A different shaped heart conversations about disability awareness
Welcome to A different shaped heart conversations about being awesome with a disability and raising awareness at the same time and absolutely Yes sometimes you have to say F…..CK you to your own mindset and especially your disability!
A different shaped heart conversations about disability awareness
From Ski Slopes To Storytelling: How A 28-Year Friendship Built A Podcast
A tech hiccup tries to shut us down, and we answer with the story that started everything: two friends who met at Challenge Aspen, found a shared language on the mountain, and built a creative life that refuses to shrink to fit. The real co-host finally steps into the spotlight as we trace the arc from a purple walker on a snowy day to a 28-year friendship that powers books, interviews, and a podcast that became much more than a side project.
We talk about what Challenge Aspen does so well—adaptive skiing, year-round access, and a culture that treats disability as a reason to participate, not opt out. That space shaped how we work today: clear communication, calculated risk, and celebrating small wins that add up to big momentum. You’ll hear how a single book release led to microphones, an unexpected full-time gig, and a co-creator who moved from assistant to on-air partner to author. The theme beneath it all is practical resilience: start where you are, build community, and let feedback guide the next step.
We also go candid on health. Corticosteroid injections are on deck to calm hip and leg pain, with sedation to keep CP from complicating the procedure. We unpack the reality of C diff and why a fecal microbiota transplant might be the exit ramp after brutal rounds of antibiotics. There’s straightforward talk about Botox for spasticity, nerve blocks, and the admin slog of joint consultations, plus the mindset that keeps us steady: advocate clearly, escalate care in sequence, and rest without quitting. If you’re navigating disability, chronic illness, or just a hard season, you’ll find tools you can use and a friendship that models staying power.
If this story moves you, tap follow, share it with a friend who needs courage today, and leave a review to help others find the show. Your support keeps this community strong and the conversation going.
There we go. Technical difficulties. You guys always, always Zoom is gonna swallow his foot one day and not let us record. And I thought that was gonna be today, but apparently not. And so and the EOS laughing at me because I said Zoom monsters coming to get us. But basically what we're going to do is I get this question, I don't know, about once once a month, I would say. And that question is who the heck is your co-host? Who the heck is your co-host? Who the heck is the cute Bonnie sitting on the other side? Well, since we have a bunch of new listeners, my co-host is a real life person by the name of Daniel Carter, who I met what twenty. I always get the the years wrong. Help me out here, D Oh, help me out here. Do we met twenty Okay, it's almost twenty-nine years. Twenty-eight. Yeah, it must have been twenty-eight. Well I didn't I I didn't realize that I knew where I met Danielle it would lead to uh everlasting friendship. I met Danielle through a fabulous program, which Danielle is still involved with, and Danielle is still she even has a sweatshirt on to represent it. Okay. That sweatshirt says, since the audience can't say it, Danielle, that sweatshirt says challenge aspen. Challenge Aspen is a year-round program that helps people with all disabilities, from the veterans to the TBIs, tremendous brain injuries, to the people with cerebral palsy, to family members who just want their loved ones active, to I mean, challenge aspen basically is all except the caregiving part. Um which I believe that Challenge Aspen was and is the greatest place on the planet, and that's why I want to go back and ski, because out here, well, out here in Arizona, Phoenix, we don't get snow. And I would have to drive two hours away to Fragstaff to get um adaptive skiing. Yes, that's wonderful, but when you come from the land of spoiled ski mountains, and when you come from one of the top ski resorts in the country, yeah, you don't you don't mess with me. And Danielle is also a phenomenal snowboarder, a phenomenal bi skier, and I'm going to ask her in a couple of seconds here what she likes more, and she'll probably tell you, and I know that answer. But I met Danielle in 95 because we were doing a challenge aspen play camp. Now, the challenge aspen play camp over the years has been um uh one of those things that's evolved, and but we've had members from age five to age geez, how old is Robin? Robin is fifteen nine and Robin has a TBI. Robin is one of the um new participants, but the age um gap the age gap you can say, the ages go from um five to about fifty-nine and so age age doesn't matter, disabilities don't matter. Challenge Aspen seems to make everyone feel equal. And of course, um I met Danielle through challenge asmons through that playground, didn't even realize she had Sam Holy at the time. All I saw this all I th saw was this cute little purple walker, and I loved the cute little purple walker, didn't didn't even realize the young woman in it would become my best friend for life here. Um all I saw was purple walker and didn't even realize she was my tribe, and then we go on separate ways. Danielle lived in Kansas City at the time, and so we go on separate ways, connect on Facebook, surprise, surprise, me being an idiot like I always am uh ask asked Danielle a bunch of questions, and you probably thought, Nan, this person is nuts. This person is absolutely banana because she knows who I am, but yet she doesn't know who I am, and I'm like, yeah, I probably wasn't nuts back. Well yeah, yeah, because um you meet you meet a lot of people that to my credit, you meet a lot of people at week with totally different disabilities. I mean, I am basically local and not local. I mean, I had a friend that um got hit by a bus and landed up in a wheelchair non-Reball, and she was at the original play camp too. Haley was at the original play camp, and then um she passed away from my injuries two years later, I believe. And so it's challenge as been is totally interesting. And fast forward, I said to Danielle, do you want to start a project with me? Well, I didn't realize the project would be my full-time job. Danielle would be my assistant forever and a day, and Daniel would be behind Mike. I thought, okay, fun little side project after I wrote the book. No, the book turned into the book, I win turned into a green monster that now I can't control. Now I'm working on a book about podcasting. And um yeah, Daniel decided to pick up the pen. And Daniel decided to pick up the pen behind me, and then she decided to write a book behind me. And this is a dream little sample pulsing monster that we can't control. Yeah. So basically that's it. Yeah. And I Danielle and I will keep this project going as long as we can. And considering I'm dealing with a injury right now. Injury is going to keep um keep me not away from this because I love it. And so, yeah. And people ask me all the time, how? How do you do it? I d I don't know how I do it. I don't know how I do it. Um, without Daniel. I would be crazy without Daniel. And so and so there we go. And my medical update, a short medical update, well, the long long of the short of it is I'm improving, I'm not going backwards, but um on Friday, uh Friday morning, I find out whether I get to get to have cortical steroids injected into me. Yes, they're knocking me out, so I don't jump when the shot goes into me and CP doesn't get in the way. And cortical steroids will come down whatever going on in my leg. And whatever going on in my hip. I think it's more I believe from day one it's more the hip than leg. But um so God goes stealers, here we come. And yesterday I got a call what is today, Wednesday, Tuesday, I um Wednesday, October 21st. So it would have been Tuesday the 20th. That's what we we called this. I got a call confirming insurance about I have to do a fecal mando transplant. Google that as your own risk, people. I'm not explaining it. It's TMI, basically. TMI. To those of you who didn't know I had C diff, which Google that too. I mean C diff is a bunch of diarrhoea and it's really, really awful. And days and days and days hospitalized. Twice for no three times. Three times for it. And yeah, and I buy strong ass antibiotics. And so now um that's in the works. My um I don't know what's going on with my Botox injections. I w went for Botox injections. They landed helping calming down the spasms, which yay finally. But I don't know which is going to um I don't know what is going on with my Botox injection. My Botox doctor wants me to meet with the specificity doctor to get a nerve block to get a higher dose. So that's all I know, and then they called me this morning um Wednesday, October 21st, and said, Well, you need a meeting with doctor, you both talk doctor before you meet with the asbestos doctor. I said, no. They want to do a joint consultation. And they're like, okay, we'll ask her. And I'm like, yes, this is what she wants to do. I'm following the lead. So twice I've had to fight with doctors, and I've had to fight with osteoporosis doctors who that's in January, and I'm like, really, really, you people can't get it together. I have to be my own medical advocate even though I have help. So there's my um now if the cardical sterilized um work um work that would be amazing to come down the pain. And they also mentioned um sort of like the bone stimulator I have I had for bone growth uh after my back. So I I don't know if you guys realize I had because of my osteoporosis, I had uh um bone stimulator because of osteoporosis and weak bones and rods and all that crap. So uh it's kind of like the stimulator they're talking about is kind of like that, but it desensitizes the body from the pain. So I don't know. So first of all, we're trying to call the code steroids, and then if they don't work, then I'll go for the bigger guns, which is desensitizing the brain from pain. I don't know how that works. Uh yeah, so that's the health update, and that's how I meant Danielle and Yeah, so there you go, but you get to kill two birds with one stone, and I'll be giving a longer health update when Daniel is gone. Solo episode me. And so I'll um be recording another solo episode. I also will have an interview coming out today after I record it, so we'll figure it out. And so I'm gonna let Danielle us out. Thank you for following us you guys. Bye you guys.
