LDL Magazine - May 2023, Volume 2 Issue 5

LDL Magazine

Sujets

• Vietnamese
• Media
• Asian American
• Counseling
• Revista
• Pageant
• Counselor
• Pacific Islander
• Vietnam
• Beauty contest
• Viêt Nam
• Host
• Magazine

Informations

• Publié par: LDL Magazine
• Date de parution: 04 mai 2023
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 105 Mo

Extrait

LDL MAGAZINE

May 2023

INSIDE LOOK: AMRITA KATARIA, LIBBA, & RAVEN SERITA

V o l u m e 2 I s s u e 5

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P h o t o g r a p h e r P a t i e n c e W o l f e

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 A u t h o r , M o d e l , M a k e u p A r t i s t  L i z N g u y e n

H a i r S t y l i s t J i m e n a M e n d e z R o c a S c h m e i d l

W h i t e C o c k t a i l D r e s s D e s i g n e r K a t y a S u z d a l e v a

A o D a i D e s i g n e r N g a n H u y e n

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L e t t e r f r o m t h e E d i t o r 7

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N i g h t m a r e s a n d D r e a m s L i z N g u y e n 8

T h r i v i n g a s Y o u r A u t h e n t i c S e l f  V a n e s s a S h i l i w a l a 2 6

L i c e n s e d P r o f e s s i o n a l C l i n i c a l C o u n s e l o r & W o m e n ’ s E m p o w e r m e n t C o a c h  A m r i t a K a t a r i a 3 6

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R e l a t i o n s h i p C o a c h R a v e n S e r i t a 4 4

P o p A r t i s t L i b b a K e l l y 5 2

T h e r a p y i s L i g h t L a c r i s h a H o l c o m b 6 0

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S o y C a n d l e s , R e e d D i f f u s e r s , & S o y W a x M e l t s L u n i c o W i l l i a m J o l l y m o r e 6 9

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M e n t a l H e a l t h & P e r f o r m a n c e C o a c h B o n n i e F a i t h 7 7

T h e B a k e r ' s G r o v e P a s t r y C h e f M a t t h e w R o s e n z w e i g 8 9

M e n t a l H e a l t h M a n i f e s t a t i o n s L D L M a g a z i n e 9 6

F o l l o w L D L M a g a z i n e 1 0 4

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Letter from the Editor

LDL Magazine’s May 2023 issue is celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, and Mental Health Awareness. We are honored to have Liz Nguyen: Vietnamese American Pageant Queen, Professional Model, Storyteller, and Community Leader as our cover feature.

Grab your favorite candle, relax, and enjoy the stories in this month's magazine. May's magazine include inspiration from a licensed therapist, relationship coach, yummy desserts to relax you, and candles that will set the mood.

Love, Le'Marqunita De'Sharay Lowe (LDL Magazine)

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NIGHTMARES AND DREAMS

BY: LIZ NGUYEN

Liz Nguyen's mother when she was 18 years old

̘You’re having the same nightmare since 1975?!̙ I asked my mother in Vietnamese.

̘Yes,̙ my mother replied stoically over the phone.

Yet again, I was in shock– which had happened quite often during those last couple of weeks in March of 2021. Two weeks before then, my mother was complaining about having horrible headaches. She said she went to church and felt like she was going to faint. A few days later, her headache was so severe that she vomited in the toilet, and said she felt something had popped inside her head. We took her to a neurologist who couldn’t find anything in her brain scans, and she left with a few prescription orders and no answers.

Together with my brother and husband, I visited her one evening and bought her gifts to check on her and to cheer her up. She was in bed, and though she was very weak, she tried to show gratitude that we had come to see her. It was tough to see my mother, who normally cannot sit still and is constantly cooking and cleaning, completely resigned to her bed. After our visit, the three of us decided to grab a sushi dinner to decompress ourselves from the emotionally draining visit. As we sat down to eat, my mother called my brother, crying and begging us to take her to the hospital. My mother hates the hospital; she always assures her children that she is fine and that she can tough out any situation.

N a n

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Her admission to the hospital was followed by an anxiety-ridden week composed of numerous

doctors of different specialties attempting to diagnose her and ordering many more tests and

scans to figure out what was happening to my mother. Every day of that week, I was the point

person to call the hospital, translate to my mom in Vietnamese what was going on, text the

family group thread on her condition, and coordinate who would be the next person to visit

her during the visiting hours, heavily curtailed by Covid-19 restrictions. Until finally, the

neurosurgeon called me back.

̘We just discovered that she has a brain aneurysm. We are going to take her to the operating

room in 30 minutes. We are allowing one person to be here in the waiting area, but you must

be here within 30 minutes.̙

The hospital was 20 minutes away and that doesn’t account for parking and racing through

the maze-like hospital wing where she was being kept. I ran out of my house and ran as fast

as my legs and lungs would allow me, not caring what anyone in the hospital thought of me as

I huffed and puffed along.

I opened my mother’s hospital room door and saw her turning towards me slowly, looking

pale and exhausted.

̘I have a few last words in case I don’t make it,̙ my mother said to me calmly and slowly.

She started to tell me her last wishes.

̘Stop!̙ I told her. I whipped out my phone and started to record. I was not going to take any

chances that I would mistake or forget any of her last words. I didn’t want this burden.

As I recorded my mother’s last wishes, I tried hard to hold the phone still and not let any

tears fall from my eyes.

She asked for forgiveness if she failed or disappointed anyone. She spoke of her hopes and

dreams for our immediate family members, so that they could live a successful and happy life.

It was all things that I knew I would not have the heart to deliver if none of us were to see her

speak in person again.

The operating room nurse knocked and came into the room, and so the video had to be

stopped after about 5 minutes of her narrating her final wishes.

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