Here's Where It Gets Interesting - Alaska: The Sled Dogs Who Saved a Village with Dr. Shanté Cofield

Episode Date: July 19, 2021

In this episode, Sharon sits down with Dr. Shanté Cofield, a business coach helping movement and health professionals succeed in the online space. The two connect to discuss the story behind the little-known 1925 Serum Run, which took place in the brutal Alaskan wilderness. During a health crisis, town doctor Curtis Welch was faced with diagnosing and treating an unknown illness, all before it infected the whole town of 1,400 people. Left with limited resources and a short deadline, the Alaskan people sprang into action to set up a sled dog relay to deliver the medicine. Sharon takes Shanté through the twists of the story, providing wit and history at every turn. For more information on this episode including all resources and links discussed go to https://www.sharonmcmahon.com/podcast  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You're here! Yay! I love it. I'm so excited that you're here. I have a story for you today that is going to blow your mind. It is about some children whose lives were saved because of some sled dogs in Alaska. And I'm sharing this story today with my friend Shante Cofield who cracks me up non-stop. Do you have a friend in your life where you communicate primarily via TikToks? Where you're like, 90% of our texts are via TikTok. Yes, that is Shante. I especially think it's funny that I chose this Alaska story for her because she finds cold weather disrespectful. And cold weather factors

heavily in this story. Let's get into it. Let's get into the sled dog serum run. I'm Sharon McBann and welcome to the Sharon Says So podcast. Shante, thank you so much. I thoroughly enjoy you. A lot of our messages are like, look at this ugly thing that is, that does not, we need to stop talking about. We don't even need to see this. I have a story to tell you. It has some weather that you're going to love. I'm going to be offended. I already know. You're already going to be offended by the weather in this story. So have you ever heard of the 1925 serum run? You know, believe it or not, I haven't heard of this. No shocking, shocking. Most people have it. It is a story that's going to offend you. It's going to offend you mostly because it involves, um, really bad weather.

Mostly because it involves really bad weather. Okay, so you know where Alaska is. It's not an island. A lot of people think Alaska is an island off the coast of Arizona. Because when you're looking at a map of the United States, it does not include Mexico. And so Hawaii and Alaska just kind of float off the quote unquote coast of Arizona. I was going to back it up and be like, excuse me, ma'am, the coast of Arizona. So Alaska is not an island. It's actually a really large state connected to Canada, not connected to the rest of the United States.

Common misconception. Alaska is also a lot bigger than it looks on a map, right? description Alaska is also a lot bigger than it looks on a map right like if you put a last that in the middle of a map it would cover like Minnesota North and South Dakota Iowa Missouri it would cover a huge chunk of the middle of the country it's not the size of Wyoming like it sort of looks like now it's teeny on the west coast of Alaska is a city called Nome, Alaska. Okay. Nome was the home of a huge gold rush. And one of the claims to fame of the Nome gold rush was that all of the gold was just on the beaches. It was just mixed into the rocks on the beach. And so it was one of those gold rushes where you couldn't like stake a claim. You couldn't be like, this here's my land and whatever I find is going to be mine.

You couldn't do that. It was literally required. You just like putting in the time, digging through the rocks on the beach and then whatever you found could be yours. So the beaches of Nome, Alaska during the turn of the century, this little gold rush yielded over a hundred metric tons of gold just sitting on the beaches. So was there like three people there? In my mind, Alaska has a population of two. Well, you know, initially it's just a location where native Alaskans live. But then, of course, once people discovered that there was gold there, the city of Nome swelled from like a couple hundred people to 20,000 people trying to stake their claim. The population of Nome, Alaska has descended to around 1,400 people. And it was a mixture of three or 400 native Alaskans and,

you know, 900-ish, what they refer to in the census records as white people. That what it said? Yeah, whites. White people. They did. It was whites. It's amazing. Okay. So 1,400-ish people living in this very remote town, which is right on the ocean. Obviously it has beaches, but it's not, you know, like Alaska has a lot of mountains and you can't, you cannot just drive across the state of Alaska.

Even to this day, there is no road trip across Alaska. Too many mountains can't build a road through Mount McKinley through Denali. That's not happening. So the way that they delivered mail, they delivered things was via dog sled, right? You can't take a boat across the interior of Alaska. You can't fly a plane across Alaska at that time. You can't build a train through a mountain. I don't know. Again, I don't know when things were made and you were like a dog, a dog sled, a dog sled. slide yeah that's the answer ever guess so what here's the problem with planes okay 1925 most of the planes were open cockpits nope also known and the weather in alaska

super offensive, right? According to you, you know, like it gets down to 50 below. And so they tried to fly planes over the winter and the pilots would wrap themselves in so many layers of clothes that they would be nearly unable to maneuver the plane. And planes crash landed many times during the test because the pilots were too cold to manipulate the controls. So plane flying in Alaska was not a thing in the 1920s in the wintertime. Like you could do negative 50. No, right. Nope. You're dead. You were dead. Also no way to get a boat up the coast of Alaska because of ice.

It's frozen. It's frozen. The port there is frozen from November to July. See? Until July. This is also what people in the Pacific Northwest are like. They're like, but the summers are great. They forget about those other months. like, but the summers are great. They forget about those other months.

Move here, the summers are great. It's negative 11 billion the rest of the year, but the summers are great. That's Minnesota. That's Minnesota for you. That's how it goes here. It's cold for nine months and warmish for a couple months.

Yes. All right, so 1925, there is one doctor that serves the town of Nome and the surrounding villages. Okay. His name was Curtis Welch. They had a small, small hospital there. It was him and four nurses and a couple of native children come in with this like serious cough and he's not sure what it is. He diagnoses them with like bronchitis, some kind of coughing illness. A white girl comes in or white child comes in. She too is sick. He starts consulting all of his medical books. He had lived by the way, through the Spanish flu epidemic,

which had happened in like 1918, 1919, the flu which by the way is just h1n1 spanish flu of course is a nickname for it killed 50 percent of the native population in that region during that time period 50 percent when i looked up the statistics on this flu pandemic. It killed, a conservative estimate is 50 million people worldwide. 50 million people that the Spanish flu pandemic killed. So he was very concerned. Yeah. Super concerned that like, what is happening? And one of the things about the Spanish flu pandemic is that it killed healthy young people. Anyway, so Curtis Welch, very concerned about what's happening, pours through his medical books and finally diagnoses these children with diphtheria. I learned about that on Oregon Trail.

Yep. Yes. It's the only time I've heard that. Yes. Jennifer has died of diphtheria. Oh gosh. I know about that. That's bad. The doctor Curtis Welch prior to anybody being diagnosed with diphtheria ordered the antitoxin, which at the time was the treatment for this illness. He had ordered it and it had not arrived in time. And you have to use a lot of units in order to inoculate with somebody or treat somebody with it. It had not gotten there in time. And he realized prior to any of this happening that he was going to be without the treatment for it for the duration of the winter, because it was too late. The ports were closed, all of that stuff.

What was left in the hospital was expired, expired by like five years. And he, I was like, that's a loose suggestion. You could sleep. Yes. He tried to treat people with it and they died anyway. So he realized very quickly that this will wipe out 100% of this town. If something doesn't happen, we will all die. And he sent an urgent message to the governor of Alaska territory, the United States health department in Washington, DC, the mayors of every town in Alaska, like an urgent message. And this is what the urgent message said. I looked it up. Did he email this? Yeah, he emailed it. That's correct. Yes. He flew it by owl. This was sent on January 22nd of 1925. This is what the cable said. An epidemic of diphtheria is almost inevitable

here. Stop. I am in urgent need of 1 million units of diphtheria antitoxin. Stop. Mail is the only form of transportation. Stop. I have made application to commissioner of health of the territories for antitoxin already. Stop. There are about 3000 white natives in the district. Don't know what white natives is, but perhaps he meant whites and natives. And that was it. That was the message. And he had about, at that point, 20-ish confirmed cases of diphtheria, expanded quickly, and about 50 other people who were, you know, like at risk because they lived in houses with people who were sick. Meanwhile, a hospital in Fairbanks discovered, you know, like very serendipitously discovered around 300,000 units of diphtheria antitoxin.

And Fairbanks is in the deep interior of Alaska over 900, yes, over 900 miles away. over 900 miles away. So, you know, like if you think about the entire coast of California is like 700 and something miles, this is 900 miles away through mountainous Alaska, through minus 50 weather. We have it, but how are you going to, how are you going to get it? So they decide we're going to use sled dogs i was gonna say don't tell me the dogs again don't yeah let's decide they're going to use a sled dog relay oh okay like a ragnar relay yeah which means that different teams of mushers and sled dogs were going to meet at different checkpoints to pick up this antitoxin and attempt to bring it to Nome, Alaska. Most of the mushers at that time were native Alaskans. There was a trail that ran from near Fairbanks to Nome, which was used to deliver mail.

And it would normally take 30 days to traverse that trail. The record time that it took to go across that trail was nine days. That was the fastest anyone had ever done it. The doctor in this scenario that was going to send out the antitoxin said, this best case scenario, this vial has about six days on the trail and then it's post and it was again january in alaska they wrap it up in a bunch of quilts they ask who is willing to mush a portion of this 900 plus mile route to save the children of Nome, Alaska. They're basically looking for people who have the experience to do the job, but also the people who were willing to risk their lives and risk the lives of their dogs, because these are the conditions under which

nobody would voluntarily be out there. And they had to go into it knowing that they would potentially die and their dogs would potentially die. Why do you invite me on to hear about a sad dog story, Sharon? Why are you trying to talk to me about sad dogs and also bad weather? Thanks for nothing. Offended. Thanks for nothing. Offended. Thanks for nothing. I'm already offended by the story.

I don't like any of it. So, okay. They get together this group of 20 different mushers and they create the checkpoints. They use what were called roadhouses, which are just exactly what they sound like, like a house on the side of the trail. which are just exactly what they sound like, like a house on the side of the trail. And they set out on this journey and they are truly racing against the clock because they know that for every day that they are delayed, more children are potentially going to die of diphtheria. Here's the other thing. It's January and there's only about four hours of daylight.

Oh, yes. Four hours of daylight a day. Yes, because the other time it switches and it's amazing. It's like this light up. That's right. Oh my goodness. Okay. So they set out, it is minus 50 and there's four hours of daylight a day. And the first person to set out with his team of dogs was a man named wild bill shannon and he's this you know very large man who he's precisely as you would envision i already i already know what he looks like yeah you know like he has he has pistols i already see you you know what i mean yes he sets out at nine he has pistols he's already see him. You know what I mean? I already know. Yes. He sets out at nine.

He has pistols. Pistols. He's in bar fights all the time. He leaves at 9 p.m. He arrives at his checkpoint at 3 a.m. Overnight, while he has been mushing his dogs during this time period, the temperature dropped to minus 65. And that is just the air temperature. That is not including any wind chill. That's just the air temperature.

How are the dogs okay? They're not. A bunch of them died. You just left that part out. He arrives at his checkpoint at three o'clock in the morning his face was mostly black from frostbite yep and it never his skin never that's it it's not going to come back yep his face was black for most of the like patchy black frostbite for the rest of his life several of his dogs uh died because they were because of the horrible conditions and because they were moving so quickly that they didn't have time to take the appropriate amount of like rests and warmups and, you know, et cetera. The mayor of Nome sees how bad it is getting in his town and is worried that this sled dog relay is not going to make it in time. He is just like, they only have

six days. Meanwhile, children are going to die. Even if they arrive in 10 days, the antitoxin will not be effective. It's basically like, we're all going to die. If you don't hurry up, we're going to die. So it just so happens that living in gnome alaska at that time was perhaps one of the most famous sled dog racers of all time he was living there he had his dogs there and his name was leonard sepala and the mayor of gnome said would you be willing to leave Nome right now in an effort to try to intercept this relay wherever you intercept them and get back here probably faster because you are literally like the world's best sled dog racer. I'm Jenna Fisher and I'm Angela Kinsey. We are best friends. And together we have the podcast Office Ladies, where we rewatched every single episode of The Office with insane behind the scenes stories, hilarious guests and lots of laughs. Guess who's sitting next to me? Steve!

It's my girl in the studio! in the studio. Every Wednesday, we'll be sharing even more exclusive stories from the office and our friendship with brand new guests. And we'll be digging

into our mailbag to answer your questions and comments. So join us for brand new Office Lady 6.0 episodes every Wednesday. Plus, on Mondays, we are taking a second drink.

You can revisit all the Office Ladies rewatch episodes every Monday with new bonus tidbits before every episode. Well, we can't wait to see you there. Follow and listen to Office Ladies on the free Odyssey app and wherever you get your podcasts. And of course, Leonard Seppala's daughter was infected with diphtheria. So his daughter is sick and he

thinks to himself, I'm going to do whatever it takes. I'm going to do whatever it takes. I am going to leave gnome. I'm going to start running towards the people that are running towards me because I have faith in my team. And because I know what I'm doing, I'm going to run towards them. I'm going to stop them from what they're doing. And we're going to be able to get back faster than if I just let things take its course. So Leonard Seppala leaves, he begins running his team. He has a large team of dogs. His lead dog has gone on to be one of the most famous dogs of all time. His name is Togo. His dog has an incredible story. When this dog was born, initially Leonard Seppala was like, this dog is no good. This dog is no good. He gave it away as a family pet because he's like,

this dog is no good. This dog is not going to be a good sled dog it doesn't listen it constantly tries to escape it constantly tries to run away he gave it away to a family after he gave it away the dog leapt out of like a second story window and ran miles back to the kennel where leonard and the work. He was like, this is what I'm supposed to say. I am a sled dog. Literally. This is my calling. That's right. There were several other stories about how Togo escaped from tethers where he was like, you are not a sled dog. You're too small. You only weigh 45 pounds. You're too small and you don't listen. So you're staying here. mall and you don't listen. So you're staying here. So Seppala sets off. Everybody else is coming towards him. None of them know Seppala is on his way because of course it is literally

in the middle of nowhere, Alaska. They don't know he's coming. They already have all of their plans to just continue and try to make it to Nome. So Seppala runs literally like hundreds of miles, So Cepala runs literally like hundreds of miles, intercepts the team that has been moving towards Nome. Meanwhile, after Cepala leaves, the mayor is like, OK, who else? Who else can be part of this? Like, we're going to need somebody to intercept the interception. Yes. Somebody needs to intercept the interception. But this is what? This is the worst planning I've ever heard. It turns out there was no advanced planning. The interception. Yes. Somebody needs to intercept the interception. What?

That's the worst planning I've ever heard. Turns out there was no advanced planning. What? But he's the fastest. Why did they? They just thought maybe he's going to run into trouble. What if he runs into trouble? So we're going to send people after him. They sent a couple of guys.

So we're going to send people after him. They sent a couple of guys, but one of the people that they sent was a pretty inexperienced musher whose name is Gunnar Kaysen. He went to the kennel that was left in town. You're like all of the leftover dogs. Yes. All the leftover dogs. and he picks out this one dog named balto oh we've all heard this name yes yep he picks out balto as his lead dog who had never been a lead sled dog before and sepala later was like i would never have picked balto to be a lead dog at all eventually as seppala is coming back, so Gnome is kind of out, you know, on this point sticking out onto the ocean. And he is coming this route where if he cut across the ice on the open ocean, he could make up many hours of time versus staying on the land and following the shoreline. You hear what he just said? Versus staying on the land and following the shoreline. You hear what he just said? Versus staying on the land. Yes.

Yes. Yes. He decides the weather, by the way, is so bad that it is literally whiteout conditions. No. And where he cannot even see the two dogs in the harnesses closest to him. That is how bad the weather was. He decides, there's no way I will make it in time. There's no way that I will make it in time if I stay on the land. So I am going to go across these ice fields across the water. And he knew it was incredibly dangerous because the winds were so strong that it was breaking up the ice on the shore and the wave action underneath the ice

flows was causing all of the ice to crack and to create these big heaves and chunks of ice. He described later that there was like these tremendous crashing and cracking sounds. Ice cracking, by the way, is incredibly loud. It's incredibly loud. So he decides- I wouldn't know. I dropped an ice cube. That's like closest thing, Sharon. Ice cracking on a lake or on the ocean like that, it'll wake you up at night is how loud it is. Wild. Yes. He decides he's gonna, he's gonna risk it. He's like, well, if I don't risk it, the whole town is dead. Yeah. Either way, either way. If I die, the town dies. If I don't risk it, the town dies.

Yeah. So I'm going to risk it. And there was one point where his team was on a piece of ice and the ice cracked off and started floating out into the open ocean. The gap between this ice flow and the shore was widening so quickly that there was no way for the team to get across. And so he unharnessed Togo, across. And so he unharnessed Togo, wrapped the rope around him and wanted him to jump across and see if he could pull the two pieces of ice closer together so that his- The dog weighs 45 pounds. Correct. The dog weighed 45 pounds. So he didn't make it onto the next ice floe, but he jumped into the water. And the harness, the lead that attached him to the rest of the team, snapped. He swam over to the broken lead, picked up the broken lead in his mouth,

swam in a circle to wrap the rope around himself. Wham in a circle to wrap the rope around himself. Swimming in the ocean at minus 60. He got close enough to pull the ice flows close enough together that they could get the rest of the team across. What? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

Uh-huh. Uh-huh. That's a thing. That is a thing. In my mind my mind for whatever reason automatically goes to what the other being one of the other dogs like oh man look at look at him go over there like wow that it wasn't me sepala eventually intercepts one of the mushers that is heading his way oh you know like he but that like we made a plan. He intercepts

them. He got off the ice back on land. The musher that was coming his way, his dogs had gotten tangled up because they crashed into a reindeer. And so they were being significantly slowed down because he was trying to like, when you have a dog team, by the way, you know, like they all have their own leads and they cannot get tangled. No, that will kill your dogs if they get tangled. So you have to stop disentangle everything. You're dealing with the dogs that are now crazy, like psycho out of control because of the reindeer reindeer. What? So sepala intercepts them takes the 20 pound vial of antitoxin like straps it to his sled and sets off in the opposite direction like turns around and starts going back the way that he just came yeah oh over the see we know we didn't learn from that we just went in the water over the ice yeah we're going in the water again. And eventually gets back onto shore and decides he has to stop for the night.

And a native family takes him in, lets him sleep, warms up his dogs. He woke up the next morning to see all of the ice gone. All of the ice that he had just run to and from was completely gone from like it washed away you mean yeah yep from the wind the wind pushed away sure so a couple of other a couple of other men who had you know been sent by the mayor of gnome including gunner casein um eventually meet sepala and get the vial from him. One of them had his hands permanently damaged from frostbite. Of course.

Kaysen and his dog, Balto. Balto, we're back. Yep, get the vial of antitoxin and begin running the last remaining 50-ish miles into Nome, Alaska. And they finally pulled into Nome at like five o'clock in the morning. And it was five days after they had set out and the record time before that had been nine days. It was truly the worst weather that Alaska had experienced in decades. Whiteout condition blizzards, temperatures that were like, basically you're unable to function in those kinds of temperatures. And despite the worst temperatures, worst weather

conditions, they made this journey, this 900 plus mile journey via dog sled in five days. Of course, the person running the last leg of the relay is the one to cross the finish line, right? It's Gunnar, Kaysen and Balto. They get all the glory. Of course. They get all the glory. They get all the media attention. Yep. They get all the glory of course they get all the glory they get all the media attention yep they get all the media attention like he's a hero the city of new york erects a balto statue this is why we've all heard of balto yes just because it was the last part yep he's a statue in central park still i feel bad at the bottom of his statue, it says, endurance, fidelity, and intelligence. That statue went up the year after this happened.

So of course, Seppala was a little peeved. He was a little peeved that he did the lion's share of the work. He risked his own life and he, you know, like he was, did not get the glory of. His dog was in the water. Yep. He was the person who like basically made this whole thing happen. Yes. But he got none of the glory. Kaysen was awarded a thousand dollars.

Stop it. For his, you know, like you brought the antitoxins. You got a thousand dollar award. All the other 19 mushers were paid $25 per day, plus the pay of $18 and 66 cents. The $25 a day was like care and feeding of your animals and all of that kind of stuff. The pay for you was $18. Yep. You got your $18 and casein was $1,000. Right. Right. So the doctor begins administering the antitoxin at this point, the antitoxin had been enough for around 70 people. Remember he had requested a million units, only had 300,000. It was enough for 70 people and 68 people were sick in the village. Almost everyone was saved. Depending on which

historic record you consult, either three, four, or five people ended up dying from diphtheria. And it could have been everyone could have been everybody because of their efforts. They basically saved the entire community of Nome, Alaska by risking their own lives doing this. So after all this happened, um, Balto goes on this big media tour. He goes around the whole country. He's famous famous all the school children heard of him yeah i've heard baldo yep yep 100 yep in 1927 it was revealed that casein did not have enough money to take care of him and he was sold to a carnival sideshow no Sharon I'm offended this is the worst part of the story he was sold to a carnival sideshow and some school children in Cleveland heard that he was living in a carnival

and they raised their pennies to buy him from the carnival and they brought him to the cleveland zoo and balto lived for six years in the cleveland zoo he's a dog though right yes they were like we don't want him but why it's a dog somebody to adopt him it's a dog they're the equivalent of facebook marketplace of like who needs a hero sled dog balto is available you know what i mean like why wasn't that a thing what happened we saw this story went from you know the remarkable problem solving questionable decisions with like that send more people out and then the only option is a carnival and a zoo and a zoo is this this is like very representative of what happens when you enter

the contiguous united states down south and like wait we got a carnival you know what you need is this dog and then why did none of the zoo keep the zoo it's a dog just say you know what this is a really sweet dog let me just bring it home bring it home maybe they just saw it as a as a money-making opportunity like people would want it i'm sure they had to yeah so togo sepala's dog you know like the best dog that has ever lived time magazine by way, named him the biggest animal hero of all time. Yes. Um, yep. He eventually, he goes on a little media tour. He doesn't get the initial fame and glory that Balto did. He did spend 10 days at Madison square gardens. and then he eventually made his way to a a husky breeding farm in maine where now you know he was bred to a bunch of bunch of sled dogs most of the siberian huskies

in the united states are descendants of togo now wow Wow. Because of the, you know, the way the genetics and the designation of being a sepula sled dog. Wow. That is something sled dog owners want. So most of that breed at some point came from Togo, the best, most hero sled dog of all time. most hero sled dog of all time. This is wild, Sharon. He, at age 16, was eventually put to sleep because he was old, like happens to dogs. Seppala made his way back to Maine to be with him while he was being put to sleep.

He gave him away to the breeder? He didn't really give him away, but he let him live there because he felt like he was doing the world a bigger service by allowing Togo to breed than it was to just keep him as a pet. So he immediately, Seppala immediately had Togo stuffed. I was waiting for it.

He had him stuffed. And he is on display at the iditarod museum in alaska you can see what he looks like and his skeleton belongs to yale university what are they doing with that but also what are they doing with that i don't know keeping it for like future scientific study? I don't know. I don't know. What does Yale want with slug dog skeleton? I don't know.

Why do they have that? What story is this? It was up. That's down. Then we went to a carnival. That's so American. They went to a carnival. Yeah, ruining things.

Carnival. Dang carnivals. Like, come on what it was like out of here literally the whole town got saved there was gold in the beginning and it ends with a carnival corn dogs lead dogs they felt bad that Balto got the statue in Central Park and not Togo. So they did eventually put one of him up, but it's much smaller. Where is this? I lived in New York City for nine years. I ran around that park a ton. There's like a Panther statue. I'm pretty sure it's a Panther. It is near Lenox Hill toward the Columbus Circle end of the park, near Park Avenue. I think I would have never have thought to look. Is it near the dog park?

There's like a dog park over there or like an area. Located north of Central Park Zoo near the intersection of East Drive and 67th Street. Okay. And this is what the plaque says. Dedicated to the indomitable spirit of the sled dogs that relayed antitoxin. 600 miles over rough ice across treacherous waters through Arctic blizzards from Nenana to the relief of stricken gnome in the winter of 1925. Endurance, fidelity, intelligence. Well, tell everybody, Shante, where they can find you.

Because you're delightful and worth following. Where can people find you? They can find me in your DMs, sharing some TikToks. But you can, the easiest way to find me is on Instagram as well, at The Movement Maestro. Maestro is spelled M-A-E-S-T-R-O, because nobody knows how to spell that, so. Nobody knows what a maestro is. They don't know how a maestro is they don't know how to do it they don't want to say it they're like maestro and i'm like what do you know what a maestro is what happened what has happened to

the reading comprehension of human beings a maestro is like a like a conductor exactly that's it i'm like come on i'm orchestrating your movement i was back in the day when i was you know doing the pt thing now it's just you know moving through life but would love to connect with any and all of you sharon has the best peeps i do everyone who's listening to this is the kind of person you want in your community. Amen. Thank you so much. Thank you. This was absolutely phenomenal. Thank you. It's my pleasure. Well, we will, we will chat via Tik TOK very soon. Thank you so much for listening to the Sharon says so podcast. I am truly grateful for you. And I'm wondering if you could do me a quick favor, I am truly grateful for you.

And I'm wondering if you could do me a quick favor. Would you be willing to follow or subscribe to this podcast or maybe leave me a rating or a review? Or if you're feeling extra generous, would you share this episode on your Instagram stories or with a friend? All of those things help podcasters out so much. I cannot wait to have another mind-blown moment with you next episode.

Thanks again for listening to the Sharon says so podcast.