A Memoir on Queer Resilience

Today In the Den, we’re diving into a conversation at the intersection of identity, belonging, and storytelling. Our guest, Ingrid Hu Dahl, is a writer, speaker, and leadership coach whose work explores the layers of what it means to be both mixed race, queer and finding feminism. Ingrid is the author of the newly released memoir Sun Shining on Morning Snow, a powerful and intimate exploration of identity, grief, resilience, and transformation.

Special Guest: Ingrid Hu Dahl

Ingrid Hu Dahl is an author, speaker, and leadership coach. She is the founder of a coaching and consulting business dedicated to empowering the next generation of leaders. With over two decades of experience in learning and development, she brings her expertise to a wide range of industries, from corporate and media to nonprofit and social justice organizations. A TEDx speaker and a founding member of the Willie Mae Rock Camp in Brooklyn, Ingrid has a lifelong passion for amplifying underrepresented voices. She has written, filmed, and directed two short films exploring identity, representation, and the mixed-race experience. She has toured in multiple rock bands, playing bass, guitar, synth, drums and singing. Ingrid is certified by the International Coaching Federation and the Center for Creative Leadership. She is a global lecturer and speaker, and an advisory board member for the Institute for Women’s Leadership at Rutgers University. She lives in Sausalito, California, with her wife, Courtney, and their dog, Palo Santo.

Links from the Show:

• Ingrid’s website: www.IngridHuDahl.com 
• Buy Ingrid’s book here: https://bookshop.org/p/books/sun-shining-on-morning-snow-a-memoir-of-identity-loss-and-living-boldly-ingrid-hu-dahl/22618239?ean=9781774586174&next=t
• Sun Shining on Morning Snow website: www.SunShiningonMorningSnow.com 
• Find Ingrid on IG: https://www.instagram.com/ingridhudahl/ 
• Find Ingrid on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ingridhudahl/
• Sun Shining on Morning Snow on IG: https://www.instagram.com/sunshiningonmorningsnow
• Join Mama Dragons today: www.mamadragons.org

In the Den is made possible by generous donors like you. Help us continue to deliver quality content by becoming a donor today at www.mamadragons.org.  

Transcript

SARA: Hi everyone. Welcome to In the Den with Mama Dragons. A podcast and community to support, educate, and empower parents on the journey of raising happy and healthy LGBTQ+ humans. I’m your host, Sara LaWall. I’m a Mama Dragon myself and an advocate for our queer community. And I’m so glad to be part of this wild and wonderful parenting journey with all of you. Thanks for joining us. We’re so glad you’re here. 

Hello, Mama Dragons. Today, we're diving into a conversation at the intersection of identity, belonging, and storytelling. Our guest is Ingrid Hu Dahl. She is a writer, speaker, and leadership coach whose work explores the layers of what it means to be both mixed race, queer, and finding feminism. Ingrid is the author of the newly released memoir, Sun Shining on Morning Snow, a powerful and intimate exploration of identity, grief, resilience, and transformation. Ingrid is the founder of a coaching and consulting business dedicated to empowering the next generation of leaders. She is also a TEDx speaker and founding member of the Willie Mae Rock Camp in Brooklyn. Well, we're gonna have to talk about that. 

INGRID: We will.

SARA: Ingrid has a lifelong passion for amplifying underrepresented voices. She has written, filmed, and directed two short films exploring identity representation and mixed-race experience. And she has toured in multiple rock bands, playing bass, guitar, synth, drums, and singing. Quite a storied career, Ingrid. Welcome to In the Den.

INGRID: Thank you, Sarah, it's such a wonderful pleasure and honor to be here with you.

SARA: Likewise, I really enjoyed your memoir. It was so beautiful and so heartfelt. There was a sweetness to it that was just really lovely. It's called Sun Shining on Morning Snow, and you write so beautifully about navigating the layers of identity in your life and experience. But for our listeners, I want to start with how you came to understand your own queer identity. I've heard you talk about that it was a long and drawn-out journey, and you share some of that journey with us in the book. So can you talk about that with us? 

INGRID: Yes. It's interesting. I always wondered why – different from my wife, you know, for her, she saw media that wasn't necessarily representing queerness, but where she was like, “Oh.That woman is attractive, you know, I must be interested in women.” And she was quite young when she had that aha moment. And by young, I mean, like, 4 or 5. – I did not have that. I noticed that women were beautiful, attractive. I also thought men were pretty, had crushes on boys. And it took so much longer for me to realize my deeper inclination was towards women and also the kind of relationship that you can have that's just, like, so deep and profound with women. Not to say you can't with a man and have, like, a straight, glorious relationship and friendship and companionship. But it just wasn't for me. My experience is that, you know, gosh, I really didn't have any media representation that showed me it was okay, that it was possible, like this was a route you could take. Everything around me was very much, like, straight first, this is the norm, this is the expectation, and I was seeing that not just in my high school, for example in New Jersey, but also everywhere in the media and in different cultures. So when I would go to Taiwan, that was also what was expected and presented. As somebody who grew up where it was always brought up that I should be marrying a senator, that I should go to D.C. and marry a senator, I was like, “Wow, that's not for me.” 

SARA: No pressure.

INGRID: Yeah, no pressure. But that was the message. And if anybody has seen House of Cards like, “Dear Lord, why would we go there?” I'm sure there's lovely senators out there, I'm just saying, not for me. And I think in the church, too, it was very much, like, that's what was presented. And I'm talking 80s and 90s. So by the time I start realizing things are changing for me, it's like basically almost towards the end of college into graduate school. Everybody else seems to freely share their beliefs at, you know, “Ingrid, you're so gay.” I'm like, “I don't know what you mean. I just think women are attractive.” But everyone else was seeing it before I did. And in the book, there's a couple of instances where I'm engaging with women, and it's scary. It's deeply terrifying. A lot of that is internalized homophobia, which I didn't understand that that's what I was experiencing at the time. But it was terrifying. And I share in the book that it almost felt like a double layer of othering. You know, an exposure to that otherness, which I was already so heightened from, being different-looking, always brought up as, “Ooo–what are you?” Like, as if I'm a spicy cuisine to eat. Yeah, I think it was really just alarming that there was a danger in the way that people looked and stared. And it was something that was just so heavily layered on top of my own existing otherness. And I'm so glad I got through that with the help of a lot of amazing people. And the Rock Camp community really helped open up that vortex.On another interview, I also talked about The L Word. The L Word came out while I was in that in-between phase of college and graduate school.

SARA: The L word, the TV show. Yeah.

INGRID: Yes, the Showtime TV show where friends and I would travel so far to get to a lesbian bar in Brooklyn from Jersey City on Sunday nights to watch it air. I think it was at 10 pm when it aired. And the room would be filled with lesbians and queer folk waiting to watch it and people getting shushed. It's a bar and it's like [shush sound] I can't hear this tiny screen, I want to watch it. But that was a beacon, finally having something, some representation of this fictitious world, which actually was very much a reality in many ways within Brooklyn, but it was underground. So, it wasn't until that where I said, “Oh, this is normal. This can be my future,” and that really encouraged me to continue pursuing my love for women.

SARA: You alluded to it just a little bit, but in the book, you share very openly about your mixed-raced identity. And your mom being Taiwanese of Chinese descent, and your dad white, Scandinavian. And I'm curious if you can talk a little bit about what that was like growing up in the 80s and 90s. You kind of briefly touched on it, but were there moments when, early on, your Queerness felt like it might be in tension with those other parts of who you are. You also mentioned the church and Christianity. 

INGRID: Oh, man, I was so heavily tied up in just trying to be a bold young woman and constantly fighting what felt like innate sexism in all of these dynamics. It was, like, racism, sexism, probably an element of classism, that homophobia wasn't even on the chart growing up. There was already just so much. And I felt always like there was a spotlight on me. Adults, since I was very young, would come up to me asking me like, “What are you, and where are you from? No, where are your people from?” Which is very invasive and also odd to ask this little kid. But it kept going, every single day. The way I watch my parents navigate a lot of stereotypes and a lot of assumptions that were pretty harsh and very untrue. People being really jealous of my parents. There was always a bit of an envy that, “How come they get to have love? How come they get to have this happy family?” which was and was not. There was a lot of complexity in our family, which I explain. And the church felt like, not a safe place to be different. It also felt like, as a young pre-teen and teen, I was a little bit sexualized. Not from me, but the way that I felt men in the congregation would look at me and treat me and tell my parents that it was my fault if they had sinful thoughts. Or thoughts that they shouldn't have about me as this young woman, that it was my fault. So very much a scapegoat. And I found that to be just beneath. You have what one hopes is this community that is looking at love and forgiveness and unearthing some of these things that people are going through and talking about them, and trying to collectively heal. Like all the things that we hope that religion or these communities and spaces can provide, and instead it felt like a microcosm of society's illness. And it was a struggle being a young kid, not feeling like you had a voice, or people to really listen to you, because I felt like what I was seeing was a lot of unearthing truth people wanted very hard to cover up. But it was through that scapegoating where I could see that truth.

SARA: Wow, that is very resonant, I think, for a lot of people. And I appreciate you weaving in the innate sexism and patriarchy, really, that permeates a lot of that, this idea that, you know, as a young female, you are responsible for the behavior and the thoughts of everybody around you.

INGRID: Yeah, I love that you doubled down on patriarchy, because it was so incredibly hypocritical and contradictory and confusing to see my mom, who was a breadwinner and tech pioneer hear a man say, “Women in the congregation need to follow what your husband says, and obey…” – I think that was the key word, was obey – “your husband.” And my mom would sort of do this contorted version of that like, “Well, I should be listening to your father.” “You mean obeying Dad? Like, what does that even mean? Especially in our household, where, frankly, you wear the pants, and you bring home the bacon. So shouldn't he be obeying you? What is this? What is this power dynamic?” And it didn't make sense to me, and I just found it compounding like, wow, my mom is really trying to force that to work for our family, because that's what the structure of this kind of religious mental model is decreeing. And she needs to follow it. And it just didn't work in our family dynamic. So that was helpful to see like, “Oh, wow, the patriarchy is not just influencing itself and other men, it has a stronghold on women, and even women who are very powerful in their own right. 

SARA: Yeah, that is fascinating. I'm curious what was the experience like coming out to your parents? How did they react?

INGRID: Oh, God. Oh, man.

SARA: And I love to ask this question, I think, because particularly for us as parents of queer kids, it's helpful to hear those stories. 

INGRID: Sure!

SARA: Hear how other parents messed it up, or didn't, and just kind of normalize the experience for people, because it can feel so lonely and isolating in our own little world. 

INGRID: I'm so glad that there's a space and a platform for people to listen to these, because I wish we had that when I was growing up. I would have loved to have listened to it. I think my parents, it would have been beneficial for them to listen. So thank you for having this opportunity space. For those who are interested in really going deep into what those experiences were like, for sure, please, read or listen to me narrate my book. But man, it was such a bummer, because I think I made the assumption that because I was bringing girls home to have dinner with my parents when I was in my early 20s that my parents would kind of get the message. What I didn't realize is that my mom had those, you know, when horses have those blinders on, like she had very, very thick, bifocal, heavy-set blinders on. And she, in her mental model, was, “Whatever I'm seeing has to be friendship. And dare it go to the edge of inappropriate, Ingrid is in a phase, and that phase is incredibly promiscuous, and Dear Lord, let's not even go there.” Like, let's just keep it super, super, like you know blinders. I did not realize that that was happening for my mother. And I think my father was sort of picking it up, but was definitely more focused on how my mother was reacting, and it wasn't great. I don't know why I chose to call my mom, but we had had this odd interaction where my girlfriend at the time, whose name is Dee in the book, we were invited to dinner. She comes over for dinner, it ends up being pretty late. My dad's excited to watch an old movie. It's dark out. It's late. And they're like, “You know what, why don't you just both stay the night and drive in the morning.” And I'm like, “Hmm, this is awkward.” So, Dee and I are fully clothed, like go to bed in my childhood home room, so to speak. And in the morning, I wake up because my mom has barged in and apparently my arm was around my girlfriend, like, over clothes, over the blanket, you know? And I'm waking up because my arm is being ripped off of her and there's no words. There's not an interaction, it's just that. And we're both sort of wake up startled and of course, you know, leave awkwardly. There's an awkward silence in the car. And Dee gets it. She had her own immigrant family from – gosh, I mean, they were from so many places – but let's just go with Poland. And she was also bilingual. She was like, “I get it. It's okay.” And she gave me a lot of that courage and space to feel it out. But the next day, I was like, okay, I'm gonna call my mom and talk to her and say, “Hey, I'm a lesbian.” So again, I don't know why I called my mom. It seems like when I look back, I'm like, why wouldn't I have just gone over and talked to her? But anyway, so I call her. I'm at work in another strange place, but alas. And it's an old-school phone, right? Where it's, like, a bunch of buttons and stuff. I'm calling her, I'm like, “Oh, maybe she won't pick up, I'll just leave her a voicemail.” Not even sure what I would have said on the voicemail, “Hi, Mom, just want you to know Dee's my girlfriend and I'm a gay.” But anyway, she picks up, and I'm like, ooh. So I start slowly saying, “Hey, Mom, Dee is not just my friend.” And I'm starting to say my truth. And my mom cuts me off and she said “I need you to stop right there, because if you continue, I need you to know, if you're gonna say what I think you're gonna say you'll be disowned from the family.” And it was such a blow, and shocking. I'm old enough to like, “Come on, really? Like what, are you gonna kick me out of the house? I don't even live at home.” So I was like, “Mom, you can't mean that.” And she says, “Yes, I do.” And then she just clicks. That's the last thing I hear. And I end up shedding a tear after that. And I'm looking at the phone as if I've never really looked at it. You know when you see an object and suddenly you're really staring at, like the cord and the invention, and oh, there's a little bit of dust, and maybe a little bug is stuck underneath the plastic, and is that the right number that was written originally underneath that plastic, you know? You start looking at these details like you've never seen them before, because it's this powerful moment of disbelief and a powerful moment of rejection. And that begins a journey where, again, here's a lot in my memoir, where my mom and I have big riverbanks with tides in between us. And we journey through that. And good thing a lot of beautiful transformation occurs towards the end of her life. But man, was that a journey. You know, fast forward, they didn't come to our wedding. When my wife told my father that she was going to propose the morning of, it was a respectful gesture. She wasn't looking for his approval. But she knew that he likes traditions. He was like, “I'm so touched by this, I have no doubt that you are the right person for my daughter. I need you to know this is gonna be a really hard journey for you with her ,a really difficult one. And you need to be there for Ingrid because I'm gonna have to be there for Judy.” And he was right. He was absolutely right.

SARA: Wow. Yeah, I remember reading in your book. I think it was the story of your engagement, perhaps? And your father saying, “Oh, we thought you would make the right choice.”

INGRID: Yes. Yes, yes, and that was another horrible phone conversation, actually, where just several hours before he had had this amazing conversation with Courtney. But with me, clearly, right next to my mom, had to sort of pick my mom, being the confidant for my mom. And we talk about that now, and he's like, “Uh, you know, Ingrid, that was really tough for me.” But he wears a pride pin now. He loves his gay kids. And I appreciate that. But at the time, it felt like parents who wanted to manipulate me to do what they wanted me to do or who they wanted me to be.

They did not want to deal with having a gay daughter. But we had really great, healthy arguments about “Isn't this similar to what you experienced, being an interracial couple? Like, you were just in love. It didn't matter what race you were, but everyone else freaked out. It just feels really similar, don't you see that?” And like, “No, God, and this, and that, and belief, and religion.” I'm like, “But wasn't there a similar kind of argument around races and intermixing.” So, I think that's healthy, and I encourage people to have those healthy arguments. But in my experience with my parents, though eventually they'd come around, at the time, it was like an iron gate. And I hope people who are listening, if they're dealing with that, too, because we had family members, not threatening my family, but to the extent where it's like, “Hey, and I love you But if you don't go to your own daughter's wedding, like, my niece's wedding, like, I'm not going to be in your life.” Like people threatening that back to my parents and, of course, that didn't happen either. Thank goodness, but it was really difficult for our family, not just between the nucleus, but rippling apart. And even the Asian family side, I have my Nai Nai calling and saying, “I accept you.” And that was so meaningful. But my mom couldn't even look at the screen. It was a Skype call. It was amazing. And then some people who weren't even invited, who were an extension of the Asian family, came to the wedding to represent. It was very dramatic, actually -- 

SARA: Very dramatic.

INGRID: -- When I think back. 

SARA: And beautifully complicated. Like, there's a lot of beauty in that, but I also hear that very much the inner conflict and turmoil in that. And I was curious, you mentioned a little bit, you do talk a lot about your grandmother, your Nai Nai in the book and that relationship. 

INGRID: Yeah.

SARA: And I was curious how, to what extent you were aware, or your mom was articulating some of those cultural expectations around her response to your gayness. 

INGRID: It was so fascinating to me, because as soon as my  Nai Nai and even my mom's sister, would share things like,”You know, we accept you, we love you.“ And it became obvious to me it wasn't about cultural. It was about my mom. She had some real hang-up around, I don't know if she herself had inclinations and those were shut down, so it was very painful as a memory. I don't know, because she's not alive. I can't ask her that. But I wonder, because it felt so deeply personal and so deeply painful that I was like, “Is this all me or is this also you? Like, did you have an experience?” I also couldn't get through to her around the interracial parallel which surprised me, because I thought my mom would be like, “Oh, I could see that.” It was like she just shut down, and she really had this strong visualization or a dream where she's describing how she could picture who my father-in-law was, and my husband, and that we have these two kids. And I'm like, “Mom, you gotta let that go. That's not a visualization for my future. That's something that you want from me, and it's beautiful. But that's not what I would want, and I would be very unhappy in that world, most likely, would be pretty unhappy. And is that what you want for me?” And I think the thing that does come in, perhaps, with culture is the female obedience. You know, you should be a good daughter who listens to your parents, who sacrifices a lot to make the family pleased so that they have face. And I think my mom was deeply ashamed. And she was ashamed that her firstborn who she had a lot of hopes for, and had provided a certain kind of parenting to make me tougher perhaps, was disappointed. And her disappointment came out in such guilt-tripping and manipulation that I also had to unlearn and unravel myself from that power. I think what was amazing in doing so, I actually believe my mom showed up in such a beautiful, profound way after she let go of some of this. Like, she had to let go, and choose me, and choose a relationship with me over all of this catastrophizing reality that she had to grapple with, and her emotions and beliefs around it. And what's amazing is, I feel like at the other side of that is both transformation and respect. I didn't expect my mom to, like, suddenly be proud again and respect me. But it was like something had just shifted where it is no longer what she wanted. It was like, ”Wow, I'm inspired by how bold you actually are. I think she was inspired in a way that helped her transform, too with the little time she had left. But it was really beautiful to be a witness to that for her, and her journey.

SARA: Yeah. Yeah, I bet, and I want to get to the transformation piece. But as you're talking, I'm thinking about the hang-up, the desire for a particular kind of future that your mom wants for you. And this sense of obedience, It makes me recall the story of how she withdrew you from your first university at UMass Amherst.

INGRID: Oh, yes!

SARA: And made you enroll in the state school, which turned out to be a great thing. And you share about this sort of open doors to feminism and justice. 

INGRID: Yeah. 

SARA: But that whole complicated moment, I thought that is really interesting.

INGRID: Yeah, You know, depression and confusion around, like, what are my choices again? Like, what? It reminded me of a similar experience, actually in high school, being pulled out of public school, forced to go into an all-girl public school, where – I think listeners who are parents, the thing that would have really helped me in those two moments, in these kind of complex moments where you don't feel like you have choice or a voice – is a conversation, a dialogue. I would have loved my parents to say, “Hey.” Going back to the high school experience like, “We're really concerned. We don't know what to do. We think that enrolling you in an all-girl private school, though we can't totally afford it but we'll make it work, would be beneficial. And here's why. And we actually think you might like it. Would you want to try it? Would you be willing? And can you help us understand is this worry that we have real? Would you agree?” So similar with UMass and Douglas, I think it would have been great for my mom to share, “Hey, I probably haven't shared this with you, but the only reason why I truly was willing to help pay for your out-of-state tuition is because you are really jonesing on this pre-vet, equine vet school. And now it sounds like midway through that year you're not taking any more of those classes. But now you're taking these creative humanities classes, and I really can't afford to pay for out-of-state tuition for you to do that? So, would you be willing to rethink going to a state school? I'd love it if you lived home. But if that's not what you want, let's talk about it. I just think it would save a lot of money and let's talk about debt.” That would have been really great to have those conversations, which we just never had. The second thing I think would be good for listeners to hear is, my father when he was really freaking out, which really was the catalyst to pull me into an all-girl private school before entering my sophomore year – and there's a lot of stuff that summer in the book with my father – I think what would have been helpful is for him to say, “Hey, I recognize you're really bold. And I'm kind of scared of it to be honest. And I wonder if you would be interested in meeting other bold women, like bold adults, bold mentors. Would that be of interest to you? And to talk to them about what you might be experiencing.” Because I was grappling with so much sexism, and anger around patriarchy, and anger around being over-sexualized at a young age. I'm feeling like, “No, you guys aren't going to rob me from my experiences, absolutely not!” I think that would have been so wonderful. And we talk about it to this day. And he's like, “Gosh, I wouldn't have even thought of that. I was in such my own turmoil and hell and anger that how dare you be this person who's so uncontrollable?” I'm like, “Yeah Dad, that's kind of scary.” I find that if parents were to look at that and say, “I bet there's somebody for you that I can help as an adult find to match your boldness and to help you feel like you have a safety to ask questions around what I didn't have language for.” I wouldn't have had language like patriarchy or sexism at the time. And that's why I really like to share that with young teenage girls and 8-year-olds at the Rock Camp for Girls because we absolutely want to know what the language is so we can talk about it and express what's happening. You know, a lot of young girls, when they lose a lot of self-esteem, like, the stark drop in self-esteem at least back then, Carol Gilligan had a bunch of research. And I was so interested in how do we combat this? And Rock Camp was a beautiful experimental catalyst to change that. But so much of it is language, and knowledge, and different tools to express yourself and get your power back. But people don't realize that this is an epidemic issue around over-sexualizing young girls, pitting girls against each other. All of that works in a very calculating system to almost tell these bold little girls that they're not fully human. They're not going to be fully respected. They're actually a vessel. They're not a subject, and can you imagine the weight of that? I know you can, because we're both women. 

SARA: Yeah. Yes. As a woman who grew up in the 90s, I very much identify with that.

INGRID: Right? Yeah, every movie, everything, it's like, “No, you don't get to do the thing you want, you're just an object.” Or the gay characters in a lot of these films, you're the one who doesn't get the happy ending, you're the one who's villainized, you die at the end, similar to how Asian characters have been treated in the past, or any minority. You don't get to have an interracial kiss. Until, I think, what was Star Trek, the first interracial kiss on television? So, I mean, Jesus. Just think about how far we've come. Yet, there's so little rights now for women and girls and their bodies still. It's depressing.

SARA: Well, your reflection there, I thought, was such beautiful advice to parents. I was just listening to you, really taking it in about how having conversations about the things you're worried about, or the decisions you're making, right? Just more words, and engaging in a dialogue. The words you described to kind of imagine how that conversation would go with your own parents was really beautiful. Really illuminating. I think that's just fantastic. 

INGRID: It's curiosity! Let's have curiosity. And we lose that. How do we lose that as adults? My goodness.

SARA: I don't know. Well, I mean, I think you're pointing to some of the systemic ways in which that we lose it as adults, that we lose it as women and female-identified folks and queer folks, marginalized identities. I think all of that affects how we lose that ability to really advocate and have conversations. Now I want to come back to your story about how things shifted in your mom, and how she let go, and then some of the transformation began to happen. And I was curious, because your mom in the book was diagnosed with cancer and ultimately died of a recurrence of that cancer.

INGRID: That's right. That's right.

SARA: Do you think the cancer had an impact in that shift at all?

INGRID: You know, I don't know. I wish that was something that we had talked about before she died. That's amazing. There's so much you're just in the moment, and that's kind of all you can do sometimes, is be in the moment, especially when you have a parent kind of actively dying over quite a long period of time. It's fascinating that you bring that up, Sara, and I like that you did, because in some ways it is a cause to blame. Right? Cancer enters BECAUSE of the pain of the reality that I am gay, right?

SARA: Well, I remember reading that line in the book, and that was just really painful to read the line where your mom was, in a moment of frustration, said, “You choosing this life, you being gay, gave me cancer.” I just thought, oh God.

INGRID: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was the climactic, for sure And I had to reject that. Like, it was my turn to get to reject something, and I was definitely going to pick that, of all things. I was like, no, absolutely reject this, like, wow. That's why I think it's interesting, like was the cancer journey part of also relinquishing and transforming her, also. That maybe could be. The thing that is pausing me is how her relationship with cancer was so naive and just completely ignoring its existence as best she could. Like, “Oh no. I'm gonna get this third master's degree, and I'm going to move back to the States. And we're gonna get this house, because I'm going to heal, and I'll be fine.” And you're like, “Mom, this is an incredibly advanced, aggressive cancer. What do you mean?” And she's like, “Well, I don't want to read that. I don't want to see that report. Don't talk to me about it. I'm on a path to recover, make a full recovery. I'm gonna make a full recovery,” she would say. So, it's a funny tension, it's almost like an oblong or some sort of triangle here, where it's like I cause cancer as she says, and blames because I'm gay. Cancer is this roommate that I don't want. I'm just gonna ignore it entirely and live my life. And it is the vortex that shortens my life where so much liberation and transformation has to expeditely occur but also naturally occur. So it's a fascinating, I guess, triangle. I can't think of another word for it. But I like that question a lot.

SARA: Well, she really did have a 180. I mean, she really did come to a different relationship with you, and a different understanding. And maybe I, maybe I'm reading into it a lot more vulnerability.

INGRID: She was. Yeah, and she was funny about it. And she was still sassy and stubborn. She was still her. She was so much who she was. But she was kind of sassier about it. She gave me a lot of little playful shit. It did feel like, when she lived with us for a summer doing her internship in San Francisco, it was like we were her queer parents, and she was a teenager And it was very funny looking back at that, and I remember these four days I took off work, and she was done with her internship, because we were all very busy. And it was just us. We got to go to all these places that I knew my mom would love, very flower oriented, rose garden oriented. And it was just so nice. And I think a lot of the things from those four days all the way to having these moments before my mom dies, a lot of it is silent, but connected. It's no longer with this big distance. It's kind of like when, as a kid, I would play piano, my mom would journal, and she would close her eyes, and we sort of had this kind of connection. But we got that as two adults respecting each other and loving each other, and seeing each other.

SARA: That's really sweet, and I really appreciate hearing that reflection that it wasn't a big cracking open conversation, but that some of that healing and transformation just kind of happened in the silent togetherness. 

INGRID: Yeah, and certainly when she came to our house and made that beautiful speech where she apologized for not coming to the wedding. Oh my god, that was, like an immediate floodgate of forgiveness and love. And just the shift of where our family was going because of that was so beautiful. But a lot of that came from her bravery and boldness, and also mine, me being like, “Look, that's your choice. If you don't want to be in our lives because of this, that's your choice. I will always receive you, no matter what. I'm gonna love you no matter what. But I'm not gonna not choose my life. Like, that's irresponsible of me not to choose who I am and be living my full truth, and I'm in love with this person, and she's a great match for me.” We're married 11 years, together 15 at this point, like I was right. You know what I mean?

SARA: Yeah.

INGRID: And I was stubborn but different from my mother. I think she was really surprised that I was like, “Okay, well, I'm not gonna appease you. And this is where I'm going.” I think she was surprised by that. I think there was something that must have shifted, which I won't know. I'm trying to ask my dad. He's struggling to remember where she must have had this moment where she was like, “If I don't let this go and choose to be in Ingrid's life, I'm gonna lose her. Like, I'm going to miss out.” And something shifted where it wasn't worth it to completely lose that. And it's not like we were promising her grandchildren. It's not like she was missing out on a future lineage-y kind of thing, because that's not really where my brother or I have chosen our lives to go. But I think that was so lovely to feel finally just completely seen, valued, heard, and loved and accepted by my parent, like she chose me over all of those shortcomings. And that felt more in that instance of worthiness – which, you know, Brene Brown talks about, which I love – but suddenly it felt like an abundance of worth, an abundance of belonging and love. And that true, unconditional love she would always talk about, but never quite practice, there it was actualized, and that was beautiful to see.

SARA: Did you feel it? 

INGRID: Yeah.

SARA: Yeah, it's really extraordinary how much attachment we have to the approval and acceptance of our parents. Like, just listening to you tell this story, I am just so moved by it. But I think that's what I want parents to hear, is you have more power than maybe even us kids would want to admit in terms of our sense of worth and sense of self. And what a gift that she could give to you –

INGRID: Yeah.

SARA: -- Before she died, really powerful. Her final years, months and year, were smack in the middle of the pandemic. 

INGRID: Oh my god, yes.

SARA: You titled the chapter “The Quarantine Diaries,” and I was thinking, as you were saying, your dad was really struggling to remember. I'm like, well, it was the pandemic, no wonder. Who can remember any, like our brains are just fried from that time. But I'm curious if you'll share some significant moments of that, because that had to have complicated – 

INGRID: Oh my god.

SARA: -- I mean, it clearly did with the quarantines and everything that you had to go through just to be able to be with your mom near the end of her life. 

INGRID: Yeah, man. It was really like a borderline traumatizing, perhaps. It was just so dramatic.

SARA: For sure.

INGRID: And you know, with the language barrier, too, I was probably speaking at, like, maybe a 5-year-old, 6-year-old psych comprehension, which is not helpful when you're dealing with a medical kind of issue pandemic. And I just remember all these moments where I'm so excited to be able to get out of my quarantine hotel to get escorted, to basically get a PCR test. But every day was wild. Like, you just didn't know which hospital you were going to, and you just suddenly show up at a place, and it was mayhem, and there was hundreds of people. And you're not sure which is a PCR, which is an antigen test. Because I made that mistake once, and then they didn't even, like, care, because they're like, it wasn't PCR, so I missed the opportunity to see my mom. So every day felt like a chaos and like a hope with not a super strong success rate that you'd actually get this one hour. This is the second year of quarantine that I had done. I'm talking about. And then, you know, you go, finally, when you're able to have this successful day you get to go to the hospital where my mom was for a month or so for one hour. It's timed. And an hour goes by really fast. In those conditions where you've spent all day just to get that hour, it's amazing how it feels like maybe 10 minutes? Maybe 8? And most of it's quiet. My mom was healing from a life-saving surgery. She was starting to kind of have moments of hallucination, but a lot of cancer pain. She couldn't eat. I mean, it was really, really heartbreaking, this one hour I received. And then you go back out, and you're covered head-to-toe with chemicals, and somebody who's fully wrapped up the entire quarantine hotel kind of taxi to just get you to and from places is wrapped in plastic, and it's like you cannot have the windows. So you don't really breathe fresh air ever, and then you go back into a place that's padded to get you up into your room, which is completely secured with plastic and no windows open. 

SARA: Oh my goodness, because you are in – for the listeners, you're in Taiwan at this point.

INGRID: It's right at the time, especially the second time around, where things kind of came late a little out of control on the island. Like, they'd done a really good job, and then things were spiking pretty high. So they're closing borders again. So there's just this once-a-year moment where you couldn't really plan it, but they'd be like, okay, there's special entry visas. So you're just, for the whole year, waiting for another. And you get one. One shot at it. And it's like money, this big application, and your passport goes into this vortex where you just wait. And it's really wild. And then once you get it back, so I’m checking to see like, “Oh my god, is there anything coming in, anything coming?” Once you get it back, you have, like a 24-hour window, it felt like, to get a PCR test and a flight. And not only that, you had to have had already a quarantine hotel kind of ready for you for a 12 to 15 night stay. So there's a lot of organizing on the fly. But also ahead prep. And then trying to understand and navigate this unique space where you could sort of get this PCR with the police organizing it, to then maybe be able to see your parent after dinner. So it was just such an ordeal. But it dramatized, like, wow. It wasn't about being a dutiful daughter, but damn did I feel dutiful. It also made me feel like this is really important and worth it, no matter what. Like, this is my mom, and she's dying. But also, there were boundaries. I think there was good balance, too. My mom didn't want me to come the second time. She told me that. And I was like, “Ooh, that stung.” But what was so precious is before I left, she did say,  “Thank you for coming.” So it felt like, she knew we were going to say goodbye, and we were doing whatever we could, even though every day, she was like, “I'm gonna get treatment,” and you're like, “Mom, you're 90 pounds. You're not eating. There is no treatment. You're in hospice.” And she's hallucinating half the time, which was kind of fun. We'd sit and talk about what she was seeing and who she was talking to. But it was important for me to tell her it was okay to let go. 

SARA: Yeah. But what, added complication and just overwhelm to have to navigate all of that in the midst of pandemic protocols, I can only imagine.

INGRID: It was wild.

SARA: One of the other moments in your book that I find really interesting, and I'm also kind of hearing it as you talk, is that you left a career and found your way into leadership coaching. And I can hear a lot of that coaching in your responses. I mean, I just feel like you have this really, really great sense of clarity and reflectiveness and curiosity. And I'm curious if you'll share a little bit about that journey. 

INGRID: Yeah. I would love to. I spent two decades in learning development, as well as leadership development, and talent development across nonprofit, media, financial tech, big tech, and retail. And have a pretty wide experience of scaling, learning solutions and events for certain groups of people, for the entire company-wide. What do leadership behaviors mean? What do they look like? How do you model them? How do you measure them? And all of that is fantastic, but all of these companies and things are these little microcosms of culture and ecosystems of dynamics around people. And the thing that I learned as a coach – which is a profound learning experience in itself, because I really was amazed about the things I wasn't doing, like I really wasn't asking what questions. I was stumped by them during my coaching training –they're like, “Okay, so we ask questions that start with what?” And it was really hard to come up with them. I was used to saying things like, “Tell me” or “Why would we do that?” which is very kind of what you learn and what you're taught as a leader. We don't always have really good models of a different way, and even though I've had a lot of different kinds of kaleidoscope of trainings. It was coaching that really taught me the somatics. There's something that you don't always see, but you feel, to get curious about those things, and to listen really deeply to evoke awareness. And it's not the awareness that you think this person needs, because that would just be like, basically, projecting your own assumptions or perceptions or judgments, right, on somebody but it's in care of. You know, you're walking down a path more curious than perhaps this person has ever experienced somebody who is the closest to them has gotten that curious about. “Well, tell me more about that”, and “Oh, I'm so curious about that”. You know, “We've come around this bend a couple times. Is something different?” Like, “What are we not seeing here?” And it's so much, in care of with deep empathy that so much comes out in those conditions. And I'm glad you asked that question, because I am taking on clients. It's so funny, some people are like, “Oh, she probably wouldn't want to coach somebody like me because I'm not in corporate or I'm not senior director or VP.” That's not true. I love coaching all different types of people in these big potential transitions in your life to unearth what it is that you want. And how to lead a bold, purpose-driven life, if that's what you're seeking and aching for. We just aren't taught to listen to that, to have a guide, like a coach, to get us to, well, how do I make that real? Um, to use visualizations for us to think about what is my future self? Like, what would I want people to be talking about my impact on human to human, not just, like, my resume. Like, there's so much you can do to evoke that clarity. Um, so yeah, I just want everybody listening to know, if you're in that moment, and you are looking for a coach, like, do hire one. It could be me, it could be somebody else, but coaching is amazing. I've been coached, and my favorite is when I have both a coach and therapy that are happening concurrently, right? That's great, because you can focus on the past to the present, which is therapy. And with coaching, you focus on the present to future. 

SARA: That is great and wonderful. And I agree, I've gotten to experience both. And I'm curious, as a coach with your coaching hat on, we only briefly mentioned this very precarious moment that we are in politically as particularly those with marginalized identities. All marginalized identities, you know, women, people of color, queer folks, trans folks. I'm often at a loss for words. It is disheartening. It is distressing –

INGRID: Mm-hmm. It’s all that.

SARA: -- the targeting that is happening. So with your coaching hat on, I'm curious what advice would you have particularly for folks in the queer community, or connected family members, parents who are supporting queer folks in navigating this moment in trying to just figure out how to human, how to be a human with so much fear and so much distress?

INGRID: There's two things. One is, this is absolutely time to find your teenage rebellious self wherever you feel the most rebellious, and let that person out and be vocal and bold and brave. Like, that time is now. And the second is to have a boatload of empathy that what you are likely, what we are likely meeting are people who have a lot of pain. It's a lot of pain. We all understand what pain is. We all share pain. And there's a tremendous opportunity to heal and to be heard and to be listened to and to have needs met. Which, honestly, it kind of requires a lot of coaching and therapy across this country, across this world. But to me, it's an endemic of pain. So when somebody's like, “That person should feel the wrath of my unhinged anger.” What is the source of that anger? It's pain. So tell me more about the pain that's there that's creating the conditions where you feel like the only way to release it is to cause harm. It's a very kind of symptomatic of abuse, right? You know, the abuser who's like, “Oh, I didn't mean to abuse,” but in that moment, they're like, you don't recognize that person, they're unhinged. But there's a need. There's a pain. And there's a way in which we disassociate from ourselves and from people who are humans like us, who also have pain and history and things that were not met from expectations. A lot of it is like the stories, the inner turmoil, what we believe we're owed, or how we grew up. I should be X, Y, Z. Those things aren't helpful. But it's compounded over time and not felt like there's been a release or a space to get healing, or coaching, or any of these resources. And then en masse, to say there is a right now and a decree to act in this way. Nobody's actually approaching the solution with healing. And nobody's approaching it with the honesty of saying, “I'm in pain, please help.”

SARA: And I hear those same words, I also really hear them in terms of the queer community and our families, and just being able to create spaces where people can name the pain that they are experiencing in this time and share.

INGRID: And that's what's beautiful about the queer community and allies and people who've gone through what I've been talking about in my book is that we're doing the active work of sharing, of being bold at all costs, and trying to heal. That's my hope, is that the queer community predominantly. But that is a story of resilience and boldness from saying, “At risk of everything, this is who I am. And I'm looking for people who will love me,” and it's around love and building community. Not everybody's going to have that life-changing experience. It doesn't mean you have to be queer. But if you've maybe never felt like you've been seen, never been heard or respected, if you feel like you've missed out or weren't able to really kind of claim the space for yourself that was loved unconditionally, or treated with care and consideration and empathy. It shouldn't be surprising that people are acting in a way where they've never had a tool to show up where we have had to have had those tools in the queer community and even healing from terrible amounts of rejection, pain, and abuse. So, what I hope is that the broader listening community takes from this is, “Where can I be brave about my own healing? Where can I be brave about my righteousness? And where am I getting this sort of thought that I'm better than, or I have this feeling that I'm higher up or more supreme over somebody else? And how have I experienced that? And how has that made me feel?” Because I bet everybody has had that experience, in some degree. And being misunderstood and not feeling like you're respected universally can be harmful.

SARA: Thank you. That's beautiful. Before we wrap up our time together, I have some final questions for you. These are final questions that we like to ask all of our guests at the end of every episode. You talked about learning the language of asking “what” questions, so I have some “what” questions for you, Ingrid. 

INGRID: Nice, Sarah. Thank you.

SARA: You're welcome. The first has to do with the Mama Dragon's name, which came about out of a sense of fierceness and fierce protection for our queer kids. So we like to ask our guests, what is it you are fierce about?

INGRID: I'm fierce about love. Loving yourself, loving people, choosing love, choosing truth. I would probably have said a couple years ago, it'd have been, like being fierce is a badass, and being really a warrior spirit, which is still true. But the harder thing, the thing that makes us even stronger, is our ability to have compassion and love. So I think it's love.

SARA: That's beautiful. The second question is, what is bringing you joy right now, recognizing that in these times in particular, we all need to be cultivating as much joy as possible?

INGRID: I take every care and action to connect with people who are important to me. And in moments where I feel like I'm being triggered or unhinged, I try really hard to check in and connect with somebody. I'm not always successful. So to me, it's being as present and proactive as possible in making human-to-human connections. Be positive, healing, and curious. Maybe that's with a coaching practice, maybe it's calling my dad every day and checking in on my brother. And making sure my wife and I, despite having busy lives, have a moment to connect. We have one life to live, so joy is a really important, very obtainable experience that we can proactively invite to come every day. And maybe for some people, it's more about just gratitude. Like, what am I grateful for? Oh, I'm living and breathing today. It's a beautiful day. There is still universal life happening. There's birds, you know, migrating. There's things that are happening that, despite the turmoil we are experiencing as a human race, there's still aspects of harmony that we can see and be inspired by. 

SARA: Lovely. Beautiful. Ingrid, thank you so much for this conversation and for your beautiful memoir, Sun Shining on Morning Snow. 

INGRID: Thank you.

SARA: You're welcome. We'll make sure to put a link to Ingrid's book in the show notes for our listeners, and remind you that you can go to our Mama Dragons bookshop where the book will be featured. And you can purchase it right from there. And Ingrid, it's been such a lovely hour. It's gone by so fast. Thank you so much for sharing so much of yourself with us and with the world.

INGRID: Thank you, Sara, and to all the mamas out there, what a wonderful time it was to be with you today.

SARA: Thank you so much for joining us here In the Den. Did you know that Mama Dragons offers an eLearning program called Parachute? This is an interactive learning platform where you can learn more about how to affirm, support, and celebrate the LGBTQ+ people in your life. Learn more at mamadragons.org/parachute or find the link in the episode show notes under links. 

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