More Money Podcast - 388 Money in the Shadow of Terminal Illness - Host of CBC's Sickboy and Founder of Snack Labs Jeremie Saunders

Episode Date: February 14, 2024

How would your relationship with money change if you had a terminal illness? Let me tell you right now, it would have a huge impact on it! This is why I wanted to have Jeremie Saunders on the show to share his story. He's the co-host of the Sickboy Podcast and lives with cystic fibrosis. From an early age, he knew that having CF would cut his lifespan short, which on the one hand made him live life to the fullest but on the other, meant he didn't think too far into the future when it came to his money. That is until he was introduced to a new drug that would lengthen his life exponentially. This meant that things like getting married and starting a family were no longer out of reach, but it also meant he needed to start thinking about tackling his finances and building long-term wealth. In this episode, Jeremie provides insight into his battle with CF, how provincial healthcare has played a significant role in his life and career, and how he hopes his Sickboy Podcast can not only put a spotlight on living with illness but why it's so important to have open conversations about health, wealth, and our own mortality. This episode of the More Money Podcast is presented by The Globe and Mail. Visit TGAM.ca/Jessica to get unrestricted access to globeandmail.com for only $1.99/week for 52 weeks (plus tax). Follow me: Instagram @jessicaimoorhouse Threads @jessicaimoorhouse TikTok @jessicaimoorhouse Facebook @jessicaimoorhouse YouTube @jessicamoorhouse LinkedIn - Jessica Moorhouse For full episode show notes and transcript visit jessicamoorhouse.com/388 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to the More Money Podcast. This is episode 388. I'm your host, Jessica Morehouse, and this is also season 18. Welcome to the 18th season. That means nothing to you. It means a lot to me because it means I have been doing this for too long. No, I am super pumped to share this episode. Not only is it an amazing episode because I have a great guest, but this is kind of the launch of the podcast also being now in video form. So if you would, you know, you can continue listening as usual, do what you want to do. Or if you want to watch, you can now do that on my YouTube channel, JessicaMorehouse.com slash YouTube will direct you right there. Or you could just Google Jessica Morehouse in the YouTube. I am the only one there. And you can find me there. It is under the podcast tab or what have you. And you can watch

to your delight. And you can skip if you don't like. I don't care. It's totally up to you. You're the user. You do whatever you want to do. But anyways, I have an amazing guest for this episode. I've got Jeremy Saunders. He is an award-winning actor, producer, and host of popular original Canadian media, including film, TV, and podcasts. And he's also the founder of Snack Labs, the audio production company that produces shows such as Sick Boy, Everyone Comes From Somewhere, Turn Me On, Ask Mr. Wonderful, and much, much more. And in the culmination of Jeremy's affinity for laughter and education, Sick Boy Podcast was founded. It was listed as one of iTunes' best of 2015 podcasts and included in South by Southwest's 2018 Podcast Festival and the Just

for Laughs Festival as well. Sick Boy Podcast is produced and hosted by Jeremy and his two best friends, Taylor McGillivray and Brian Stever. Together, they explore conversations with a wide range of guests talking about and laughing about the experiences of living with a terminal or chronic illness. I know, that's why it hasity in otherwise, you know, dark situation. And he has had some amazing guests on his show. So you need to check it out, including Chris Hadfield, Gabber Matej, Ben Nemton, and comedian TJ Miller, and much, much more. And also myself, myself, I was on the show. So check that out. So we are going to have a real conversation about his journey with cystic fibrosis and the Canadian healthcare system and how, depending on where you live in the country, access to healthcare and just, you know, medication varies.

It really, really does. And so I hope you enjoy this episode. We've got some really great stuff to chat about, so I know you're going to love it. And so with that, let's get to it. This episode of the More Money Podcast is supported by The Globe and Mail. We've yet to see what 2024 has in store for us when it comes to the economy, interest rates, housing prices, and inflation. But the one thing you can always be certain of is no matter what's going on in the world, you'll never regret investing in yourself by growing your financial knowledge. And what better way to do

that than to check out all of the amazing resources from The Globe and Mail, Canada's leading source of business and investing news. At globeandmail.com, you can learn more about saving, investing, and reducing your debt from their expansive array of personal finance content, helpful tools like The Globe's Watchlist and RRSP Savings Calculator, podcasts, and newsletters like my personal favorite, Carrick on Money. And for a limited time for more money listeners, the Globe is offering unrestricted access to globeandmail.com for just $1.99 per week for the first 52 weeks, plus tax. For full details, visit tgam.ca slash Jessica. Once again, that's tgam.A slash Jessica. Once again, that's T-G-A-M dot C-A slash Jessica. Welcome, Jeremy, to the More Money Podcast and the first ever video podcast in 2024 that I've

ever done. So I'm excited. And thank God you have a beautiful studio, beautiful lighting, beautiful microphone. I'm so lucky. Welcome. Yeah. Well, thanks for having me. I didn't think it was video. Well, I didn't tell you. I didn't tell you. Surprise. Which I love. I love. Coming from my passion as a youngster and into my early adult life was improv. And these are the moments that I live for. The moments where it's like, weren't expecting that. And this is now a gift. And I'm going to have to sit with this gift forever, as long as the internet exists. Dude, I know. Man, you saying that, because I looked at your bio and I honestly did not know that you were an actor and did some amazing things. But the improv thing, that is a special

skill. That is my worst nightmare. Going on stage and having no rules, no plan, no script. Absolutely. I will never do that in my life. So let's go back to get a little backstory about you. Now you are known as Sick Boy, the podcast, and then now helping other people create podcasts is just very exciting. But I assume, similar to me, a weird bit of a background. I went to film school. You probably had aspirations of being a famous actor and doing the thing or what have you. Tell me what the hell happened. Man, I tell you, if I was talking to my 15-year-old self and told him what I would be doing at 35, I'd be pretty astounded for a number of big reasons. Number one, I'd be like, I'm sorry, I'm going to be alive at 65? What?

But then on top of that, I probably would have scratched my head and said, audio production, well, that doesn't make a lick of sense. I was born in St. John's, Newfoundland. And I was raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Amazing. And we moved, my whole family, we uprooted and moved to Halifax when I was three because I was born with cystic fibrosis, which is a genetic disease. And in Halifax, the children's hospital here, the IWK, it's renowned in Canada as one of the best children's hospitals in the country. And so my parents thought, okay, well, we've got this little boy

who's got some serious health issues. Let's go somewhere where we feel like we can get a grasp on that. And so I spent the majority of my life living here in Halifax, where I'm actually recording from. And one of the parts of having a kid with CF, and especially back in this day, I'm pretty sure this is probably still the deal for parents with kids with CF today. But physical activity is extraordinarily important in terms of managing the disease. To build your lung capacity, I assume? Yeah. Yeah. So for people who aren't familiar, CF, cystic fibrosis, I'll just say CF. CF is a, it's a multi-organ affecting disease, but it's mostly known to be a lung disease. And so,

I'm not a doctor. So if any doctors are listening to this right now, just cover your ears. But basically my body has this inability to move chloride or salt in and out of the cells of my body. And so that leads to this buildup of really thick, sticky, heavy mucus. Gross. And so the way that the lungs are involved is that mucus, it cannot clear out of my lungs naturally, or it has a really hard time. And so physical activity is super important because that allows airway clearance. So when I was a kid, my parents kind of just forced me to be physically active. And, you know they tried a variety of different sports and um i i really took to uh the sport of canoe kayak so i was oh i was um you know when i started it i was probably oh i'd say i was probably about 10 10 or 11 and i i picked it up and was really excelled. And so in my youth, right up till about the age

of like 15 or 16, my whole worldview was just like, I'm going to go to the Olympics. That's my thing. And I was kind of, I mean, I think it was too early for me to say that I was on that trajectory. But I was on the trajectory that if you wanted to get there, these are the steps that you had to achieve. And so it was around the time where I was the age where I was competing to join the Canada Games team. Wow. And things were looking up and up. Things were looking good. But I ended up that year suffering a knee injury. I developed like a callus on my patella.

And I basically went from the top canoer in Eastern Canada to one of the lowest on the rung. And at that point in my life, it became very evident to me that this was not something I was going to be able to pursue. And so as a youth, as an athlete who is really seriously taking athletics as a serious path in your career, I was basically training two to three times a day on top of going to school. And so all of a sudden, I'm no longer training. And I had a really good friend, still one of my best friends of all time. His name is Ryan. And he was on the improv team. And he said, Jer, you should audition for improv. And I thought, all right, well, it sounds fun. And I took to improv the same way that I took to paddling.

I just naturally excelled. And that sort of like, I got the acting bug. And from that led to being cast as the lead role in the musical in grade 12. And so I was like, okay, well, maybe this is my career. I wanted to go to the Olympics, which was a pipe dream. Now I want to be a world famous actor. Also a bit of a pipe dream. Two things about getting attention. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Right? We'll dive into the psychology of all that later. Yeah. So that's what I did. I went to... I ended up auditioning for, at the time, for... Well, actually, I went to Acadia University for my first year of university, which very quickly I realized that if I wanted to take my life seriously, going to a hardcore party

university... Was it? Oh, yeah. Not good for me. That was a bad route. So I was like, okay, if I want to take this seriously, I have to audition and try to get accepted to a conservatory-style acting program.

And so I auditioned for the three top schools at the time. This might have shifted, but at the time, it was Ryerson in Toronto, York in Toronto, and National Theater School in Montreal. And not to like, this is a little bit of a subtle flex, but to get into one of those three would be immaculate. They whittled down somewhere in the realm of like 2,000 students. They end up taking 20 in each program. I got into all three. Oh, look at you. So I was like, okay, I'm onto something here. I'm passionate about it. I'm good at it. And maybe I could actually make something of this. And so I ended up going to Ryerson

and studied acting. And before I even got into my fourth year at Ryerson, I ended up going to Ryerson and studied acting. And before I even got into my fourth year at Ryerson, I ended up getting cast in a children's television show called Art Zuka. Is this still available that we can find on the internet? Oh, it sure is. And if you have any listeners in Turkey, there's a very big chance that they know exactly who I am. Apparently, the show still today is a huge deal in Turkey. So anyway, yeah. So with this, I decided, okay, I'm going to take a break from university. I'm going to follow this.

And that just led me down this very interesting path where over the next 10 years, I was living my dream. I was acting. I ended up really taking on to hosting things like documentaries. One of the most memorable experiences of my entire life was hosting a National Film Board documentary for schools. It was called Space School. And at the time, astronaut Chris Hadfield was prepping for his mission to command the International Space Station. And so as a part of this documentary, I followed Chris Hadfield around the world and we documented his training. So, you know, I went with him to Houston, to the space center in Houston. We went to Star City in Moscow, where all the cosmonauts and astronauts kind of hang out and train and prep before they go

to Baikonur, Kazakhstan, where I also followed him. And I stood next to Chris and we watched a Soyuz rocket launch three astronauts, the three astronauts ahead of his mission up to the ISS. Unbelievable, you know, mind-altering experience. And that, you know, that point in my life, it was, I was kind of pinching myself going, this is wild. You know, like I'm literally living my dream. But all of that sort of shattered in, I believe, 2015. And the reason for that was because here in Nova Scotia, there was this incredible film tax credit. And it was this tax credit that invited a lot of film work from the US into the province of Nova Scotia. Anything that was shot that had anything to do remotely with a coastal city, an Eastern coastal city, it was all shot here. So there was so much work. But there was a shift in government and the Liberal Party at that time basically just axed the film tax credit here in Nova Scotia. And within the span of a couple of months, everybody I knew in the industry uprooted and left, went somewhere else. They went to

Winnipeg, they went to Toronto, they went to Vancouver, wherever. But the thing was that I was kind of stuck here. And the reason for that is because living with cystic fibrosis, Nova Scotia is a pretty awesome place to be. And the reason for that is that every single medication that I need to stay alive is fully covered here in Nova Scotia. Just under the provincial healthcare plan, everyone gets that when they pay their taxes. That's right. And I came to realize that that's not the case everywhere you go. No, that's when we met and we chatted about health care. Like, oh, yeah, Ontario doesn't really cover anything. Yeah, yeah. Like I just had to get a prescription, some antibiotics the other day and it wasn't that expensive. It was only $18. But yeah, no, nothing's covered.

No, you have to and I don't have private health insurance that may change. But it's just yeah, it's just like it's fascinating. I want to I want to kind of talk about that because that's an interesting thing. I didn't realize how different health plans are per province. I'm originally from Vancouver. And I know at some point you lived in B.C. as well. I don't actually know if their health program is better than Ontario. I know Ontario is just like we have a terrible government right now and not to get political, but they are just, you know, a lot of cuts and a lot of things that just aren't helping people who need it. And it's interesting that, yeah, some people may have to choose where to live in this country based off this really important thing, which is, is this going to, you know, save my life? Because these medications I assume that you're taking, if you were to pay out of pocket, they'd probably be very expensive. Yeah. So for context, I, you know, in the midst of this sort of life crisis where I figured, oh, I can't do the thing that I've wanted to do, that I've spent all this time training and dedicating my life to do.

And realizing like, oh, you know, as an actor, I rely on other people to allow me to do what I do, which was a bit of a staggering realization. And so what I decided at the time, at the time, I was also a yoga instructor. And so I was like, oh, okay, I'm going to move to Salt Spring Island in Vancouver and become a total hippie and open up a yoga studio. And I had a business plan. I had a business partner who was sponsoring me and supporting me in that endeavor. And I got to BC. And at this time, I was like, free healthcare. Canada rocks. And I got to BC and they were like, oh, no, no, no, no. These meds are covered. Yeah. Some of these essential ones, but all these other ones that really sort of guide you towards having a quality of life, you have to pay for it. And that's going to cost you somewhere in the realm

of like 15 grand per year. And so for someone who's like a yoga instructor and a starving artist, it's like, oh, I don't have that. And so I was in Salt Spring for less than a year. I think I was there for nine months, moved home't really plan for that. You didn't plan for your future. You didn't plan for anything. And so I was kind of just left sitting here in Halifax going, what the hell do I do with my life? It was such a jarring realization. Yeah. Your health is really the ultimate determinant of what your future is going to look like because you have to be in a place where these things are covered. And when you think about it, and this is something that honestly never gets talked about in personal finance, a little bit

more on the US side because of their healthcare or lack thereof U.S. side because of, you know, their health care or lack thereof of public health care. But in Canada, I feel like a lot of people think, oh, you know, in Canada, it's all pretty much, you know, universal. It's all good. And you're like, no, it's not. There's things that are not covered. There's a lot of things that are not covered. Or if it is, and I'll just bring up a personal situation I've been dealing with, it is hard to find the help that you need. So I've had a health issue recently, and I'll just bring up a personal situation I've been dealing with. It is hard to find the help that you need. So I've had a health issue recently and I don't have a family doctor because they're all leaving Ontario because it sucks over here. And so I found through the office I usually go to,

there was a virtual doctor, free, covered, great. Talk to somebody. She's like, this is probably what you have. She's like, you should go to an urgent care clinic. I'm like, covered, great. Talk to somebody. She's like, this is probably what you have. She's like, you should go to an urgent care clinic. I'm like, great. Sounds good. I Googled for days, urgent care clinic in Toronto. I still cannot find what, like I called a bunch of places that were listed on websites. They're like, no, we don't do that. So I've had to go to a place that's an hour away. And it's like, just even that, it's like, that is a privilege that I was able to take time off work because I work for myself. My husband was able to drive me because we have a car an hour away. We went there once. Today, we went today. I have to go back tomorrow for the

situation. This is not okay that there's like no access, even though the procedure that I got was covered. There are so many things where it's like like if you work a nine to five, you'd have to take off work. You will not get likely paid for that. And then you're spending an hour to two hours in traffic going to get this thing fixed. This is ridiculous. And this is just like a minor situation. I was writing my book and that there's a section on people are not talking about the cost of having some sort of disability or chronic illness or something like that. Not only the actual financial cost of it, lots of which is not covered in any way by public health or even if you have private health, it's only going to help you in a little bit of a way, but the amount of time you have to take off work and you can't earn to pay all of your bills, like no one's talking about it. Cause I think it just makes people, I don't know. I'd love to know your perspective, but like uncomfortable, like we don't want to talk about it because we hate talking about privilege or something. Yeah, totally. And I mean, you know, I think also too, it's, it's not just, it's not just that issue, but it's also the issue of like, we just don't, we actually don't have the supports in our country to, to support people with that situation. And so it's, you know, it's also the issue of like, we just don't, we actually don't have the supports in our country to support people with that situation. And so it's like, I mean, you're speaking to a personal experience of your own health, right? Now imagine you're a new parent and you're healthy,

right? Mom and dad are healthy, but you are a new parent to a child with cerebral palsy or to a child with Down syndrome or to a child, whatever, any kind of physical or mental disability, well, now what happens? If you have to now completely upend your life in order to be a caregiver to this child that requires full-time attention, what kind of supports exist for you in that situation? And to be quite frank, there's not a lot of support. We don't have the scaffolding to support caregivers in this country. It's a massive, massive problem. And we're actually just... Me and my two best friends and colleagues who I do Sick Boy podcasts with, we were having this

conversation today. The caregivers in Canada are the largest non-paid workforce in the country. And that should be staggering. That should be a stat that is really mind-blowing to people. And it's something that we don't often think about until it's affecting us. But here's the thing is that it's affecting all of us. I know. When you talk to people, you actually find out the real stories and everyone has a story of this and that. Just as another personal experience, my husband's dad had MS. He unfortunately passed away. But the only reason I think he got the care because it was pretty progressive and he had to be in a facility. And the only reason I think he got the care that he did at that level that he did was because of his employer. He was working for the bus company

and they had really good benefits, disability benefits, and it covered him for years and years and years. But if he didn't have that job and didn't get those benefits, it'd be a very different situation. It's funny that you mentioned that. Back in 2015, when I was like, what the frick am I going to do with my life? One of the things that I thought of was like, I guess I'll become a bus driver. I love driving. I hear there's great benefits. There are. And to be honest with you, I like my life now and I think things are actually going quite well. But there's a small sliver of me that's like, that dream has not died yet, being a bus driver someday. So who knows? Maybe that'll be my backup if audio production just fails.

I mean, it's not a bad backup. I feel like we always need bus drivers though. But yeah, it's just like when you think about that and you hear the stories of people, it's like, how did you make it work? You find out, oh, they were only able to make it work because they had family support, like financial support. Or it's, oh, they were lucky. Their employer had great benefits and covered them for this amount, all this kind of stuff. But what about the people that don't have those situations? Like, that is terrifying. And, yeah, especially the caregivers, the amount of time.

Even if it's not that, you know, it's parents to a child, it could be you're a child and your parent needs help. That's definitely something that me and my husband think about often as our parents get older is the support that they are going to need financially and also they're across the country. So what are we going to do? Do we have to move back at a certain point when things are shaky. We'll see. Yeah. I will say that conversations like this in the past have always kind of left me feeling a little bit sort of pessimistic and kind of heavy where it's like, oh, it seems like we're just all just swimming around in a broken system and there's not going to be a lot of change. But the one thing that I will say is that I've been blessed with being invited to a couple of change. But the one thing that I will say is that I've been blessed with being invited to a couple of conferences, especially over the last couple of months. And there's a lot of people out there that are making some huge, huge waves in the world of the healthcare system within our country, especially pertaining to people like caregivers,

and especially in the world of like pediatrics. And so, you know, as, as, as I am typically an eternal pessimist, I do to those two, you know, these two conferences that I went to, I'm, I'm all of a sudden I'm having this shift where I'm like, Oh, I'm actually feeling quite hopeful and quite optimistic about the future. So, so if, you know So if you're hearing this and you're thinking, oh, goddamn, we're all screwed. It's like there are people that are behind the scenes we don't know about that are doing things. They're doing the work. They're going to try to make it better. We just don't see that. We just see the problems. I'm curious, at what point then, because I'm sure you talk about these things all day long on Sick Boy and you talk to guests, what inspired the podcast and what are some of the things that you discuss? Because this is something that isn't discussed,

I feel like, in open conversation. People do not talk about health things. It is like, TMI, da, da, da. But it's really important. Just like money, it's like, we shouldn't be ashamed to talk about it. We have to talk about it, right? Because it's interesting that people I've found out that, oh, I didn't know you had that health issue or I didn't know you have chronic this and that, like migraines. But you're like, oh, that's just a headache. You're like, no, it's debilitating. Yeah, there's a real strong stigma and surrounding health. And I don't think that that comes as a surprise to anyone. You know, where this all sort all began was at that confluence of realizing that I really screwed up

with the way that I viewed my life. So I guess for context, before I get into that, one of the things that has really shaped me into the person that I am today, which is I think one of the So when I was 10, I actually didn't know this. To me, CF was just like an everyday annoyance. I knew I was sick. I knew I had CF, but I was never told that it's actually a life-shortening illness. And so when I was 10, I read this pamphlet. And it was like a pamphlet for my teachers, I think, to give them a sort of sense of what it's like to have a CF kid in your class. And the pamphlet in it, there was a sentence that said, the average life expectancy of someone living with CF is 30 years of age. And I remember at

10 just thinking like, what? Hold on. Yeah, you're like, I'm sorry. This can't be right. I feel like my mom and dad would have told me this, but they didn't. And the reason they didn't was because they were told not to. At the time, I guess that was like the mode of thinking where it was like, oh, no, no, don't tell them. They'll find out and then they'll come to you with questions. And so I did find out, but I did not go to them with questions. I just kind of buried that down. But that moment really shifted the way that I ended up living the next 25 years of my life. I spent my entire life after 10 living with this notion where I was completely and utterly convinced that I was going to be dead by 30. And that sounds heavy.

Wow. That does sound heavy. But I'll tell you one thing. It was truly incredible. I mean, it forced me to meditate on mortality. And it guided me into this way of living that was very much like seize the day because there is no tomorrow. You have this time right now in the present. The past, there's no point in focusing on that. And there's not really much point in focusing too much on the future because there is not one. So it's like, what can you do right now? And that's the thing that led me to this idea of like, well, I like acting, so I will become an actor. Worst financial decision I've ever made in my life, for sure. But also it led to a number of years where I really felt like I was so rich. Maybe not financially, but in my heart, I was living.

You were living. I was living so hard. When my film career seemingly tanked in the matter of a month, I had that mentality of like, oh my God, you've dedicated so much of your time and your life to honing this craft that, again, relies on other people to give you the permission to do your thing. As an actor, it's like you can't just... A musician can pick up their guitar and go play on the street corner. Or a painter can pick up the brush or the pencil and express themselves wherever they are, on a napkin in a restaurant. An actor, you can't really go down to the street corner and just start busting out a soliloquy. You could, but you don't want to be that guy, right? So I was like, what do I do? Like, I am such a creative person.

I'm so right brain heavy. And maybe we'll get into that and how that's sort of shifted. And it's especially with like the way that I view money now. But I was like, well, how do I express the side of myself? And so I ended up, you know, long story short, I saw Kevin Smith, famed Canadian director of Jay and Silent Bob and Clerks and many, many more amazing films. He was giving a talk and I saw him in this talk. And one of the things that he said in this talk was, he was talking about podcasting because he's like a podcast mogul.

The guy's got... He had his own network at the time. And this was like before podcasting was even a household name, right? This is before Serial. This is before, you know. Like 2013, 2014 or something like that? Totally. Yeah. And so one of the things that he said that really stuck with me that night was podcasting is the perfect form of creative expression. And the reason for that is because everybody in this room likely has a cell phone. If you have a cell phone and you have a thing that you are passionate about, you have the opportunity to create a podcast. Let's say your thing is... your passion is knitting hats for kittens.

And it's the thing that you love more than anything. And it's a pretty niche thing, but guess what? There's guaranteed to be at least one other person in the world who also shares that passion for knitting hats for cats. And if you put that podcast out into the world and that one other person tunes in, it doesn't matter if it's just one or if it's 100,000. You have the ability to create this form of art that can connect with somebody else. And he said this. And I remember just like all of a sudden being... It's like I downloaded the information out of thin air where I went,

holy shit, I could do this. I could start a podcast and I could call it Sick Boy. And it could literally be about living life with illness, but touching on the elements of that that are really funny because there's a lot of humor and a lot of laughter that is tied to hardship and struggle. There's nothing funny about CF. There's nothing funny about terminal cancer. But I'll tell you right now, from lived experience, there's a lot of funny moments that come up in that particular situation. And so that was the birth of the idea. I sat on it for a few months, kind of workshopped it with a couple of friends, some in healthcare, some not. And this all led to me and my now co-hosts and business partners, Taylor McGilvery and

Brian Stever. We were just hanging out at the Halifax Central Library. We were talking about creating something together. And so I said to them, I was like, hey, I got this idea for a podcast. And they said, all right, well, let's do it right now. There's a recording studio here in the library let's rent it out and and have a conversation so we booked a recording studio and for the very first episode it was like okay brian and taylor you guys can be the hosts i'll

be the guest and you ask all the questions that you'd ever want to ask you know your sick friend and that one recording was the first episode of the podcast. And it just kind of steamrolled from there. It took on a life of its own very quickly. And fast forward now, nine years later, we've produced and published over 800 episodes. We've spoken to people from across the world. And we have a list of over 3,000 people from around the world who applied to come on this show and sit down with three strangers and share their experience in living with illness. And it, the, you know, this project that all stemmed from this one talk that I heard from Kevin Smith has now become my,

my life. It's become my career. It's become the thing that has given me purpose. And it's also the thing that's been paying my bills. And, you know, not to say that there's a ton of money in podcasting, but there's a way. There's a way to get into that world where, you know, it can be fruitful and it can be financially successful. And it's only really been in the last couple of years where the idea of financial success and my work has started to kind of mesh together. Because I bet being someone who wants to be an actor, you're like, I'm going to be starving this whole time. I mean, that's what I felt after film school. I'm like, I'm never going to have money because you were told that. I don't have high expectations, which is a terrible thing to hear

because then you don't try or you just think, well, you know, why bother? This is the way. But I mean, I was right before this watching your amazing TED Talk and you're an amazing speaker. And you, yeah, you really do have, I mean, it does help that you have the natural ability of acting and improv and stuff like that. That does help, doesn't it? Comes in handy, those skills. But it's amazing what you've been able to create with the podcast and your speaking and everything else that you're doing. Because you're, you really are. Yeah, I just, yeah. I mean, we met and I'm like, I like this guy. This guy's got something. I like him. He's just, and I feel like lots of people are drawn to you.

You're just very real and won't shy away from talking about things. Just the idea of like talking to your sick friend and asking them questions. You know how many people would love to be able to do that, but people feel so uncomfortable and then don't, and then no one's talking about it, which is weird because maybe we should be more open and just be more cognizant and all that kind of stuff. Like we need to be more open about these things instead of just brushing things under the rug. Totally. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's, it is a, you know, it's, I, I, I think it, I think it stems from, uh, uh, you know, a thousand different things, but I think one

of the big parts is like, we've, we, especially in a Western society and especially as men, holy shit. Like, you know, we've been taught that like Western society and especially as men, holy shit. Like, you know, we've been taught that like vulnerability is this huge sign of weakness. And, you know, take 10 seconds to listen to Brene Brown speak. And it's very evident very quickly that, oh, no, no, no. Vulnerability is actually a massive sign of strength. Because you know how hard it is to be vulnerable? Like, ooh. Yeah. So that's, Yeah. So that's what I do now. And it's been incredible. And I love my work and I love

what I'm able to do. And I think that's also kind of shaped me into this person that I am today, at the risk of sounding vain. I really love myself and love who I've become. But to dive a little bit deeper into my relationship with money... Yeah. I was just going to ask, what came to mind is, how does financial planning change for someone who knows that they have a shorter lifespan? Because most people that are like, I don't have an illness of that kind of sort. I'm going to live to, you know, the average is like 85 or whatever. And so you're like, that's, you're like stressed to the age of 30, I really lived with this... Although it was an incredible way of life, of living to squeeze out every second of life that I can, it also led to the downfall, which was not planning for a future. The idea of kids, completely out of the question for me. Oh, really? You're just like, no.

No, yeah. For me, even at 16, I remember having this thought where it was like, okay, I'll never have a kid. Why would I do that to a human? Bring a child into this world only to have them grow up the majority of their life without a father. I had no interest in that. And I used to think that marriage was kind of out of the question because it was like, well, who's going to want to marry a guy with less than 10 years to live? But I ended up getting married. I got married when I, but, but again, I got married in a very like impulsive way. Right. I met this person. I met, I met my, my now ex-wife Bridie in university and, uh, we were dating for two years and I just, I was like,

Hey, I'm going to die and I don't have time. Will you marry me? And I think she was like, I think Bridie was like, oh, geez, you've got what, like seven years? Yeah, I'll take a short term marriage. That sounds great. Yeah, that's one way people are great at commitment. You're like, oh, great. I don't really have to commit that much. Yeah, yeah. It's like by the time, for her, it's like by the time you're dead, I've got plenty of time to find another partner. From 23 to 30, it was like, I mean, the idea of saving money was just out the window. It's what's the point, right? But let's fast forward to when I'm 32, 33, there's all these rumblings in Canada about this new medication for people with cystic fibrosis. And it's called Trikafta. And it's this gene modulator. Essentially, I won't get into the science behind it, but it's not a cure to CF, although it's like the next best thing.

So it's not a drug that treats the symptoms of CF, rather it treats at the source. So that inability to move chloride in and out of the cells is due to a genetic mutation. And that genetic mutation causes a protein in my body to be malformed. So this pill doesn't genetically change me, but it changes that malformed protein to be in the shape that it should be. And so now my body actually does what a normal human's body should do. Amazing, right? Like huge win and maybe like a step closer to a cure. But the other part that comes with this drug is the fact that... Okay. So to kind of really hammer home the the grandioseness of this pill, when I took the pill, I was at the lowest my lung function had

ever been. This was in November 2021. My lung function at the time of taking Trikafta was 50%. Two months later, January of 2022, my lung function was 83%, which was the highest it had been in over a decade. Wow. And the drug is still quite new, but the way things are looking now with people who are on Trikafta, it's very evident that the world of CF is going to see this massive shift where originally we were dealing with a pediatrics disease where people were often dying in their 20s, even before their 30s. We're now going to start seeing people living with this disease,

likely up to the time of 80, 85. It's like, all of a sudden, my looming dark cloud of like, oh, death's right around the corner. You know what? Death's actually going, forget you. I'm just going to go down here and focus on these folks over here. And so now it's like, oh, you actually have a life. And now you need a plan for your future. And I didn't do that. And you're like, shoot, the best time was doing that in my 20s, like all the personal finance books said. No.

I didn't start that until literally a year and a half ago where I went, oh no, I've got a future. And so now it's like, oh, maybe I do want to have kids. And maybe I do want to start thinking about what does it mean to save for retirement? And so that has been a real, real trippy whole worldview shift. But to tie into all that, to make this even more complex and convoluted for myself, like I said earlier, I'm very right brain heavy, right? The right side of my brain is firing on all cylinders. It's all creativity and physical movement know, and like, like physical movement and, and, but there's not a lot of, there's not a lot of like reason and, and, and logic. It's all impulsivity and, and, and creativity. Those are not good when it comes to money. I'd say. Yeah. You know? And so one of the, you know, not to like tag this other thing onto my situation, but

it turns out I've also been sort of dealing with untreated ADHD throughout my whole life. And it's funny, like I, you know, when I started to kind of clue into this, that this was an issue, I asked my mom, I was like, hey, mom, did you ever, did you ever like, did teachers ever come to you at any point when I was growing up and say like, hey, you know, you might want to get tested for ADHD. And my mom goes, oh, yeah, yeah. Like every single teacher. And I went, oh, okay. And so like what was your thought there? And she went, oh, I just, you know, you're just a hyper, you were just a hyper boy. But like, that's

normal. And I was like, oh, God, it might have been really helpful if you... So as an adult, and this is very, very, very recent, I ended up... Over the last two months, about a month and a half ago, two months ago, I fell into a pretty intense depression. So I was diagnosed with clinical depression, diagnosed with ADHD. Was this kind of during the time of COVID, I guess? No, no. This was literally like three months ago. Oh, okay. Wow. And so this was actually, this was like right before we had you as a guest on Sick Boy.

Okay. Oh, wow. I was just swimming in really heavy depression and it was manifesting in some addiction behaviors. And so what we ended up doing was we decided to treat both the depression and the ADHD, but we would do it one step at a time. And the first step was, all right, let's handle the ADHD. Let's see if we can handle that. And maybe that will bring you to a place of clarity so you can work on the depression. And so I started a prescription of Adderall. And I was probably about a week, a week and a half into my Adderall prescription before you came on Sick Boy. God, that's crazy. And in that conversation that we had with you, you said something that really deeply stuck with me.

Really? And what I'm going to say here isn't something, it's not some glorious, wild piece of information. No, that doesn't sound like me. But it actually is when you can comprehend it. And I don't think I had the ability to comprehend it up until that moment, which you said, when it comes to dealing with finances and when it comes to talking about money, you have to be able to remove your emotion from that equation. And because I have lived 35 years of my life as an impulsive, right brain focus, that's it. I'm all emotion. I run hot on emotion. And so I didn't have an innate ability Yeah. life when it came to any element of my life, whether that be my interpersonal relationships, whether that be my own relationship with myself. Money and me just did not mix.

But when I was able to... I know that there's lots to be said for medications. And there's some people out there that think the world is overprescribed when it comes to things like Adderall or stimulants and stuff. And rightfully so, you're probably right. But I'll tell you right now, that medication has fundamentally shifted my life in a huge way. And it actually allowed me to be able and capable to step back from my emotions and look at something just with logic, just with reason. And it has completely shifted my worldview on finances. That's amazing. Like I'm swimming in debt. I've just racked up debt from living like a frigging, you know, just living fast in the fast lane. And I couldn't

look at that debt until, you know, actually, literally the night we spoke, the day we spoke to you, I went home that night. Yeah. I got a copy of your budget spreadsheet for self-employed and employed couples. Yeah. And I sat down with my partner and we went through the whole thing. And I was like, this is it. This is great. My partner who's typically like, she's pretty good with that stuff. I could start to see her getting really emotional about it. And I was having this like outer body experience going, holy shit, this is what you typically do, but somehow you're not in that. And so now you, now you have to like, now it's your role to kind of help and be supportive and guide her in, into this realm where you are. And it's, man, it has completely fundamentally just shifted everything about my

life. And so firstly, I want to say thank you for, for putting that little piece into my head. But also, thank you for the work that you do. I think we spoke about this when you were a guest on our show, but not only are we a society where there's a lot of us who are very right brain focused, we're also a society where when we look at the education that we grew up with, and maybe it's shifting, maybe it's changed today. But when I was in high school, there wasn't a single ounce of talking about financial success or how to even do your taxes, all of these things. And so the work that you do, I think, is just so vitally important because you're teaching a generation of folks who just didn't get that.

It's interesting because it's like I'm probably the opposite of you where because of a bunch of other things in my life, I've always been very rational, logical and non-emotional. And I, this year, through my own healing journey, have had to figure out the vulnerable emotional side because I always just lock that into a door and threw away the key, which has its own set of problems. It's such a great time. I highly recommend everyone. I'll link to it in the show notes to listen to that episode. I had such a great time talking with you guys because we talked about everything under the sun and went deep and talked about how your past and your childhood affected things. All of these things are involved. So even though I say, take the emotion out of it to make good financial decisions, which is kind of true, that is like the ideal situation, but emotion will always try to get in and that's fine. You just need to like recognize that and manage it and just, you know, because

even to this day, me and my husband have been doing the same thing. We have our monthly money meetings. Sometimes, you know, it's more just like put our numbers in and we don't really talk about it. Maybe we'll talk about it next month or what have you. He still hates doing it. And we've been doing it for like seven years. And he's because he is a creative, he is very emotional and stuff like that. And we have to have these conversations being like, your money is not your identity. You are more than your money and it's okay. And every time it was like, hey, we filled out our net worth. It's better than last month. How do you feel? He's like, awful. He's always just not having a good time. And I think it's important to talk about that. It's okay to not feel good about your money, but it's important for you to do it anyway.

That's right. Yeah. Just like anything in life, you want to take care of yourself in any way, psychologically, you know, fitness and health. You got to, it's not going to be fun and you have to do it anyway. It does get better though. And it gets easier. You're not just like, oh, this is the word. You're like, oh, it's a little less painful this time. That's right.

And like, there's something to be said for, you know, I mean, being comfortable in uncomfortable situations is so important, right? That's the thing that allows us to grow. That's how we grow. That's how we learn. I also just want to say, I just want to clarify there because I know that what I said was like, hey, I got put on stimulants and now I can focus on my money. I don't think that Adderall is... If you're listening to this and you're like, oh, I actually have always had a hard time with money and I have a hard time removing the emotions, you actually don't need an ADHD medication to be able to do that. You may not have ADHD. That's right. That's the important thing. Yeah. There's a lot of research to show. People are being

kind of over-diagnosed. With that said, yeah, don't just go like ask for a prescription or something like that. Seek some help to find out maybe it is something else or maybe, you know, or maybe it's just like, no, it's just you. Yeah, totally. And the thing, the wonderful thing when you make that realization that it's simply about removing the emotions, even if you're in a place where you're like, well, I just don't seem like I have the ability or the capability to do that. There are really effective ways to be able to quiet the right brain and wake up the logical brain. And like, it's very simple that, you know, if you don't, and I know that this, this is, people probably hear this and roll their eyes, but like, there is so much to be said for a, a, even a, even a sort

of like low key meditation practice, you know? Oh, don't, I'm all, I mean, I don't do it. My husband's all into it. He did a 10 day silent retreat over the summer. Yeah. It, it was a bit of a life change. He came home wanting to go back to school and now he's in school, you know, but it was great. But he's all about like, he has always had anxiety and lots of things, emotional dysregulation, which is funny because you would never know it because he just like, it just buries it, but it's like happening inside. Meditation has changed his life. It is the thing that he needs. So I highly recommend doing it. I am just terrible at it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's even as easy as if you're doing monthly money meeting sessions, whether it's on your own or with your partner, it's like, just set aside. You've scheduled it

in. It's going to happen on a Monday at 7pm. Well, at 6.45, just go sit somewhere quiet and just be present with your breath and your body and slow your breathing down. Or there's lots of grounding techniques if you feel those emotions rising and you're just like, ah. There's so many ways, just like Google, grounding techniques that you can do to get yourself back into that mode of like, okay, we're removing all of this baggage and all the things that I associate with money. Like I'm a piece of crap or I'm a failure. Let's get rid of all of that. Cause that is none of that's true. That is just, that's not true. And let's just like, look at things logically. Cause that is the only way you're going to be able to like do the math and then do, you know, actually activate whatever's in your budget.

It's funny. It makes me think about approaching you and your money and sitting with it and whatever, breaking down your budget or whatever it is. Treat that the same way that you would treat a fight with your significant other. Yes. Right? And it's like, if you look at the work that relationship therapists or couples coaches, all the work that they do, you can take that same work and just apply it to your ability to work with money. And it's the same thing. I mean, it's all based on emotional regulation. It's all based on really just being present with the the the shared reality and not the reality that you've built up in your head you know um so so yeah that's it's yeah it's man

it's it's a it's an interesting place to be in right now because i just feel like a this renewed sense of of life that that i didn't have before and it it's really exciting. Yeah. Well, to kind of wrap things up, because we're getting to time, what are some of the things that you have done? And what are some of the plans that you've put in place that you may not have put in place before? Yeah. Well, I mean, this is kind of a big one. So my partner and I were talking about having a child. And again, that's not something that I ever thought I would say. And so with that comes some sort of future monetary goals of, you know, if we're going to do this, the one thing that I would like to be able to do before taking that step is just having control over the financial debt that I have found myself in. And so that debt is just built up from... It's credit card debt. It's line of credit debt. It's past tax bullshit debt. It's a mountain. It's a mountain of debt. And prior to this newfound sense of removing emotions from money, I wouldn't have been in

a place to be able to even comprehend what that would look like. But now, thanks to your budget spreadsheet and thanks to removing the emotions, I can see like, oh, actually, this is tangible. And this could be very well be doable within the next two years. And so two years from now, that's the goal right now. It's like, okay, let's have a kid. Let's think about having a child and let's use that as our goal to take control of our financial health. And so, yeah, that's where I'm at right now. It's really exciting. That's really exciting. That's really exciting. Well, I know we could talk. I mean, I'll probably have you back on the show because it was such a great conversation and so important to have these conversations. But I know people can find more

about what you talk about on Sick Boy. tell me where people can find it and some of the guests. I know you've had some really amazing guests over the past couple of years. Yeah. So at Jeremy Saunders on Instagram, if you want to connect with me directly, at Sick Boy Podcast on all socials. And Sick Boy Podcast is like, it's wherever you find podcasts, you just look it up, Sick Boy. But yeah, we've had the real, real fortunate life to be able to speak to a lot of really interesting and fascinating people. Most of the people we talk to are just your everyday, normal, average folks living in Canada who are experiencing illness.

But we also speak to... We do three episodes a week. So we have a day specifically for those folks. And we have a day specifically for folks under the umbrella of sort of healthcare providers or professionals. So we've spoken to lots of really interesting people. Actually, we just recently did a live recording with Dr. Gabor Mate. Yes. Which that episode will be dropping soon.

We had him on the show before, but we somehow managed to get him out to a bar and do a live recording, which is an absolute hoot. And then Fridays, we do episodes where it's just the three of us and we talk about super weird and wild health crap from the history of health to what's happening in the world today and upcoming things. So yeah, I mean, feel free to check out the podcast. And if anybody has any questions or wants to connect or wants to come on the show, if you're listening to this, you're like, oh, I've got a thing. Or if in 10 years, you get a thing, you can just go to sickboypodcast.com and sign up to come on the show. And we love hearing from folks from all over.

That's amazing. Well, Jeremy, it was a pleasure. I knew it would. I was so excited for this episode. I'm excited. Such a great time on your show. Thank you so much for coming on. It was great.

Thank you so much. And that was episode 388 of the More Money Podcast with Jeremy Saunders of Sick Boy Podcast. I'm going to tell you where to find him because you're definitely going to want to look them up. First, go to sickboypodcast.com. And also, if you're listening on whatever platform you're listening on, find that podcast, subscribe. It is amazing. You can also find him on Twitter or X at Jeremy Saunders, and that's S-A-U-N-D-E-R-S. You can also find him on Instagram with the exact same handle, at Jeremy Saunders. I am going to link to everything in the show notes for this episode, jessicamorehouse.com slash 388. And just a reminder, you can find any episode show notes with all the details about that guest and what we kind of chatted about at jessicamorehouse.com

slash podcast or jessicamorehouse.com slash the number of that particular episode. One thing I'm definitely going to include is Jeremy did a TED Talk back in 2017 called Embracing Your Expiry Date. It's amazing. He killed it. You're going to want to watch it. So definitely check out the show notes and all that good stuff. So as always, I have some things to share with you. So do not go away. Stay there. Stay with me. Stay with us, as the news people say. This episode of the More Money Podcast is supported by The Globe and Mail. Want to finally get a better handle on your debt and spending this year? Or maybe you want to stop feeling so intimidated by all the financial jargon and terminology that's thrown around all the time. I've said this on the podcast countless times,

but I'll say it again. One of the best investments you can ever make in yourself is by expanding your financial knowledge. And one resource I've always turned to for staying up to date on financial trends and news and expanding my own knowledge is the Globe and Mail, Canada's leading source of business and investing news. Not only do they have a plethora of personal finance content by top financial journalists like Rob Carrick, Erica Alini, and Salman Faruqi, but they also have helpful calculators, podcasts, and explainers on everything from how to invest when you're just starting out to how to pick the best robo-advisor. And for a limited time for more

money listeners, The Globe is offering unrestricted access to globeandmail.com for just $1.99 per week for the first 52 weeks plus tax. For full details, visit tgam.ca slash Jessica. Once again, that's tgam.ca slash Jessica. All right, so reminder, I am doing another big book giveaway. I closed the one for season 17. So that is all wrapped up and I'm starting up a new one. And I'm going to be adding to it every single week whenever there is a guest who has a book. And I've got several authors coming on the show. And the first book that I'm giving away that you can enter to win right now was last week's guest Scott Fulford. His book, The Pandemic Paradox, How the COVID Crisis Made Americans More Financially Secure. You can check that out at jessicamorehouse.com slash contest.

Enter to win and then, you know, get into the rhythm of maybe checking that every little bit. And, you know, sometimes I'll remind you in my newsletter, honestly, 2023, I think I sent out like, I don't know, four or five newsletters in the entire year. And I, you know, used to send them out weekly. And then I just was too busy with the book writing, basically. But I'm hoping to get back into that. So you can get the reminders, hey, there's a contest and all that good stuff. So make sure to check that out, jessicamorehouse.com slash contest. Another thing that you may or may not know, but just a reminder, and also this is sort of like the around the anniversary. I have an investing course called Wealth Building Blueprint for Canadians, and I launched it, crazy now to think about this, three years ago, three years ago,

over 400 students have entered the course to learn about how to build wealth through passive investing, something I'll talk about on the show ad nauseum if you are a longtime listener. And it really goes from start to finish, all the key things you need to know about investing, something I talk about on the show ad nauseum if you are a longtime listener. And it really goes from start to finish all the key things you need to know about investing, specifically for Canadians, specifically passive investing through index ETFs, all of the things that I could think of that you would need. There's a great community of students as well. I do a monthly group kind of coaching, ask me anything that you have access to, you get lifetime access to the course, a lot of great calculators and spreadsheets that I have specifically built for the course, and a lot of good stuff. So if you want to learn more and see if it's a good fit for

you, you want to start investing, or you just want to learn more about it, JessicaMorehouse.com slash course is where you can find information about that. Along the same lines, because we're still like at the beginning of the year ish. And also we're getting close to text time. Anyone else excited? No, just me. Okay, that's okay. Anyways, if you are looking to kind of get your financial life together, I always recommend a budget or spending plan, whatever you like to call it. I've got a bunch of budget spreadsheets on my website to download and you can use them every single year. So once you buy it, you can literally use it forever. And yeah, if you want to check those out, jessicamorehouse.com slash shop to get your money organized. What are your goals? What are your

expenses? What's your net worth? Let's track your expenses every single month and see where your money's going. Let's see where the money is going. Because once you find out where the money is going, then you can start making some changes and then you can divert it to the place where you actually want it to go. Like your savings, your investments, buying a house, getting a pet, having a family, a wedding, anything, you know, and so it all starts with a budget. I still use this budget spreadsheet to this day. I'm not joking. I use the exact same spreadsheet, obviously, because that's why I built it. I built it for myself. And then I started sharing it with others. And it has helped me now how long I've been using this particular version. I mean, I've always been budgeting,

but this one I've really been strict with it, especially with like the tracking of the expenses and net worth since 20, no wait, what did yours say? It's 2024. 2017 is when I started this new spreadsheet and started using it. So seven years or something like that. Is that right? Oh my gosh. A long time. And it has been amazing because whenever my husband who does not really like, he still gets very anxious and does not like talking about money, which I totally get. And it is what it is. I like showing him the numbers to be like, look, look at how far we've come. Budgets are amazing. Anyways, that's enough about that. So that is it for me. Thank you so much for listening. I'll see you back here next Wednesday. And a big thank you, of course, to my podcast team, video edit by Justice Carrar and produced by MRAVCanada.com. Matt Rideout, you are awesome. I will see you back here next Wednesday. This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast

Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.