00:00:40.160I think it's important for us, for me, to be able to put all of this stuff on the table
00:00:45.560so we can all sort of have this shared experience and draw from it what we need.
00:00:52.400So, let me catch you up. For those who haven't been following my TikTok insanity, about a year ago, I would say a year ago in October, my mom, you know, obviously this amazing person in my life, and I'm going to get into those stories too, because I think those stories are important when I'm talking about this.
00:01:14.700But a year ago, my mom was diagnosed with bladder cancer. Now, I got to go a little further back. And here's why I got to go a little further back because my mom hates the doctors. Now, there's some irony there. I understand. My mom was a nurse for like 50 years. She worked in plastics. I pretty much grew up in a hospital. I'm going to tell you a few of those stories.
00:01:38.780So why on earth she was so afraid or so trepidatious about taking care of her own
00:01:45.640physical health? I don't know if that's because she was a nurse and she saw what could happen
00:01:51.180and she thought better just to ignore it or if it was just something innate to her. She's very
00:01:56.800much a caregiver, but to be taken care of, she's not having any of it. So let me go back. I'm
00:02:06.200sorry. This is like one of those TV shows where they kind of go forward and then go back. So
00:02:10.260you're going to have to, you know, keep track here, guys. If you can keep up with me, I'd
00:02:14.240appreciate it. It'll be worth it. It'll be worth it. So quite a few years ago, after my mom retired,
00:02:22.540so my mom retired, oh, I don't know, about five years ago now. And it was at this five-year mark
00:02:28.580when she retired, it was like everything went wrong. And, and slowly pieces that she never,
00:02:37.060I guess maybe she never dealt with. It's kind of like when you work for an exceptionally long
00:02:41.580period of time, you never get sick. And then you have a weekend yourself. And all of a sudden you
00:02:45.040get slammed with a cold that you've never had. I feel like it was kind of like that.
00:02:50.760And initially I believe my mom hit was, was hit with a gallbladder thing. Now I think my mom's
00:02:56.400always had a gallbladder thing and she had it taken out. She came through like a champ, although
00:03:00.660it kind of shook her sense of mortality, obviously. She then got atrial fibrillation. I can't even say
00:03:08.540that properly. AFib, which is this heart thing in a regular heartbeat, which in and of itself
00:03:13.400isn't problematic. You get these bouts of AFib, you take a medication, it regulates your heart
00:03:19.400rate again, you go about your day. And my mom's always had high blood pressure. I think it's
00:03:23.800familial my mom used to be a heavier person so obviously there's a genetic and a lifestyle
00:03:29.060component and all of these things kept happening and it was just like one after the other and and
00:03:34.720there's me constantly saying you're fine this is you got this you got this right never thinking of
00:03:42.220a bigger picture and then it came around to um they they found and i don't know go in details
00:03:49.640here because, you know, nobody wants to hear the gory details, but they found that she had a polyp0.98
00:03:54.340in her uterus. I've had polyps in my uterus. I've had them taken out trying to get pregnant. That's0.94
00:03:59.540annoying. So again, familial, genetic, right? So she had a fairly good sized polyp removed from
00:04:07.760her uterus. She came through with flying colors. Everything was fine. And for quite a while after0.98
00:04:14.760she was having some post-op bleeding. Now, couldn't really tell why. And at some point,
00:04:22.980her gynecologist said, you know what? I think you should look at your bladder.
00:04:28.760Because, oh, and to jump back a little bit, my mom used to, 35 years ago, smoke. And she smoked0.96
00:04:35.900for about 20 years, and then she quit cold turkey. Funnily enough, had nothing to do with the health
00:04:41.700concerns. It had everything to do with the up cost of cigarettes at that particular time. And she
00:04:46.540quit. Done. Never to have one again. So she's been off cigarettes longer than she was on them.1.00
00:04:53.240And her gynecologist said, the secondary leading cause of cancer in bladder are smokers.
00:05:02.700So immediately my mom was like, that's it. That's what she has. And it was all doom and gloom. And
00:05:08.400I said, mom, I'm going to feel, I don't know if I'm going to feel guilty about this, but
00:05:13.900mom, I've watched a lot of house. You're not going to have two things wrong with you
00:05:19.320at the same time. You're going to have this huge polyp and you're also, no, that not going
00:05:27.820to happen. It's not going to be a thing. And sure enough, the more tests that we got,
00:05:34.100she had the different tests in order to see what it was and sure enough that's what it was0.52
00:05:39.580and then we had to go and she had to have the surgery to figure out
00:05:43.180how significant was it right because you only can kind of guess by scans
00:05:48.160and all the while I'm like you just can't have the world's worst luck time and time again
00:05:56.420it's you there's got to be something on your side right you're she's this guys like she
00:06:04.000has taken care of people, whether it's me, whether it's my family, whether it's all of those people
00:06:08.900she's nursed for, for decades and decades. I'm like, not going to be it. So they went in to do
00:06:18.320the surgery and there's different levels, right? They went in to do the surgery and
00:06:23.600they couldn't just take, what they wanted to be able to do is just take out the tumor from inside0.98
00:06:29.500of her bladder. So I guess because the bladder is a full organ or whatever, and excuse me,
00:06:35.120God, please don't come at me for any medical kind of stuff. I'm going to do the best I can here, but
00:06:38.820I do watch a lot of House and Grace, but I only can do so much. There's a full bladder
00:06:43.600and it's a sealed organ. So hopefully it's just in there and you go in, you scrape it out,
00:06:50.020Bob's your uncle, you're good to go. What you don't want is you don't want it pushing or
00:06:55.160breaching the wall and going into the musculature of the external organ. So I'm at school waiting
00:07:03.980to hear about the surgery because you can't go in because of COVID. And of course it had breached
00:07:11.520the wall. So, okay. All right. So they're going to take the whole thing out. So they're going to
00:07:18.480take the bladder out. And because my mom is 73, the uterus is so close in proximity and that's1.00
00:07:24.500usually where the transfer happens or the, you know, any cells that escaped can go there.0.89
00:07:29.340So they took both her uterus and her bladder out. Oh, okay. They say, look, clean margins,1.00
00:07:40.080everything's good. Everything's gone before this surgery, by the way, and I know I'm jumping all
00:07:44.800over the place. She did the full rounds of chemo. Um, and she handled it like a champ. Like
00:07:53.300when I say handled like a champ, I am comparing it to me and I would have been
00:07:58.660a complete and utter whiny mess, but she handled it like a champ.
00:08:05.760Her kidneys took a hit though, because chemo, as everybody knows, chemo is very, very hard
00:08:11.320on your kidneys. And also because the bladder, obviously the kidney flows into the bladder,
00:08:17.480it had gone up part of that conduit a little bit and it had infected, not infected with cancer,
00:08:23.420but it had caused trauma to that kidney. So there was kidney damage. Okay. Okay. So we get her
00:08:30.020through that. I go see her in the hospital. And again, you know, it was a rough surgery. It's a
00:08:35.840big, guys, she lost two organs. Like, like that's significant. I asked her if she felt lighter.
00:08:42.800anyways so I go into the hospital and she's handling it like a champ it's hard for her to
00:08:49.580get up and it's it was a big it was a big incision right belly button to pelvic bone kind of incision
00:08:57.620nothing laparoscopic there and and I see her in the hospital and and I'm trying to like make sure
00:09:06.320that she's okay I'm trying to bring her the right foods I'm trying to you know do all of that that
00:09:10.780I can. And while she's in the hospital, which I think was an actual, a significant aspect of this
00:09:16.760whole progress, she gets a very, very common GI infection. Now, I'm not going to talk about how
00:09:23.600angry I am that she got it. Yeah, I'm sure you can read my face. Nor how angry I am that it was
00:09:31.480probably left too long because they should have tested for it earlier. It's very contagious.
00:09:37.040It should be tested for very, you know, very quick after surgery.
00:09:45.900And this was, this particular GI infection really did a number on her rehab, a number
00:09:55.500on her health, a number on everything, and even worse, a number on her kidney.
00:10:00.920So she, in the hospital, taking care of this, and they want her to come home.
00:10:07.040Well, she doesn't look like she's ready to come home, guys. But in a lot of our medical systems right now, and I'm saying part of a lot of this I'm saying because, and I'm going to share with you because I think it's so incredibly important to self-advocate. And the problem is we, me, most of us don't know enough how to self-advocate, right?
00:10:29.920but here's what you do know you do know how your person feels so when my mom said I'm not ready
00:10:38.500I'm not ready to come home I should have fought a little harder for that but I was a bit selfish
00:10:44.560right I wanted her home I thought I could take better care of her I thought I don't know what
00:10:48.940I thought I don't know what I thought but but my mom also hated in the hospital so it was a hard
00:10:54.580balancing act so I brought her home and we brought her home my uncle was here and I was
00:10:59.560taking care of the dog and he was here and guys she was so sick and it looked so scary to me and
00:11:09.200it looked so traumatic when she was in this house and she was still having some post-op bleeding
00:11:14.500which is a a little bit common but I I she was afraid and and that fear should have told me
00:11:23.080something a little bit more too and we waited a few days she was home for about a few days and
00:11:28.700And then I saw her and she was afraid because it was a little bit more bleeding.
00:11:55.860And I'm purposely not mentioning hospital names right now.
00:11:58.700because I still want her to get well. And I'm trying not to be angry or, um, persecutory
00:12:04.600yet. Um, because it's hard. I get it. It's hard. And guys, this was all happening amidst
00:12:11.720the insanity of COVID. So I'm trying to leave that too. Right. And we get to the hospital.
00:12:16.800I know a lot of my TikTok listeners know this story because I get to the hospital and I go in
00:12:21.100to, to emerge. And I say, I can't get my mom out of the car. Can you please send somebody to help?
00:12:25.420And this beautiful, amazing paramedic came out. His name is Adam. I put together a lovely thank
00:12:34.980you for him as well. And he came out and he treated my mom like a human being. He got down
00:12:40.500on one knee as soon as he saw her in the car. And he said, listen, he looked her right in the eyes
00:12:45.240and he goes, we're going to do this because my mom was in pain. We're going to do this exactly
00:12:49.820how you have to do it. It can take five minutes. It can take five hours. I got you. And we're
00:12:55.440going to do this together. And he asked her what her name was and would use her name. And, you know,
00:13:00.580and, and I said, are you, should I stay here? He's like, no, he goes, you can't stay here.
00:13:05.840You can't come in. He goes, don't worry. I got her. And I'm going to stay with her for the entire
00:13:11.840duration until I know she's where she's supposed to be. Now, this is a paramedic. He doesn't work
00:13:16.680for the hospital, right? I don't know if he was off duty or what he, he doesn't work for the
00:13:22.220hospital. He's a parent. He works externally, right? So, I mean, he goes in there. Mom said,
00:13:29.700I'm okay. I'm okay. And I, and then I was talking to my mom and this young man, and I say young
00:13:35.760man, cause I'm old. I can say that he stayed with her for the entire time until she got taken to an
00:13:43.420actual floor. He took her up to the floor. He took her up to the floor. He stayed with her
00:13:49.960no matter what anybody said, just leave her here. He goes, no, I'm good. I'm going to stay right
00:13:54.780here. He stayed with her no matter what. And he gave my mom something that day that A, I'll never
00:14:04.160forget and B, neither will she. And I think it really helped her get through what she needed to
00:14:08.040get through at that point, which was a self sort of this awareness of an identity of, of, of being
00:14:14.220a person again, of somebody looking at her and saying, I care about you. I'm going to make sure
00:14:20.220you're okay. I don't care what else is happening out there. And so he stayed with her and everybody
00:14:26.880kept saying, you know, Oh, you're just gonna, you're, you're gonna, you don't need to stay
00:14:32.500with her. We got her. We got her. And, and that happened for a little while. And that happened
00:14:39.940for a little while. And eventually she got to where she was supposed to be. And he said, you
00:14:44.940know, you're going to be okay. I'm going to check in. And he did check in on her. And then she went
00:14:50.500back into the hospital. And at this point, she felt a little empowered. She felt a little empowered
00:14:55.120by Adam, a little empowered by, by herself going, she knew she had to go back in. And she said to
00:15:02.060everybody in that hospital, listen, I'm not, I can't go back home like this. So I'm going to
00:15:06.920have to go to like, let's say a rehab clinic because her walking was difficult. Even walking1.00
00:15:14.360with a walker was problematic. Like everything was really hard and I couldn't be there 24 seven.
00:15:20.460So she said to them, I, I'm going to wait now. Here's the funny part. And this is the part I
00:15:26.180want you guys to listen to. The standard with which a hospital is willing to transfer a patient
00:15:34.600is willing to transfer a patient when it comes to going to rehab or going to home
00:15:42.240are very different, completely different standards. Going home, it was as though she only had to be at
00:15:51.320maybe a four out of 10. Go ahead. You're good. You're good to go home at a four. Why? Because
00:15:58.160you have all these people at home that's going to help you. When my mom said, I'm going to go
00:16:03.580to rehab, guess what standard you have to be to go to rehab? You got to be at a solid seven.
00:16:10.980Are you kidding me? So another healthcare institution that is dedicated to taking my
00:16:20.000mom from being hospitalized for weeks, major surgery at 73, well, 72 then, taking her and
00:16:27.300being able to get her up to a level where she can actually come home, that rehab facility says to0.99
00:16:33.980the hospital, you can't send her to us at a four. We can't take care of her at a four.1.00
00:16:41.440It's probably the most frustrating I've ever been. And I did speak to management and I did
00:16:45.460go through a bunch of different things, but I had to talk, you know, I had to talk to those people
00:16:53.100and sort of assert where we stood here, all the while stipulating, well, she's going to go to
00:16:58.080rehab. She was never going to rehab. I was never going to, she wasn't going to rehab because I
00:17:02.260realized, oh my God, by the time you're good enough to go to rehab, mom, you can come home0.72
00:17:07.420because then I can take care of you, right? Because then you're at an eight.
00:17:12.400so I that part of our of our health care system that needs to change that needs to change you
00:17:20.640can't assume and you know I'm obviously younger to take care you can't assume that that person
00:17:26.780has those people when she goes or he goes home from the hospital after major surgery it's all
00:17:31.760to save money by the way by the way guys this is all about the bottom line this is not about
00:17:37.200healthcare. It's about health business. And I'm in Canada and I know the States is different on
00:17:44.920different levels. I know they have their problems. Absolutely. Do I believe in universal healthcare?
00:17:49.220Yes. But I believe in a fully funded healthcare model that doesn't send patient home early so
00:17:54.980they can get more sick and more scared and have a harder time of it. So my mom came home after all
00:18:01.520of that. And guys, it was a rough go. It was a really rough go. So her surgery was in May
00:18:09.160and slowly but surely we got her. Thank goodness that I was here. I know this sounds hilariously
00:18:16.680ironic, but I was here because of COVID. I could teach online and I could help take care of the
00:18:20.820dog and make sure she was okay. And I could go grocery shopping for her and I could do all those
00:18:24.300things for her. And she was really on the mend. And as she was on the mend, she was still having
00:18:32.100an edema problem. So getting rid of fluid, that's probably a kidney issue, separate.0.91
00:18:37.900They said, okay, well, we do scans, right? And as they were doing scans, they saw something
00:18:42.720little in her lung. They thought, it's nothing. Don't worry about it. No big deal. It's probably
00:18:49.040old infection. It could be old COVID. It could be anything. We're going to leave it. We're going to
00:18:53.840watch it. So they watched it for months. And very recently, they said, okay, well, it got a bit
00:19:02.360bigger. So let's go, we're going to go in and do a biopsy. So they went in and did a biopsy and did
00:19:08.680tests on the biopsy. And it turns out to be a bladder cancer metastasis. Oh, I can't say that
00:19:16.000word, it was spread. So her bladder cancer, which is also weird, but again, apparently it's where
00:19:24.800it goes. One of the first places that bladder cancer will metastasize to is the lung. I didn't0.99
00:19:32.280know that. I feel like they should have known that a little bit. They had tables of doctors
00:19:38.100looking at it on scans and saying, no, that's not what it is. It's not that at all. Don't worry
00:19:43.080about it. So now, you know, we get this news. Now, this news comes with a limit. And I know
00:19:54.180a lot of people are going through and have gone through. And the reason why I'm doing this is
00:19:58.060for me, 100%, 100% for me. And it's also for everybody else who's listening and everybody
00:20:03.800else who's going through it or might go through it or any position on that timeline.
00:20:13.080You know, they sat us down and they said, there's no, we can't, you can't have a cure now. So before
00:20:18.500with the bladder removed, there was a chance at a cure. So now there's no cure. Okay. Now there's
00:20:26.000these possible options. Will we do surgery? Probably not. I don't know if that's because
00:20:30.360she's 73 or that's because of whatever, but probably not. It would be a big deal. We want
00:20:34.940to shrink the tumor. Okay. So she gives us a window, a window of, you know, I don't know if
00:20:44.040I even want to say it out loud, guys. You know what? I'm not, I'm not going to, I don't want to
00:20:48.320give it any more power than it already has, but they gave us a window, which kind of stops you
00:20:54.620dead in your tracks, doesn't it? A prognosis, a timeline, an end game, it kind of stops you
00:21:00.740dead in your tracks and you just kind of go, and, and, and this window doesn't include healthy
00:21:07.800years, right? This window can include X amount of healthy years, and then a whole bunch of years of
00:21:13.780not. So we don't know, we don't know. So I had my moment and I, again, people on TikTok really saw
00:21:22.060me have my moment because I didn't know where else to put it. This is a much more calm version of me.
00:21:25.560I had my moment of panic. What do I do? What do I do now? How do we play out? Because it was
00:21:33.980almost as though somebody gave me this timeline and then that's it. We're done. That's all I'm
00:21:41.860giving you. Have a nice day. And I, I gave up. I looked at that timeline and thought, that's
00:21:50.780definitive. And I didn't know what else to do. Cause then I'm like, do we go on trips? Do I
00:21:58.120quit school? Do I, do I take a time off? Like, what do we do here? You know, and my mom was,
00:22:04.700was up and down, but my mom's way stronger than me. Have I said that before? Leaps and balance
00:22:09.400stronger than me. So we take this time and it doesn't, it's not long. And I pour my heart out
00:22:18.820on a TikTok. Now, some people would be like, oh, how dare you pour your heart out on something
00:22:23.620like that? I didn't get any actually hate because of it, but I'm sure some people might think it's
00:22:28.600opportunistic or it's whatever, but I didn't know what else to do. And again, I'll send you guys
00:22:34.160each my $150 for the hour because I feel like this process is my therapy, right? I'm a talker.
00:22:40.700apparently i don't need a lot of coming back all the time and then so i told this story to some
00:22:49.080degree and i got not only did i get love and support and all of that amazing energy and i
00:22:55.540appreciate that but here's what i got and here's where i what i want to pass on i got actual
00:23:04.940not even miracles. Because right now I'm betting on a miracle, right? They said X amount. I'm
00:23:13.420betting on a miracle. But these people are like, Joanna, my dad, my cousin, my kid, my mom,
00:23:23.240my grandfather. It was story after story after story after story of getting cancer A and
00:23:30.220metastasizing, it going here, it going there, people giving us shelf lives, and them time and
00:23:36.740time and time again, beating it. And I read these and they're like, you should try this,
00:23:43.440you should call here. It was this network, not just of well wishes and good energy, which I love,
00:23:51.620but it was a network of information. And I think information on the internet
00:23:57.960can be overwhelming and doomsday and all of those things. And you don't know what to pull
00:24:04.300and what not to pull and what has validity and what doesn't have validity. But I know somebody's
00:24:09.260story. I can listen to somebody's story about what they went through, what cancer they had.
00:24:17.360Now, do I think they all apply? Of course not. Of course not. I'm not that easily lifted. But
00:24:25.360what I was lifted by was this. Time and time again, they were given a shelf life. Time and
00:24:30.340time again, they were given limits. And they broke them. They were told two years, they lived seven.
00:24:37.460They were told five years, they lived 15. There were still people fighting years and years and
00:24:42.120years later. And how did they do it? They did it because they didn't listen to that diagnosis.
00:24:48.400I also got therapies I'd never thought about. So therapies now that I can bring to my oncologist, therapies like this directed radiation thing. There's an acronym, CBRT, something like that. I'm sure you guys will correct me. And this is relatively new and it's directed radiation right at the tumor itself.
00:25:15.520and i read this and i read a little bit of the parameters around it it works well on primary
00:25:21.960cancer and metastasized cancer so both forms and i and i listened to this and i and i read this and
00:25:29.200i i was energized and i and i all of a sudden realized how dare i let the opinions of a
00:25:41.520handful of doctors who, by the way, I respect doctors. I grew up in a hospital.
00:25:49.840I took my first steps to my mom's head nurse. I spent most of my New Year's in one of those
00:25:57.000comfy chairs in hospitals with another nurse's daughter because they were both single parents.
00:26:02.920I grew up, I feel very safe in hospitals. But the one thing I think that I was lacking
00:26:10.500isn't this idea where you question everything and you throw it all out, the baby out with the
00:26:16.680bathwater, that whole horrible, that's a horrible metaphor, by the way, or analogy, baby out with the
00:26:22.200bathwater. But what I am saying is this, because I grew up in and with such high reverence and
00:26:30.540respect, when somebody says to me wearing one of those nice coats, this is the, this is the time
00:26:35.860allotted. I believe them. I did. I believe them. I go, oh, well, they have all of this training
00:26:45.860and all of this. I believe them. And what I've come to understand, and as you get older, I think
00:26:53.620you, and if you're listening, you understand that just because they're wearing that jacket
00:26:58.920doesn't really doesn't make them an expert like not an expert in my mom right they have a general
00:27:07.920idea and they again all the education all the respect in the world they don't know everything
00:27:13.280they're not all powerful in all knowing they just aren't and the more stories I heard the more I
00:27:19.920realized how true that was and how I've always wanted a doctor and I've always respected doctors
00:27:25.860that said, this is my best idea. This is not, this is not the only idea. And I've really come
00:27:36.000to respect doctors more and more that can do that. Because at the end of the day, they know
00:27:42.180that they have, you know, limited information. Like my mom and all the different things. It's
00:27:49.200like she has seven different doctors taking care of seven different body parts. Who's taking care1.00
00:27:53.520the whole picture. Nobody. Nobody really. I'm counting on you to know her lungs, you to know
00:28:00.960her kidneys, you to know her lymphatic system, you to know about her thrombosis clinic stuff,
00:28:06.560which is all about blood thinners and stuff like that. Look, all of you, and then you can give me
00:28:11.120the information and somehow I'm going to compete. Who's in charge of all of it? And then, and then
00:28:18.320who's in charge of the human spirit i know that that sounds like you know kind of cheesy a little
00:28:24.720bit especially coming from me and i'm not talking religion and i'm not talking so i'm not talking
00:28:31.120any of i am talking about our sheer willpower and ability to bring things into existence that we
00:28:42.400deem vital that positivity that is and everybody says it a positive attitude right everybody says
00:28:49.520it but everybody underplays that because your mentality and your your belief system and what
00:28:56.720you think going in really does shape what you have getting out and that happens in so many
00:29:01.760different ways but especially when it comes to your health so i listened i listened to that
00:29:08.880i really did and and these the social media people slam on social media0.72
00:29:14.560for all sorts of reasons nah to hell with that to hell with that guys i put out this panic and this0.74
00:29:21.760fear and this desperation when i go you want to know what i got back i got love back and i got0.95
00:29:29.520so many options and i got my spirit back i i know you guys are gonna be like 20 sound ridiculous
00:29:37.360spirit. What are you talking about? But I'm telling you, it was the most powerful thing.
00:29:43.760So I do that TikTok and then I get on to a live. Day after, kind of decompressed,
00:29:52.460pulled it together a little bit. And I started listening to people's stories on lives.
00:29:57.280And then who comes on my live? Rosie O'Donnell. Rosie O'Donnell pops on as a guest. If you guys
00:30:02.840have ever seen that, I immediately cry. I don't know. There's something maternal about her that
00:30:07.160makes me cry. She's very caretaking, right? And she gets on and she doesn't try to fix anything.
00:30:16.140She just listens. She's been through a lot herself. And if you know her story,
00:30:20.580you know exactly what I'm talking about. And she says a few things. She goes,
00:30:27.060there's no finality. No doctor has that final anything, period. So don't you dare succumb to
00:30:34.580that, number one. Number two, I know some people at Sloan Kettering. I know doctors. I'm going to
00:30:43.000give you their number. And when you need that second opinion or you need to go somewhere because
00:30:47.780this isn't good enough, I'm going to give you that connection. And number three, and this is
00:30:55.740an important one. I'll try to articulate the best I can. Sometimes, all the time actually,
00:31:04.580We need to find a way to talk about death and about losing people we love and about the limits on our mortality and our lives and figure out a way to live with that knowledge, not in denial of it.
00:31:25.100We live in such denial of it. Me too. Me, 100%. Not going to happen. Not going to happen. Such denial of it.
00:31:32.320and accepting our mortality doesn't mean you're accepting those parameters that's not what she
00:31:37.440was talking about she was simply saying we all get to be in this space and i'm paraphrasing we
00:31:44.600all get to be in this space with people that we love and it's up to us to utilize that space
00:31:50.700to our best possible potential we're all in rooms with people don't you dare waste a minute of it
00:31:58.620And don't you dare think that by being with somebody at the end of that life is any less important or any less powerful or sometimes enjoyable, right?
00:32:12.020You're going to have moments of greatness in that time, even if there is an end.
00:32:16.780And by the way, there's always an end.
00:32:20.320We just don't know when it's going to happen.
00:32:22.220you know i talked to my mom about all of these and i showed her all of these messages and we
00:32:28.860we talked about different treatments we talked about sloan kettering we talked about rosie
00:32:32.660all of this stuff and i saw her energized does it change it i don't know i don't know
00:32:39.860but i'll tell you what it's this kind of energy that is powerful that is a better way to live
00:32:49.780even if you know one day you're going to die because we all are.
00:36:06.380So my mom and I are going to shop. We do that well. My mom and I are going to reminisce. We are going to record these books, which I always wanted to do in order to make sure I get as much perspective as I possibly can.
00:36:22.940at Christmas we are going to have family over we are going to go see family in order to
00:36:28.780build out the stories and build out this amazing thing that's gotten to be my life and our lives
00:36:35.620and we're going to do it all um together and it's and it's already been powerful it's already been
00:36:43.440funny now initially I thought about it as a book right and Rosie said something to me
00:36:49.620that I'm not going to forget even though it makes me feel wildly uncomfortable because I can do this
00:36:57.760here with you all because I know you're listening you're going driving to work or maybe you're
00:37:02.660watching me on YouTube or whatever it is you're doing but there's some distance here I don't have
00:37:07.500to look you in the eye and she said that's not just a book that's a one-woman show that's a
00:37:17.100That's a life-encapsulating, poignant, giving this amazing perspective into who I am, why I am.
00:37:30.220But maybe, maybe, and this is what I hope for, it resonates for others.
00:37:37.660I told this whole story, A, to get it off my chest and to talk about people advocating and living life and all of those things.
00:37:44.860whatever it is you can pull out of this pot. I don't know what you're going to pull out.
00:37:48.480Sometimes it's just a train of thought. Again, you get my $150. But I think when the more that
00:37:54.660we listen to people's stories, and I'm a history teacher at heart, the more we understand people,
00:38:01.260the more we understand what our potential can be. Because we're not limiting it just to what
00:38:09.660we envision anymore. Our brains have so much power, right? We have so much power to go out.
00:38:16.500And I honestly believe that sometimes the only thing that limits what we can do,
00:38:24.520how we can heal, what kind of power we have isn't anybody external. It's everything in here. It's
00:38:31.520everything that's in our head. It's everything we've told us. And I think for the most of my
00:38:35.760life, ironically, I've lived in a box, even though my haircuts like this, and, you know, whatever.
00:38:43.800But I've lived in a box. I've lived in a box of you go to school, you get educated, you get a
00:38:47.700good job, you take care of your family, you do get a house, you get a right drive, right? That
00:38:52.960kind of box, never, never rolling, never taking a big risk. I was always terrified of this kind
00:38:59.580of thing, terrified of acting, terrified of all that stuff, because I was insecure.
00:39:03.120and you know a divorce COVID your mom getting cancer has a way of really knocking the insecurity
00:39:14.220right on its and maybe I'm still insecure right maybe I don't know if I can do it but I'll be
00:39:20.520damned if I'm not going to try now I'll be damned if I'm just going to give in because it gives you
00:39:26.200this perspective that you've, I've never had. I've never had. And I think that's so incredibly0.99
00:39:35.700important. It's empowering as much as it is devastating. So I think, I don't know. I mean,
00:39:46.800this was a big podcast, right? I think, I think my bottom line here, if I had a bottom line,
00:39:53.840which i rarely do because i you know i can ramble is this idea is this concept
00:40:03.600that in your mind you know more than you think you do you have more power than you think you have
00:40:11.040don't let anything external anything limit who you can become how you can become it
00:40:20.400don't let it limit what the potential is and that doesn't matter if it's a guy in a white suit
00:40:28.300doctors teachers bosses at work family members partners that are don't let anything like that
00:40:40.720limit you take a look at the big picture advocate when you have that feeling in your gut
00:40:49.120But advocate, whether it's for you, whether it's for a person going through a hard time, whether it's for a family member that's fighting literally for their lives.
00:41:06.660Understand that all of that experience is power.
00:41:11.020Sometimes it's crappy, hard power, but it's power.
00:41:14.280you know and and my mom and i can can look at all of this and um i will be with her