These Fukken Feelings Podcast© - Charging the Human Heart: Pulsating Resilience Against Unseen Odds | Season 3 - Episode 300

Episode Date: November 1, 2023

Send us a Text Message.Welcome to the emotionally stirring premiere of Season 3 of the "These Fukken Feelings" Podcast. Join your hosts, Micah and Rebecca, as they delve into a deeply moving conversation with Bethany and Hannah, the courageous powerhouses behind Heart Charged.This profound dialogue begins with Bethany and Hannah recounting their transformative journey from vivacious high-school athletes to resilient warriors battling hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). This silent adversary, o...

you don't have to be positive all the time it's perfectly okay to feel sad angry annoyed frustrated scared and anxious having feelings doesn't make you a negative person it doesn't even make you weak it makes you human and we are here to talk through it all we welcome you to these fucking feelings podcast a safe space for all who needs it grab a drink and take a seat. The session begins now. What's up guys? Welcome to these fucking feelings podcast. I am Micah here with my girl Rebecca and we got two guests today, Hannah and Bethany and it's's Heart Charged. Is that right? Yes. Yes. So now we believe here that no one could explain what you do better than you. So go ahead and tell us a little bit

about yourselves and your organization. Okay. So Heart Charged is a nonprofit organization. It began as just kind of using the power of social media to bring people together, especially young people with heart conditions. Hannah and I were both diagnosed with a deadly heart condition in our teens called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. And what that basically is, is the left ventricle wall in your heart is abnormally thick. So it makes it really hard for the blood to flow in and out. And then that's what causes you to go into sudden cardiac arrest. So if you've ever

heard a crazy story of someone just dropping dead, it's usually from the condition in which Hannah and I both have. I'm not sure if you guys know this by listening, but we're both sisters. And it's a genetic condition. We have six older brothers, and then we have another sister. And we're, we're the two with it. And then our mom also has the condition. It presents itself differently in everybody. But we realized, we were so lucky to have each other on our heart journey. So we were like, you know what, we need to find other people so they don't feel as alone. And that's kind of where Heart Charge began and came to be. And then it became kind of a two-part mission. So not only do we do the patient-to-patient

support, but we're also really big on advocacy. And we've done a lot of great awareness and different things along those lines, which we can get into later. Definitely. That's incredible. Yeah. Well, it's not incredible that i got a heart condition and it's actually very funny because my mom actually has the same thing hypertraffic and she actually just went through the alcohol septal ablation okay yeah yeah and then she had to get a pacemaker because of it because they end up messing up like her electrical system and yeah it's been crazy so wow yeah i i just like seeing it from the other side it's crazy like not going through it because i actually have my heart works too fast but maybe i need to get it checked out right yeah maybe

and now your mom can join our bionic club because we both have defibrillators so there we go she's a bionic babe that's crazy i know and i was thinking about that i was telling them helpful for her too right i was telling them earlier and i was like i think they have defibrillators and i wonder why my mom got like a pacemaker instead of the defibrillators do you know why that is um so it all it all varies it's not like one is better than the other um so what's interesting with my defibrillator it also paces as well okay and more with the pacing is um more if they think that your heart is never gonna in sense of like go into cardiac arrest and reach a very like off rhythm so i've actually been shocked by my device four times. And I went into cardiac

arrest and it literally saved my life and got it back normal. So usually the defibrillator is just sending a bigger, stronger electrical thing. So when they think you're more at high risk, you'll have a defibrillator instead of a pacemaker, which is sometimes either constantly working just to pace to kind of keep your rhythm in check. And then Bethany is just to defibrillate. So it's more probably maybe a bit of a good thing that your mom only has a pacemaker. Because then she may not need to be extremely shocked a lot. She's not at high risk of going into cardiac arrest. So in a way, it's it's kind of better. But they both, in a way, depends on how intense the electrical shock is being sent to your body. But pacing is not fun either.

But you hope it never goes off. Right. And it was just crazy, though, because my mom has this theory that because she's older, she's 71. I tell everybody her age. She always gets mad at me. I tell it again. She's 71. And she feels that she didn't get the full medical treatment she's supposed to get because she's older and she's geriatric and she feels like they're just trying to like patch her up

and send her up on her way. So it's good that you said that because I could be like, oh, nope, I talked to somebody and they said it doesn't necessarily mean a bad thing that you didn't get both. So thanks for that. No, yeah, of course. And we would love to talk to her too, if she has like any further questions or anything like that. That's kind of why we made our thing is so people could have a better understanding because doctors aren't going to answer those questions of like, how am I going to look with this, you know, with having these scars? How does it really feel the treatment of after and you know, the recovery process of it. So we're always open to talk about any of that stuff, you know, with her, if she has any questions. And I mean, not only probably as an older person

too, but also as a woman, sometimes women have a different, you know, experience as well, like with doctors, which is kind of sad to see. We're not always taking that seriously or told it's just stress or, you know, dismissed by doctors. Okay, that was a good point. I see you about to turn this into something else. So how old were you guys again? So I was 17 and Hannah was 14. So is it that this was like when they diagnosed it, did they think you kind of over had it and it was just this when they discovered it type of thing? Yeah. So HCM is a genetic condition. And if it wasn't for our aunt, our mom's sister, she was at like her normal kind of like cardiology follow-up appointment. And while she was there,

she was complaining of some symptoms and they said, oh, well that makes sense because if you're hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and she basically goes, my what? Like has no idea that she had this, but it was in her chart and she's had some valve replacement and other heart issues, but had no idea that she had this other condition. So like anybody that gets diagnosed with something, you immediately start Googling, like, what is it? How can you get it? You know, how severe is it? And so come to find out she finds she finds out it's genetic. So she immediately tells my mom and she's like, because she has no kids of her own. She's like, hey, you need to go get the kids checked. Like just so we can be like aware, like, let's see

who has it. So my mom calls to get an appointment. And since we had no real symptoms, they were like, okay, we can have an appointment in six months. And so by the grace of God, my mom takes Hannah to get checked first. And while Hannah was at that appointment, basically the doctor was like, how have you not dropped dead yet? Because it was that severe, her hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. And then a week later, I get diagnosed and I was in a pre-professional ballet program with Miami City Ballet and kind of our, our life's changed from

there. But it's crazy to look back because now we know the warning signs of this cardiac condition. And we had all of them. And we told our pediatrician and it's crazy because 65% of the time, your normal, you know, pediatrician dismisses it as it couldn't be cardiac related at all. And they totally were. And so we're really lucky that we got diagnosed when we did because it could have been a definitely different outcome. Definitely.

Wow. Now, none of your brothers have it. So is it like a genetic female thing or? So that's the thing. There's like no, like nobody knows. Like there's not a lot of research on it. We actually, so the brother right older than me actually has like the gene for it,

but he doesn't really express it. And recently he like had a few symptoms, but nothing that a cardiologist would say is really HCM. Yes, your sisters have it, but I would never just, if I didn't know they had it, I would never diagnose it likeM. Yes, your sisters have it, but I would never just, if I didn't know they had it, I would never diagnose it like that. So it's crazy. So yeah, but then we've met other families that the boys have it. So it's crazy. Like who knows where it came from? My mom and my brother both got a pacemaker like a week from each other.

Oh my gosh. Yeah. He actually had a really, really low heartbeat when he slept. And it went into like 19s and 15s. And he goes to the hospital. They're like, how are you even talking to me? To emergency surgery. He gets a pacemaker. And then we find out that, hey, my mom has to have surgery. And then she gets a pacemaker. And I'm like, I don't want no makers.

No makers. I don't want it at all okay i'm sorry guys i'm a little silly but i'd like to bring the fun to this because i know they're heavy topics and i want to watch it all the way through so you know i kind of i'm silly trying to bring the humor yeah but i do we're the same okay we like to laugh. I didn't know because you had that face on earlier and I was like oh. Yeah, we already talked about the resting bitch face, but you know what? I have the same thing. I often talk to about it,

but you know, I don't have any of those conditions to go along with it. So what's my excuse, right? You're just a bitch. No, I'm'm just okay it's okay we have a love hate relationship but mostly love yeah yeah there we go you know what we're probably sisters kind of but i say that because i always want her to be better yeah but we're the same age you know but i feel like i'm hard on her because i expect

her just to be so much different you know he always tries to change it's not trying to i just think you deserve happiness we're not gonna argue right now we're gonna get back we can talk about that later but so now hannah at 14 i know right hannah was 14 bet Bethany 17. First of all, both of y'all young, like you said, ballet and, you know, doing things. Like how did you guys deal with that mentally? I mean, in a sense, we're still dealing with it mentally because with HCM, there's no cure. It's all lifestyle changes. So in the sense of thinking you have a chronic illness, right, that's, you know, in most senses, pretty much going to get worse with time, you know.

But because I, when I was 14, I literally, it was a month into my freshman year of high school, completely changed my life. Because as Wendy mentioned, not only was my doctor like, well, I'm surprised you haven't dropped dead, because what I told her, you know, what I was doing, you know, months prior to this diagnosis, this appointment is I was on two basketball teams. I was dancing in school, outside of school on competitive teams. I was like the most active I had ever been. And of course, right. Like when we talk about, oh, we had symptoms like while I was exercising. Right.

Of course, my heart should be beating fast. But you know, what's too fast, you know, no one ever really tells you that. And because it's a genetic condition, I was living with it my whole life, right? So that was kind of my normal. So I had nothing really to think, oh, I was different, right? Like, this is something alarming, or whatnot. So being told, like, right then and there, of course, it was a you know, it was a tear. Lots of tears, crying, tears left. I'm surprised I still do. Yeah, I'm surprised I still do. I mean, I definitely have a lot more tougher skin now. But even though sometimes I feel like I'm more emotional just with having to go through things you know more empathetic especially like hearing other people's struggles and stuff um because you know it's so personally right where you're like oh gosh yeah here's the tears coming i can imagine like just seeing people or not even seeing you hearing a song that you want to dance to you know it's like i i can imagine but can't imagine that like how hard that is you know it

was like or seeing people play basketball and that's something you did and knowing that you can't play look oh yeah i'm not trying to make you cry nothing no no no i mean right now i'm pretty good i think i got my tears in yesterday so but we'll see we'll see if we make it at the end without any tears um but it was it was hard because like with having this condition, it's not very visible. Right. You would think me about they look fine and healthy if you saw us. So what was hard is I was this active person. My people knew me as this person. And now all of a sudden I went to one doctor's appointment and I'm telling you I can't do any of that because I'm at risk of literally dropping dead.

And so it was hard because not many people understood it and yes I'm trying to explain it as I'm also trying to understand this and live with it and I had groups of like like and she's like oh yeah come hang out like they were gonna play basketball and it's like why would I come to watch you play something right that I can't play like you think I find enjoyment in that I could just go home and just stay home and watch tv and stuff so it was hard of trying to figure out you know and like what I wanted to do but I never felt because right Bethany still got a dance and we have the same diagnosis again it presents itself in different people but I never for watching Bethany be like oh f her like screw her how come she gets

to still dance because I knew how important it was to her life so I was more grateful that Bethany still got to dance and still got to live that you know dream of hers out while I was okay with you know what let me figure out what's a new dream of mine let me you know now I have all these don'ts let me come back to the to the drawing board and figure out what I want to do and I'm and I'm happy that you know this was a blessing in disguise that it got me to filter out some some of those crazy dreams that you have like would that ever even really happen and and focus on what I wanted to do and still kind of do something that brings joy and happiness to my life, but it definitely, you know, wasn't easy,

you know, but it took a bit and it took some, you know, different perspectives of like, I'm grateful to be here. Let me make the most, you know, of our life. And that kind of turned into advocacy work as well, especially when we like Google searched our condition and we found out most kids our age were dead doing what they loved. Right. So it's like what I have rather have that and played the last minute of the game and be dead or have to change my life and, you know, give up, you know, basketball and dance and it lightly that i still going to be alive and doing what i can for those people um who didn't unfortunately got to make it you know what it's very crazy because until you said something i never considered the fact that some people have to face reality that you can only dream but so much and i guess i take the dreaming aspect of my life for granted because I live inside my imagination it's mega millions listen little mega millions I want it I got y'all though big donation okay you bring it life I guess I just oh I just don't it's like how do you how do you mentally prepare yourself for that at 14

I guess you don't and then we're like no you or like you know we're like they're not bullying but you know kids are just retarded you know just say they're yeah yeah no they say stuff and it's also like because it's non-visible people will say things that's like and it's actually like kind of offensive like for me I struggle a lot with like taking the stairs because it just like you know lowers my pressure like I really get winded which you think you know when I show up at the elevator you kind of look at me like why are you here and I've had people be like oh I'm gonna take the healthy option I'm gonna take the stairs and like looking down at me when it's like oh that's the healthy option for you right but I know Bethany struggled a lot more with like people saying really dumb things after she got her surgery for her implanted defibrillator because hers is a lot more visible also because of down

she's you know it's out more in the open because you're wearing you know you're wearing you know sports bras and booty shorts and stuff that's's more revealing of your body and the way that people reacted to her, which you think like, okay, this is like, I thought we were past that. Right. Like I thought we were more accepting community and we still find, you know, sad stories of people being made fun of their scars. And it's because people don't understand. And yet they ask in such a tone that's like, oh my gosh, like that's, that's flipping rude. I don't know why.

Would you want to be asked those people, but I always feel like those are the denial people. Those are the people that life is perfect. I don't have no trauma. Nothing in me is wrong. I'm good. But really underneath, there's a million things wrong and I need help and I'm sad. And that's kind of the basis of why we created this podcast because it's like you know let's talk to everyday people who experience this stuff you know and it's like compassion compassion for yourself compassion for others I'm starting to realize that's kind of like the tone of this but Bethany girl okayaps too for wearing sports bras and booty shorts. You know it, you're from Miami. Oh yeah. So you still do ballet, Bethany?

No. So unfortunately, um, that dream of mine ended. Um, I am really lucky and blessed that I, I got to dance for as long as I did. I graduated with a bachelor's of fine arts in dance performance. But unfortunately, the year before I was going to graduate, I was told that my heart worsened and that I probably need a heart transplant and that I kind of needed to stop anything that was adrenaline based at that time. And so my path kind of changed. And I work in politics, besides running heart charge full time. But again, like Hannah was saying, you you have to, you know, you dream and you maybe only get to live that dream out for so long, but I got to repivot it. And now I'm passionate about other things and stuff like

that. And, and when I get to dance a little bit here and there, I'm really appreciative that I just can't keep up like I used to. I'm like out of breath. I'm super tired. And I just I can't, you know, and it hurts me still. And I still like get emotional about it. And I think about like, how old am I now? And the fact that, you know, I don't get to do that dream that I so long and wanted to do and all that time and energy that I put into something. But I'm glad to be alive and grateful for where I am today. So now, sorry, I just have to ask this. Did you go through any anger? Did you go through that angry phase? Like, why has this happened to me?

Or like there can't be a God or like was there ever, you know, I'm thinking about you're a year away from your dream and now it's like. Yeah. So, so definitely at the time when all of this kind of happened, I kind of was like content, I would say. And I kind of knew that it was always coming because from the moment I was diagnosed, like I had my doctors tell me, oh, well, you can dance, but at 70%. And it's like, how do you tell somebody that dances, you know, six days a week, eight hours plus a day to dance 70%? Like that's you, you're not going to get any roles. You're not going to achieve anything, you know, at that. So it was like really hard for me. And then when I was told that I was more like shocked and I thought, you know, something's

going to change. Like I'm going to find a different thing, but I'll be honest, in the past, probably like last couple months, I've been really angry about it, that I'm now, you know, the age that I am, and that I'm kind of just figuring out what I like. And sometimes I look back, and I kind of wish like, why didn't I know this sooner that I wasn't going to be able to make a career out of dancing? And why couldn't I have like, you know, studied something else or, you know, done something else, you know, so I've been struggling with that. And this is like truth. And, you know, really recently been struggling with that. And that's dope that you're talking about it. Now, do you seek professional help? Or have you talked to anybody professionally? No, I haven't. And that's actually something that me and Hannah actually have been recently talking

about because we go to a lot of these different conferences with especially other young people with rare diseases and different disabilities, both visible and invisible. And a big thing that always comes up, of course, is the mental health. And then a lot of people say, oh, well, I seek special medical treatment for mental health and stuff. And we're like, oh, gosh, like we didn't even think about it. And it's crazy that at the age that we were diagnosed that nobody went to us and said like, hey, maybe you guys should go see somebody. Right. And, and to talk about that and for the traumas and stuff like that. And now every time we get together with these, these other people within the rare, you know, space and stuff like that, we're always like, yeah, they should be telling kids like, hey, this is something like a resource you should be able to tap into.

And it should be part of your treatment. Unfortunately, though, some insurances won't cover it and stuff like that. And so cost and make it so hard. But definitely something we've talked about recently. Right. And that's pretty dope that you say that. I'm saying Britney for president. So I'm with you. Let's go.

Let's go. I said, oh, my God. I said Britney. I mean, Bethany. I'm so sorry. I promise I knew your name. I promise. No, you're good.

You're good. I cut you off. No, because we don't want them to vote for the wrong person. You know what I'm saying? That's how it is. Okay. Exactly. And actually, we had a discussion a them to vote for the wrong person. You know what I'm saying? Exactly. Your last name, pronounce it for us. Kime.

Kime. Like time. Or line. I say Kimmy. I was like, Kimmy. I'm sure you guys have heard it all. I know. We have. I was just thinking, and I don't know, it's probably I'm sure you guys have heard it all. I know. Yes. Yeah. We have. Yeah.

So I was just thinking, and I don't know, it's probably maybe a sensitive topic, but you both are young and you're both women. And I was just kind of thinking, I'm a mom myself. So I was just wondering what the possibilities, I don't know if either of you are interested in having children, but are there, is there a possibility of children for the two of you? Yeah. So we're both, I mean, coming from a big family, we're both interested in, in having kids and that's not a, no topic is too sensitive for us. So we're, we're open for anything to talk about. Um, but we, I recently just had an appointment with um a specialist like in our condition um and he was presenting the fact of hey if you wanted to have kids um because there are obviously risks of like you know like going through childbirth and stuff like that but like in a side note it was nice that our mom didn't get diagnosed until we got diagnosed and the fact that she went through nine births you're like okay at least if she could do it that gives me hope I could do it um but the specialist was

saying that now through like IVF is that they could if we really say hey I want to have kids I don't want my kids to have this condition that they could you know choose the eggs that don't have the gene since we are lucky enough that one of the main like commonly known um genes um we have of hcm because it's a genetic mutation the one pertaining to you know the protein that deals with the growth of your heart um is messed up so that they could go through and be like okay this egg doesn't now how comfortable me and bethany are with you know playing a little bit of god and being like, you know, having good choices. Well, I have a story to that.

I actually have a couple of friends who just gave birth to a baby to that effect yesterday. They had a selection. And she is amazing. She's beautiful. And they just wanted to make sure that she was going to be a she and that she was going to be healthy and happy because they had two boys already. And they didn't want to chance it or, you know, make, let God have the choice. They wanted what they wanted and this was it for them. So, you know what?

I'm just going to say though, before you come out with this She Amazing thing, she only a day old. Well, she's beautiful. How about that? She's beautiful. We got to give her a chance to really show us. Show me She Amazing, you know? She's amazing.

No, and that's a beautiful thing because we've had this this topic with other people in the in the heart community and some are like no i would i would like the choice of doing it and so it's nice that it you know can be an option that people can choose from a personal choice i mean i don't know how much you want to dive into it then there's also like thinking like i was talking with somebody else about it and they're like in a way it feels almost like you're dismissing my existence is like as if what I'm living with is like less than other people which is already something struggling of the whole so it's so like such a touching topic that it's so personal but leaving it that that is an option right that we can do it and that you know how the person was conceived we shouldn't be looked

upon but hey if I want to know if I'm like it's hard like imagine yeah if I have my condition and I have to care for another person who has my condition but then you think oh how much easier that would be that I understand that condition I can be there in a way that doesn't so there's like pros and cons so it's nice to just leave it up that it can be a personal and then nobody should be like you did it that way or this and that but yeah so it's nice that is an option i would say i'm really blessed to have the option and if the options there want their kids if i get sit here and stop you from all the pain i went through yeah okay i'm gonna need you to go ahead and throw away that little cell get rid of it you know You know what I'm saying? So no, I can see both points. And one thing I'm gonna say, Hannah, girl, you know, open my eyes a lot today, you know, said a lot of things now. You got me over here like, damn, I never even considered that. No, Micah, you're not gonna have children, okay? don't want kids either. I grew up traumatized kid, went through a lot of trauma. Then to become

sick, I had Guillain-Barre syndrome at the age of 16. So I was like paralyzed from the neck down, had to learn how to walk and talk and all that kind of crap again. And then to go to 25 and with a cancer and a 7% chance of living, I just decided after all that, I don't want no kids. I don't want to pass on these genes. I don't want to pass on this DNA because- And you genetically have- Oh my God. I'm insane. You know what I'm saying? I'm so screwed up because of the things I went through. I do not want to put that on nobody else. So you're all right. It's definitely a personal choice, but I didn't know I had the option. So thanks, girl.

Like, can we get rid of this? Get rid of a little bit of that? Add a little more testosterone? It would have to be a boy. And again, he's just putting humor into this topic. Oh, no, I'm serious. But you sound like you're adding salt and pepper.

Oh, so I need to stop? Okay. um so um see she messed me up now because i had a follow-up question and so what do you work now what do you guys do do you have other than this is that a bad question no no no no no no um so so besides running heart charge which we are super passionate about and we love what we get to do and we're excited for what's to come with that um but really it we don't make money from it or anything like that it's just literally driven by us and our passion and the people like you guys that we meet um but now i am actually a legislative aide for a state representative in the state of Florida. So that is what I do. Yeah. I just got back from Florida yesterday.

Oh, how fun. Too hot. It is really hot. It's ridiculous. You guys are in Miami, right? Yes. I swear to God, there's lava flowing under that ground right now. Probably.

It's going to erupt. flowing under that ground right now. Probably. It's going to erupt. I know there's not, so I'm safe to say that there is, but it's going to. The ocean's like 95 degrees. It's not pleasant. I'm sorry. I'm done now.

Sorry. Look, you have to cut me off because I will talk over you now. Just go ahead. But it's been a really hot summer because we've been traveling a lot for different conferences up and we were in dc it was like 100 degrees like it's the hottest thing and even for us miami kids we were like no no no i gotta get inside this is too hot but no miami we're grown in the heat so we prefer you know the heat but of course we go inside and have ac you know we're not like we're constantly living in the heat all the time we ain't got no power i was with they kind of went out on the boat and did their thing

and i stayed in the condo with a little puppy and did my thing i was melting i was i was not happy oh nice so getting back to the conversation. Getting back to this heart stuff. I love Florida. It's beautiful. Okay, last one. Sorry. No, no, no.

It's okay. I'm just joking. And I don't like Florida. I don't like heat. I'm good. I mean, I'll come. I want to take my nieces and nephews to Disney World. Only because I want to show people what the world's baddest kids are.

And what better place than to take them to, you know. Oh, that's not nice. Absolutely. That's a good lesson right there. Oh, my God. Sorry, sorry. They're another reason why I don't want kids. Okay, let's hope they don't watch this episode.

Right. Well, they're like legit little. I have a nephew that legit is Houdini. Like... Wow. A second. All you gotta do is turn away for a second and he is nowhere in eyesight. Take him to Disney.

Yeah, don't take him to Disney. No, but then you always hear somebody yelling, come get your child. You're like, oh, there you go. It's like, come get him. His ass is bad. Anyway, so Hannah, what do you do for a living? Yeah, so I, a year ago, I graduated from film school. So through my diagnosis, since I liked performing, you know, when I was dancing and stuff, I did like acting.

And then I took over a little like theater group in my high school, we had no budget. So it's pretty much everything we wrote or like stole, you know, from SNL or whatever and made it our own. And that's where I fell in love with directing. That's really what I love to do. So I was like, you know what, like, I had all this free time now, right? Cause I wasn't doing all these extracurriculars. So I would like watch a lot of TV and movies. And then I kind of got in the sense, like, I mean, I have an addiction. I'm not going to lie.

That is my therapy is watching TV and movies. And then I was like watching it, not for entertainment, but like realizing like, Hey, what's good. Is it writing? Is it the directing? Is it the acting? Is it a mix? And so I fell in love and it was like, Hey, if I'm going to go to school,

that's what I'm going to do. And then so like all of the videos that we make, like on Heart Charge, since we're like big on social media, I direct, I edit. So right now I like freelance and do different gigs in here and there. So like, wait, what? Say that again? Can I get in your first movie? No, I was going to say was gonna say yeah yeah for sure yeah we gotta keep in touch so yeah he's so cute isn't he so sorry not to cut you off but you were saying film and i saw director and i saw me on the big screen yeah yeah you saw the dream so

we're gonna make it happen so yeah like you over here talk about can't dream and you giving me dreams you know no but it is cool to see that you guys both kind of found new dreams and it's helping people and that's pretty dope so i kind of just want to commend you guys on that for real for sure so i wanted to say so i actually have a fast heart so i have tachycardia i had it for a long time right but that's the thing it's like so i had cancer and because of cancer i have like a major chemical imbalance so i have a lot of i produced a lot of hcgs uh like the pregnancy hormone so my body basically thinks it's pregnant and has been for the last 15 years but the the reason they say i have tachycardia is because i have so many emotions so they're saying because i'm and i'm like but have you ever checked my heart you know my mama

just got now you got me thinking like yeah what if i'm like uh oh i don't want to be i told you i don't want no makers yeah yeah we don't want we don't want that for you but you should still get checked though yeah but it's i guess it's just that simple thought, I never would have thought to get checked until we had this conversation because you know, that's kind of, and I've had like high, like 178. And they're like, you're good. Call me in the morning. And I'm like, Oh wow. Yeah. I mean, it's really hard because of it. I can't sleep because I'm always racing. It's probably why I live in my imagination, you know,

I can barely get my heart rate out of the 60s. We should change. Mix it together and then split it and then you guys should have good hearts. So now the brothers, were they like spoiling you guys or supportive or were they like still

punch and drop kick? Spoiling? Spoiling? Oh my God, did they spoil y'all? Tension. Dropkick. Boiling. That's a funny word. Oh my God, did this boil y'all? We have one brother. He's number four in the lineup. And when Hannah and I both got our defibrillators implanted and they were at different times,

he was the only brother that was there and like brought us candy. And like, he was there with me, my whole surgery with my dad. And then for Hannah, he came when Hannah came out and like brought us candy and like he was there with me my whole surgery with my dad and then for Hannah he came when Hannah came out and like brought us candy and then number six the brother that expresses the gene he is a huge supporter of heart charge the work we do just a great big brother and then um I mean the other ones help in their own way but they're boys and they're older and married to some of them so

I was just wondering I'm like six brothers it must be tough to be a girl and then a girl who has an ailment yeah I know now I'm kind of upset I'm wishing we were spoiled a little bit more like that you know what

brothers you should be ashamed of yourself Now I'm kind of like upset. I'm like wishing we were spoiled a little bit more. You know what? Brothers, you should be ashamed of yourself. Yeah. So now let's get into Heart Charge. Okay. What is it that you do? Yeah. So kind of, I was talking a bit earlier, we do a little bit of everything and we're just really, really passionate about making sure that other people do not die from a preventable death.

So we have a huge online patient to patient community, especially on Instagram. We're really big there and we spend, you know, days at any time people can know that they can reach out to us and we message them back. And it's just really cool. We do virtual meetups with people from Australia to England to Italy to Spain and getting to meet other people with heart conditions is really, really cool. So we have that component. And our favorite thing that we get to do, which was a big goal of ours, was care packages for people that were either newly diagnosed with a heart condition or getting a defibrillator. So that's something else that we get to do within heart charge. Then the other component of it is I'm a CPR and AED instructor. So I think in the last probably last month, we did like five or six free CPR and AED classes for free in the community. We donate AEDs all the time.

We just actually donated some AEDs to a city in Miami so that all the police cars had an AED. And one of the AEDs we donated actually saved somebody's life like three weeks ago, which is really, really cool. And then because Hannah and I, our lives were saved through a heart screening, we, Miami-Dade County Public Schools is the third largest or like second, I think now, school district in the US. And we got past that all kids have the opportunity to get a free heart screening. So they rolled out the program in October and over 8,000 kids have already been screened and dozens of them have already gone through some type of like life-saving treatment or something to help them, which is really awesome.

And that's just, again, pushing for our goals. We're right now working on some legislation that will hopefully pass in the state of Florida to make sure that all schools have enough AEDs and that people know how to respond and react in them. And then we're really big content creators on Instagram. And you kind of see like, I guess, our side of us and how we like to spread awareness in different ways. That is incredible. How do you get your funding for all of that? There's no funding. We work on a zero dollar budget yeah we actually made a video one time for like for like give tuesday right where you can donate to charities of showing like hey we had this money and look what we were able to make so no our it's mostly we're very resourceful

so if you want to invest we definitely know how to make something work for whatever type of budget i was like i'm sending y'all a thousand dollars i am oh wow oh that would yeah that means a lot to us we'll do a lot with that we'll say that that means a lot to us make sure you know where to send it yeah yes we'll send you the info because that's where we do we do receive donations, but nothing like, you know, we're not working in like, you know, huge or big. Nothing should receive. I mean, this is something that people should stand behind. Because, you know, I want to ask now, like, my next question is to go into some signs, some things that people should take. You know, I take things lightly.

Like, my heart, I'm like, I'm good. You know? I do it to her all the time. She's like, go to the hospital. And I'm like, no, I take things lightly, like my heart. I'm like, I'm good. You know? I do it to her all the time. She's like, go to the hospital. And I'm like, no, I'm fine. It was just a little heartburn. You know? You just never know.

He's so fragile, it feels like. Like, he's had so many issues. I need a bubble, too. He does. Yeah. But no, we definitely. Oh, sorry, sorry. No, we'll just need to know where we and how we can send it to

you for sure that's that's amazing no thank you so much no it's honestly people like you guys that that have allowed us to do what we've been able to do and um we've gotten a few grants but like the one grant to do the care package that we've done we've sent over probably 150 care packages maybe 200 now and that was on a $2,000 budget. And that included the water bottles to pill cases to buttons, you know, a bag and all of that stuff. And it's just amazing to see what we've created in so little, but it's amazing the people that you never know, and they just show up and they like help us and keep us going. And we're so grateful for that. A village. I think that's what we need to come again as society, a village.

We legit don't sit here and pick people apart because I'm like, everybody does it, you know? Yeah. It's like, come on now, let's get it together. Let's love each other, support each other. You know, it's like, we all a little bit crazy. And if we don't admit that to ourselves first to ourselves and then to others, I feel like whatever you give, you're supposed to give somebody else, you know? Yeah. So I should want what I want for you, for me, if that makes sense. No, yeah.

Did I say it right? Yes. So my bad. Sorry. Back to the signs, symptoms, anything a person should take as, you know, that most of the time they'll just like brush it off yeah so the the main warning signs which we like go out and do presentations and tell like especially the kids we even have like a little bus shelter out that we put out in our town that has the warning signs um so you have and this these signs you should know whether you have them with or without exercise you know you should go see a doctor, you know, tell them about it.

Also, does not mean, you know, 100% guaranteed that if you have one or all of these that you for sure have a heart condition. But these are things that most common signs that you're like, oh, that's nothing normal. So shortness of breath, you know, if you're trying to like, that's a sign. Fainting is a sign, you know, whether you think, oh, I think I was dehydrated. That's just something that should be noted that your doctor should tell. That's kind of why my mom had me get checked first is because I had a few fainting episodes. And then they were like, that's very common for girls and like your age.

And I'm like, it's not really common. Your body should not just be like I'm like how scary is is it to go through that as often as you do because one is too many times so I at least know two times that it happens so oh I mean I have so many times I could write a whole book on the different variety of times I fainted but I've become so so so well to it that I know when it's coming so unlike the event that happened yesterday where I thought I could make it before I completely knocked out yeah and I didn't have to eat dirt and skin my face usually I'll lay down flat and that's usually what you want because that's what your body's trying to do to reset itself so you do want to

get into a place where you could just lay flat and I've even done it in like you know I was walking to my car from an apartment I was like you know I'm just gonna lay flat here you know don't be embarrassed just do it let your body like realign that's what you want because like usually with fainting you'll start your vision going and once your vision goes you cannot see so then you're you know a liability of like knocking into things and hitting things you'll usually get really hot it's another thing, you know, a liability of like knocking into things and hitting things. You'll usually get really hot. It's another thing, whether, you know, it doesn't matter what, whether it's cold inside or hot, like you'll start feeling like sweaty and stuff. So because I'm so now I'm so attuned with my body, I'm like, OK, this is what's going to happen. Let me catch it before, you know, damage happens.

I'm like, and then you talked about you described me right and i know it's not because of exercise because i don't do that so i think you need to go get your heart checked i'm gonna do that and you know and i just once a year but they kind of always it's oh because your hormones like your endocrinologist said like now they're brushing it off and i'm gonna need y'all to go look in the air run some tests do something yes yeah yeah no and also so another sign and it's a that's like a big tell is family history since not every condition you know heart condition is genetic but that is that's usually i mean in any medical thing

they always ask you found the history of this condition or this disease that that's also kind of a big thing of like oh wait if my family has is and even something that they ask now is like if a family member of yours under the 40 just like randomly died that's also something they look into because it could have been cardiac arrest it could have been you know not like oh they died in a car accident or something that you know the the reason of death but but something like unusual, like, hey, they were really young. And all of a sudden they just died is something that they actually make note of. And then you have lightheadedness or dizziness. You have fatigue, which I think is a hard thing to kind of wrap your brain around.

I mean, we have so much fatigue it's just you know the constant state of tiredness but it's more like because I got always in trouble like being a teenager it's kind of hard to think oh do I have fatigue or not because people like you went to bed at 3am that's why you're tired it's like no like it's something else it's like if you pulled an all-nighter right for like two straight weeks and you can never really catch up on your sleep that's what fatigue is really like it's like doesn't matter if i sleep eight hours or this i'm just constantly dragged and i have um no energy which is a big you know tell all like yeah why am i getting so tired i didn't do anything like

you should definitely tell your doctor and then am i I missing anything else? I'm about to go to the ER though. I've been tired for the last three years. And the other thing that we do, because we go and do a lot of like assemblies to like kids in elementary school, middle school and high school. And the other big thing I don't think is that we tell the kids like keeping up with your peers, you know, like even though everybody's

running laps and pee and you can't keep up, it's not because you're out of shape or you're lazy. It could be because of an undiagnosed heart condition. There's a really sad story. And that happened in Los Angeles is the little boy was running laps and he said, my heart was hurting. And the teacher was like, no, you're're just being lazy and the kid unfortunately died of sudden cardiac arrest um and nobody did anything about it because unfortunately now we all know the warning signs but it's making sure other people are aware of it and we're not discounting that just because a kid is saying i can't keep up you know we have to we have to consider that right i think it's something because it's too hard on people you know yeah oh and then the ones that i forgot which is like most important though um is i mean we have them out there but then i'm like writing on my arm to remember is um obviously like slow heartbeats

rapid heartbeats irregular heartbeats anything like like i'll get which now i understand is arrhythmias but i for a long time I didn't understand like what that you know you they don't tell you how it feels you know they're just like yeah and if your heart beats you know but it's like for me it feels like my heart like will get stuck and then I feel like and then it will start again so if you don't be having anything like that for sure go get checked and then obviously if it's like oh my heart's beating really fast like like Bethany had a funny story like in high school right since we're used to it like oh I exercise right like you know they're like okay guys let's count our pulse like let's check our

heartbeat now that we've rested a minute and you know you're trying to count it and then all your friends are saying like 90 this and then you're like oh how did I get 200 did I not count right because you're embarrassed and as a kid you 200 did i not count right because you're embarrassed and as a kid you don't want to be like that kid like i think i have this and then everybody's looking and you're like that doesn't make sense yeah yeah so it's like if you feel it like being out of your chest if you feel it's off and i think it's just like we're always big advocating of like you know your body the best right so if you feel something's off like let your doctor know because that's really the best way they can diagnose you is you're having

the most information from you and then being okay if you feel like your doctor is not understanding you to leave and find another doctor because that's also important don't think you have to stay with this one doctor especially if you don't feel like you can be honest with them or that they're understanding you like go find another one because you want to have that relationship with your doctor and that's a good advice and we say that for the same thing for therapy most times people try therapy one time have a bad experience and never go back and it's like and then there's so much different forms of therapy we're in therapy right now you know so it's like you realize that like there's so many forms but i wanted to tell you so we did an interview the other day with leslie evans right

and she's kind of like a hypnotherapist and you guys probably should holler at her because she was very dope right because it felt like it's not like the, ooh, bark like a dog kind of hypnotizing. You know? Well, when I think about someone being hypnotized, that's what I think about. Like, quack, quack. You know? It's like, no? No?

Am I the only one to think so? Anyway. But she was talking about, like, using it to, like, deal with past with past traumas and like go back to moments and things. And I was like, I bet for someone like you all. And I don't know. Look, she didn't pay me to say this. I promise. She just she just seemed really dope.

I'm a contact of myself. I just don't think I'll be able to slow my mind down enough to go through that. So, Bajasha, that might be an avenue you want to check in your healing journey yeah no definitely it sounds like it's interesting to be able to go back to the moment my life changed and now view it from who you are today yeah you know yeah definitely unhealthy way in a room by myself alone you know because i because I moved and I kind of was, and I went through my little trauma phase that lasted like two years, but I went through a lot of crying and why me? And, you know, but it was like, I got, I got to go back and revisit those moments. And I know it

wasn't healthy because I feel like I should have had someone to guide me because I kind of just went straight in, but it helped me to heal a little bit. Rebecca over here, wiggling her foot, telling me to shut up. No, I'm not. I know what you're doing, Rebecca. I was in on that interview, so I was in Florida at the time. So I'm into what you have to say about it. She's telling me to wrap it up. Wrap it up. Okay. But no, I just think that you guys would kind of like benefit from it. Right. But now let's talk about,

you said something. Me. My biggest fear is for someone to have an emergency around me. I got ADHD and I'm dyslexic. I'm not going to be able to find your pulse. I don't feel like I'm going to be able to do CPR. So what would someone like me do?

Like, what would I do if someone needed help? You could save a life. You could, you thinking you have all these to like marks off of you, but when we like to teach our way where you'll see in our content is making it for the everyday people because we try to teach it.

Like, I mean, Bethany is the instructor, but like even through like film and stuff is like we made a music video on how to use an aed which an aed is what's going to save somebody's life if they go into sudden cardiac arrest which little quick little ted talk sudden cardiac arrest is different than a heart attack a heart attack has to deal with the structure right the plumbing they oh it got clogged cardiac arrest those with the electrical like your heart you know it's off of its electrical so it's not beating right um so you need an electrical impulse to get your heart back into rhythm so an aed is really what saves somebody's life in a cardiac arrest and anybody pretty much can use an aed they all you have to do is know where it is and turn it on and it literally walks you through every step some even have video of showing you hey like call 9-1-1 if

you forgot to call 9-1-1 like something you can do is call 9-1-1 and that's i'm gonna call 9-1-1 i just feel like they're gonna tell me and try to give me instructions and i'm like lord and i gotta argue with you because i can't follow these instructions. Do either of you watch the show called Station 19? Yes. Yeah. Well, one of the episodes recently, Jack is teaching this group of young firewomen. Yeah, yeah. They're like girls.

They're girls camp. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. girls their girls camp yeah yeah yeah yeah and he's teaching them cpr with um well he started out with staying alive staying alive staying like oh and then but then doing a different song and i thought that was kind of cool they became began being a little bit more interested but thought it was funny but it got them more interested even though it was kind of dorky. Yeah. So I have it in my mind every time I think about

CPR. No, never mind. That's the main, because of the beats, that's the main song. And then Jack suggested the song Baby Shark which everybody has in their head unfortunately. I don't know it. I don't want to sing it because it's going to get stuck in my head. i don't know it i don't want

to sing it because it's gonna do you know do you know doja cat song say so no you gotta go old school we gotta go 90s for me baby um well tell them that beat it has to be justin timberlake's suit and tie oh i think so i get my suit and tie like there's a we have a whole playlist on spotify of all these different songs like from all different eras that all are the beats and it's funny because like when we go into elementary schools we say so is really big on tiktok so we taught all the kids this song so all this dance to the three steps to sudden credit aggressive. I'm like, oh my gosh, this song. But it's really cool because it's little things like that just to remind people or to say, hey, you can be empowered to save a life. And it could be just calling 911 or feeling like, hey, I can do some compressions or, hey, I can run and grab the AED and use it.

And an AED is only going to shock somebody if they need it. They're so smart. I could put it on Hannah right now and it's not going to shock her because she doesn't need it. Maybe it's not going to work that. I was going to say, don't bet no money on me. I can break the impossible. You don't have any forever watches

you're supposed to be able to have forever and they just don't tick no more. Probably the electric current that's already running through his body. You know what? I'm just going to talk to y'all for the rest of the show. There's a wall here.

I do want to ask you a question though, Hannah, real quick. Just a random question. Favorite show right now? I knew you were going to ask that because I was listening to one of your guys' podcasts so it was interesting to hear your guys' favorite tv shows and why you like them um and they completely took mine out of context you see how they did me yeah they were really being like the ages right that's not what i said they were bad okay let's go i liked your i liked your pose i was like pose was a good show i was like i like yeah yeah and little house on the prairie yeah i remember you guys's little

one um yours oh okay favorite is hard for me because it's like i watched so many different ones like and for different reasons they're my favorites um i a big fan of Westworld I loved the Nolan Brothers I loved Lisa Joy I liked Game of Thrones until you know the finale which everybody's always like I can't bring myself to because everybody has said it's just so wonky whatever

that's fine yeah just live in that little ignorance little nice ending there I mean House of Dragon is really good I was almost going to wish that yesterday on the way home on the plane but I didn't That little ignorance, little nice ending there. I mean, House of Dragon is really good. That was good. I was almost going to wish that yesterday on the way home on the plane, but I didn't. You should. Okay, we get it, Rebecca.

You was just in Florida. I'm going to be flying to California on Sunday. Ooh. That's for fun. Not for fun. But then I liked Killing Eve that finale had a little bit of a um orphan blocker

I was like trying to watch the first episode okay I said I have ADHD so if you don't get the first 15 minutes I'm done I don't do it no more and Eve didn't get it you have a huge like you've watched some pretty deep stuff you don't watch just the but i watched i love those both of those are my thing but i liked like uh the last

thing he told me on apple pie on apple really yeah yeah did you watch it yeah yeah okay hannah what's yours i mean how do you ask a director if i call you britney one more time i'm so sorry because she's long now when i know name britney right yeah but you know what i'm gonna do i'm gonna edit those parts out so ain't nobody gonna know that that's what i'm gonna call you can call me b you can call me b if it's easier okay i'm gonna call you queen b so queen b what's your and actually we gotta come back hannah because i need to know your guilty pleasure too right so you got to think about that oh okay okay queen b what's yours okay oh my gosh um i'm definitely like not into TV that much. I like it.

I'm a huge documentary person. I love any type of documentary, from war to murder to any of that huge documentary, docu-series person. I'm currently watching the Playboy Secrets one, which is pretty interesting.

I'm enjoying that. And then I, of course, love Grey's Anatomy, Scandal, all great shows. Yeah. We were a big Shondaland family. We were like, Thursday night, we know what we're doing. Okay.

Yeah. Animal Planet kind of docuseries. All the animals. I feel like you and Rebecca will be real good friends. It's all about knowing stuff. I'm going to be on TikTok because I'm like, I can't get into it. I'm a TV person.

I'm like, you're watching a lion take a shit. That's what happens. That's what you're literally doing. He eating somebody else. I don't want nobody watching me when I'm eating. What is happening right now? I feel like it takes a certain mind frame to, like, watch those shows.

I'm not trying to insult you. She's not the one watching the lions. I am. You're like, first you can't get my name right. Now you're going to judge my shows. No. She watched more like true

crime or real people documentary yeah i'm trying to overlap and watch you're insulting me that's okay right it's all back up yeah and i like and when i want to watch tv i like make myself have to like go on the treadmill or do something because i'm like you gotta be active if you want to watch this show. I'm weird. You kind of messed up our whole friendship. You just went back to being Britney, okay?

You back to being Britney. That's why I called you that time on the treadmill. I don't even want to walk to my car. He's still keeping it real with you guys. Right. He came out here and kept it real with us.

getting back to some... No, no, no. Guilty pleasure. Right, guilty pleasure. But I also wanted to ask about... Okay, we can talk about guilty pleasures. That's going to be a long thing. It's like guilty pleasure TV show no anything any guilty

um that's a great i mean we love ice cream but i don't think that's a guilty pleasure i'm uh we support ice cream um but i have to say station 19 ended up being a guilty pleasure and i actually talking about the cpr that one like really hit me because we have a whole campaign about how women are less likely to get cpr and ad help so like right now i'm working on like if they were to bring that girls camp back of how they could be like talk about how women are less likely to help like a rewrite of that episode because we have boobs that's why nobody wants to show your boobs because no offense you can't even show that on like television

without a certain rating or being blurred out like you'll see in our account we even did flashing but i had to you know go frame by frame and have the big black bar over it because we would be flagged our content so it's because people especially i mean like like with the me too and times up movement which were very good, powerful movements to come and bring that awareness is now people are like, I can't even touch a woman, I'm going to get sued or whatnot. But there are good Samaritan laws that if the person is unconscious, you can perform CPR on them. And you cannot be sued. And you know, place an ad. But because with an ad, you have to have it on bare skin, the pads, and that involves, you know know cutting your shirt off and your breasts being exposed so

people use excuses of like well like I just can't I don't want to get in trouble instead of being like that's a person's life so if you're thinking about my boobs before my life then I don't want you to save me anyways but it's unfair that you know like I'm less likely to survive because I have breasts of tissue and fat that you have deemed, ooh, sexual or like, oh, I'm getting turned on by that and I can't do anything. Weak. You know, you have an accent and I've been thinking about it for an entire episode and You kind of sound like... Oh my God, her name is leaving me. But she's on Station 19.

Oh. She's the doctor with black hair. Oh, Karina DeLuca? Yes, DeLuca. Oh. Karina. Kind of sound like her. Wow, that's...

Well, that's flattering. Is she like a sex doctor? Yes, well, she's a female doctor. B-G-Y- she's a female yeah oh is that what it is no okay i've seen like one episode where they're like they were transplant i guess a guy was going through a sex change and they found no i'm lying okay i'm lying it was a woman who lost feeling in her vagina so they like that oh that's not no they like got together to like make her vagina feel again so that's why i associated with sex yeah that was like the only episode huh that's the one episode it was an episode of gray's anatomy is what i was saying because she was on there and then came in and now that she's married to the firefighter, Maya Bishop,

now she's more of a Station 19 regular instead of just being like... I don't know why I'm getting into the whole... It's cool. It's cool how you know your stuff. I was going to say earlier that that's how you know you're into film. You're saying like Ronda Shines.

What's her name? Shonda Rhimes. See, I done messed it up already. I'm like, you naming all these people. I'm like, who is that? I know that she is from. From Italy, yeah. Thank you.

Oh my God. You're good. So where does your accent come from? So I get this question asked all the time. So that's why I laugh when you ask me. I was born and raised 305 Miami, Florida, my whole life. But my accent, because like sometimes people are like, oh, you sound like, you know, a little bit of like Hispanic influx. I mean, I did go to public school i'm white non-hispanic so i'm not gonna claim like

i don't have but the thing is going to public school in miami of course most people here are hispanic of course it's gonna you know like impact like depending on the slang i use in different words um you can definitely hear it more but I think what I've come to the conclusion it's not like a cool like oh I'm from this place that's why I speak like is being raised here because my dad is from Colorado my mom's from Pennsylvania so it's not like they really have strong accents but I have like a a really long tongue like I can touch my nose with my tongue and when you do like accent work it's all where you place your tongue. So I think because of that, where I place it is a lot different than what you normally, you know, speak. And then me and Bethany did go through speech therapy when we were younger. So

that kind of, did it sound like we did good and graduated well? No, because you can speak well still. They sound great. I just, it's just, I know you two are sisters, but I just don't hear an accent from Bethany, but I do from, so it was just really baffling me. And I just had to ask, it was just burning me up. All right. You're like, I'm adopted. I know, I thought you were going to come out and say something like that too.

I was like, no, this is about to turn into a whole nother episode. No. Like I'm adopted and turn into a whole nother episode. No. No, no. First, like I'm adopted and I got a heart condition. Okay, God. You know?

This is not funny. Okay, Queen B, what's your guilty pleasure? Okay, well, I'm going to say my... Like mine, it's been fruit roll-ups, right? Okay.

They take my guilty pleasure so much that I sleep with a box. You hear me? I love that. I have me a Fruit Wollops. Not his pillow. Like, it has his own pillow. Like, legit, it has his own pillow, right?

Because, you know, don't nobody love me. This is serious. I'm single. So, it has his pillow, right? And I even cover it. And I can, like, push my... That's new, right? Look, no, but for real. But real but you know what's funny is that

you could tell I love them that I was making a TikTok video and I had Fruit Roller rappers all around my neck I didn't notice it until after I post the video and someone was like what the hell is that plastic stuff it was all I think you can call this an addiction at this point. Well, I was actually going to say, I think my guilty pleasure is also my addiction because I have a really bad addiction to shopping. Like if I'm feeling happy, if I'm feeling sad, if I'm mad, I have to go like shop. Like I have to go buy really expensive shoes that I don't really need or like I just need to go buy clothes. It just helps me. So I would say it's my guilty pleasure, but also my really bad addiction. You know what? So you're back to being Queen B. Now you said shopping.

Oh, yeah. Look, I'm wearing some coat shoes now. Yes. Yes, you better. But you know what? I'm going to tell you my struggle. Bethany, I'm going to tell you my struggle right now, all right? I am doing okay in life, right? Am I boring you, Rebecca? One more thing.

Oh, my God. She touches everything I do. I always thought that was natural. She was looking at her time. I can see the time up there. I know. I know we're going over an hour. I'm sorry.

I have one more important question before I let y'all go. But I am going to finish what I was trying the time. I know. I know we're going over our hour. I'm sorry. I have one more important question before I let y'all go, but I'm going to finish what I was trying to say. If I remember what it was. You were saying, you were saying you were happy where you are in life. I can tell. Okay. So like,

it's hard because I'm kind of doing okay. You know, podcast top 10 last two months. Thank you guys for watching, you know? But it's like everybody around me is miserable, you know? Everybody around me is. Everybody? Yep.

No, like my mom and like depression and anxiety, like family members. You know, I have a lot of sick people in my family. You know, I feel like we was just all born sick. So I get the genetic thing. You know, it's like we came out the womb with like a temperature i still haven't cooled off but so now i go through a fight with everybody because i kind of give a lot of things away i'm one of those people i just get you need it here you go you need it here you go even though he needs it he needs it, he gives it away.

I give it away. But I always look at, Bethany, you're going to understand this a little more, right? I always look at it like if I could spend $500 to buy a coach bag and this person needs $500 to pay their rent, what the fuck kind of person I look like walking around with this coach bag? And now I'm passing you on the street because you're homeless because I wanted my coach yeah that is my struggle and my point of life right now yeah I haven't been shopping like I normally would but I did just buy a $500 bag I just I bought a pair of uh Christian Louin. Oh. The other. So I think we there. We go through the anxiety.

Yeah, we're right there. If I'm too happy, I'm going to shop. Yeah. Sometimes I shop just because I feel like I ain't spent no money recently. And sometimes he'll shop for other people. Sometimes it's just like, I feel like I haven't put nothing on my card. Like, I ain't getting no notifications today. I tell people, they call me Mr. Swipe a lot.

Oh, I love that. I love that. Well, and I was going to say too, like back to your point is I think, Hannah, I think you can attest to this. I think I do a really good job of like giving to our little sister Evie and Hannah. And I'm always like, what can I buy for you guys? Like, oh, I'm going shopping. I want to take you guys with me. You guys can get whatever you want.

Because again, you know, like I shouldn't just like you know get enjoy it you know what i mean i always love giving giving giving but then sometimes i'm like i want to give for myself right right right but my mom just be like and this is how you know you're mad about something i did because she hit me up with i'm never gonna tell you what to do with your money. So I know right there that I did something that she's mad about. In case you guys don't know, his mom lives with him. And okay, I need to make sure y'all understand that she lives with me. She lives with him.

I pay the bills. I'm not a scrub. I just love my mama. Okay? My mama is my everything. I'm about to cry. But okay. Seriously, we're going over time.

And I do have two questions. I lied to set one, but I do have two. And is it okay if I ask them? I know. Yeah. You have to do a part two. We had a heart condition and you over here. I need to go take my medicine and stuff.

And I'm just joking. I'm so stupid. I'm so stupid. Jeez. I'm going to get canceled. That was harsh. They want to go now. They want to go now.

You're an asshole. I really wasn't being like that. Trust. I joke on my condition all the time. And I got to realize that other people don't have the sense of humor I have. Oh, we do. I think we should all hang out in person. I think so, too.

I think so, too. We're going to Florida, though. I thought he was going to say no. I'm going to Florida now. I like Miami. Hello. Maybe over there. Wait, but where are you guys at? We're in New York. Upstate New York. Our little sister lives in New York.

Yeah, she goes to school there in Manhattan. So we're always going to visit. So we go upstate. Oh, there we go. Alright. Alright. Okay, there we go. Okay. All right. So we definitely.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. So y'all just tell us when and where we'll be there. Yes. I can't wait. Okay. I want to know why you went into politics. Okay.

Yeah. So basically when I found out that I could no longer dance anymore, I spent the whole year really working on heart charge. And the year before the year I was graduating college, sorry, let me like reverse a little bit. I had helped pass a law here in Florida that made it mandatory for ninth and 11th graders to learn CPR and AED training. And I went to Tallahassee and being in, if you know, Florida, right? It's like one long thing. And so Miami is here and Tallahassee is all the way up here. And I would do the drive in one day. So basically at like midnight, I drove to Tallahassee. I would

testify, share my story of why it's so important. And this is a step in the right direction, then come home. And while I was up there was like wow I love the process I love when you can actually make a difference like when you feel like the politicians are actually listening to you and I kind of fell in love with it and then I then found out I could no longer dance and so I spent a whole year kind of really focusing on heart charge and doing more of that and then I realized like hey this ain't paying the bill um and I kind of need to And then I realized like, hey, this ain't paying the bill. And I kind of need to live. And I was like, you know what? What about politics? And a few other representatives who had seen my work and kind of knew what I did with Heart Charge were

like, hey, a representative has an opening for a legislative aid position, you should apply. And I'm going to put in a good word for you. And I was like, wow, that like means a lot for me, because I have no real background in this, just the advocacy work I did. And I actually got the job and other people had applied. So it's not like, just like I was the only one, you know, I'm just kidding. But I got the job. But then got the job. I do, though, see the ugly side of politics now and I get really frustrated. And I only hope that I can be like the better side of it. And I try my best to do what I can. And I also thought it would be a great way to meet people, connect and then use my story to hopefully help other people and then use my story to help impact more change and more laws in all different type of, especially like healthcare areas and stuff. But yeah, that's

kind of the long story short, how I got into politics. I mean, I'm talking about, hey, Bethany for president, let's go. Yeah, let's go. But then once again, I got to put myself in there. You got to hire me to do something. I will, 100%. That doesn't require me to do nothing. Yeah, I want you to be like, I'm trying to think, like probably one of the cabinet members or something. Oh, right. I look good in the cabinet.

Yes. We can talk. So whatever position requires speaking. I know. I'm so sorry. You'll be right at it. But I really loved you guys' energy. It was really, really amazing and it's dope.

And I feel like we should collaborate in another kind of way and maybe get together and do like a podcast event kind of thing and invite people. And yeah, we should talk about this. Yeah, let's do that. I would love that. My mouth. I know I introduced myself with having a resting bitch face, but my mouth hurts so much from laughing and I haven't had that in a podcast.

Like, I don't know when. So you guys are amazing. It's been a pleasure. Now, before I let you go, I wanted to ask, go back to the women. What signs, like, when do you know? Because you said when it passed out. And I'm like, I hope when they passed out, ain't nobody thinking about, I don't want to touch these boobs. You know what I'm saying?

Because even me, I'm going to get down there and help. But I go around and grab people's boobs every day anyway, right? Put some context with that. I'm gay. So it doesn't mean the same. Yes. There's the

context. That's the context, right? Look, Lord, I'm going to say this now. They're going to protest. They're going to say that gay people now Yes, there's the context That's the context, right Look Lord, I'm going to say this now It's not just strangers Gay people now have rights that straight people don't have Oh lord But Maybe I'll edit that out too

But seriously It's concerning to think that women go I don't know, sometimes I get mad at the world Because I'm like, okay, women give birth, but then they go through all this pain and it doesn't like, how do you build the world and be buried under it at the same time? It's just crazy to me. I like that. That way he said that.

Yeah. That was really touching. Yeah. I do. I really see that. And I think that's why I love my mom so much and why I spoiled the hell out of her because i'm like you did it for me but let me tell you raising a parent ain't easy okay back to the question but now a person needs help but they're not passed out like is there something you could recognize in that kind of situation like i've i had a co-worker who had a stroke and i never knew that that's what she was going through. I was just like, damn, she got the ugly face on, you know, and it was just kind of like, you know, and she's dying next to me the whole time. And I'm like, I ain't gonna bother her. Her husband must have pissed off, you know, what to look for.

No, that's the answer. That's the tricky part, because a stroke is different than a heart attack and cardiac arrest. And we're big on cardiac arrest because it's actually the number one killer on school campuses. As many as, you know, in the first year of COVID killed, sudden cardiac arrest kills that many people every year. So it's an epidemic that people. Isn't it also when you smoke a lot of marijuana, kind of go through. I have known like two people that died from like cardiac arrest we smoke a lot of marijuana kind of go through i've known like two people that died from like cardiac arrest for like smoking too much marijuana or at least that's what they said we never heard interest so it could be the thing is it could be anything and that's

cardiac arrest is different than like a heart attack or stroke that happens like you know when you're older like past 40 and in the heart attack and a stroke, you know, people are more conscious cardiac arrest, you immediately be unconscious. So there is no like, there's no like, oh, she, I could catch it right before it happened. That's the scary thing about cardiac arrest is it happens suddenly, you know, like it's, it's comes fast. So there is no like build up. Also, like with a heart attack, the symptoms look different than like versus a woman and a man with cardiac arrest, it does not matter your age, gender, cardiac arrest can affect anyone. Like we know people who are under the age of one who went into cardiac arrest, and people,

you know, over 60 who have it, it hits any, you know, gender is the same race, ethnicity, pretty close in the same marks that it affects everyone so yeah there is no like oh what could i do or what and then i think it's annoying is like at least you tried to help because i think there is that point of like oh my gosh like you don't want to you know would you rather live with the regret or you know it's like hey i don't actually want you yeah like and the thing is and that's the sad thing is people really push the like the lawsuit instead of like oh my gosh you're gonna get you know sued or whatever we were literally yeah like hey i'm trying to help you and no offense like most of those cases will be thrown

they won't ever make it to like will be thrown away like hey this person was trying to do especially if it's like witnesses of like hey i came to help you i don't know why you're you know but like we were at the we were at a restaurant in the airport literally like and somebody stood up was like I'm choking I'm choking and then like we were on the other side so Bethany was about to run but then somebody got to her quicker and a man did it and she's not over here like you know like you're grateful we know many people who survived who were like I didn't care my boobs were out I didn't care that I was this person who did it.

I am grateful to be alive and to be here. And that's what you have to think is the alternative, right? Like what, you know, like, like when people think, oh my gosh, the CPR, what if I like break the sternum? And it's like, would you rather have a broken sternum or be dead? And like, you don't want to have to think about it, but that's the reality of it. It's like the alternative is way worse than anything that you could do as trying to help them to prolong their life and you know save it and and the emts the paramedics want you to see that you were doing something when they

arrived on scene because average is eight to ten minutes till they come on right and by eight to ten minutes if you did nothing like the brain damage that person will have, it'll be a lot harder for them to come back. Then, you know, if you were able to find an AED, use it, if you're able to, you know, do CPR. But if all you can do right is call 911, at least you did something and you don't live that with regret of like, I didn't do anything at all. At least you tried your best. So if you're like, hey, I can't do it. I feel you talking to me. I hear you talking to me right but it's scary because i'd be like i'll be the person that'd be like you know i don't know i push something in the chest and their leg be broke i'm like i got that you know so it's like well at least the defibrillator will not defibrillate if they're

not actually in cardiac arrest okay yeah. Like it's just. Okay. I'll be the person that trip over. Now I need the ambulance. You know, I pray and hope that I never have to do that. But if I do, I'm going to listen to you at least call 911. Yeah.

Right. First thing. But Hey, if you can do better than that, do better than that. And cause it can save somebody's life. And even though like I'm not joking and I'm kind of joking, I would be terrified. But I would like to think that I would know what to do.

Yes. I actually just had somebody text our podcast recently and was on a bridge talking about they wanted to commit suicide. And I was like, what the fuck? And it's like, is it a joke? Is it serious? You know, and then it was like, I gave him like, if you're having an emergency, call 911. And I'm like, oh, that's so impersonal. You know, so then I'm like, well, they got a suicide hotline, you know, pound that 988.

And it was just like, but I don't want you to feel like I don't care. And it was so awkward. We ended up working our way through it, you and but it was very i never want to go through that again i don't know if it was real if it was fake it was hard to tell because the text message but i'm like what if this is real and i'm the reason that this person jumped off this bridge yeah to put all that pressure on you you know and i was like oh so so when we hang out, I'm going to need y'all to be on your best behavior. We will be. I don't believe her. I know, right?

We will be. We will. We're going to have a blast. We are. We do ask any last words that you'd like to give to our audience, any words of advice, words of wisdom. A lot of people are in like a mental health journey um they're probably just now realizing that hey they need some help and why they watch us because they're like he crazy and he makes sense so tell us something that's crazy it makes sense

so i guess i'll say is um i know probably not everybody listening has a diagnosis. But a big thing I always like to say is your life doesn't end with a diagnosis. And that could be even to like you, I don't ever want you to feel like something really bad happened and your life is over. And I think you have to remember that you can work through it. And there's light at the end of the tunnel. And I think sometimes I even forget that. And it's really important to remember and then to also, you know, please come and join us on our journey at Heart Charged on Instagram. And please, if you're ever wanting to talk about anything, we're really open to it. But we're just more known, no heart conditions

better than anything. And we will list all of your contact information on our website and everywhere that we post and all that. And we will get you that thousand dollars. That is so sweet. Thank you so much. Give her a plug. We're going to post you. That was her talking to the IRS for real, for real. I'm giving it away to charity

yeah you can write it all off your taxes now any mental health advice I would say I mean yeah I'm not an expert but I would say I mean I love the lives thank you i appreciate that um and i'm grateful to be alive um i cherish that um i don't take that lightly um but i would say i mean i love your guys's name of like these fucking feelings

and i would say you're allowed to feel however you want like I think we touched on it like you're allowed to feel angry you're allowed to feel sad you're allowed to do this like especially with something like that you're battling if you're having even a hard time for yourself of I think finding the right words to explain to someone I think like just feel them that you get used to it like and I think on the other, be a person that you can just support somebody through it and not expect them to have all the right words. Or I don't know. I always feel like when people are in need, sometimes people don't reach out, especially I feel like in my generation, because they're like, I didn't know what to say. I didn't say the right thing.

And usually it's just, you just want somebody to show up and be there for them. All you have to say is hello. Yeah. Like just be like, Hey, or like, if you want to blow your mind off of this or just like being present, like, Hey, I'm here. If you want to talk about what you're going through or if you don't, but then I think also like how you were mentioning earlier, sometimes you do have to have boundaries and it's okay to say no to things, you know, like it's okay to be like, Hey, that's a lot for me right now to handle what you're going through and me going through doesn't mean I don't love you any less or can't be there for you.

But I think sometimes we put too much pressure on ourselves as human beings. And especially like we can all sense that we all have good hearts here, right? Like we want to be here for people. So sometimes you're like, hey, let me take, you know, a break for me and then I can come back and be stronger for you. So I think allowing yourself for that, not thinking that you always have to I think I learned something big in my life is it's okay to disappoint people like I think that teaches you that you're a human being that like I think constantly thinking that you have to uphold this high standard and hit the marks every time it's like hey if someone was like oh my gosh like I'm disappointed in you it's like well I didn't

ask for you to you know put me on a pedestal I didn't ask for you to, you know, put me on a pedestal. I didn't ask for you to think that I could accomplish all of this stuff. Like, hey, I messed up, but I'm human, right? So allow yourself to be human. You have to change that thinking a little bit, right? Because it shouldn't be okay to disappoint people. But it's not okay for people to expect more than they should expect from you. Right. And usually, and yes, and that's why I speak from that case.

It's usually people who are expecting all this stuff. And then it's like, oh, it's not like I didn't meet your quote. It's like I didn't meet to your expectations. And I think communicating your expectations like, hey, if you have set expectations, let me know them. So I know if I can meet them right and I can we can have that communication beforehand before I come disappoint you and I think it always ends up into that open communication where people don't really talk about like oh wait I'm upset it's like well did you tell me you know this beforehand did I know you know all of these parameters what you talking about there's a wall here and I'm looking okay so um and honestly you said a lot of really really dope

things and but one thing that came to mind is when i had cancer one thing i always told myself was that cancer is a word not a sentence you know it's all it's just a word it's not a sentence and that kind of helped me get through things so sometimes it is something simple you know i think it should always be with uh our producer over there going up to the wrong camera. See, they just... I might have to chop this all up. It's funny, I noticed that, but I was like, who's switching?

That's so fun to do their broadcast. Now you gotta introduce yourself to our friends, Hannah and Queen B, which is Bethany, okay? I got it now. This is Chris. which is Bethany. Okay, I got it now. This is Crystal. This is our producer. She's the one that's like telling me,

wrap it up, okay? Wrap it up. We're going to have to do a part two. The longest we ever went over. We laugh and we learn a lot and that's pretty dope, right? One more question. I know. One more question.

I know it's a bad thing is that I have 15 more questions, but we'll have to get you back on because I'm going to need you to answer them because I feel like it's just things I never considered. Okay, I got a fast heart, but that's always my explanation. If I feel like my heart

is racing, it's like, oh, I'm excited. You know? And it's like, I kind of brush it off to what everybody has told me. And it's like, you're kind of teaching me like, no, we take the first answer, you know? And then I just want to be regular, like regular people. Yeah, I get that. And on that note, I know, right. I'm gonna make it all sad before I end. So go ahead. Queen B tell me a joke. And on that note. I know, right? I'm going to make it all sad before I end. So go ahead, Queen B.

Tell me a joke. A joke? Yeah. I don't know. I got nothing. Three nuns went into a bar. I don't know. Do I know a joke?

No. Oh, my God. People don't joke no more? You got one? Not like that. I had one, but it. Oh, Crystal, you got't joke no more? You got one? Not like that. I had one, but it... Oh, Crystal, you got a joke? No?

Okay, so we're not going to end with a joke, but we're going to end with peace and love. Wishing you guys many blessings. Continue to search for whatever it is that you need to search for, whether it's physical or... Y'all did that right at the same time. That was dope. Those two did.

It was perfect. I was like, oh my God, did y'all did that right at the same time. That was dope. Those two did. It was perfect. I was like, oh my God, did y'all practice that? Did y'all know like at this second we're going to do it? Okay. I saw this. Good. Really cool. Thank you for becoming a part of our village, a part of our community. We're going to shout you guys out and support you as always. Rebecca sent you $1,000

which is pretty dope. Thank you guys for watching and we will see you next time. Yay! Thank $1,000, which is pretty dope. Love it. Thank you guys for watching and we will see you next time. Yay! Thank you so much for having us. Thank you. This was like really amazing. Thank you.