An Army of Normal Folks - Monica Kelsey: I’m Blessed To Have Been Abandoned (Pt 2)

Episode Date: February 4, 2025

After having been abandoned as a baby, Monica Kelsey has gone on to help save the lives of 227 babies! Her nonprofit Safe Haven Baby Boxes offers a compassionate and secure option for mothers in crisis who are unable to care for their newborns.Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/premiumSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey everybody, it's Bill Courtney with An Army of Normal, folks. We continue now with part two of our conversation with Monica Kelsey right after these brief messages from our generous sponsors. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh man, this is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff.

And my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler. Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing. Exactly! Ha ha ha! Oh, that's good. Now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears.

I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is. And now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one. Our brand new season features special guests like Chuck Bryant, Mayim Bialik, Julie Bowen, Sam Sanders, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and lots more. Listen to the Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful.

And I should have seen it coming. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer and philanthropist Julian Lennon. One of the really important things that happened to me in my relationship with photography and the images was that I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world or go anywhere, couldn't or were disabled and couldn't travel the world or go anywhere. And what they had all said to me is that you bring these stories to us, you bring the truth, you bring life to us of cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about. Photography really does allow me to do that. Have empathy for people on the

other side of the world that you'll never ever meet but you'll at least have some understanding of what their life is and what they went through or are still going through. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast,

Minnie Questions. Over the years, we've had some incredible guests. People like Courtney Cox, star of the infinitely beloved sitcom Friends, EGOT winner Viola Davis and former Prime Minister of the UK, Tony Blair. And now, Mini Questions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests our seven questions, including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe, and Cord Jefferson. Each episode is a new person's story with new lessons, new memories, and new connections to show us how we're both similar and unique. Listen to mini questions on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Seven questions, limitless answers. How serious is youth vaping? Irreversible lung damage serious, one in 10 kids vape serious, which warrants a serious conversation from a serious parental figure like yourself. Not the seriously know-it-all sports dad, or the seriously smart podcaster.

It requires a serious conversation that is best had by you. No, seriously. The best person to talk to your child about vaping is you. To start the conversation, visit TalkAboutVaping.org, brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council. So you're sitting down with your family. Okay. Yeah.

See, he's getting us off the squirrel path. See, that's why you're here, right? He needs to shut up. This is my show. I got a mic now. So yeah, so we sat down as a family and I said, we either tell everyone or we tell no one. There's no in between here.

We can't do this half basically and And so my my son was like well if we can just save a life Why wouldn't we do it and so interesting enough, and I'm sure you know this Since you watched you know me He my son who said that was the one that was attacked the most. Your son that said what specifically? He was saying, you know, if you're going to go out there and do this, and if it saves one child's life

by you talking and telling your story, then why wouldn't we do it? You know, he's kind of like me though too. He's got a big mouth, like really big mouth. You know, I'm sure that's not a surprise to you. But out of all three of my kids, he is the one that will be the most voiceful. And so he, and this is another story for another podcast,

but my son actually went to prison and we were literally just attacked and he made the worst decision of his life and it cost him his best friend's life. And so, but that's another story. But what me going back is he was the one that stood up and he was the one that took the blunt of it and he's still taking the blunt of it today.

He's a pretty good kid though. He's a pretty good kid. So then after I decided to start talking about it and going public with this story, I found myself in South Africa on a speaking tour. Okay. Am I too far ahead? That's a jump. Okay. First of all, let me go back. First of all. I read that your son as a teenager

rolled a Jeep and his best friend passed. And. And I was the medic on that run. Holy crap, I didn't get that part. Yeah. You showed up to your own son's wreck. I was halfway to the scene and I had no idea who it was. And then I got the call.

And then I knew it was my son and his best friend and one was dead and one was alive. And I didn't know which one was which. And then I got there and and then I knew it was my son and his best friend and one was dead and one was alive and I didn't know which one was which. And then I got there and I seen my son doing chest compressions on Casey and then I worked Casey in the field for 18 minutes. Casey's his best friend. I worked Casey in the field for 18 minutes.

I couldn't save him. And I think that's one of the things that I think haunts me the most is as a medic, this is your worst fear and as a mom, this is your worst fear. And as a mom, this is your worst nightmare that's happening right in front of you because we loved Casey. And they just made a really bad choice. They were at a high school graduation party where the homeowner bought booze.

And they decided to do donuts in a 19-acre field, being stupid. And this Jeep flipped and killed Casey. And so after we called time of death of Casey, I had to walk over to my son and say, what have you done? Like, what did you do? Little did I know the extent of what had happened, but he was legally drunk. He was, his blood alcohol is 0.085. And they handcuffed him and put him in a cop car and took him to the hospital for a blood draw. And that became the nightmare. Now, this is not to jump ahead, but this was 30 days after I launched Baby Boxes in America

when all hell was breaking loose on people wanting to shut my boxes down. My son is in this accident in case he dies. And so literally, our family was just put into the position of sink or swim. There was no middle ground for us at that point. And I mean, this was, you know, I put this in my book also

because this is part of the story now. This is part of the story. This is how the devil will attack you when you're trying to do good things. And not saying that my son doesn't take responsibility because he does, he actually pled guilty. He didn't fight it, he didn't go to trial. And he stood in front of the judge on sentencing day and and

Said, you know, I'm not gonna say that I didn't do something that I did because what you're accusing me of doing I did and I'm here to get my sentence and Casey deserves me for me to be honest and so the judge sentenced him to four years in the Department of Corrections and As the mayor's son, you know, you you can see the media just tearing us apart And you know drunken, you know kid mayor's son, you know, you, you can see the media just tearing us apart. Uh, and you know, drunken, you know, kid mayor's son kills best friend and drunk in accident. It was just a hard race for kids. And Lisa and I tried to raise them right. And there is no doubt in my mind that every single one of them have done a really stupid thing in a vehicle after being around alcohol. So before anybody starts throwing stones at you,

they need to think about how the challenges that they had with their own children. Well, you can raise them inside the house, but when they walk out that door, they're on their own. They're going to make their own decisions. Hopefully you've impacted them in a way that they think logically and they think ahead instead of in the moment. My son and Casey didn't, they thought in the moment. Something I've been quoted as saying is that football doesn't build character. It reveals it. And what that means is tough times don't, a lot of people say, Oh, if it doesn't kill you to make you stronger, it builds character. I think that's crap.

I think the foundation and basis of the way you raise your children build character and then the tough times when those occur, that is the opportunity that reveals that character or lack of it. The fact that your son stood up in front of a judge and said what he said, that not the wreck itself indicates that not the wreck itself indicates what he's made of. And I think people should get their arms around the truth about that. And they should also, especially every parent that's had a kid that's been 16 or older,

should get their arms around the truth about what 95% of the kids in this country do, which is stupid crap. It's just most of them, by the grace of God away with it and your son didn't know he didn't and neither to Casey No, those boys weren't lucky that night So You've got this ball of stuff going on but before that South Africa yeah, so South Africa is where I see the very first baby safe.

And we were speaking at a church. And as I'm walking in, there's this box on the side of the wall, it looked like a mailbox. And it said baby safe on it. And I was like, well, what is this and what is it used for? And they said, baby safe? Safe.

Like a safe. You put money in. Yeah. Baby bank. I'm kidding. Okay. Whatever. Baby piggy bank, I don't know.

Go ahead. But I was like, what is this and what is it used for? And they said, well, women bring their babies here at night when they can't care for them or they don't want them. And they place them in this box and the box calls the pastor and then someone from the church adopts them. And I'm like, shut the front door. Like really, does this actually work?

Is this being used? And they had saved seven babies that year. And so I couldn't get this out of my head and You know you always say that there's an aha moment in your life where you just it defines you and this is the moment That defined me was standing at this box and so on the flight back from Cape Town South Africa on a Delta napkin I hand drew my version of the baby box when you heard that story. Did it get personal to you? Oh, yeah, yeah that Tied back to the first 15 minutes of our conversation, it had to hit you right in your gut because of you.

Well, it gave me purpose. I think this kind of goes back to the worth issue. This was 2012, I think, was when I was there, 2013. I was still trying to figure it out. I was still trying to find my worth and I hadn't quite got there yet But it was like at that moment. I could see purpose and so when I got back to the United States I Went to a builder in Fort Wayne, Indiana and said here, you know

Here's my Delta napkin that I wrote my drew my little baby box on Yeah, oh man, I had it all. Three quarters of my company is built off that Delta napkin, literally on this Delta napkin. And so I go to this builder and I said I want you to build me a baby box. And he's like a what? And I'm like a baby box. And he's like, what's a baby box?

And I said, I'm going to put him in fire stations. I'm going to save babies. He thought I was crazy. He's like, well, you know, for 700 bucks, I'll build you whatever you want. And so I wrote a check from my husband's account and walked out of there like a boss. And so, you know, two weeks later, I had this. Honey, you're spending 700 bucks on a baby box. Yes, dear.

And so I walked out of there and two weeks later, I had this very basic box that I had hand drawn and with no electronics in it for seven hours. It was literally the shell. There was nothing else with it. It was a shell. And so then I went to a legislator and I said, Hey, I want you to build me a baby or I want you to pass me a baby box bill. And he says, a what? And I said a baby box bill. And he says, well, do you have model legislation? And I'm like, dude, we will be the model legislation. This has never been done in America before. And he's like, you got to help me out here because I have no idea what you're even talking about.

And so the more I started talking about babies being dumped in our country, every three days in America, a baby is left somewhere. Say that again. Every three days in America, a baby is being left somewhere. What does left mean? In a dumpster, in a trash can alongside a highway, in a shoe box under a bed. That's left. These babies are meant to die. And so knowing that, I started talking to this legislator and saying, if we could save one of those three. Every three days in this country, in the United States of America a baby is tossed out yep, and

We're not talking about left at a police station or a fire state right now or not. We're not talking about that We're talking about thrown away dumped That is horrifying yeah, and you know I mean I could give you statistics on states do it Texas is the worst in the country last year they had 33 abandoned babies. Okay, let's let's it ties back to and again, please, like you said, just data. I'm not I'm not making a social value judgment or political statement when I say this

but I would assume that abandoned babies happen more in states that are harder on abortion than others because they can't be aborted that would be the assumption yeah that's not so I'm teeing it up for you so so Texas actually has been consistently the worst state in America for 15 years. This is no secret with the data. The other states that are horrible with abandonment is New Mexico, which has abortion up until the day of delivery, California again, New York again, and Illinois. Those are your top states for infant abandonment across this country.

So the one state that has a huge restriction on abortion is Texas, you know, but the other four states don't. So you can't make a correlation. No. And that's one of the things, you know, abandoned babies were happening before Roe v. Wade was overturned. This was no secret. It's just now people are trying to tie it together because the justice and the Supreme

Court mentioned safe haven when they were talking about overturning Roe v. Wade and so now they're connecting those two which is harder on us because we're just getting we're just wanting women to keep their babies safe you know and we're dealing with babies after they're born we're not dealing with babies in their first trimester babies in their second trimester women don't call us for prenatal care they call us when they're they've given birth they have a baby in their arms they don't know what to do with, baby's a couple of hours old, or they're in labor and want to know

what they need to do, and those are the women that we handle. Now, if a woman calls us in the first trimester of pregnancy, we're going to refer her to a location in her area that deals with that. That's not our wheelhouse. You're dealing with trying to keep these one out of every three babies in the United States from being left on the side of the road or thrown in a freaking dumpster. I think I already used the word, but to me, I can't think. It's horrifying to me that somebody would be so desperate to do that. And you're just trying to give that desperate woman an alternative to the trash bin.

We are giving women an alternative that does not include the death of their child. I'll support any option that you choose, as long as it does not include the death of their child. But remember, we're in labor or we've just given birth. And if they want to kill their child after the, I mean, we're going to have a huge issue there. So as long as they choose an option that does not involve the death of their child at that at that moment in time, we will support anything, a parenting plan, an adoption plan, walking

into a fire station and handing the child to a person if they don't want to use our baby box. Those are all good options because it doesn't include the death of their child and they're getting to choose what they want to do. So we try to stay out of the abortion debate, although we still get brought back into it. Plus my story doesn't help that. And I can't change that.

I can't change the fact that I am an adoption advocate that is against abortion. I just, I can't change that. But I try not to bring it into the talk of abandonment Because it really doesn't have anything to do with that when you look at the data We'll be right back Something about Mary Poppins something about Mary Poppins exactly Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh man, this is fun.

I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler. Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing. Exactly. Oh, French dressing. Exactly. Ha ha ha!

Oh, that's good. Now, you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is. And now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one.

Our brand new season features special guests like Chuck Bryant, Mayim Bialik, Julie Bowen, Sam Sanders, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and lots more. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful. And I should have seen it coming. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer, and philanthropist Julian Lennon. One of the really important things that happened to me in my relationship with photography and the images was that I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world or go anywhere, couldn't

or were disabled and couldn't travel the world or go anywhere. And what they had all said to me is that you bring these stories to us, you bring the truth, you bring life to us of cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about. Photography really does allow me to do that. Have empathy for people on the other side of the world that you'll never ever meet but you'll at least have some understanding of what their life is and what they went through or are still going through. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeart Radio app, Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast, Minnie Questions. Over the years, we've had some incredible guests. People like Courtney Cox, star of the infinitely beloved sitcom Friends, EGOT winner Viola Davis and former Prime Minister of the UK Tony Blair. And now Mini Questions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests our seven questions including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe and Cord Jefferson. Each episode is a new person's story with new lessons, new memories and new

connections to show us how we're both similar and unique. Listen to Mini Questions on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Seven questions, limitless answers. How serious is youth vaping? Irreversible lung damage serious, one in 10 kids vape serious, which warrants a serious conversation from a serious parental figure like yourself. Not the seriously know-it-all sports dad

or the seriously smart podcaster. It requires a serious conversation that is best had by you no seriously the best person to talk to your child about vaping is you to start the conversation visit talk about vaping org brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council So, I know I've seen like news reports of babies being found wrapped in blankets and shoe boxes at a Goodwill before and then they go and rest the mom. Yep.

How does all that work? They should be arrested if they're going to place their child in an unsafe place. Okay. Okay. So a Goodwill box is not a safe place. I get it, but so, I'm trying to get to, does that make your baby boxes not only allow them an alternative for their baby to live but also offer them a legal alternative for themselves exactly what it does

Well, tell us about that So when a mother chooses one of our safe haven baby boxes Not only is she saving the life of her child But she is saving herself from a life of prison time if she throws this baby in a dumpster You can go to YouTube right now just type in the worst case that's out there right now is if you just type in Abandoned baby Hobbs, New Mexico You will see this baby literally being tossed in the dumpster by a girl that was found and arrested a video, a video that was on CCTV. This, this parent did not realize that there

was a camera by this dumpster. And so you see this 18 year old girl just chucking this baby in this dumpster. This baby was there for six hours in this dumpster found by dumpster divers. And so this baby lived Lived after being in a dumpster for six hours. How old two days one day a couple of hours old. Oh my god Yeah, I think in that case the Placenta was still attached. Are you kidding me? And so so just just Google it you'll see all these stories that come up That's one of the ones that I teach on when I go in and I train firefighters. This is one of the videos I show Are you kidding me? No. And so just Google it. You'll see all these stories that come up. That's one of the ones that I teach on when I go in and I train firefighters.

This is one of the videos I show. People have to be just... I don't want to watch that. You got to know the reality though. I know. For a fireman, I'm just saying people have to be just awestruck when they Watch that and then find out the things you just told me I'm awestruck sitting there hearing it Well, so firefighters think about this. So a firefighter finds a baby in a dumpster. That's dead

That will live with them for the rest of their life 100% no question. No question about it rest of their life. 100%. No question about it. But if a baby is placed in a safe place, a baby box, and that same firefighter pulls that baby from the box knowing that that mother did everything possible to keep this child safe, the trauma is less on the firefighter, less on the mother, less on the child. So you have a win there. Now, is surrendering a baby in a box without pain? No, there's pain involved and the birth mother bears the blunt of it. But we have to respect that this is what she's chosen. I didn't choose it for her. You didn't choose it for her. She chose it herself. And

if we're saying that they don't have options, then we haven't looked far enough. These women are intelligent as we talked about earlier. They're smart. They have smartphones. They can at the click of a couple buttons, they can find out everything they need to know about what resources are in their area. And so saying that they're not smart enough to find that is actually kind of demeaning to these parents that do choose a Safe Haven baby box,

because they are basically saying, I want what's best for my child and it's not me. And that's heroic. So the legislature says, I don't even know what you're talking about, but okay not me. And that's heroic. So the legislature says, I don't even know what you're talking about, but okay. Yep. And? And so, uh, we passed the very first baby box bill in Indiana in 2015. Then it was government, a governor, Mike Pence, who became president under Donald Trump. The last time, uh, he signed the very first baby box

bill into existence. And what that did was make protocols, policies, and procedures, the problem, um, for procedures the problem for the health department and the child services to do for me. So I wanted their help. I wanted them to say, hey, here's your policies and procedures. You need to follow these. I wanted their help. I wanted to work with them.

And so they came back in like six months later with a letter that said, well, your legislation said that you wanted us to recommend protocols, policies, and procedures. We don't recommend baby boxes, so we're not recommending any protocols, policies. This is literally the letter, and it's out there, you can get it online. And so we sent back, this legislator sent back and said,

well, that's not what we ask you to do. We ask you to put these things in place. And so they didn't do it. And so knowing who I am, and me being a little spit of fire, I hired a prick of a lawyer in Indiana. I needed, I needed. You hired the butthole. I hired the guy that I knew that was going to fight for me and didn't matter what was standing in his way. And-

The Aaron Brockovich of Indiana apparently. what was standing in his way. And- The Aaron Brockovich of Indiana apparently. Jim Bopp. He's actually the attorney for the national rights of life organization. So he's in the realm of fighting with, you know, controversial things.

But anyways, so I contacted him and I said, Hey Jim, is there anything in the law that says that I can't put these in? And he says, let me get back to you on that. A couple of days later, he goes, Monica, there's nothing that says you can, but there's nothing that says you can't put these in. And he says, let me get back to you on that. A couple days later, he goes, Michael, there's nothing that says you can, but there's nothing that says you can't. So you're in this gray area.

And he says, I don't recommend that you do it. And I'm like, but there's nothing saying I can't. And he says, no, there's nothing saying you can't. And I said, cool, thanks, appreciate it. Peace out, Jim Bob. Hang up that phone. I'm like, hey babe, can we put a box in our fire station in Woodburn since you're the mayor? Oh, your husband.

He's like, yeah, let's do it. I mean, that's not really how the conversation went. But I launched at my fire station in Woodburn. Did he fight you at first? My husband? Yeah. Shit, no. Are you kidding?

If he wanted to sleep with his wife at night, he was not going to say no to this. There was no way. He didn't at least say, are you sure you want me to do this? Nope. No, it was, we're going to do it. Yeah, we're going to do it. But you know what? It takes a, what do you have him doing now? Washing the winter bag on walking the dog. What's going on with the mayor? Where is he? What's he doing?

What do you have him doing? Changing the tires? He's probably now whatever he's well told is probably the answer to that. Go ahead, Monica. So you get so that so the mayor says, yes, dear, we're going to put a baby box in our local fire station. And so I launched at my fire station five days after my birthday in April of 2016. And two days later, then we launched in another fire station that had had five abandoned babies in a seven year period.

They knew the risk. They knew what was going on that we hadn't got protocols. Tell us functionally how these things work. Because I imagined when I first heard baby boxes, I imagined a wooden box on the front doorstep. It is so much not that it is this is kind of a technologically advanced safe haven alarm ringing thing. So we need people to understand as they're listening to this baby box, which like put a baby in a box,

but explain the technology and how it actually works. So the box we use technology and technology is at our fingertips. And so basically the box calls 911 on its own. And what we do is we call it a hole out of the side of a firehouse. And I say, we, it's not me, it's a contractor, a licensed contractor. And basically it's like cutting a window out of the side of the wall. So the outside of the baby box is on the outside of the building and the inside is on the inside

of the firehouse. And it's almost like another door into the firehouse for someone, an infant. Almost feels like the pass through when you do the drive through pharmacy, just bigger. Are you bringing up pharmacy? Oh my gosh. But yes, yes. That kind of idea because half of it's outside, half of it's inside. Except it doesn't roll out and roll back.

I get it. But anyway, so mom opens this outside door and an immediate 911 call goes out. She doesn't have to do anything but open the door. Just open the latch. And then when she places this baby inside, now it's climate controlled on the inside or temperature regulated, that's the technical term. And she places this baby in a medical bassinet that's in the NICUs.

So this baby is contained in this medical bassinet. So it's a box, but the baby's not thrown in a cardboard box. It's actually a- Medical bassinet. Got it. And so, and then when she, and it's now box, but the baby's not thrown in a cardboard box. It's actually a medical bassinet. And so, um, and then when she, and it's, it's now at this point, two alarms have been triggered that have called nine one one and they're not connected to each other, which is important because that's a safety feature of the box.

So if the first alarm fails for whatever reason, the second one would still pick up cause it's not connected to the first one. And then once she shuts the door, the door locks, no one can get in it. And that's a safety feature because if someone was watching from across the street, we don't want them coming and taking this in. Snagging the baby. Yeah.

And so the babies are in these boxes for the average time is two minutes. Some places are a little bit faster. Is there an alarm inside the fire department so the firemen inside know what's going on? So yeah, so there's one inside, but if they're gone, we have to have something else. And so the 911 system, and this is where I think Christ the firemen inside know what's going on? So yeah, so there's one inside, but if they're gone, we have to have something else.

And so the 911 system, and this is where I think Christ really, I mean, my life has been set up from the get go because I lived in fire stations. I know them, I know the 911 system. And so for me to be able to make a box that uses that technology was critical. And so the box is gonna call 911 whether they're in the building or not.

Either way, it's calling 911. 911 is gonna know. And so if they're in the building, they're already gonna have the alarm prior to 911 getting it. If they're not in the building, they're gonna have to come back or police officers in the area

are gonna come and retrieve this infant. Or if it's a volunteer fire station, anybody close is gonna come take this child and pull it out of this box. The longest time a baby's ever been in our box is four minutes and 20 seconds. And so you look at that time, the five minutes, we'll just say five minutes or less versus six hours in Hobbs, New Mexico dumpster. Think about that. Six hours in a dumpster versus five minutes in a baby box.

Or let's not even use the worst case scenario of the Hobbs dumpster. If there's one every three days in the United States, at the very least, it's at 30 minutes to a couple of hours or somebody finds them or they just die and they're found as a corpse somewhere. OK, so that brings up a good point, because in Chicago, two years ago, it was January, there was a fire station in downtown Chicago. That's cold. It's very cold in Chicago, especially in January.

That's what I mean. But this fire station, it said Chicago Fire up above, you know, blah, blah, blah. In the side door, the side exterior door had a sign above that said safe haven location. Regular folks would know that this was a firehouse. Firefighters would know this isn't a firehouse, this is where they do their maintenance on their vehicles.

Oh no. And so this parent comes to this baby, this fire station in the middle of the night, or first thing in the morning, nobody really knows, either knocks on the door or doesn't knock on the door, rings the doorbell, doesn't, nobody's there. Nobody lives there because this is where they do the maintenance in their fire station. And so firefighters come in

the next morning at 5 a.m. and there's this blue duffel bag beside the door. And so they're out shoveling snow in January. They unzip it and there is this baby that is frozen to death. Now, this baby was not taken there dead. Why would a woman take a baby to a fire station and leave a dead newborn and leave it there? The woman probably thought she was leaving it for a fireman to live. To find, yeah. And this baby died. And so there's other circumstances for these, you know, these boxes to be important. And that's one, if they're not there. We don't want a baby on the ground. We don't want a baby sitting there

because how many women, so say this fire station is out on a fire. How many fire stations is she gonna go to until she finds someone? One. Yeah. The first one, she's already scared to death. Exactly. And no mother, especially young mother in this situation

is going to trust going to a police department because they're going to worry they're going to get in trouble. So they're not going to go to the cops and firemen are much more trusted than the police are just socially anyway. So it all makes sense from that perspective. I think. Yeah. Well in hospitals, hospitals are also safe haven locations. Every hospital in America is a safe haven location and so you can walk into a hospital and hand your child to a person. And walk away. Yeah but you think you're on camera? Of course you're on camera. You know they're gonna ask you a ton of questions. You can't just walk in there hand the child and turn around walk away. That's the law but do you really think that's reality? No they're gonna say

wait a minute what are you doing? Hang on a second. Don't leave yet. I need to get some information. We need to call a counselor. We need to call security. We need to call these people. And then all of a sudden, you're off alone. Yeah, they don't want to make a mess of a situation or a mistake. And so they're like not letting these women leave.

And this is the calls that we're getting. We actually had a firehouse in New York City. Hold a woman, would not let her leave. We were trying to get her to surrender at the fire station. She called us. We wanted her to go to a hospital, but that's a whole nother story. And so she gets to this fire station and we even told her, do you want us to stay on the phone? Nope, nope. And so she goes to this fire station, she calls us back, she goes, they're not letting me leave. And I said, who's not letting you

leave? She said, firefighters, they're calling somebody to come. And I said, who's not letting you leave? She says, the firefighters, they're calling somebody to come in. I said, let me talk to them. And so they get on the phone and we're like, what are you doing? Do you even know the safe haven law? And they're like, yeah, she can leave her baby here. I just got to get some information. No you don't. You clearly don't know this law.

And so I fight day and night for these moms to remain anonymous if that's what they choose. Now, if she wanted to give her name, she'd give it. If she wanted to stay, she would stay. Don't force her to. That's why we're finding dead babies in dumpsters and trash cans is because these women don't want to go face to face with these people. They don't want to be asked questions and they certainly don't want to justify their decision. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly.

Oh man, this is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler. Dressing. Dressing. French dressing. Exactly.

Oh, that's good. Now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is. And now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one. Our brand new season features special guests like Chuck Bryant, Mayim Bialik, Julie Bowen,

Sam Sanders, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and lots more. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful. And I should have seen it coming. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer, and philanthropist, Julian Lennon. One of the really important things that happened to me in my relationship with photography and the images

was that I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world or go anywhere, couldn't or were disabled and couldn't travel the world or go anywhere. And what they had all said to me is that you bring these stories to us. You bring the truth, you bring life to us of cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about.

Photography really does allow me to do that. Have empathy for people on the other side of the world that you'll never ever meet, but you'll at least have some understanding of what their life is and what they went through or are still going through. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast, Minnie Questions. Over the years, we've had some incredible guests.

People like Courtney Cox, star of the infinitely beloved sitcom Friends, EGOT winner Viola Davis, and former Prime Minister of the UK, Tony Blair. And now, Minnie Questions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests our seven questions including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe and Cord Jefferson. Each episode is a new person's story with new lessons, new memories and new connections to show us how we're both similar and unique. Listen to Mini Questions on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 7 questions, limitless answers.

How serious is youth vaping? Irreversible lung damage serious, 1 in 10 kids vape serious, which warrants a serious conversation from a serious parental figure like yourself. in the Ad Council. Can I ask a question as I hear you? I think it's important. I want to allow you to speak to this because I don't want any of our listeners to misunderstand this. You're fighting for these babies life. And if defending somebody who's in this position is what you have to do to save the baby's life, you're going to defend those 100%. But it's not about them.

It's about the baby's life. Baby first, mom second. Every time I'm starting to get that talking to you. Baby first mom second. And the reason is because that baby is you. Well yes and no. I mean the law was never enacted to save mom. But what I'm saying is you feel it. Oh I know how they feel yeah. I've been there. I've struggled with worth as we've talked about. I know how important it is for these mothers to have a safe place for their baby because they're going to choose something and we need to make sure that

they're choosing something that's safe. That does not involve the death of their child. Stigma says, when you hear this, well, they're young and stupid and they shouldn't have got pregnant in the first place. So shame on them and too bad for them. Get that all the time. I'm just teeing it up for you.

And you know, we, we all fall short of the glory of God. Every one of us. That a girl. And I was hoping you're gonna say something like that. Yeah. And you know, I mean, this two days two days ago on Tik TOK and we have, you know, between Facebook and Tik TOK, we have 2 million followers. And so I put my opinion out there a lot and I think people respect that,

but there was a girl that was forced to stand up in front of her church and say that she was pregnant. What? Why are we doing this? What wire? Yes, we're in a church, but the church should be surrounding this girl with love, not making her shame, not shaming her in the front of a church. Here's a squirrel for you. Oh, well, I would argue one of the reasons church attendance continues to fall is our church has been its own worst enemy by the notion believe like me or you're going to hell and do like me or we're going to hell and do like

me or we're going to shame you into doing right. That is not really the good news of the Bible. No, no, it's not. And it's stuff like the story you just told that continues to disintegrate the very, what I would argue is a very vital and good work that faith and church can do. But the church seems to be its own worst enemy when it pulls stunts like that. 100%, 100%, yeah.

You know, I mean, I remember going to church when I was young. Wasn't anything like it is now. You know, and maybe it's because I'm older, maybe it's because I understand more. But I seen that the other day and I just went off. And you should see the comments underneath. People are like, that's why I don't go to church.

It's usually I do what you said. Exactly what I'm saying. Yeah. Yep. Yeah, there's a lot of people searching for what their belief is and what their faith is and that are sitting on the fence. And it will take one of those videos for them to say the hell with all

that. Yep. That's a squirrel. That's a squirrel. So but the point is you are fighting for these babies lives and if defending a woman who's even not been the victim of a crime but has just made a really terrible decision or a series of terrible decisions in her life to lead her to a place where she has this four day or four hour old child. You don't care. You will defend her for the sake of the life of that child. She is basically saying I want what's best for my child and it's not me. How could anybody be angry at that?

You can't. You know, we have 17, 16, 15 year old girls that are becoming moms. And we're all praising them. And then three years later, these kids end up in foster care. But yet we're gonna criticize a mother for choosing something more for her child and allowing her own heart

to break. It's not easy putting a baby in a box. It's not easy putting a baby for adoption. You know, I recognize that I've not been there. But I recognize this by talking to these moms. And instead of shaming them or judging them, what we should be doing is lifting them up and saying it's okay, we've got it. We've got it from here. And your baby is going to be okay. So you don't have to live with that trauma the rest of your life too.

Yeah, and you know, every baby that's placed in our box, I go on social media, a lot of times I go down to the location, we do a press conference, and I speak directly to this mother. All those videos are out there, you can see them, but I thank her for keeping her child safe and thank her for trusting me to take it from here. You know, these babies, you know,

when they're put in our box, they're safe. A lot of them, 99% of them are healthy, you know, wrapped up. You know, I just did a video yesterday talking to one of my staff. We had the baby in our box and I always call my staff and say, hey, what are you doing? You know, and people love these videos.

I don't know why, but I think it's because it's raw and it's real. And I told them, I said, this baby, you could tell this baby was loved. This baby was wrapped up pink, warm and dry, cleaned up in a diaper wrapped in a very tight blanket placed in our box. Do you think that was a mother that didn't love this child? No, she did everything possible to keep her child safe. And for us to criticize her or say anything negative about her. Shame on them. I can't help but tell you. And I hope you'll go back and listen

to it. There's an episode from Oh my gosh, probably over a year ago. probably over a year ago. Alex, what's the name of the lady who started the organization, the pictures of the past? Talking about sleep in heaven. No, now I lay me down to sleep. You ever heard of this? Yeah, with the babies that are... Remember, it's photography. The stillborn babies that photographers donate their time to. When I first, when Alex said, hey, we're going to review this thing about these people that take pictures of dead babies.

I mean, when you hear that you think, wait, what? No, I'm not. That's what, until you understand how those pictures of, of, of, of couples who have had, or women who have had stillborn or babies dot birth and that they they they These photographers volunteer their time that these mothers five six seven years later. Those are some of the most cherished possessions Because their baby lived their baby existed even though it's not on the face of the planet, it existed and those pictures support that and it helps them so much to get over their own trauma of having lost a child in birth or stillbirth or whatever.

So once I understood the story after interviewing now I understand what an unbelievably beautiful story it is and how selfless it is of these photographers and how redeeming it is for these parents. And obviously yours and that is a different story. But in that same regard, at the very least these mothers know my child will live, my child will be cared for, and whatever trauma led up, because I can only imagine invariably to get to a point that you're going to leave your baby in one of these boxes, you've experienced some trauma. At the very least, the trauma is not doubled or heaped upon them about the health and welfare

of their child. And that's what you're providing those women as well as what you're providing for the baby. You're exactly right. You know, that which as you were talking, I was thinking of the story of one of the babies that was placed in one of our boxes where when the baby was adopted the adoptive parents contacted us and they said if you know who her mom is will you tell her she's safe and that if she ever wants pictures or letters we'd be happy to send them to her and that was so beautiful for me like i was like wow this is like interesting enough we were still counseling her

birth mom. And this was about a year and a half after the baby was surrendered. And so I talked to our counselor and I said, can we connect them if they both agree? Can we connect the birth mom with the adoptive family? And she says, this is very risky. This is not a good idea. And I said, well, if both people agree, why couldn't we do that?

And against her approval, I did it anyway. I mean, they both agreed. So I was like, you know, I guess this is the right thing to do. And four months ago, they met the adoptive parents and the daughter that she placed in our box met her birth mom. And you know what the relationship that they have now is just so beautiful. I mean there is nothing negative about this.

This birth mom gets to see her daughter grow up from a distance and no one knew she was pregnant. She's still doing this from a distance with no one knowing that she has a daughter. But for her, she's finding peace. And this little girl now will know her story. And so you look at that. That's really brave of the adoptive parents to they can't be left out of that equation. My goodness, what, what phenomenal grace and trust on their part. They're the ones investing in that job. Yeah. Oh, and she's she's just she's a little spark of fire.

Interesting enough, they have now two of our babies, this this adoptive family. And so they've reached out to the other birth mom, she does not want anything to do with with you know, and then that's okay, you know, that's okay But it's because that's second the baby's fine, right? alright, so You start with one box because your husband does what he's told and then you get another box How many boxes we got around the country now? 302 302 baby boxes and fire fire stations literally it's this that encompass every single state in 21 states right

now. I will launch in my 22nd state which will be the state of Montana. Next month, please tell me we have one in Tennessee. Oh, you have 10 in Tennessee. I love that. Do you have one in Memphis? closest one is a toka. Yeah. Well, that's just outside of Memphis. I got one there and that one almost had a baby. We actually got this mom to go into the hospital though and give birth instead of birthing alone and and placing in a box. We'll be right back. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins?

Something about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh man, this is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler. Dressing. Dressing. Oh, The Puzzler. Dressing. Dressing.

Oh, French dressing. Exactly. Oh, that's good. Now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is. And now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun. Let's try this one. Our brand new season features special guests like Chuck Bryant, Mayim Bialik, Julie Bowen, Sam Sanders, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and lots more.

Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful. And I should have seen it coming. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer, and philanthropist Julian Lennon.

One of the really important things that happened to me in my relationship with photography and the images was that I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world or go anywhere, couldn't or were disabled and couldn't travel the world or go anywhere. And what they had all said to me is that you bring these stories to us, you bring the truth, you bring life to us of cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about. Photography really does allow me to do that. Have empathy for people

on the other side of the world that you'll never ever meet, but you'll at least have some understanding of what their life is and what they went through or are still going through. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast, Minnie Questions. Over the years, we've had some incredible guests.

People like Courtney Cox, star of the infinitely beloved sitcom Friends, EGOT winner Viola Davies and former Prime Minister of the UK, Tony Blair. And now Mini Questions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests our seven questions including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe and Cord Jefferson. Each episode is a new person's story with new lessons, new memories and new connections to show us how we're both similar and unique. Listen to mini questions on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

7 questions, limitless answers. How serious is youth vaping? Irreversible lung damage serious, 1 in 10 kids vape serious, which warrants a serious conversation from a serious parental figure like yourself. Not the seriously know-it-all sports dad or the seriously smart podcaster. It requires a serious conversation that is best had by you. No, seriously, the best person to talk to your child about vaping is you.

To start the conversation, visit TalkAboutVaping.org brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council. Alright so now besides these boxes, which if that's not incredible enough, you've alluded to it a little bit, but you've gotten into counseling and what it tell tell us what safe haven baby boxes has become in terms of like an organization now and the other things that you're doing. So there is so much more that happens beyond the box is what we call it. Because the box, the box, the box and beyond the

box. So my new podcast is called Beyond the Box and I'm excited about that. But so what what we do in front of the scenes, everybody gets to see that's the babies being placed in our box, you know, us thanking these parents. What they don't see is yes, we have a counselor that counsels these moms if they want, and they can remain anonymous. They can give a fake name.

That's okay, but they have to do it via Zoom. They can keep their camera off, but they have to do it via Zoom. We will not counsel over texts for obvious reasons. And so we also have gotten mom's medical care. That's important that these babies aren't born in hospitals. We wanna take care of mom too if she'll let us.

Also the adoptions that are happening with our babies. This is not gonna surprise you, but I'm gonna spit a fire when it comes to adoption because our babies aren't for sale. And I know this is gonna probably, your listeners are gonna be like, what the heck is she talking about? as an adoptee My parents paid a hundred dollars now, I know this is 51 years ago. I get that but 51 or 51 years ago

$100 is what my my adoptive parents paid for me Because it wasn't about the cost today these babies are 50, $60,000. We know. We just recently, has that episode released? Yeah. We just- Way to know your own show, buddy.

What's that? Way to know your own podcast, buddy. Smoke Man, you were the producer. What? Both hands with JT Olsen. So they like that is they raise money to help people pay for the adoption. So it's it's based off of James 1 and 27 true and undefiled religion is caring for the widows and the orphans. So the way they raise money for the adoption is by helping an

orphan or by by helping a widow. So what they do is they go in and fix up a widow's house and they get people to go in and fix up a widow's house and they get people to sponsor them doing that. And in fixing up the widow's house, they raise 50 or $60,000 to then give to a family so that they can adopt a child. Rather than just having a golf tournament and people go out and golf.

You should get in touch with them. Well, okay, so. How cool is that? It is awesome, it is awesome. But why are we paying $60,000 for an adoption agency? OK, you and I agree on that. But the reason is, is because you would agree to what's up. You would agree to he would agree to.

He would say it is insane that it costs us much to do a good thing for a needy situation and to take in a child. But adoption agencies have administration there's laws there's attorneys are over litigious society I am NOT saying that the 50 or 60 thousand dollars is appropriate or right I'm just saying as you would say the data says that it is no I in an adoption agency so these people erase that so that people can adopt children and that thing which is cool and I do love that

I do love that and i'm not talking about adoption where a mother chooses an adoption agency and then chooses the parent That's not where my problem lies. I I am all safe haven so the babies that we get if they go to an adoption agency You know We're basically handing this baby to them. So what do you do? Well, so the baby that comes through, say the fire station, goes to the hospital. Most states go through the Department of Child Services. Some states go through adoption agencies.

I'm trying to get the cost of the adoptions for safe haven babies down to minimal because these mothers are trusting me. If they place a baby in our box, they're trusting me to make sure that the process works. And I'm not saying that having a family get a baby and paying that much, that that baby's not gonna end up good.

We have a lot of families that are foster families, that are foster to adopt families, that don't have to pay $50,000, that can do it through foster care. And maybe pay two thousand dollars for the court cost to be this forever family for these these babies and so what we're doing is we're kind of like dividing these people up you have to have so much money in order to adopt which you're kind of hitting that to

where they don't have to have that much money because they're getting that raised and I understand that but then on the flip side the people that don't have the money or they don't have the support of this organization what do they do they're out and they're good families and they would be great families for these babies Yeah And so that's what you know from beyond the box What I try to do is our babies and I say our babies because we work so hard to save them But our babies we want to make sure that

They're not bought and I know that's gonna raise a few flags with some people when I say that But I that's just how I it's almost like that's how you that's how you feel like like If I can pay $2,000 by putting the baby into the foster to adopt program making sure and I know the foster to foster program Is a hell of a mess right now. We've also done plenty shows Yeah, and so I understand that but instead of making more laws and sending These babies to adoption agencies so that adoption agencies can profit off of them Why don't we fix the problem with the foster care system and get these babies into homes that are good homes Where they don't have to pay?

You know, so I do know that it's a double-edged sword I do know that this is a uphill battle for me But that's something that I look at from beyond the box. Maybe it's time double edged sword. I do know that this is a uphill battle for me. But that's something that I look at from beyond the box. Maybe it's time to call Billy Bob. Whatever his name is who the attorney Jim Bob Jim Bob Bob can fix it for you. I don't know. Maybe again. But I can you know, and you know, if if these babies go to the adoption agencies of safe haven babies go to the adoption agencies if safe haven babies go to the adoption agency

The adoption agency doesn't have any they didn't work with a mom. They don't have any counseling. These moms are anonymous They don't get the count So all the things that they're doing for the birth mom that they're saying that they're collecting money for for their services is Is obsolete they have no parent that's fighting this or needing counseling or anything like that and so if I can just put a cap. No, you're actually, you're actually the, as I hear you, you're almost stepping in. I'm stepping into a fire because I've got a lot of adoption agencies that are like, hate me right now. I bet.

That's what I'm sitting here thinking. You're probably, yeah. But it's the right thing to do. You know, it's the right thing to do. You know, it's the right thing. If I just, if I can get adoption agencies to the baby. And again, if an adopt, if a birth mom chooses that adoption agency and knows how much this is, that's her choice, but the babies that are coming through us, if I can just get them to $10,000, that's more I think than what it's going to cost to adopt this child, but whatever. Okay. $10,000. If I hand you a baby that's been placed in our box and I say, me hand it, it's not me.

But if a baby is given to you that came through our box, why can't you make it work for $10,000? Why can't you make it work? I can make it work on our boxes on the cost, and I know it's probably coming up in this thing, the cost. We charge $15,000 for a box. Do I spend more? Hell yes, I spend more than $15,000 for a box. Do I spend more? Hell yes, I spend more than $15,000 marketing, training, producing the box, signage,

media push. Cutting the hole on the side of the wall. Lawyer fees, okay? 15,000 is very minimal and I spend a lot more than that, but I rely on donations to cover the rest of it. Yeah, that's what I was about to ask. This has got to, this has become an enterprise now. Where in the world does all the money come from? Because there's no revenue here.

There is no revenue. And it's people that believe in our ministry that give us those dollars. And so if adoption agencies can just take a little play out of Monica's playbook and say, let's charge less. But if people wanna give us, because most of them claim to be nonprofits, they can get donations in.

So, Monica, you really think they could do it for 10 grand instead of 50. There's a lot of excess profit there. Well, OK. So yes, I do think they can do that. So you have attorney fees, court costs and a home study. Those are your three main things with an adoption. How much is that going to cost you? Home study, 2500. Attorney fees, 2500. Court costs an extra five grand.

You're at 10 grand. You can do it for that. You can do it for that. But what adoption agencies do- I was gonna take some of your guys' staff to manage all this too, so you'd have to hire up and scale that part of it. Well, I'm not doing it.

I'm not doing anything on adoption. That's not my forte. You know, that has to be. I won't do anything with adoption because I don't wanna look like I'm profiting, or trafficking. Got it. You know what I mean?

And so, but what we need to get people to see is that you can do it for that. And if you're a nonprofit, you shouldn't be taking in $50,000 from a family. You know, to cut- It can be done for 10 or 15 based off of what you said. Yeah, and so, but what these adoption agencies are doing is when an adoptive family calls them and says,

hey, we want to hire your, okay, well, let's do a home study, 2,500 bucks, right? OK. And you're going to have to pay for birth mom to probably live. That's probably $4,000. I think in Indiana, it's $4,000. They get to help or whatever.

And then we have to do a nice little thing for our website. That's another $5,000. And then, did you want us to do this for you? That's another so it's almost like an a la carte. Okay, so you can put all these things up front. So before they even get a baby, they're 30 grand in. Okay. Okay, that's fine if you want to choose that. But then these families that have already paid $30,000 are getting our babies and then they're paying an additional 20, 25,000, 28,000 on top of what they've already paid.

That's where you get those numbers from. And I'm just saying, hey, can't you have a list of people that don't wanna pay all those extra stuff? Or can't afford to but are still great families. I mean, if your adoption agency wants to handle them, can you have a separate list for Safe Haven babies? And then just $10,000. So that's what you're working on now. That is what I that's it's I'm not against that

They do hate you. Oh, they hate me right now wrench in the whole works Yeah, but it's the right thing to do and that's that's you know, it doesn't matter how many enemies I make I know there's a lot of them out there, but that's the right thing to do. How many babies since inception as safe haven baby boxes saved? We're at a total of 227. 227 lives and yeah, since 2017. Our first baby came in November of 2017. And so 57 of those are in the box and the rest are handoffs. And so a lot of those handoffs are at baby box locations

and that's just our protocol. We ask these moms or dads if they'll walk in and hand the baby to a person and some of them will. And that's safer. So they call for the baby box but will they find out there's a safe Alternative. Alternative where they're not gonna get in trouble.

They just assume. They just need to be assured Hey, i'll call the fire station my count. So I have a counselor that answers the phone She's answering the phone talking to mom. She'll let me know. Hey Atoka's getting a baby. They're 10 minutes out. I'll call atoka's fire chief and i'll say hey chief. It's monica You got a baby that's coming. They're gonna walk in and hand this baby to to you make sure you give them the orange bag They're not using your box. And so that process helps mom assure

that she's not going to be stopped and asked questions. We'll be right back. Something about Mary Poppins? Something about Mary Poppins, exactly about Mary Poppins. Exactly. Oh man, this is fun. I'm AJ Jacobs and I am an author and a journalist and I tend to get obsessed with stuff. And my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler.

Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing. Exactly. Oh, that's good. Now you can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears. I thought to myself, I bet I know what this is. And now I definitely know what this is. This is so weird. This is fun.

Let's try this one. Our brand new season features special guests like Chuck Bryant, Myambialik, Julie Bowen, Sam Sanders, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and lots more. Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That's awful. And I should have seen it coming. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin.

This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer, and philanthropist Julian Lennon. One of the really important things that happened to me in my relationship with photography and the images was that I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world or go anywhere, couldn't or were disabled and couldn't travel the world or go anywhere. And what they had

all said to me is that you bring these stories to us, you bring the truth, you bring life to us of cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about. Photography really does allow me to do that. Have empathy for people on the other side of the world that you'll never ever meet, but you'll at least have some understanding of what their life is and what they went through or are still going through. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast, Minnie Questions. Over the years, we've had some incredible guests. People like Courtney Cox, star of the infinitely beloved sitcom Friends, EGOT winner Viola Davis, and former Prime Minister of the UK, Tony Blair. And now, MiniQuestions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests are seven questions including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe and Cord Jefferson. Each episode is a new person's story with new lessons,

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No, seriously. The best person to talk to your child about vaping is you. To start the conversation, visit TalkAboutVaping.org, brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council. Do you have relationships with the with the chiefs of each of these fire stations where your box is so they at least know who you are so you can actually have a conversation with them? Yes. The first 200 boxes that was blessed, I did them all myself.

I went into their fire stations, I did their trainings. I drove there flew there. And I guess being a medic and a firefighter yourself, they kind of g haulhaul with you because they know you know their world. Oh man, yeah. I'm their sister. It is an interesting number of circumstances along every step of your life from not only how you were conceived to who raised you to your finding your mother to marrying a guy who happened to be a mayor who could say, yes, let's stick it in the wall of our fire department, to your trip to South Africa, to what you do for a living that came from you enlisting in the Navy. All of these things kind of come together to make this happen.

And it's a very unique skillset, really. Well, and it's a very unique skill set really. Well, and it's Christ driven. It's Christ laid this out. There is no way this life could have done. Yeah, too many. There is too many circumstances and too many things that are connected. And so that's why I know I'm doing his job.

And it's interesting, because people will say, well, what's your goal? Five years, what's your goal? I don't have a goal I'm just a passenger in this car that Christ is driving Wherever he goes is where I'm gonna go and sometimes it might be a little bumpy. I get that Sometimes we might have to stop I get that sometimes I need to get out I get that Did those 227 lives?

help you to overcome that Self-worth thing that you dealt with? For God's sakes it should. Working with these moms is what really gives me the peace. Because my birth mom didn't have this. You know I text a lot of these moms. I have had people contact me on TikTok said I want to talk to Monica because they know that I have somebody else helping me with my social media and so I'll give them my cell phone and I text back and forth with these moms. And I think that also brings them a little bit of peace knowing that I got their back. You know, I've spent hours on these texts on the phone with them only because they wanted

to talk to me and not a counselor. Some people don't want the bullshit. You know, they don't want counselors are great. They serve a purpose, but they don't want to be coddled. They want to be told, you know, they don't counselors are great. They serve a purpose, but they they don't want to be coddled They want to be told You know kind of raw and real they want they they don't want you to dance around something and that's me I'm not gonna dance around and I'm not gonna tell you something that's gonna make you feel better. I'm gonna tell you the truth if somebody

Is listening out there and Needs or If somebody is listening out there and needs or knows someone that may need the use of a baby box or somebody out there wants to just donate to baby boxes or um I'd forbid we got a firefighter out there saying I want to stick one of these things at our wall how do they find safe haven baby boxes and how they find you? And probably most of our communities don't have it. So even just, you know, concerned citizens like, Hey, we need this in Oxford, Mississippi. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. If you're not set a fire, just normal citizens. Someone wants to call their fire chief and say, stick a baby box in your wall,

dude. How do they find you dude how do they find you how do they find everything what's give us all the all the handles the website and how to get in touch so the best place to go is to shbb.org that's our website you did that fast sh BB so it's the first letter of safe haven baby boxes org okay and that's where you're gonna get a ton of information some testimonials and some stats if you want to connect with me if you want the raw and the real Monica Kelsey the only way to get that is tick tock and hopefully that's the that's not going away anytime soon But we kind of tone me down on Facebook because it's a different generation on Facebook And so our marketing team does a really good job of letting TikTok just be whatever I want it to be.

And I can say whatever I want. What's your handle for TikTok and Facebook? It's just Monica Kelsey. That's it. That's it. It's K-E-L-S-E-Y. Yep. If someone wants to talk to you a little more personally,

can they email you? What's your email address? Yeah, so it's just Monica at safehavenbabyboxes.com. Or if they want to go to the website and go to the Contact Us page. I get a lot of them that says, so it's just Monica at safehavenbabyboxes.com or if they wanna go to the website and go to the Contact Us page. I get a lot of them that says, please give this to Monica and those come to me. So I have one person that answers those emails

and she'll shoot it right to me and it come right back to me. So I will contact you. Why are you in your Winnebago today? Where are you headed? So I'm headed to Florida. We're blessing a box in Hernando County. Blessing a box. So we in Hernando County blessing a box.

So we call it the blessing of the box. As a Christian, you know, we bless every box before we put it into operation. A pastor comes out and puts his hand on it and blesses it. You're kidding. No, I'm not kidding. That's why I'm so tired. You know, because I'm like 303 boxes. It's like I did 200 by myself. Now I have a little bit of help from some girls in the office. But but we're going down to Hernando County to bless a box. Just north of Tampa. Okay. Got it. And then, um, we're going to mobile Alabama to bless a box.

And then, uh, there's another place, uh, Marion County, which is Ocala in Florida. We're blessing another box. And then it's my 20s. Yeah, kind of in the middle. And then my 26th wedding anniversary is the 23rd. And so I really have to take care of my husband because he really takes care of me. So we're gonna spend a few days down in Fort Myers. Good for you love. Yeah. If you with our dog in our Winnebago in our car being told what your dog's name, Harper Harper. If you follow us on TikTok, you know this because I will show up at events and people will be like, Oh my gosh, there's Harper. She goes to all these events with me.

She's like a baby box dog. It's so funny. But yeah, Monica Kelsey, what a story you have to tell. What's the name of your book? It's called blessed to have been abandoned. The story of the baby box lady. Amazon Amazon. Yep. Blessed to have been abandoned. The story of the baby box lady. Amazon Amazon. Yep. Blessed to have been abandoned. Monica Kelsey. How long? How long ago did you write that? I wrote it in 20. Well, my dad was dying of cancer. And so I kind of took that up on myself to start your adoptive dad. Yeah, be clear. Yeah. Right. And my parents had celebrated 50 years of marriage that year. And then he passed away a few months

later. But I wrote it and then four months after he passed away I Published it that was in April of 21 Awesome and people could find that on Amazon. Yes Monica, thank you for stopping off in Memphis on the way to bless some boxes and to take care of your husband with your dog, Harper, to spend a couple hours with me. Phenomenal story. And, you know, most people listen,

most people don't watch, but I wish I could share your aura with folks. You are, you're such a bright light and you are a bundle of energy and you, I love straight talking, hard-nosed people who beneath that really hard shell have this massive heart and you're one of them. I can tell and just an ordinary person. I just army of normal folks man. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Thanks for being here. Thank you for having me. And thank you for joining us this week. If Monica Kelsey or other guests have inspired you in general or better yet to take action by trying to

bring a baby box to your community, donating to them or something else entirely? Please let me know. I really want to hear about it. You can write me anytime at Bill at normalfolks.us and guys, I'll respond. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with friends, share it on social, subscribe to the podcast, rate it, review it. Join the army at normalfolks.us. Consider becoming a premium member there. Any and all of these things that will help us grow, an army of normal folks. Thanks to our producer, Iron Light Labs, I'm Bill Courtney.

Until next time, do what you can. [♪ music playing, fades out. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I speak with musician, photographer, and philanthropist Julian Lennon. One of the really important things that happened to me with photography was I would have people write to me, people that couldn't financially afford to travel the world.

And what they had all said to me is that you bring these stories to us. You bring the truth. You bring cultures that we would. You bring the truth. You bring cultures that we would never necessarily know anything about. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Dressing. Dressing. Oh, French dressing.

Exactly. Oh, that's good. I'm AJ Jacobs and my current obsession is puzzles. And that has given birth to my podcast, The Puzzler. Something about Mary Poppins? Exactly. This is fun. You can get your daily puzzle nuggets delivered straight to your ears.

Listen to The Puzzler every day on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What if you ask two different people the same set of questions? Even if the questions are the same, our experiences can lead us to drastically different answers. I'm Minnie Driver, and I set out to explore this idea in my podcast, and now, Minnie Questions is returning for another season. We've asked an entirely new set of guests our seven questions, including Jane Lynch, Delaney Rowe, and Cord Jefferson. Listen to MiniQuestions on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Seven questions, limitless answers. Tickets are on sale now, y'all, for our 2025 iHeart Country Festival, and I'm going to miss the chances. Sam Hunt, Megan Moroney, Bailey Zimmerman, Nate Smith. Tickets are on sale now at Ticketmaster.com.