oh, well, maybe I’m gonna keep this. So, and they’re very nice clothes and then a bunch of hats that I am not going to wear, you know, but then when you look around and you talk about, you know, treasures and you talk about decluttering and then you have boxes and it’s like, if you don’t know what’s in that box, give that box away. Don’t open it, you know, you’re gonna like, oh, well, I think I’m gonna use this. Oh, I forgot this was in here. Oh, I’m gonna keep this. And then, you know, but decluttering is, honey, decluttering is a process and staying in one place, you know, we get attached to our houses, you know, apartments or whatever, you know, and that is just so adventurous, you know, just to like, whatever the day brings, you know.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, that’s, I would ask you for decluttering, you know, for your mother’s belonging specifically, there are charities out there that empower women, you know, I know when we lived in Southern California, I was working with those charities, like women that are coming out of domestic abuse shelters, homelessness, and they’re prepping them for job interviews and for just presenting themselves to go out into the market and get, you know, some professional status. So those clothes can get re-gifted to that kind of purpose too. And that empowers, it brings joy to you too, because now you know your mom’s clothes aren’t maybe not just going right into the trash can around the corner, but they might go to empower another woman who’s, you know, to lift her up in her season of struggle.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Wow, Jackie says, Jacqueline Rodney says, I have my mama’s coat from 15 years ago. Wow.
Vanessa Donaldson
Oh, it’s the emotional attachment, you know, and a few things here and there is fine, but if it takes the point where it is stifling you from, you know, having an open mind or like this one woman who never had a dinner party, she did not have people in her home for years because of the clutter. And she, you know, that’s what she admitted to me. She’s like, I can’t have people over because it’s too cluttered. I can’t even, so her goal and her why was to unclutter so she could host a dinner party for her friends that she’d want to have over for so long. It was, it was beautiful. But yeah, so those things too. So there’s a fine line. You want to hang on to some treasures from our parents and all those memories, but that some things you literally have to look at each other. Oh yeah, clothes, you gotta let go.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
I have to, you know, like she liked bells. So I’ve got a couple of crystal bells and I thought, you know what, I have those and a couple little things in the clothes I know. And I said in the spring, that’s what I’m not going to unzip the bag, Jacqueline, like she said, you know, someone else can really benefit from that. And so Jacqueline, we’re going to stay in touch and we’re going to do this together. We’re going to be accountability partners in this.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yes, that’s how it gets done even quicker, holding each other accountable for sure. And I would ask you, you know, I’m not trying to tell everybody to go live in a van and this is the only way, but for my lifestyle, like I moved every two to four years with my parents that were in the State Department, you know, all over the world and then married into the military. So my entire lifestyle has been kind of getting uprooted, replanted wherever I go. That’s why I say helping military spouses bloom wherever they’re planted because we uproot, we move on, the kids have to move on. We’re constantly reinventing. It keeps the mind fresh, that’s for sure. And it was as hard as it was every time I got to pack up the house and we always had to let go of stuff there too because by rank you were allotted a certain amount of literally pounds to pack. So the higher rank, the more pounds you got to move your family. So based on my, you know, the ranking that goes on when we started off, it was a lesson, you know, I remember having, calling you, hang on all this paper, you know, when I hang on the paper, the paper’s going like, but it’s my notes or whatever I’m working on, you know, had to let go of it. But then it was so freeing to walk into a new space every time we moved and had that blank canvas again, right? And just like, what are we going to create? We’ve got a new place to fill and the garages never got overcrowded because every, you know, two to four years you’re moving and then you go into a home where someone’s been there their whole life or 20 something years, more stuff’s kind of like start to hang around the garage. I’ll put it in the garage, we’ll get to it later in the garage, you know.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yeah, so Vanessa, okay, so you were a, would you consider yourself a digital nomad or you just a nomad?
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, a little of both, but digital because I am working remotely on computer and like today needed Wi-Fi, which I’m, I have a booster, but not a full setup system. So I’m working on that. It’s in the mail actually, which is why I ended up at a truck stop paying 20 pesos.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
So keep on time. Okay, we’re good. If we cut off, I apologize to everybody in advance. So now I looked at your bio and you were in the Peace Corps.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yep.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
In Africa and also you were in Africa. And so, so what, you know, what made you join the Peace Corps?
Vanessa Donaldson
I know every question would be like, why is this girl living in a van and that, who would you sign up to go to Africa? I know I’m an anomaly, right? So how the Peace Corps started was really my, again, upbringing. I moved around so much when I was younger. I had been to African countries, so I’ve seen the world from different perspective, very global vision. And then in college, I ended up, I remember signing up at first, I went to an undeclared school, so I didn’t have to declare a major, you know, until close to my junior year or so, because a lot of kids, you know, we’re young, like I didn’t know what I’m gonna study. So I said, I took all of the general ed and went with it. And then by the time I had to sign up, I had to have a meeting with my counselor again. And they said, okay, we got to declare majors here. What are you doing? I don’t know. And they said, well, let’s look at your whole path of what you’ve taken so far. So they literally went through all the courses that I was taking, all the little electives on the side and said, you’ve got an international relations degree going on here. So how about international relations? I said, that sounds good. Sounds like the kind of stuff I’m studying. And then I had to pick a track of a country or something else. So I picked development. So it was really like studying developing countries and all about sustainability abroad and helping indigenous people better their status and in the economy and their lifestyle for their homes, their families, all that. So yeah, it was a degree in international relations with a focus on developing countries. And I also liked, because I’m, I don’t know, my Christian upbringing, I liked the philosophy courses. It was just a lot of, you know, is this pen really here or not? I was just like, they were fun for me to take these like existentialism, do we exist or not, all this. So I ended up double majoring also in philosophy. So yeah, that’s how the Peace Corps seemed like a good, a good path. And also a mentorship. Mentors are so huge in our life, right? So I don’t know if you can remember back to a time if you had a mentor that might have just been that spark or that nudge that got you to your next season of what you were doing. And my mom had a friend that had done the Peace Corps in the 70s and or the 60s even. And you know, it was my one voice that said, Vanessa, you should consider this. You’ve got this international background. You seem like the type of person that would thrive in that kind of culture. You speak French already. You could end up in a French-speaking country, you know. And she also advised, if you want to do this, apply like the beginning of your senior year because it could be competitive. So it could take about a year to get in. So senior year in college, I thought like, don’t, don’t you just walk into an office and say, I want to volunteer or sign me up. But like anything in life, there’s trials, there’s paperwork, there’s bureaucracy. And so yeah, I started my application into my senior year beginning. And thank God I got that advice because it almost did take a year. And I had to go into DC for interviews, second interview by phone. I remember somebody called me once to see if I really spoke French and called me on my college phone in my room and started speaking French to me. And I think I spoke better than that person. I went off in French. They couldn’t quite continue. And then I said, would you like to speak in Germany too? Now my mom’s German. I can, I can speak a little German for you too. They said, we have quite enough here. Thank you.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Or does the Peace Corps choose where you are the best? That’s why you do this podcast. You were just, oh man, your questions are amazing. So yes, there, there are different ways to enter at different locations. So if you apply from like a really quiet country state somewhere like the middle of Idaho or Kentucky, I’ve heard those people kind of go through the system quicker. I was applying out of an international relations hub of Washington DC. So the competition was a lot steeper, stiffer there. So on my application form, I clearly remember writing down, I checked the anywhere box. You could check all different continents, regions, whatever. And I checked that box that said anywhere in the world. That’s a scary box to check people. But you know, I checked it because if you don’t, then you know, you’re going to this country you check most likely, you know, if you’re, if you want to go to South America, people wanted Guatemala. I mean, I heard people getting stuff like Fiji. I’m like, you were in the Peace Corps in Fiji. What did you do? Just paddleboard and spearfish? Like what are you doing to Fiji? I was so jealous. So yeah, I checked anywhere. So you get what you asked for sometimes. And I got in the middle of this hill desert, Niger, West Africa. So not Nigeria, right above Nigeria is another little country. It’s actually was like the third or fifth poorest nation in the world. And it was called Niger. So I, you know, that’s, I went to my, like they said, okay, we got a spot for you close to a year later. I was actually on my way to grad school. I was going to University of Delaware and I was going to do urban development or something like that. And like a few weeks before I went to go look for my housing, I mean, talk about a change of path, right? And the Peace Corps called and said, you’re in, we got a spot. And they had, they sent me to Chicago with the whole next group. And we did all this training and all of our medical shots. They were poking us in the behind and like, you know, all kinds of boosters because now your government property, you know, there was no, I don’t want to do that. And so yeah, we all, a lot of us clicked the anywhere, anywhere or was paper applications then it wasn’t internet, no internet yet. So, but a lot of us click, check that box, you know, anywhere in the world. I’m like, okay, what are we up to? And just getting to the country, that’s a whole other story. Our plane got rerouted because of, you know, a strike, any parents at the airport and then a president Africa was landing. So they rerouted us to Ivory Coast and there we were. And apparently no one in my group could speak French. I was the only one. I said, I thought we’re all going to a French-speaking country because we speak French. So you never know how the Peace Corps signs people in Africa. So I was there for, well, with the Peace Corps two and a half years. I did my two-year service, which a lot of people too, like about 50 even quit, like after a year, they’ve gone home, they’re doing Christmas with the family back in LA or wherever they are. And then they’re thinking, what am I going to go back to this mud hut and let them know where I lived in a 10 by 10 mud hut, you know, with sand floors. Oh yeah, it was pretty, pretty robust. So I mean, my husband even that’s like the military doesn’t send people out like this. And where’s your buddy system? I’m like, it’s just me and a little stray dog I picked up on the way. So I did two years.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
So, you know, we look, we’ve gone all away and I told you, I said, depending on how the conversation goes, we got to get to the military though. But oh yeah, what did you do in Africa, you know, working?
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, yeah. So my role that I was assigned to when I got the notification was it was WCD was the acronym and that was women’s community development. And I said, oh my gosh, I love that. So they realized, yeah, the Kennedy started, President Kennedy started the Peace Corps like in the 60s or 70s. And then they were only be sending our volunteers over to work with men. They left out 50% of the population. It was just how they set it up, like go talk to the village chiefs, go work with the men. And then they realized over time that they left out a really big population, all those women. And then men also, it’s not all of men, I don’t want to categorize all, but statistically in a third world country too, if a man’s getting more money after, you know, you’ve helped him with his trade or whatever, he might spend it on liquor and prostitution. That’s kind of big over there. So what do women spend their money on if they get more money? What do you think they spend it on?
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
On their children.
Vanessa Donaldson
Children and education, exactly. Like, oh, no brainer. So they finally started sending women to work with women. So it was a really empowering experience to be in a village that accepted me. They had to build my little 10 by 10 mud hut. That was the village contribution to bring a volunteer in because I was the first volunteer. Some villages had it down. They had so many volunteers there and they’re like, oh, here comes the next one and a whole different experience. But for me, I was the very first one there. So everything was kind of like learning as we go. But yeah, and I worked with women on their income generating activities. They had little businesses that they wanted to work, but they didn’t have enough startup money, you know, like happens in the US too. So they could, well, there was a whole model called Quest Popular and they could pull all their money together and borrow with interest. So I got trained going to other villages, how it was done. And then I brought it back to that village. So working with women and then I loved it so much. I mean, I met my Marine off to another, you know, country and I was left behind because I want to finish my service. And then I extended and then I almost lost him. So thank God my letter writing, our penmanship worked well because again, no internet, but just love letters back and forth. That’s all I had to hang on to. He’s like, why would you stay in this place? Like you did your two years. And I said, I had the opportunity to become a volunteer leader for another year almost. So I got hired by the country director and the Peace Corps volunteers were voting as well. So I moved into the city more and I was in charge of a whole region of volunteers, like 30 of them to get them out into the village, to help them with their grants, their projects, whatever. I was like the support. I gotta stay longer. Although I was supposed to stay here and I talked to the Peace Corps director, I negotiated. I’m not always negotiating well for myself, but I did okay that time. I said, he said, okay, this is a year assignment. And I said, well, my heart’s in Rome, Italy right now. That’s where my husband, my boyfriend was at. And I said, my heart’s in Rome. So you got me for six months or I’m on the plane tomorrow. I couldn’t believe I told him that, but he knows I’m a hard worker. He’s like, we’ll take you for six months because I’m a hard worker. I gave it my all.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
That just shows us what kind of heart that you have. But before we go, I got to go to commercial right quick, but it’s a question that came in. What place have, and this when you were talking about your van life, what place have you left as far as the van, you know, when you’re a van life, but deep down you wanted to stay? Any place like that?
Vanessa Donaldson
Well, I’ve gotten that question before and the list keeps getting longer and longer. You know, it’s like apples and oranges because every place, I mean, some places like if you’re near a loud road or a truck stop or something, no, moving on. But if you find one of those beautiful spots, like in a mountain top with nothing around but the trees and birds, you know, whistling or that lake spot, Upstate New York had beautiful places where you did this whole trip to the East Coast all the way up to Baxter National Forest and Maine and back. And I love being by the water. For me, it’s just, I’ll just sum it up with water. So if we’re by a beach spot and like last night we stayed in a spot and woke up with the rate, you could hear the waves going to sleep and waking up with the waves. I mean, for me, that’s just magic. It’s therapy. So lakes as well, New York, like we ended up at this place, we were supposed to pass through again a night or two and they had a, it was like a Bureau of Land Management free parking and they had a note tacked to the tree that said, if you stay more than five days, you need a check-in, you need to call this number, we need to come give you a permit. It’s all free, but it’s some kind of technicality. Five days went by and we’re like, are we leaving? We’re not leaving here. And it was just this beautiful glass lake in Upstate New York. And my husband was off, we were paddleboard fishing on there. I was on the paddleboard with him. Each of us were the line. I caught little, you know, snook or whatever they had. I can’t remember the fish, but yeah, so you find these spots and that’s the thing. If you can work remote and you’ve just got your Wi-Fi and you know, you don’t have to rush to a truck stop like I did today. Don’t do what I do. You can find these spots and people just camp out and just extend your stay until you feel like you can’t, you know, I feel like we’ve experienced a spot, we’ve walked around, maybe we’ve hiked over a hill to a little beach, private beach on the other side and had the place to ourself. And then just say, every day we like look up, wake up and say, should we stay or should we go? Are you ready to move on? And again, communication, relationship, like we just communicate. And sometimes there’s yielding and now I want to stay longer and he’s ready to go. And sometimes he wants to stay and I’m ready to go. But that’s what it’s all about in a marriage.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
That’s very true. Well, Gwen Dunbar says you are adventurous. And since we don’t have a lot of time and I don’t want them to cut you off in Mexico, I’m going to put my commercials in on the end. But you also work for the CDC.
Vanessa Donaldson
I did.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Wait, can you tell us what you did?
Vanessa Donaldson
Yeah, if no, for that, I did have a top secret clearance, but that was when I worked spouse jobs at U.S. embassies abroad. So for the Center for Disease Control, it was not a top secret job, but it was in Trinidad and Tobago. And I was hired to help with this AIDS initiative that they had because AIDS in island type countries are really taboo to talk about that subject. You know, people have AIDS, but they don’t want to talk about it. If you have it, you’re ostracized. So they would have this whole project and program. Even I think the U.S. ambassador signed off on it to work with the local schools, the communities to start speaking about it more. And the way you could speak about it more, we decided was to make an art festival about it, make a whole art series about it. So through poetry, through drawings, and people could draw anything related to the subject matter. And we went all through the island and going to different schools and picking out the top artists, the top things that, you know, people voted on all around. And then the top people came into the big, the Trinidad and Tobago Port of Spain, right, is the capital. They came there for like a big, big celebration and they got to be on a stage and like read their poem or their artwork was showcased. And really it was all just about spreading awareness that, you know, it’s okay, it happens and let’s accept it. Let’s not hide it. These are the numbers, these are the statistics, and these are things you can do to protect yourself, you know, and go through that conversation rather than running and hiding. Because like anything in life, running and hiding from things just, it’ll just kind of get swept under the rug and come up another time or turn into a volcano or something.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Have you been anywhere where you didn’t enjoy?
Vanessa Donaldson
Oh, like I said, any kind of parking lot, if I hear truck stops or noise, that’s my only, like, what do you call it, boundary now. Like if we’re driving out, my poor husband, I’m like on my Google map with satellite, I don’t see a river here, we gotta keep going, honey. So yeah, that’s it. Different states have been great. I mean, now we’re meeting all kinds of van life communities because we went to this van life expo with a thousand vans. So you can imagine my WhatsApp now, the different groups and people are shipping their vans to different countries to continue. Like vans, when you hang around your like-minded people in anything you do. So our mind is expanding to all kinds of stuff like that.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yeah, I never knew there was a van life community. But now I want to get, you know, because I know we only have maybe about 10 minutes for you, but before they say adios. So now you consult with military spouses and, you know, and their wives. How did you get into that?
Vanessa Donaldson
Well, I basically, since I am a military spouse, married 26 years, once I went through my life coaching certification, you have to pick a niche, like what are you focusing on? And I said, well, I can only focus on what I’ve lived and what I am. So I didn’t want to start, you know, reading books and starting from scratch. I said, this is what I am. I’ve walked the path. I’ve been a young spouse who raised kids in the military with my husband doing, you know, five deployments all through our career or his career and moving all over the world, not just in the US. And there were some struggles, there were some ups and downs. And I said, if I can come alongside other women in that transition or, you know, a lot of people, my clients talk about the military tells you where to go, what to do, how to do it, what to dress, everything. Imagine getting out and you don’t even know, like you’ve never even put an outfit on for a while, like you’ve been wearing a uniform. So even for these women, men that like have to re, they learn how to tie a tie in the military, but some of them are learning even just the dressing, like little things like that, that you take for granted on civilian life. And so for some of these spouses too, they’ve been betrayed, not all, but they’ve had betrayal issues. So they have to decide, am I staying with my spouse? Am I leading on my own? Are there kids involved? And they’ve been maybe abused. There’s rape situations that happen in the military. A lot of them come, they go into the military because they’ve already got like a tough life situation they’re trying to get out of. But if you don’t clear that thing up before you go in the military, like my husband would always say when it was more with those young, young Marines in training, he said, you’re just bringing all that baggage with you into the military. And then it compounds because now you got people yelling at you too and, you know, giving you orders. So yeah, working with the ladies on self-worth, confidence is a big thing. For some reason, you think they’re in the military, they got it all together with that. But that was like in their military lifestyle, going to civilian, you kind of go into a shell. And like I had one woman, she didn’t leave her house for months. She, you know, had some kind of claustrophobia, did not leave the house. She was completely terrified to go out. And I just happened to meet her the one time she took a big plunge and went out. And then that became one of my clients. And now she’s out on her own with her dog. She’s walking the beaches in Florida. She’s back in school, working on a medical degree. She’s got a job. She just texted the other day, she had a job interview going on. So for me, oh my gosh, that’s, that’s, that’s my why. When I see women that have all these skills and abilities and they’re just, because they’re stuck because of something that happened in their life, I’m just there to kind of come alongside them, get them to the other side, cheer them on, hold them accountable, all that. So yeah.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
And there’s most of your clients, are they still with their husbands?
Vanessa Donaldson
I would say a half and half. Half are still with husbands and they’re, they’re journeying into a new season with empty nester or is my husband, you know, I do a free disability audit with anybody that’s talking to me as well to go over when they’re getting out of the military. Have you looked at your disability? What’s your rating? You know, because a lot of guys, they get so much information. It’s like a fire hose and three days before they get out and they can’t just, nobody can retain it all. We were just saying these other women were telling me too, some clients, I wish the women were more involved when they left the military in certain, certain scenarios, certain topic discussions like the disability, because that affects the entire family. If he’s getting a paycheck, you know, some type of retirement or compensation for the rest of his life, it affects the whole family, what that bill is going to be. And if they just get out and forget about it, they don’t fill the paperwork out and I’ll get to it later. You know, it takes time. You know, we didn’t do it the right way. And I’d love to help women get through that step quicker and make sure I’ve been told you can ask the command, I’m going with my husband to this topic because this affects my family and I need to hear about it because it’ll be sometimes a spouse that’s helping get the paperwork going, helping with those details because he’s got a million things on his mind trying to exit, you know, the military. So some guys did really good with paperwork. They, you know, if they’re in the doctor, the medical field, they’re good with numbers on and then others, grunts and infantry and people that just don’t do paperwork, they’re like gonna, you know, the things you don’t want to do, you push aside, right? You just forget about it.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
So you have, do you have, let’s say spouses or, or couples where the husband has been like in Iraq or something like that, you know, where he wasn’t behind a desk or anything, but.
Vanessa Donaldson
Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like to the war zone and things. Yes, yeah, I’d say all of my clients have because of the age group they’re in and retired, they’ve all had spouses that have served somewhere. Maybe a few just rotate around the U.S. and special operations or whatever, but most had a spouse that did some type of tour overseas. So that will be some kind of baggage too when they come back, you know, whether they admit or not, when you’ve seen war and you’ve seen things, it affects your mind. You come back and how you’re gonna handle that is up to each individual and support system they have around them and their mindset, that whole thing too, which, you know, like you mentioned my description, coaching on mindset, emotional intelligence is huge because a lot of them can, you go to a job, you can’t just blow up at your boss in the civilian world, like in the Marine Corps, maybe you’ve heard a different branch, you could just, you know, hash it out right there. But in civilian world, there’s a lot of etiquette needed and emotional intelligence. And when you get triggered, there’s ways to control that. There’s techniques, there’s breath work, there’s meditation, there’s tactile things you can do. So yeah, I’ve been trained to show that to my spouses. And now when, if they get triggered, they just know they can see it coming on so they can react and not jump into it as quickly and, you know, just control it more. So yeah, stress, right? That’s what it’s called.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Okay, does the military provide counseling for them?
Vanessa Donaldson
They do, talking with spouses, they do have some resources when you get out of the military where you can call some 1-800 numbers and some things like that. But I was just speaking with another military spouse and she was saying, you know, it was still not enough because the veteran, I think, can call like a 1-800 like suicide line and maybe get help a little quicker. If it’s a spouse or she had something going on and they told her, yeah, we’ll see you in about, you know, three months is the next appointment. So there’s still some work to be done on the spouse side. But yeah, there are some numbers to call, but hopefully they, you know, they should have that same kind of speedy service as their veteran if they’re experiencing something. There’s a lot of postpartum trauma from after birth even or retirement if they served in the military and then they’re out, they’re going through their issue too because a lot of these spouses might have served as well.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yeah, right. Wow. So another question came in. What is the worst situations one of your clients have had to work through?
Vanessa Donaldson
Ah, the worst that you, oh, I’m trying to extend the light here, sorry. The worst situation that you’ve had to, when you’ve had to work with a spouse, right? And if it’s, if it’s something, because like I say, I’m a life coach. So if it’s something where I feel like their life is in danger or something, you know, there’s a waiver we sign and I will get them onto a licensed therapist, someone else that has a different discussing psychiatrist. But some of my clients even are seeing both. They come right on saying, listen, I’m seeing you for life coaching. I want to work with you because I know, you know, the papers, I know what I’m struggling with now, but I want goals for the future and I want to, I don’t want to stay stuck here. But then they say, I’m also seeing my psychologist or somebody else to go over the wartime trauma, the abuse that they had, something like that. So yeah, the worst situation is really just, I would say if they’re in a relationship that might be abusive or they’re just stuck and they’re just, they’re just, they’re just stuck and they’re not moving and it’s, it’s a relationship and then kids are involved. It’s just, it’s harder once those kids are involved too. It’s not just, you know, man and woman now, but now you got to do with children and their lives and what’s going to happen to them. So like one of my coach or one of my clients had this issue, like she had to pretty much flee from her state, like had people like family members that were abusive. I mean, it’s just crazy stuff. So when I hear those stories, you know, it’s a fine line. Like I can’t take on too much of that stress myself. I have to go through actually like decompression after two hearing some of these stories because I’m thinking, you know, how could anybody do this to somebody? And then I’m getting mad with them. And, but I just try to focus on the result and what are you doing now, you know, to get out of the situation and how can I serve you? What are your next action steps? You know, one step at a time like that. But yeah, if it’s something that’s right above my head, I’m gonna get other help. And I have other resources too. If it’s around betrayal, I have a betrayal coach that I lean on that I’ve done group coaching, which we get it right on the line and we go through, you know, her expertise because she’s a, was betrayed herself. So she gets that. I’m married 26 years, so I don’t have that part of my story. If they’re Christian, I have a chaplain I can reach out to as well, who’s offered if you’re ever, you know, needing a third person to end up on a Zoom call with somebody. So definitely love to get support and help from people that are, you know, expertise in different fields.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
I appreciate your clients since you are in the van. So they’re all over the States. You do Zoom because I’m gonna put this on here. So if people, I put it here where I can see it. Here it is.
Vanessa Donaldson
Oh, that’s right. Yes, resetwithvanessa.com. Thank you. Oh, that’s so pretty with the little banner at the bottom. You’re so professional. Look at that. So yeah, that’s how I put, that’s how they find me. So yeah, I can be from wherever and it’s part of the fun of coaching with Vanessa. You know, you get on the call and they’re looking at my background. It’s usually not blurred. I’m an open book. It’s like, where’s Vanessa now? I’m like, well, right now we’re on a beach of, you know, in Baja. So yeah, I’ve clients in California. So I got, oh, oh goodness.
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
So Vanessa froze. I don’t know. Well, they said they given, they were giving her a whole hour. So she’s still in the studio, but she is in Baja, Mexico and they might have just, it said they would give her an hour on the internet. She’s in Baja in a desert, so to speak. And she was just talking about her, how she coaches her military spouses. And this is also if you know anyone who needs her services. Oh yes, she’s gone. They, oh my God, they didn’t even give her a whole hour. But this is Vanessa. She is a reset coach and that’s her number. Now you gotta put the one in front of it, but it’s 949-776-8731. So if you’re interested in van life, in the van community, or you’re interested in just as she’s a reset coach, so if you’re interested in just resetting your life and decluttering, and she’s there for you. But so this is where you can reach Vanessa. If you’re a military spouse and you need some assistance, or if you know someone who’s a military spouse or who’s just a niece and coaching to reset their lives, that’s Vanessa. I am so sorry, but they did, they were supposed to give her one hour of internet service, what she said she paid, she paid 20 pesos, but they didn’t give her a whole hour. They only really gave her 50 minutes, so they owe her 10 minutes. So she has no internet service. But anyway, very, very interesting. And I hope that, well, not I hope, I know that she’s brought you a lot of value. And I don’t know that I could do van life. I don’t know that I could live in a van. I don’t know. I’d have to ask my husband about that. I don’t think he’d want to live in a van either. I don’t know. But it sounds like it’s fun and it sounds like it’s really adventurous. So I saved my commercials until the end because I really wanted you to get to know Vanessa, Vanessa Donaldson. So I gotta do my commercials right quick, but don’t go away because I want to tell you something.
[Commercial Break]
Dr. Janice Hooker Fortman
Yes, you know, I had to put my shameless plug in there. And my book is “The Secrets to How Not to Throw Mama From the Train,” and it’s all about how to navigate the challenges in the mother-daughter relationship. And it’s available, Kindle version and hard copy on Amazon.com, or you can always come to janfortman125@gmail.com. And I have another, okay, Jacqueline, okay, Jackie, great guest, admire her sense of adventure and constant reinvention. And I will definitely tell her that you said that. But anyway, so I am doing, I’m continuing to do my mother-daughter relationship coaching and also my communicate. I am starting a communications and relationship mastery class. I will give you more information on that very soon. And I will put this on my Facebook page, and that’s Limitless for Women. It’s in Chicago, Illinois. Well, it’s in a suburb. It’s March 18th through 19th. There will be some awesome, fabulous women who will talk with you about your relationships, communications, if you’re in business, life in general. And the women who will be speaking are from, actually, I was going to say all over the country, but actually all over the world. And of course, I will be on a panel, and I’m not sure now exactly what I’m going to be speaking about, but I’m sure it will have something to do with communications and relationships. So I want to thank you for coming in, and I will have to try and get back in contact, excuse me, with Vanessa. I think that she can receive phone calls, but evidently they just took her off the internet. So next week, I have two authors, and they are, they have a book called “Leave a Mark,” and it’s all about you educators out there. It’s all about leaving a mark as far as your students are concerned. And they even go into adults and leaving a mark in your relationships, a good mark. And so it’s a father and a daughter, and I would love to see all of you back next week, next Thursday, 7 p.m. Central Standard Time. Oh, it’ll be daylight saving time. Yeah, wonderful. So we’ll have more daylight. But anyway, thank you all for tuning in. Thank you all for watching. Thank you all for your comments. I love all of you all. And if you would like to be on my show, Jacqueline Rogers, because see, I know who you are and what you do, but if you would love to be on my show, just go to relationshipmatterstv@gmail.com or call me at 1-877-667-SPEAK, and we can talk about you becoming a guest on my show. So have a beautiful, blessed rest of your morning, afternoon, or evening, wherever you are in the world. Bye-bye.