Debbi Zlotnick Chanin is from Johannesburg, South Africa. Her father, Harold, grew up in a black hat Orthodox Jewish culture and rebelled against his upbringing by marrying Mac, a wild-at-heart and very free-spirited woman. Debbi describes her mother as a white Jewish woman trapped in a black Zulu woman’s body. Debbi left South Africa as a teen to move to Los Angeles, leaving behind the atrocities of Apartheid and the fear her brother would have to go into the army.
Debbi met Erez, a fellow South African living in Los Angeles when she was just 19. She married him five years later. Wanting to get away from their large complicated families, she moved to Atlanta, Georgia to start their own family. Debbi studied at the Art Institute in Atlanta becoming a personal chef. Debbi and Erez moved back to Los Angeles in 2008 with their three young daughters, Shira, Emma, and Talia. Besides loving being back in Los Angeles with her extended family and her role as a mother and home cook, Debbi loves her job as a server at True Food Kitchen in Santa Monica.
When Debbi moved back to LA, she enrolled in the Landmark Forum with the goal of understanding the relationship she had with her father, leaving her with the tools to accept and love him. And so, when her father shot himself after a fight he’d gotten in with her mother, the tools Debbi learned at Landmark Forum years earlier came flooding back to save her. Whereas Debbi’s brother and mother were consumed with blame, guilt, shame, and sadness, and even separated from each other for four years, Debbi remained the peacekeeper with the understanding her father’s suicide was the result of mental illness. Debbi is here today to discuss warning signs, how to cope with a loved one’s suicide, and how to heal.
SHOW NOTE LINKS:
Debbi’s Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/debbi_chanin/
Landmark Forum:
http://www.landmarkworldwide.com
The Total Money Makeover, by Dave Ramsey
https://www.daveramsey.com/store/product/the-total-money-makeover-book-by-dave-ramsey
True Food Kitchen
https://www.truefoodkitchen.com
NAMI-National Alliance on Mental Illness
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org
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