Hello and welcome my favorite murder.
This is the minisode, Yes it is. This is the minisode doing this for years.
It's fine.
We know what we're doing, and we always.
Have trust us. Trust us with your life.
We're and your emails which you sent to us.
As she did, and we're going to read them. Good job, good intro, Thanks so much.
You want to go first?
This is for Mother's Day?
Oh yes, So we're doing kind of an unconventional salute to motherlike figures or mother's or mother's situation.
The way they've shown up for you in different ways.
In any way a mother or a mother like figure can't No, one's going to check this. We can do it anyway we want to.
Okay. This one is Tram, a fan call member named Aaron, and it starts Sadako made my childhood better, my adolescence tolerable, and my adulthood enjoyable. My uncle's mother in law. Sadako a tiny, feisty, funny Japanese woman who who brooked no shit from anyone something.
Yeah brooke, Well it's brooken. Something that's like an old fashioned saying brook.
No, Uh, what's it called? Quarter? Yes? Really?
I think so.
Definitely that's purely from yeah, who brooked no shit from anyone? Made my life so much better. She says, this is the mother in law of her uncle, which is like so random and you don't even have to be nice to that first.
But she's yes, exactly, But those are the people that at like the family functions where you're like, I need to go sit by Sadako because she's totally okay.
She would slip me candy, clean the glass door so well I walked into them more than once. Made me feel seen and encouraged me to live my life before doing any anything my other relatives expected of me, i e. Marriage, children, and all that bs that was pressed upon me starting at fourteen. Gross.
I love that she slipped and cleaned the glass windows so we walked into them.
Yeah, like that's how dedicated she was.
Whatever she was doing, it sounded to me like two plus's and a minus. They're hidden in there.
As an adult, my home intentionally was located near hers.
We would do store runs, lunches out picture all ninety pounds of her eating a massive Wagoo birger the size of her face, shared treats from her family in Japan, some great and some I learned were absolutely foul as I ate it, much to her joy, and generally demanded that any event I was required to attend, that I would be the one to show for her, so we could bail early and just have a nice drive home where we would take detours to just drive through all
the green and sunshine in spring and summer. She passed April sixteenth, twenty twenty two, and I cherish the memories I have with her. While the rest of my extended family doesn't understand or even really know how much she meant to me, she is still a light in my life. Pictures I have of her holding my firstborn, a daughter, and her telling me that I did everything right and that she was so proud of me and whatever I did carries me through when times are hard. She is
loved and missed every day. Everyone have someone like her in their life. Aaron, And before we started, you were like, you're gonna create your no. No, but you said I'm gonna cry, I'm gonna break, and I'm like, I don't break for mothers, but this is what I want to be.
I don't break for mother but this is.
What I want to be in someone's life. When I'm older, because I don't have kids.
You are with Micah, like with your nephews, I don't care, but they don't. A girl, you don't act like they don't care. I mean they act like I don't care, but they do. Because that's the other thing, is I think that anti position. It's not about you giving them anything they give to you and you just kind of follow. Yeah, and that's the piece of it. Okay, you know.
This is what I aspire to be, is sabaka sadako?
Maybe all okay, break, I don't break for mine, I don't break for mothers. And people are driving behind you, like, what is what is the fot her problem?
Okay?
The subject line of this is that one time my adoptive parents stole me lighthearted and it says, I'll just jump right in. I was removed from my home when I was eight years old and raised by my aunt and uncle, who would eventually become my parents. Before this happened, though I had seen some seriously bad parenting for a few years. My biological mother tried to get sober many times, and during one impromptu's rehabs day, she left me at
her sleezy friend Lany's apartment. This woman liked pills a lot and frequently fell asleep while driving me around. One time, she thought she was parked and took her foot off the break and we slowly crept down a small hill into oncoming traffic. I got to save the day that day, eight years old. I mean, I don't ever remember telling anyone all the crazy shenanigans this lady got us into. But somehow my badass aunt an RN knew I wasn't safe.
She came up with a sneaky plan that I never knew about until years later, when she nostalgically asked me, remember that time I stole you from Lany's. I did remember being there for an entire summer, but couldn't remember details. Her plan was to tell Lanie that they were having a birthday party for my cousin and she would pick me up and they could make arrangements to return me
after the party. Later that day, Laney called to ask if I was ready to be picked up, and my aunt answered with a simple no, thanks, We've got it from here and never brought me back.
Oh my god, okay, it's going to get me.
I had no idea any of this went on, since I was used to being shuffled around and these people seemed nice. My aunt, who eventually became my adoptive mother ssdgmed and got me the.
F out of there.
Stay sexy and when in doubt, steal your niece. Side note, I realized I was one of the lucky ones. Hold on, God, damn it, this is what this whole thing is about. I know the people who understand how at risk children can be, even when it's not the worst.
Totally situation totally.
I realized I was one of the lucky ones. I was not one of the many children who have to gather their belongings in trash bags and be thrown into a scary situation. I'm forever grateful and pay it forward whenever I can. Love you all.
Sarah, Oh my god, Sarah.
Sarah and her badass aunt. That's just like nanwa. Yeah, it's gorgeous, so good.
Okay, this is wedding dress treasure, dear fellow la peoples and creatures. In two thousand and eight, my mom was diagnosed with mesothelioma, that bitch of a cancer caused by asbestos. Horrible. She underwent chemotherapy and refused to lose a single hair on her head because she was too stubborn and vain for that.
Shit.
How did she do that?
I don't know. Wow, that's amazing, Like.
I'm not doing it well.
Her long term prognosis wasn't great. She was doing pretty well and underwent cancer related surgery in February two thousand and nine. The exhortation was for her to come through the surgery, and my siblings and I were planning on taking turns caring for her after the surgery back in our hometown in Pennsylvania. The things didn't go as planned, and she died from complications from the surgery on her sixty ninth birthday, so we ended up unexpectedly planning a
funeral and packing up her house. In the weeks following her death, I was going through a cardboard box of photos from the sixties, and at the bottom of the box, under all these photos there was a crumpled up plastic bag with what looked like a lace tablecloth. My mother was exceedingly organized, so it was odd to have something stuffed randomly in there, but I pulled it out to
see what it was. I shook it out, took it out of the plastic bag and was surprised to see that it was her wedding dress from when she married my father in nineteen sixty five. White dress, knee length Empire waste with long lace sleeves, one that Georgia would love. And I have a photo of it and it looks identical to fucking going My actual wedding fits for real, pretty much, not a stain on it, not a tear, not a riff, basically in perfect condition, despite being stored
in the worst way for over forty years. I tried it on because, of course, and it fit me perfectly sweet right. But it was especially meaningful because right before her surgery I had told my mom on the phone that my boyfriend and I were looking for a house and were planning on getting married. My first marriage had gone down in flames, and the fact that I was getting remarried to a man who loved me and my
two young daughters made her incredibly happy. According to my sister, she was singing going to the chapel when she came out of the surgery. In twenty ten, ten months after my mom died, I wore her perfect dress and walked with my two little girls in the backyard of our new home to marry my amazing husband. I feel like it was my mom's way of being at the wedding,
even when she couldn't be there. Below our photos of my mom Kathy and dad Dan good job, thank you on their wedding day, and one of me in the dress on mine. Oh and please make those fuck you I'm remarried sweats, Oh because I need them. Why have we never thought brilliant? Thanks for all you've done in so many ways SSDGM, and remember to not pack cool family heirlooms and zip locked bags in cardboard boxes ever. Julie, And so I think we can show the photos. Look
at that dress I have the Iridge, she's amazing. And then let's see that is your dress, Julie, it is. It's crazy like the scallop top.
Yes, oh so beautiful. I'm not trying to cut in on your thing. But that also looks like my wedding dress because I wore my really sweating dress.
Yeah you were your mom wedding.
Yeah, and similar vibe. It was just longer, yeah, pretty, so pretty. You know what, Maybe it's the thing of their like it's not the classic mother's day because her mother died, right, right, But I love the idea of a mother that has fucking mesothelioma. It was like trying to like get through every day and is like, I have to make sure she finds this dress so she sticks it in a box. Yeah, okay, So this one,
the subject line is Sarahgate mother. It says, hey, folks, growing up, my mother was a raging narcissist with the dead eyes and emotions of a four hundred year old shark.
That wow, that's the best description I've ever heard of anyone, Like, I know what you're talking about.
I mean, that's right, just get it right out there. My dad was a vodka soak guitar player, still chasing his dreams of stardom while mentally being stuck in the eighties. They did their best to raise me while still being kids themselves, but there was always a very deep lack of emotion in our relationship, and I felt alone a lot. My childhood best friend's mother became my Sarah Gate mother. Her name was Barbara. A teenager growing up in the eighties,
she had the best stories. She partied with some of the musicians I was obsessed with. She encouraged me to be myself, but she also called me on my bullshit. Since the second grade, she bought me clothes and let me sleep over at her house whenever I needed a break from my own.
I'm sorry, I knew it. I was reading these was like, Karen is going to fucking lose.
I mean it's like, A, did I not eat breakfast? But B this That's how my mom grew up because both of her parents were alcoholics, and my aunt, kay Kirkpatrick Antoni Giovanni was her best friend and she was raised by them. So when we were growing up, we had my grandma, who he loved and was great, but then we had the Kirkpatrick's that I was always like, who are these people who are also our grandparents? Yeah?
I mean I was thinking about like your friends and neighbors and this person, and you call people cousins like you have a huge, huge yes. So I was like, she's going to cry it every single way.
There's I'm going to relate to every single person.
If we do a cat episode, I'll cry it every single one.
Uh.
She even drove me all over town for an entire day looking for an apartment to move into. When I was seventeen, and my own mother told me she couldn't afford to have me live in her house anymore. She was righteously funny, sarcastic, and I loved her. She adopted me as her own child, and her house became my safe space until I was almost twenty. She taught me a lot. Barbara passed away in her sleep from a heart attack in her late forties in twenty eighteen.
That's tough. Wow.
Mostly I miss hearing her voice because it had a charming, calming quality to it. I found that same feeling, and the voices of your podcast, Oh, God damn it wow, also was on the second page. Didn't surprise hold for emotion. You both have similar voices to Barbara, and very similar senses of humor. I know she would have loved your podcast, and I would have shown it to her if I'd discovered it back then. Sometimes when I listened to the podcast,
God damn it. Sometimes when I listen to the podcast, I can imagine what it would be like discussing current events with her if she were here.
This is Oh my god, I do that all the time with my mom. You do well?
Yeah, she would fucking love this, so much. She would think it was amazing, like, oh my god, sorry.
God, you hen me. No, it's good that one of us.
That was like, I think this is the point of this, which is, this is what Mother's Day is like for people whose mothers are gone or who never had them in the first place. It's just what it's like. This is just one of the many reasons why I love what you do. It helps combat the loneliness of losing someone you care about deeply to remember them fondly, and you both help me to do that. It's truly a gift. And then it just says Jazz.
God, I never thought of us in that way.
I know.
I mean, we call each other aunties all the time.
But like, actually what that means? Yeah, jazz, you said Jazz. Jazz, Thanks Jazz. Thanks for making me cry on TV. Jazz very unprofessional.
We contain moreitudes all the tears. You also look pretty when you cry, which is fucking hard to do. I don't look pretty when I cry.
That's hilarious because to me, I look like an Like the second I have emotion, my eyes turn bright red.
No they don't.
It always looks crazy to me.
Same for me.
Yeah, why are we we're criticizing our appearance while we're having an emotion.
That's the fun.
That's old, that's nineties. Shit, it's weird. Get rid of it.
Yeah, okay, not all spirits like the dark is my last one? Oh, get ready to cry. Okay, if you don't cry this one, something's wrong. Hey my favorite Murderino Babes and four legged Friends. So my best friend Sierra's mom passed away unexpectedly in twenty fifteen, and it shattered everyone who knew her. She was the neighborhood mom who took care of every child as if they were her own, and since I grew up with my best friend, her
mother was like a second mom to me. Because of her unexpected passing, her landlord was very kind and gave us extra time to arrange her belongings and get every removed from her condo. Sierra and I were finishing everything up and left only a single lamp in the house, a cheap dollar store six foot lamp shot all the
lights off and locked up. When we were pulling out, we looked back at the house one last time, trying to remember all the great times we shared there, and noticed that the lamp that was left in her mother's room was on. Thinking one of us must have not flipped the switch all the way or some bullshit, I parked my truck and went back in to turn off the light. This time I knew one hundred percent that the light was off and continued to lock up the house.
When we went to leave, the light was on. At this point, we thought someone's playing a dumb prank on us, so we both went in and took one last look around. Of course, the house was empty, so this time, for good measure, we unplugged the lamp, and Sierra even moved the lamp away from the outlet, which was by the window, to the opposite side of the room, and we closed the door, thinking that it must have been some freak occurrence or that we were both just mentally exhausted from
the recent events. When we walked outside, we both looked up at her mother's bedroom window and saw the light was off, and we laughed for a second, climbed back into my truck and went to leave. When we reversed out, Sierra took one last look and I saw her jaw drop. The fucking light was on again and the lamp was back by the window.
Whoa.
At that point we said fuck it and agreed that her mom prefers the lights on. Looking back, now, we laugh about it and take solace in the fact that she's still with us and still finds ways to make us smile. Thank you for bearing with me through this email, as I am not the best writer. That's not true. Yes you are.
Yeah, that was a great story.
I also want to say thank you for helping people be more aware of mental illness and helping erase the stigma that comes with having a mental illness. I used to be so ashamed and scared of my mental illnesses, but over the years I have learned that my mental illnesses don't define me or control what I am capable of. Much love from Columbus, Ohio. Alie, Kay, Alie.
My mom would be so excited you say.
That that's so BEAUTI yeah, totally.
But also, I mean if I was in that draw in that parking lot and I looked back up, I would have just been like, yeah, someone call the police or something like holy shit.
No, it's so I love those little unexplained things that you're just like, of course it's what it is.
Yeah, of course it's that they just need you to know that.
They love you. Yeah. It's like a little wink.
Yeah, Okay, here's my last one. It says, uh, my honorary mom is a subject line. This is high KNG. Been listening since twenty eighteen. Love you gals, et cetera. My honorary mom was Missus Hamstra, my seventh grade math teacher. She helped me overcome the intense feeling of failure after a very terrible year of sixth grade math. Not only did she help in still confidence, but she taught in such a way where math no longer felt hard to me.
I mean, that's a great teacher. Missus Hamstra opened up her classroom to me in the early morn when I had to be dropped off at seven point thirty and school didn't start until nine to twenty. I'm a teacher now, and there's not a snowballs chance in hell i'd be at work that early.
Or real. I had a teacher that let me in at lunch when I didn't have any friends and like eat lunch in her And then I didn't have lunch too, and so she gave me lunch like half a sandwich or whatever.
Yeah, she listened to me laughed with me and allowed me to be my weird middle school self, all while encouraging and reminding me that though math was hard, I was capable. Middle school is should be illegal. It's the fucking worst.
You are at your worst hormonally, physically, mentally, Like none of it makes sense.
There's a family picture of me, and I'm in seventh grade and I'm still wearing like those little mini ponytails, like my hair's down, but then mini ponytails and like overalls, and I was just like, I'm dressed like I'm in four It's great.
You haven't figured out if you're this or that yet a grown up or a kid? Right, and then you call break recess and everyone expended to you. I mean, I was just recess fucking a year ago. The rules keep changing. Yeah, it's bullshit. Okay, fast forward a few years.
Missus Hamster and I kept in touch, and I learned the devastating news that she had als. She sold all of her belongings and moved to Columbia to become an English and math teacher. She said she wanted to experience life before she could no longer. Missus Hamster had the adventure of a lifetime, and though I never got to hear all these stories, not long after she returned back home, her ALS got worse. Despite battling such a terrible disease, she always made sure to make her friends, family, and
former students feel heard and seen and loved. Missus Hamster passed away in twenty twenty two after a long and valiant battle with als. She's the reason I am a teacher today. Come on, and I hope that I can make my students feel confident, seen and heard because middle school sucks, but one teacher can truly make a difference. Thank you, Tyler, she her, Oh my god, Tyler. Also all the themes here women total, the power of women, women knowing their responsibility.
Their empathy, their like connection to other humans.
In a way that that really they can make up for so much horror. And just like that, Karen kindness and awareness, the Karen kindness, Karen kindness Murderinas.
You can be this to someone else at some point in your life. So I'll always look for opportunities where you can do that for someone someone else, And it's just so meaningful.
Pick a middle school girl, they need you, dude, yes please uh and stay sex and don't get murdered.
Goodbye, Elvis. Do you want a cookie? Ah?
This has been an exactly right production.
Our senior producer is Molly Smith and our associate producer is Tessa Hughes.
Our editor is Aristotle Ascevedo.
This episode was mixed by Leona Squalacci.
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