Today on the show we sat down with Jordan Delmundo, Executive Director of NAP, Nebraska AIDS Project in Omaha. He shares about how NAP started along with all the wonderful resources they provide in education and testing right here in the Omaha area.
Founded in 1984 as a compassionate response to the AIDS crisis, Nebraska AIDS Project (NAP) leads the community in the fight to overcome HIV/AIDS and its stigma through education, supportive services, and advocacy. As one of the few statewide AIDS service organizations in the country and the only community-based AIDS service organization in Nebraska, NAP provides HIV prevention education and case management services to the entire state of Nebraska, 11 counties in Southwest Iowa, and two counties in Eastern Wyoming.The employees of Nebraska AIDS Project come from diverse and wide ranging backgrounds and each person brings with them skills, education, and experience to best serve our community. NAP’s team includes a Board of Directors, administrative staff, client services staff, education/prevention staff and more often than not, a few interns and students.
If you can not see the player click HERE and listen to the podcast on Pod-O-Matic.
I am a HUGE fan of The Voice. I love it for so many reasons but the main reason is the blinds. To get on the show you audition with the judges only hearing you. They don’t see you until they push their buttons and they don’t push their buttons until they hear something so incredible they can not help but push the button.
This season, started the same as all the others but the main difference being one performer who even blew me away from the moment he first opened his mouth. His name is Jordan Smith. His blind audition song was “Chandelier” by Sia. Here is the performance if you missed it.
Jordan is not your typical pretty boy. Although I personally think he is incredibly handsome. He is a bigger guy and has more than likely been shamed more than once for his appearance. And not only is he a bigger guy, he can hit notes that many women couldn’t even hit if they tried. And again, something tells me he has felt the sting of his peers teasing him for having the voice he has.
What many of them may have missed is that Jordan has the voice of an angel. And he has the compassion, love, generosity, and humble nature to go with this angelic voice. He inspires me to love myself for me. Last night on the Voice he sang “Who You Are” by Jessie J. The lyrics to the song are so powerful. Here is his performance
The song is an anthem to loving yourself for exactly as you are, to follow your heart and be true to who you are. I am so very happy Jordan has made it as far as he has on The Voice and in my humble opinion I believe he will win this season! And if he doesn’t it will be a crying shame but he will have an amazing career in music and I will forever be a fan. I can’t wait to see him perform live! Good luck Jordan with all you do although I do not believe you will need luck with your Voice of an Angel.
Update December 10, 2015
Jordan AMAZED me once again! His semi-final performance of “Somebody To Love” was truly sublime. So heartfelt so real so passionate! Freddy Mercury was applauding from above no doubt! I must admit that every week I wonder if he can pull it off again and he just keeps getting bigger and bigger!!! Thank you Jordan for sharing your gift with us! VOTE JORDAN SMITH!!! Finals are next week and I can hardly wait for it. If you missed the performance here it is for you! ENJOY!!!
And just because I LOVE this song so very much I had to also post my other most fabulous performance of the song from Happy Feet performed by Brittany Murphy.
Update December 14, 2015
I keep thinking there is absolutely no way he can bring me to tears again and then he does this:
And needless to say I am swimming in a puddle of tears and so incredibly grateful that he found his way to The Voice tryouts and the judges recognized his incredible talent! In my mind he won this competition from the beginning! He is pure talent and he is humble and sweet and I believe he deserves to take this thing all the way! We will find out soon if he is going to be our next winner and regardless of what happens he will always be a winner to me and I will forever be a fan! Thank you Jordan Smith for sharing your gift.
Singing with Usher
Update December 16, 2015
Jordan Smith WINS The Voice!!! That is right my guy went all the way and pulled off the win of the year! I have been awed by him all season and apparently so have a huge number of other people! He did it and I couldn’t be more proud! Way to go Jordan!!! Congrats!!!
On the show today I sat down with Dr. Amanda Duffy Randall. Omaha Therapist, Associate Professor, and the Director of the Grace Abbott School of Social Work at UNO. She shares some insights into her personal journey into becoming a therapist and how she started working with the LGBTQ Community. Dr. Randall is an amazing compassionate no nonsense human being who has a refreshing matter of fact way of approaching things. My favorite quote from our conversation is:
“Reaction is often times not long term adjustment, especially for a trans person, this has been something they have struggled with for a very long time. And when they tell their families they have about 30 seconds of reaction time. And often those reactions aren’t elegant, and aren’t pretty. But long term adjustments a very different process for families.” Dr. Randall
I LOVED our chat and I hope you will enjoy it too! I also hope you might learn something useful you can pass on to others. Please feel free to share this post with anyone you feel might benefit from it.
If you do not see the player click HERE to listen to the show on our Pod-O-Matic channel. The link will open a new window so you can still enjoy looking at other posts on our site! Also be sure to listen to previous episodes of the show!
Also, if you haven’t done so already, be sure to check out my video on transition and how it doesn’t just affect the person who is transitioning but everyone he or she knows.
On a special episode of the podcast we sit down with Kate Parrish, President of the RCGA (River City Gender Alliance), and she shares about TDOR Omaha and what is happening along with how RCGA is supporting the play Mama’s Girls produced by SNAP! Productions and showing now at the Shelterbelt Theater. Click HERE to buy tickets to the show before they sell out!
Transgender Day of Remembrance is this Friday, November 20th.
TDoR Omaha presents the 4th annual Transgender Day of Remembrance at the beautiful First Unitarian Church of Omaha, 31st and Harney. TDoR is a day that we gather in community to remember those who have died in the name of transphobia, share the living history of the transgender community, and to celebrate the transgender community.
We couldn’t be happier to have today’s podcast go live! We sat down with Ferial Pearson who is an educator, activist, public speaker, human being extraordinaire and she shared how The Secret Kindness Agents became a reality!
Taken from their facebook page:
Moved by the Sandy Hook Elementary School tragedy, Ferial Pearson wondered if a simple act of kindness could change a life. She thought of the school where she taught and the students she guided every day and wondered, what would happen if we started secretly carrying out small acts of kindness in school? Could a modest act of compassion really change the course of a life? She posed the question to her students. They didn’t have the answers but they were willing to find out. And so they became the Secret Kindness Agents. They not only changed the lives of those they met, they changed their own. Their hope, their hearts, and their hunger for happiness will inspire you to change your small corner of the world, in your own way, for the better. Let them show you how they did it, and how you can do the same.
Ferial Pearson, a native of Nairobi, Kenya, is a national award-winning high school teacher and college instructor. For her dedicated work in education and human rights, she has earned the National Education Association’s Virginia Uribe Award for Creative Leadership in Human Rights in 2012, and the Gay Lesbian Straight Education Network’s Educator of the Year Respect Award in 2011. She is an Instructor and Instructional Coach in the Teacher Education Department at the University of Nebraska Omaha.
Buy a copy of Secret Kindness Agents by clicking here. Follow the Secret Kindness Agents on Facebook by clicking here.
If you don’t see the player you can click here and listen to the podcast on Pod-o-matic! Thank you for listening!
On todays show we are chatting with Jordan Brown, President of the Queer Nebraska Youth Network, QNYN, in Omaha. The Queer Nebraska Youth
Network is a grassroots organization that aims to create a healthy, empowered, and visible community of LGBTQ+ youth in Nebraska. composed of 3 subgroups: the Queer Women’s Subgroup, the Queer Men’s Subgroup, and the Trans*/Genderqueer Subgroup. Peer leaders known as “admins” lead each of these groups, which are made up of youth, age 15-24, across the state of Nebraska and parts of western Iowa.
The QNYN’s current membership exceeds 700 LGBTQ+ youth. Members’ hometowns stretch from Council Bluffs, IA to Alliance, NE. Our growing community represents a diversity of experiences in terms of socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, ability, and sexual/gender identities. We learn from the experiences of one another every day and work to make the QNYNs as radically welcoming as we can!
If you don’t see the player you can click here and listen to the podcast on Pod-o-matic! Thank you for listening!
This page is for our SUPPORTERS! And anyone can become a supporter and it isn’t just about giving us money but about creating a powerful network. A network of AMAZING humans, businesses, and non profit organizations. All who believe in one thing, BEING HAPPY, and celebrating diversity! So if you have something you would like us to share on Speaking of Happy please email us at elirigatuso@catchcreative.com so we can work out the details! A GREAT BIG thank you goes out to the following supporters of Speaking Of Happy, without you we would barely know how to manage our way around the interwebs!
What is in a name? From before we even take our first breath, outside of our mother’s womb, we are given a name. Something people can know us by and can start to formulate opinions of before they can even see us. People will begin to shop for you based on that name and they feel some sort of comfort in knowing if they are shopping for a boy or a girl.
When I was born it was 1965 and back then ultrasound technology was not being used in the United States. As a matter of fact, it would be another 5-10 years before it would even emerge in the states and I would already be firmly known as Beth. There is a part of me that wishes the world could come to a place where we just allow our little creations to emerge as HUMAN and then allow them to share with us who they are as they grow and develop. So that young transgender/nonbinary humans would have the say in what they will be called long before a name that might not suit them takes hold. And they could be respected in their choice to wear non-traditional clothing for their assigned gender.
It is not typical in the transgender community for folks to comfortably share their former names, also referred to as a dead name, but I have never hated the name Beth. I do know, as I progress in my transition, I have moved further and further away from it as something that was a part of me. Most transgender folks refer to their former name as a dead name because it is a part of their identity that is dead to them.
According to the Advocate, “dead-naming” is a term that involves “the practice of uttering or publishing the name that a transperson used prior to transition.” Most of the time, an individual will pick a new name as soon as they begin to identify as the gender they know they are on the inside. This new name, in a way, marks the “death” of their old identity and the person they once were. With a new name, they signify a new, more truthful, and more fully realized phase of their life.
Another thing that is true for me is I don’t honestly feel I was born in the wrong body, just not the one that is 100% me. I still don’t hate my name but I do know that it doesn’t fit who I see myself as being completely and authentically.
The process for coming up with my name was a funny one. After being born and raised in Omaha and 50 years of being Beth and creating my own personal brand, so to speak, it was hard to think of how it might feel to let that all go. Or perhaps to re-create myself on the outside to match who I feel I am on the inside.
Would people still love me?
Would they understand and support me and respect my choice to be called Eli?
Well one thing is for sure, after 50 years of living a life being something I do not feel is 100% authentically me, it was time to start living for ME and allowing myself to have the freedom to be Eli! Regardless of what anyone else thinks about it.
So, here is a short video which further explains my choice to be known as Eli and to allow Beth to take a rest, after all she has really done some extraordinary things over the past 50 years! I will share more with you as I continue along my transition and I promise to answer all of your questions! Thank you for the incredible love and support you have showered on me. Thank you for giving me the freedom to be Eli!
Eli Rigatuso shares why he chose the name, Eli. After 50 years of being known as Beth to his community, it took some time to settle on a name. And as of Thursday, October 22, 2015, his name change was submitted and by December the name will be official. We of course will keep you updated (it is a 6 week process)! A GREAT BIG THANK YOU goes out to Joni Watke Stacy of Sena, Polk, and Stacy LLP
If you need legal assistance we highly recommend Joni Watke Stacy!
On the show today we speak with Michal Simpson, Artistic Director at SNAP! Productions a Non Profit theater space in Omaha. SNAP! has been around for 22 years and has produced award winning theater productions and musicals all focused on educating people on diverse topics. Simpson has been with SNAP! for 22 years and shares some heartwarming and wonderful insights from both past and present shows.
Simpson also shares about the current production which opens on November 12th and runs through December 6th.
Mama’s Girls– Written by Marilynn Barner Anselmi
The show is about Eleven year old twins Amelia and Sam who argue about everything. Barbies, sports, chores, everything – except Sammy’s knowledge she is a girl trapped in a boy’s body. Amelia fights for everyone and everything who opposes Sammy, including their parents. The shrapnel of these conflicts brings Sammy’s transition and the fragility of their parent’s marriage to the fore.
Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased by clicking here.
We hope you enjoy the podcast we sure enjoyed our conversation with Michal!
If you don’t see the player you can click here and listen to the podcast on Pod-o-matic! Thank you for listening!
Today on the podcast we are talking with JohnCarl Denkovich who is the Chairperson of the Board of Directors for GLSEN and his primary role is to serve as the local chapters Director of Policy and Legislative advocacy. He also sits on the National Advisory Council for GLSENs National Board.
GLSEN Omaha is a Chapter of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. The mission of GLSEN Omaha is to assure that each member of every school community is valued and respected regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity/expression. They primarily serve the Omaha metropolitan area, including Council Bluffs, IA but provide services across Nebraska. They strive to protect students from bullying and harassment, to advance comprehensive safe schools laws and policies, to empower principals to make their schools safer, and to build the skills of educators to teach respect for all people. They work closely with the national staff of GLSEN to implement programs and affect positive change in school communities.
If you don’t see the player you can click here and listen to the podcast on Pod-o-matic! Thank you for listening!
Founded in 1984 as a compassionate response to the AIDS crisis, Nebraska AIDS Project (NAP) leads the community in the fight to overcome HIV/AIDS and its stigma through education, supportive services, and advocacy. As one of the few statewide AIDS service organizations in the country and the only community-based AIDS service organization in Nebraska, NAP provides HIV prevention education and case management services to the entire state of Nebraska, 11 counties in Southwest Iowa, and two counties in Eastern Wyoming.The employees of Nebraska AIDS Project come from diverse and wide ranging backgrounds and each person brings with them skills, education, and experience to best serve our community. NAP’s team includes a Board of Directors, administrative staff, client services staff, education/prevention staff and more often than not, a few interns and students.
Eli Rigatuso shares why he chose the name, Eli. After 50 years of being known as Beth to his community, it took some time to settle on a name. And as of Thursday, October 22, 2015, his name change was submitted and by December the name will be official. We of course will keep you updated (it is a 6 week process)!