A Heartfelt Conversation 21 Years After Becoming Blind: Kaley Z Sits Down with Kevin Lowe

Kevin is truly a gift to the world.

He is the quintessential symbol of strength and resilience.

And as you will hear in this episode, today is a very special occasion.

And I felt it was important for all of Kevin's listeners to get a deep dive into his journey and story today.

We will learn how, in fact, Kevin became the beacon of hope and strength that he is, and how he created this space for inspiration and transformation, which is really what the podcast is.

I'm really excited to guide all of us on this journey together today.

So please join me in welcoming our very special guest slash host, Kevin Lowe.

SPEAKER_00: Yo, are you ready to flip the script on life?

Because those bad days, they're just doors to better days.

And that's exactly what we do here at Quick Race and Inspiration.

Your host, Kevin Lowe, is just flipping the script on his own life.

And in over 20 minutes of being completely black, it's a straight-up inspiration, motivation, and encouragement just for you.

Stop.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Well, I feel so honored today to get to interview you, Kevin.

So I'll just let everyone know my name is Kaylee, and this is the greatest honor.

I put Kevin on the spot all of a sudden and said, wait a second, have you been interviewed?

Maybe you should be interviewed.

So today we are doing this very special interview in honor of your anniversary.

So why don't you get us started there, Kevin?

What does it mean that this is your anniversary?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so so October 28th of this year was my 21st anniversary of, as I say, the day that both my life was saved and the anniversary of the day that my life was forever changed because of that marking also the day that I became completely blind.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.

And, you know, obviously I have so many questions.

I feel I'm the one being interviewed a lot.

This is very different for me to get to interview you.

And I just want to say in preparation for this, it was extremely humbling to realize that, first of all, there's so much I hope that we'll be able to share today.

But just in hearing you talk about this anniversary, you were pretty young, right?

How old were you?

SPEAKER_01: I was.

I was uh 17.

So I was in my junior year of high school.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

Yeah.

Which for all of us listening, you know, you can only imagine what that's like.

And and it's bittersweet in a sense, your life was saved.

And did you know when you went into this this all unfolded from a surgery, correct?

SPEAKER_01: Correct.

So we found out that I had a brain tumor.

It was non-cancerous, thank goodness.

But yeah, so they this all relates to me going in to have this brain tumor removed that that they literally at the time that we had found it, they gave me only six months to live if it wasn't removed.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

So here we are celebrating.

And, you know, if if if everyone could see me right now, I'd be, you know, lifting a glass for you and toasting to your life.

We're celebrating your life, and yet that surgery did not go as planned.

Did you know what, like, was this a risk?

Were you told that this could be a risk?

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

So if anybody's ever had any type of procedure before, you know that like the doctors, they always go through like all the big long list of possible risks, you know?

Sure.

And and it's it's it's ironic now when I think back on it, because I always remember the last one he said, and it was a 1% possibility of becoming blind.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, I'm covered in chills.

Yeah.

That was the last risk you were told, and it was 1%.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

Yeah.

So I say you can you know decide how you want to look at it.

I'm either the most unlucky or the luckiest person alive.

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_04: Of course he would say that.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: So, I mean, you you've already opened so much I want to ask you about.

When you found out that look, go back a little bit.

When you found out that there was a brain tumor, your mom, your I actually got a chance to talk to your mom.

That was the coolest thing ever, by the way.

She's so special.

She told me about that moment and how she just she just sort of was frozen staring.

And she just said, I just kept staring.

And I just kept staring at him at the doctor.

What was that moment like for you?

SPEAKER_01: The moment when.

SPEAKER_04: When you found out there was a tumor, when you were told there was a tumor.

SPEAKER_01: So we had gone to a doctor.

So when all of this, this whole kind of ball got rolling, basically all started by me going to a new family doctor.

And that doctor basically was the one who put all the pieces together of all these different symptoms I was having.

I had I had always had like migraine headaches.

You know, I wasn't growing.

I mean, 17 years old, I hadn't gone through puberty.

Oh all these things that my my pediatrician always just kept blowing off, basically that I was just a late bloomer, you know, that I'm just gonna be short, you know, all this stuff.

And uh so frustrating.

And so exactly.

And so so when we went to this new doctor, and he was just a new family doctor in town, and he immediately, he was the one who told my mom out in the hallway, like, listen, I we need to get him to a specialist.

And so, so that then brings up the first time that the the term brain tumor was was ever said was in the uh doctor's office of the endocrinologist.

SPEAKER_04: But you had now spent not just years, like your entire childhood, right, going through different symptoms that they were just ignoring, kind of like he'll grow out of it.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

Yes, absolutely.

Yeah, my my entire childhood was when you look at it now from the big picture, it was just textbook symptoms that should never have been missed.

SPEAKER_04: Oh my gosh, Kevin.

Like, like what?

Tell us about those symptoms.

What was your childhood like?

SPEAKER_01: So I I think it was maybe in kindergarten, is when I failed the eye exam at school.

And so that started my journey of of getting glasses.

Then as I would continue to to grow up and and keep going to eye doctors, all of the eye doctors I went to, they always found it strange that they could never get my vision to perfectly correct, even with glasses.

SPEAKER_04: So there was always sort of something off.

SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes.

Same thing with with my mom, you know, she would tell the pediatrician, she's like, you don't understand.

She's like, he drinks more than any human you've ever seen.

I mean, Kaylee, I didn't know what a night's sleep was.

Because I literally, when I would go to bed at night, I would wake up every single hour.

And I would wake up, I would use the bathroom, I'd get a drink of water, go back to bed, and repeat.

SPEAKER_04: Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01: And so we another textbook symptom of what was going on.

And so when I would go to school, I wouldn't be able to drink enough.

And so at the end of every school day, especially starting in middle school, is when it got really bad, I would come home every day with a raging migraine headache.

It was because I was totally dehydrated.

SPEAKER_03: Oh my god.

SPEAKER_01: And literally, I remember my, yeah, my Nana, she would pick me up from school and I'd come home and I would literally drink an entire pitcher of tea.

SPEAKER_04: Oh goodness.

SPEAKER_01: Just dying of thirst.

SPEAKER_04: So this, so, so you're describing just one component of this.

What we're talking about, I didn't say this earlier.

We're talking about a tumor on the pituitary gland.

I don't know, you know that this is my field.

So I mean the pituitary gland is responsible for so much.

I don't think a lot of people understand the implications.

You're describing one mechanism.

Tell us more about, if you want to, the the pituitary gland and and it's just like it feels like the impact could be endless.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, basically.

So basically, my understanding, basically, the pituitary is it's just like the powerhouse of like controlling all of your body's hormones.

And so, so unbeknownst to us, I had this brain tumor that was was slowly either encasing or pressing against whatever it was interfering with the pituitary gland.

And so that's why me talking about drinking, it was the thirst hormone.

You know, it was testosterone, um, growth hormone.

The the drinking, you know, they they ended up giving me a thing called like a diabetes insipidus.

And it's not that I have diabetes, but it's this condition that is related to the pituitary with my thirst hormone.

Wow.

And so all of this stuff, and yeah, and so every symptom I had was all related back to the fact that a brain tumor was basically killing off my pituitary.

SPEAKER_04: And it's it's so easy.

I know it wasn't it now, probably is very clear, but for any of us listening, I think it's you could see it's like a doctor's gonna just look at that one aspect.

And what's so important when we look at the body, we have to look at the whole organism.

I can only imagine what it feels like too.

It's like, well, if one doctor had just picked up on that sooner, does that ever cross your mind, like how different your life would have looked?

SPEAKER_01: I don't let myself sorry to bring it up.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: Sorry.

SPEAKER_01: No, no, no.

No, honestly, no.

I mean, it's it's a good question.

And it is a question that I think me and my whole family have thought about many times.

And I've learned in life that you can literally drive yourself insane if you get stuck in the trap of what-ifs.

SPEAKER_04: Totally.

Yes.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: I learned that I learned that when I'm married now, I was engaged once before.

I don't remember if we spoke about this, you and I, but my first fiance died.

And and of course, like all the what ifs went through my mind, you know, what if I had been there?

What if I, you know, he had called me first, like maybe saw like anything, because I was out of town at the time.

And a good friend taught me, he said, you you cannot do the what-ifs.

Anytime a what if pops into your head, you have to just shut it down, change the sub subject, think something else, because you can't know.

If you if you say, like, well, what if I had been there?

Or what if what if a doctor saw it sooner?

We don't know what how that would have played out.

So I I really value you sharing this.

I think it's one of the greatest lessons that anyone listening can hear because you you kind of lose out on your life when you play the what if game.

SPEAKER_01: Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.

Okay, so I took us back.

So, so I I just wanted to get a better sense.

So you talked about the thirst, anything like what what other symptoms were you going through?

Were you experiencing as a child?

SPEAKER_01: Basically, like the most like like say like impactful were were the migraine headaches.

You know, always going to the eye doctor, you know, always getting, you know, different glasses and such.

But but the most debilitating would be the migraine headache.

Sure.

Just the the thirst factor, which I mean, it was such like a slow, gradual process that I mean, I didn't think anything like weird about it.

You know what I mean?

It wasn't like I didn't realize honestly, like it was just part of my life that I woke up every hour during the night, you know?

Whoa.

That was just life for me.

And that is why when we finally got the diagnosis, that it just took me by complete shock.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Wow.

SPEAKER_01: When all of this this started happening and and went to the the the new family doctor, and then he referred to the you know uh endocrinologists, and they sent me to the neurosurgeon and MRI and all that stuff.

I never never thought it was gonna be something like like a brain tumor.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Wow, yeah.

Wow.

Wow, I can only imagine uh that kind of surprise.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: Wow, especially after years of sort of these things being dismissed or taken as as like piecemeal.

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

Exactly.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

How soon after discovering that it was a brain tumor was there a plan in place to to have surgery?

SPEAKER_01: So I I can remember when we when we got to meet with the the pediatric neurosurgeon.

And I remember that we were there the first day that we met with him, and when he went over everything, he had the you know the results of the MRI, of course, and and he actually had an opening.

Um, I think it was the next day.

SPEAKER_04: Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_01: And my mom, she wanted me to take it.

I did not want to.

And uh, you know, she you know, she was scared.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Everybody, everybody was dealing with their own emotions.

And and ultimately, though, we decided to wait.

And and I think it was maybe somewhere around maybe like two weeks later, maybe two, three weeks later, something like that, when when I would go back in infrasurgery.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

You said everybody's emotions were were in a different place.

Where were your emotions?

SPEAKER_01: So when my mom told me about the news that she, so she had gotten the call on like a Friday evening.

Oh, wow, with with the results of the MRI.

And so she was the one who would tell me.

And um, and we had taken our boat that evening up the intercoastal waterway up to St.

Augustine, Florida.

And we were staying there for the weekend.

It was one of my favorite trips that we would take on our boat.

And my mom, she wait waited to tell me till we got up there.

Oh my god.

And um, so I was down in the cabin of the boat.

I always say that like this part of my story is always weird because it's like I just remember like photographs, like snapshots.

The first snapshot being down in the boat, sitting there, flipping through a magazine.

And that's when my mom came down and she told me.

And the next snapshot is me getting out of the boat and just running, running up the dock.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_01: And the next snapshot is me up at the top of the marina, leaning against the railing, looking out at the marina.

I didn't know why I was upset.

I guess it was just the simple fact of I never thought it was gonna be something like a brain tumor.

You always just think it's gonna be something easy.

Especially then.

I mean, I never you never even heard of anybody having a brain tumor, let alone that I would be the one.

And so after though that initial shock wore off, and after I would get confirmation, you know, from the doctor, from the neurosurgeon, that everything was gonna be okay.

He literally told me, he's like, he's like, I do these surgeries all the time.

And he, you know, he let me know.

He's like, Kevin, he's like, it's gonna be no big deal.

He said, We'll go in, we'll remove the tumor.

Basically, they had to kind of remove like the front quadrant of my skull.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah, when you said no big deal, I was like, I'm sorry, didn't they open your skull?

Like, didn't they have to like remove?

I mean, sorry, this is graphic, but like your forehead?

Like, what?

No big deal.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

It was, yeah, it was no big deal to the nurse.

Oh my god.

But but honestly, you know, like for me, and so, you know, literally, I mean, he told me, and he told me, you know, I'd be back to school in three weeks.

SPEAKER_00: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: And so I've always had a really good personality.

And so I immediately realized the positives.

unknown: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: I got to get out of school for three weeks.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

Your mom mentioned you really didn't like school.

She mentioned you were highly intelligent, did well, always got straight A's, but didn't like it.

SPEAKER_01: No.

So literally, as soon as I got this news, first day back at school, went into my guidance counselor, amazing Miss Tully, told her, Miss Tully, I've got to drop out of trigonometry.

Much, much to my disappointment.

Yeah.

And so that was literally the greatest day of my life when I got to walk into class and see all my friends, and I got to hand a slip to the teacher and say, See you later, suckers.

I'm going to be an office aide, you know.

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_04: And um, and so you're seeing all the pros.

SPEAKER_01: All the pros.

And and to the point that I even I named my tumor Bob, Bob the tumor.

And literally, like our whole family before surgery, we had a going-away Bob party.

SPEAKER_04: Oh my gosh, I love that.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

And and I mean, and even all the way up to the day of surgery.

Well, it was actually the day before when we had to go over to the hospital over in Orlando, Florida, about an hour away.

I mean, my mom's minivan was loaded up like you you would have thought we were going on vacation.

Because we had everything, all kinds of bags of clothes, everything.

And we went over there.

And I mean, up to the fact, Kaylee, the night before my surgery, I'm literally in the hospital room.

My family's there.

I wanted Outback Steakhouse for dinner.

So literally, my my sister and aunt went out and got takeout from Outback for everybody.

Nice.

And I'm literally sitting in my hospital bed, eating my Outback steak.

Wow.

The end of the night when everybody else left.

I remember we pulled up my one of my favorite movies uh was the the too fast, too furious.

And yes, and we had it playing this is this is how old it is.

It was on DVD on a laptop.

SPEAKER_04: Okay, okay.

I saw it in theaters, you know.

SPEAKER_01: I exactly, exactly.

SPEAKER_04: I got you.

SPEAKER_01: And so I remember my sister got in the the hospital bed with me.

Oh, and we laid there and was watching that movie.

If this Kaylee was a bump in the road, we finally found the the problem.

SPEAKER_03: Right.

SPEAKER_01: And I thought we were just solving the problem, and then I get to get back to life, and life would be really great after this.

SPEAKER_03: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: And no idea.

Nobody did.

Not even my surgeon.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Nobody had a single clue what was gonna happen.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

Yeah.

One of the things that I I almost can't unhear that your mom shared with me.

She said that they gave you a heads up before surgery, or they told them.

I don't know if they told you, actually, you'll you'll tell me if they told you, that you would have eye patches or like like uh a gauze or a bandage, a bandage over your eyes, so that when you would first wake up, you wouldn't you wouldn't be able to see.

But then but because you knew that that to like not worry.

So yeah, it's almost like I I can't I can't even imagine what what that means for you to then have found out that like you were told to like, okay, that's just normal, stay calm.

But so then it was like a delay, you you only realize much later, right?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I always say it's really tricky because I don't really know, like everybody wants like that really like awesome point of the story.

Like, when did you realize that you were blind, you know?

And like as somebody who loves a good story, I wish I had a good, like, climactic point, you know.

Like, unfortunately, I don't.

And and you're right, though my mom says that she really thinks that that's partly to do why when I did start waking up that I didn't I didn't freak out.

Is because they had told us that.

You know.

So yeah.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Wow.

When you did realize what was that like for you?

What what were your first thoughts?

What ensued in the you know, in the following days?

SPEAKER_01: I had my surgery October 28th.

I stayed in the ICU and didn't come home until I think November 13th.

I think I came home on my sister's birthday.

SPEAKER_04: Oh wow.

Your family, you guys you guys have big milestone days, okay?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

And so I don't remember any of the time in the hospital after surgery.

My memory doesn't come back until sometime later, being back at home.

And I can tell you that for a really long time, every day when I woke up in the morning, I had to face the reality that I couldn't see.

Especially because every single night I'd go to bed and I'd beg.

I'd beg God with all my being to let me see again.

And I truly knew that God could heal.

And I knew that God is capable of everything, of anything.

And I would beg and I would plead Him to please let me wake up in the morning and be able to see.

And yet every morning I'd wake up and I'd open my eyes.

And I'd see the same thing that I did when they were closed.

SPEAKER_04: How you share this saying, you know, I know God can do anything.

How do you maintain that faith?

Here you are years later.

Still wake up seeing the same thing as when they're closed.

SPEAKER_01: God has blessed me, Kaylee, in the most amazing ways possible.

It took a really long time to be able to understand it and to believe it.

And that that this was all in God's plan.

When I look back on my childhood, Kaylee, everything about my childhood was in preparation for what was to come.

Wow.

He made me a kid who was super organized, a skill that lends his hand to when you become blind.

He made me a kid who always wanted to try something new.

I mean, my mom will tell you that I drove her crazy as a kid.

SPEAKER_04: She did tell me that.

I didn't test her.

He's right.

She did say that.

It was like how many hobbies, surfing.

Well, every few weeks was something new, right?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, pretty much.

Exactly.

And so God was letting me just try out all kinds of things.

Wow.

To the fact also of being blessed with an opportunity to get to travel.

I mean, I got to, you know, see the Florida Keys.

I got to go up snow skiing in in, you know, snowshoe West Virginia.

You know, I even got to in middle school.

We went to Alaska.

SPEAKER_03: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: So cool.

I got to I got to see Alaska.

God let me see all of these things.

And then even the little stuff, like the fact that my sister, Tiffany, she's five years older than me.

Yeah.

I remember when she was in like her junior and senior year of high school, same high school that I would go to, Seabreeze.

And I hung out with Tiffany and her friends all the time.

I went to all the high school parties with Tiffany.

I went, I went to all the high school football games.

I went with to the concerts and everything with all of them.

You live large.

I got to live, I got to live out my senior year then.

All of this to say God was preparing me.

And especially, especially prepared me when I was in um, I think it was sixth grade.

So I guess I was probably 12 years old.

When I would go to my Nana's house every morning, my mom would drop, drop me off at Nana's.

She would take my my sister to school, then she would go to work, and then Nana would take me to middle school and then pick me up in the afternoon.

It was one morning I had been helping my Nana with a program that she was doing through her church, through a First Baptist.

And it was a program called Faith.

And it was a program that she had no understanding of why in the world she would volunteer to sign up for because it was totally out of her comfort zone.

Okay.

And it was where like her and a small group would literally like visit people's homes and sit down and talk with them and go through this whole like faith program.

And so she had to have this stuff like memorized.

And so every morning she would help like quiz me on my stuff.

And then I would quiz Nana on her little studies of the faith program.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, this is so cute.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

And so we would do that every morning before middle school.

Well, all of a sudden, one day it was towards the end when Nana was had gotten really good, had got the whole thing nailed down.

Something changed because when she was telling it back to me, all of a sudden she was speaking to me.

And um she came over.

She came over, she had been over in her recliner.

I was over on the couch, and she came over and she knelt down in front of me and she took my hands, and together I accepted Jesus into my life as my Lord and Savior.

Kaylee, I didn't realize that that was the greatest gift that I would ever be given until five years later, when I would enter into a world of hell, and the only way that I would be able to make it out is through Jesus.

That was the final thing he had to do to prepare me for what was to come.

And so today I can tell you that I believe in all my heart and all my being that God had it in his plan for me to become blind at 17 years old because he knew that I would make a greater difference in this world, having gone through what I did, than if I hadn't.

I have to find great honor that God chose me to be the one.

SPEAKER_04: You know, I believe that I believe that what you're sharing is actually all of our lives.

That if any of us really took the time to look back on our lives, we would see that each step was preparing us for right now.

Yeah.

And then for the next challenge or for the next milestone, you know, for the next stage.

Yeah.

But it takes some digging, you know, that doesn't come easily to most people.

What was your journey like in in you're sharing this?

Did you and yet you were, you know, every night begging, you know, let me see in the morning.

When did it click for you that, oh, I was chosen?

SPEAKER_01: Oh, good gracious.

A really long time.

It took, it took the better part of about 10 years before I even came to a place where I was finally ready to really move on with life.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: I finally realized, like I said, it took about 10 years that I didn't have to give up on my faith of seeing again one day.

But I realized at that moment that it probably isn't gonna be till I'm in heaven.

So right now I got more life to live.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Wow.

You you had to just really accept it was radical acceptance that allows you to then step into a new phase.

SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.

And it would be it would be sometime later on when I would really come to this point.

And honestly, it was probably a lot through this podcast when I started it back in 2020.

And I got into it and I started to understand more of my superpower that God gave me.

He being able to turn my disability into a superpower.

And it was really through the podcast that I got to really understand and bring me to that point of truly understanding that um what a gift it is.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

I'm amazed by what you just said.

It's not that you had all that awareness before and then started a podcast about you know grace and inspiration.

You're saying that as the podcast unfolded, that became clearer and clearer.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

SPEAKER_04: So why start the podcast?

What would be why?

Like that's not, I would have assumed the opposite.

Like, you know, you realize, okay, this is my purpose.

You're like, no, I realize that during it is a superpower, by the way.

I I I I feel so yeah honored and blessed to call you a friend.

It it is it's truly superpower.

And and I'll I'll try to humble, I'll try to say this humbly.

I don't know if it'll come out this way, but you know, a lot of people say that about me, that I'm their their inspiration, that I I find the light in the darkness.

And I look at you and I'm like, okay, no, if there's a person finding the light in the darkness, it's Kevin.

So I'm blown away by this, that it happened the other direction.

unknown: What?

SPEAKER_04: You're still surprised in me here.

Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, the podcast, I I always say that the podcast kind of I think saved my life.

In the fact of, you know, I had been a travel agent for seven years.

So when in 2020 is when I started my own home-based travel agency.

Um and I did that up until 2020.

And by that point, I mean, I knew that I was supposed to be doing something more with my life, but I didn't know what more was.

And so then when the pandemic came and and we're all stuck in quarantine and the travel agency, I always say it went from my what was going to be my best year ever to the worst year ever.

Wow.

It gave me the opportunity to try my hand at a podcast.

And you know, you know, Kaylee, the the joke is that originally I was gonna start a YouTube channel.

SPEAKER_04: Okay.

SPEAKER_01: And and so I started I started getting excited about that.

I thought perfect opportunity.

We're in quarantine.

Great.

And so I start ordering stuff off Amazon, and then I always say it was kind of like that light bulb moment, you know, even yes, and yes, blind people have light bulb moments.

SPEAKER_02: Thank you for clarifying.

SPEAKER_01: Of course, of course.

And so I realized, what am I doing?

I'm like, if I don't have somebody who is here to film, to do all that stuff, I'm not gonna be able to do this on my own.

SPEAKER_04: And I I can't believe anything crossed your mind that there's something you can't do on your own.

I'm sorry.

Um, hello.

Like you're telling me how, oh, it's so convenient that I'm really organized.

That's very helpful when being black.

I don't even know if people register what that means.

But you have to figure out what what color your clothes are, like all that.

Then you're managing a podcast.

I mean, just for the listeners to understand this, I I asked Kevin when he interviewed me, how did you you you referenced at some point, like, oh yeah, I was, you know, trying to keep track of my questions.

So we were going, I'm thinking, I've got my notes in front of me.

I can see them, I can see our little, you know, uh stream yard window.

I've got, I can see my microphone, I can see the cup of coffee next to me.

I was like, wait a second, how are you doing that?

And you taught me, this was new information for me that you had.

It's just like when people multitask, right?

They've got like seven tabs open on you know a browser.

I was blown away that you could listen to the next questions coming while you're listening to me.

Totally blew me away.

So, I mean, when you say, like, wait a second, I can't, I can't, you know, make this happen.

I'm like, I don't know, you probably could.

No pressure, but if anyone could do a YouTube channel, you probably could.

Anyways, it's a it's a great tangent.

SPEAKER_01: Go ahead, continue.

No, I love it.

And so, you know, the fact is, is you're right.

I probably cut it off.

But I'm not trying to make you feel bad that you should have done it.

SPEAKER_04: I think your podcast is great.

SPEAKER_01: Well, trust me, the fact is I am proudly now no video because I I'm I'm not falling victim to the sighted world wanting to see stuff all the time.

Um exactly.

So I am proud, I am proudly no video.

But so what I was gonna say though is at this point when I'm crushed that I can't do a YouTube channel, my sister says, Why don't you do a podcast?

My answer, what the heck is a podcast?

Oh, for real?

For real.

And so I start listening to podcasts about how to create a podcast, and I realize I'm like, oh my gosh, I just found my jam, the world of audio.

Like, this is made for the blind eye.

SPEAKER_04: This was made for you, yes, Kevin.

SPEAKER_01: Yes, and so so when I started the podcast, I thought I was still gonna be a travel agent.

SPEAKER_04: Okay.

SPEAKER_01: I always say that God hadn't cued me in on the plan.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Um, and so um I started the podcast.

So this podcast, if you go back to the very beginning, was called The Lowdown on Life and Travel.

Oh.

And so I was doing travel-related content, sprinkling in little bits of stuff about like my life being blind.

And then the podcast took it took over my life.

Oh, yeah.

What happened is once I started getting into interviews, and I started switching from just traveling I started just this natural, gradual, beautiful transition into having these amazing conversations with people.

And when we would get off the call, I would have people constantly tell me, they're like, they're like, Kevin, they're like, you ask me questions that no one else has ever asked.

Or I had I had one lady tell me, she's like, you see parts of my story that no one but my therapist has ever seen before.

For me, you know, of course, Mr.

Mr.

Funny Guy, my response has always been, well, you should really be interviewed by more blind people because it was quite evident.

SPEAKER_04: Um you know.

No, you really have a gift.

It's true.

Yeah.

So you had you just it just unfolded.

SPEAKER_01: It did.

It was it was the most it was the most natural progression in, and I think the the most important lesson here for anybody listening is that a lot of times in life we try to figure out if we're on the right path in life.

And I realized then what it felt like to be on the right path.

SPEAKER_03: Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_01: Is that for seven years, I literally paddled and paddled and paddled upstream trying to make it work as a travel agent.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_01: Kaylee, when I started this podcast, it literally was like I was flipped over on my back, floating down the lazy river.

SPEAKER_04: Nice.

SPEAKER_01: It was effortless.

SPEAKER_04: That's how it should be.

Yeah.

When you're when you're doing it right, when you're when you're on the right track, it it's doors should just open.

It should be with ease.

We're not supposed to swim upstream.

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

We are not salmon.

SPEAKER_04: No.

We are not salmon.

It's it's amazing.

And and it's so profound to see the impact that you've had and and how quickly it's grown and the amount of inspiration that comes out of every conversation.

And I I really, I really value what you shared, you know, about like you being chosen for this and how much you've leaned into this.

I think everybody's going through something, you know, everybody's facing something.

And to be able to hear your perspective through huge challenges, you know, it's just like it could just get someone through the day.

You know, it's profound how it can change a life.

One thing that I would love to know if you're open to sharing more about, you know, we're talking about your vision and being blind, and yet I know the pituitary gland was impacted.

I know this isn't the only thing going on for you.

Can you, you know, share a little bit more about what else is going on in your life?

You're you're inspiring others, but there's more you are navigating, right?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

So for a really long time, I believed in all my heart that if I could have one prayer answered, it would, of course, be that God would let me see again.

It took a really long time to get to a point when I came to understand that being labeled as pan-hypopit, having no pituitary function, is actually a far greater disability than being blind.

SPEAKER_03: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: Being blind, I can I can overcome it.

I can learn tactics.

I can do all this different stuff.

But there's not much I can do when I wake up in the morning and I don't feel good today.

I there's not much I can do when I just can't sometimes live a normal life because maybe stuff that when it affects others, for me, it just wipes my body out.

And so my life is it's honestly a it's a constant balancing act of medicines, always trying to replace, you know, what the the pituitary should be doing.

You know, I do that through medications.

And I mean, thank goodness they, I mean, they they are what makes me still be here today, but I always say they're they're they're no comparison to what the body should do naturally.

And so that is definitely one thing that I that I have come to understand is that that condition is is definitely more of a quote disability than being blind, 100%.

SPEAKER_04: Wow, so there's so much more that you are juggling than I think most people realize, especially when they hear your story.

I I don't know that that comes up so much.

And one of the other things that of course stands out is you know, you are labeled, and you've also labeled yourself like this now with your podcast, but as an inspiration.

I think a misnomer of of that is a lot of people think that someone who's so positive and so optimistic that somehow that's that they're just always happy.

They always see the glasses half full.

I would love if you could share, you know, how you actually cope and how you manage those hard days, you know, the days when you said you you said like your body's just not with it.

How do you how do you get through those moments?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, such a great question.

Because you are right, you know, especially in this day and age of of social media, the highlight reel.

I mean, nobody nobody wants to post about the boring stuff or the dull stuff or the bad stuff.

We only post about the good stuff in our life.

And so it's so easy to think that you're the only one not living this, you know, amazing life.

Right.

Well, it's honestly the same thing about the podcast.

I get on the podcast and I build up my energy, even on days when I don't feel good.

I know that I gotta I treat it like a performance.

I gotta show up, I gotta do the thing.

Wow.

Now, what's powerful about it is most of the time it it uh by the end of recording an episode, I come out feeling 100% better than when I started.

SPEAKER_04: The power of the mind.

SPEAKER_01: It's amazing how yes, exactly.

And so all that to say is that, yeah, I do have bad days.

I will say that I am so grateful that they don't happen very often anymore.

I say that I believe it's the power of time passing, is I do believe that time does heal and it makes things a little bit easier.

Because I mean, I don't know that I can remember the last time that I had a full-out cry over not being able to see.

But it's more like in today's point in my life, it's just when certain things happen and you get frustrated over something that is only frustrating because you're not able to see.

It's something wrong technology-wise.

And if I could just see it, I could fix it.

Or it's a fact of a loss of freedom.

Yeah, I have family.

Yes, I could call an Uber, but it's not the same as walking out your door and getting a car and driving away.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: Those are the kind of things that sometimes can get to you.

Now, like I said, luckily, 21 years later, rarely do I have those moments that I even think of that.

I just don't.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: But I think the most important thing that I want to be able to say is that there's nothing wrong, though, that if you do, there is nothing wrong with being sad, yeah, with wanting to cry, of just wanting to stay in bed all day.

Now, if that turns into a week and months, yeah, then we gotta do something.

But to just have a bad day sometimes, I don't think it's such a bad thing.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it would almost be weird.

If you had told me you never had any bad days, you never broke down and cried, I would think that's just weird.

That that would concern me, Kevin.

I'd be like, what?

But you you shared so beautifully that like it it took a decade to to actually accept this reality.

And and I think that's so powerful for people.

I think a lot of times people see people like us and think, why aren't they like that?

How come they haven't managed to to be more positive or to be stronger?

Oh, maybe they're just not strong enough.

Maybe they're weak and we're the strong ones.

Like, no, there's a process here.

There's some stuff we gotta get through.

And and I I really value you sharing so honestly about that.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Oh, absolutely.

It's been a journey.

It has been a journey.

And I always I always say though, that I never like I never want people to think that that my situation is is any worse than say somebody else's.

You know, that that's always been a big thing of me, really, ever since I went blind, is is wanting people to understand that that their problems are just as big to them as what I'm going through for me.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: You know, it doesn't it doesn't matter.

We're not supposed to compare one thing to another.

That's not what life is about.

SPEAKER_04: Yes.

Yes.

I felt that so much growing up with illness.

You know, we we we talk about this in a different interview.

I grew up with MS multiple sclerosis.

And I always felt the same, exactly how you're describing.

Like I wouldn't have chosen some of the challenges other people were facing around me growing up.

And it really taught me that.

Like you should never compare.

This was the lot I was given, and I'm learning to navigate this.

I would like to not have to figure out how to adapt to those other situations.

Everybody's facing some something, you know?

SPEAKER_01: Exactly.

Exactly.

SPEAKER_04: Yeah.

Yeah.

There's so much I want to ask you.

I don't even know how much time we have.

I could be here for days.

You mentioned how with something like blindness, you know, you can adapt.

You can figure out workarounds.

So I would love if you could share a little bit with us about echolocation, because that blew my mind when you shared that.

Um I told some friends about that.

And I there's a long list of questions, but can you can you just just tell us first of all what is echolocation and and how you learned to see again?

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

So so yeah, echolocation is the cool, the cool tool in my toolbox.

Um and it is the thing, though, that I didn't even learn about until 14 years after becoming blind.

Even though I went to all these places like, you know, blind services, Center for the Visually Impaired, Division, you know, Blind Services, all these resources that are amazing and have helped me so much throughout the years, nobody ever mentioned anything about echolocation.

And so when I found out about it, thank goodness it was at the point when I was a travel agent, and one of my travel agent friends saw a YouTube video about this guy named Brian Bushway.

And he was blind and he was using echolocation.

And so, fast forward through the story, I end up going out to Los Angeles, California with my mom and sister for oh gosh, I think about 10 days.

SPEAKER_04: Well, that's where I'm from.

You get is it?

SPEAKER_01: Okay, amazing.

So we we went out there, I think we were in Culver City.

Okay, and so I got to train one-on-one with with Brian learning echolocation.

Now, it was not easy for the first three days, it was ridiculous.

Because here I am, you know, Brian, he's he's doing this clicking technique and he's telling me, and I'm trying to learn how to do the clicking technique.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: And it's basically just with the with your tongue against the roof of your mouth.

SPEAKER_04: Okay.

SPEAKER_01: And so what happens is when you do that, you make that little snap with the tongue suctioned against the roof of your mouth.

Okay.

That is a sound that then bounces off of the objects around you in front of you.

They come back through your ears, and your brain's visual cortex learns to interpret them as images.

SPEAKER_04: It's it's profound.

It's something you hear about or see in a movie.

It didn't just happen though, right?

The brain had to kind of learn that that's what you were doing, and then and then get you those images.

Like, like my mind is blown.

Well, like, walk me through this.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

So so it was interesting.

So before I went out to California, something happened.

I didn't even realize that it was echolocation kicking in.

But I was walking down, I think I was with my mom, and we were at a shopping plaza, and we were walking down the sidewalk.

And as we were walking, from the sound of our footsteps, all of a sudden, I could tell every time we passed a column because we'd be walking, and I'm like, there's a column.

I just saw it.

Whoa.

You know, it it but I didn't even know what that was.

So come to find out, yeah, that was kind of a form of accollocation.

And so, so it took, I think it was on day three of training, the first time that I got to see something.

SPEAKER_04: It took three days.

I'm like, that's all.

So you could see something?

What that's crazy.

SPEAKER_01: Well, what's crazy is I remember talking to Brian before I went out there, and I asked him, you know, how long does it take?

And he said, uh, generally about three days.

And sure enough, I mean, it was day three of training.

We were in the Airbnb apartment that we had rented.

My mom and sister, they would go out every day doing tourist stuff.

Me and Brian were working in the apartment, and we were identifying corners of the room because corners are kind of easy to identify.

SPEAKER_04: Okay.

SPEAKER_01: And so he's having me make the little click and then I'd back up and make the click.

And all of a sudden, it was like somebody turned on a light switch.

SPEAKER_03: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: Because all of a sudden, Kaylee, the wall in front of me, it turned.

All of a sudden, I could see it.

It was like this fuzzy gray.

Huh.

But I literally could see the whole wall.

And to the point that I could literally walk right up to it and stop without touching it.

Wow.

And then I could, I remember I kept doing the clicking technique and I walked along the wall, and then all of a sudden it stopped, and it was like this big, like dark cavern.

It was the opening to the kitchen.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

It's like a doorway.

What so when you say you could see it, can you can you compare what what this site is like now through echolocation versus how you saw before?

Could you describe that for us?

SPEAKER_01: So I've been doing that.

So I think I went out to California in, I guess that was was 2017.

And so it's what, 2024.

So what, seven years.

And today I can tell you, and it's a good way to kind of describe how it looks and what I'm talking about is I will be standing, say, in in my kitchen and uh the faucet will be on, and maybe the water hits a dish a certain way where all of a sudden literally it's like the light turns on.

And I can look over and I see my mom's figure standing in the kitchen.

SPEAKER_04: Whoa.

So other things trigger it.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, not typically.

Yeah, but but yeah, and so so it literally, I can see my mom's figure.

I can see the um just the figures of the the cabinets.

It's like a world of of different shades of of gray and dark, and um you can identify even like texture, because I always say like it's easy to identify like where a faucet is because you'll get, I describe it as like a little uh ping off of the faucet.

So almost like you think of like one of the commercials for like glassware, and they show like a visible like little sparkle.

That's literally how it how it handles with like the shiny metal, like that, versus like say a couch, it's more just like a fuzzy gray, but I see the shape of it.

SPEAKER_04: That's so interesting.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so literally it's changed my life so much that my life is no longer like it used to be.

It's no longer nothingness, but instead the world around me has shape and dimension.

SPEAKER_03: Wow.

SPEAKER_01: You know, it is it has been the truly the most profound thing that ever happened.

And I'll share with you that while I was in California, the that day, the first day when it happened, I remember going to bed that night.

I remember laying in bed and I remember praying.

I remember saying to God, I remember smiling.

It was like, God, you let me see again, just in a whole new way.

SPEAKER_04: Well, I oh wow.

You know, I'm Jewish.

And every morning there's like a series of blessings that we say.

And and one of them is, you know, blessed are you, you know, master of the universe who gives the blind sight.

SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.

SPEAKER_04: And when you were telling me that every night you went to bed asking to see, asking to asking to get your sight back.

And and I knew, of course, you and I have talked about echolocation.

I was thinking, I was like, wow, it's like that blessing.

And now you just said that.

And I'm like, wow, you you actually got to live that.

You were given that.

I mean, I have that in a very small way.

I also I I I've had a lot of vision issues, and I I went blind in one eye.

So I when I read that blessing, I feel like, yes, I've experienced that.

I'm like, but you your brain developed and it's you developed an entirely new way to see.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.

It's been the biggest life changer.

Honest to goodness, I am so blessed to have gotten that opportunity to even learn about it.

Because it it's I learned in the the blind like uh circles of organizations and stuff.

They almost view the whole echolocation thing kind of like doctors view like chiropractors, you know, like like they're not real, they're not real doctors or something.

That's so weird.

SPEAKER_04: What like that's crazy?

This is so powerful.

What a gift.

SPEAKER_01: Well, and that's what I remember when when I realized it and I I understood and I and I learned it.

I remember I was so also like upset at the same point, thinking I've been blind for 14 years.

Why aren't these organizations teaching this?

SPEAKER_04: Yeah, why?

I'm like blown, I'm so confused by what you're saying right now.

What an amazing gift.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, exactly.

And it has been it's been amazing.

And and what's cool is it it blossomed into an amazing friendship that that I'm still friends with Brian Bushway.

Me and him, we talk all the time.

And uh just two really good friends because of that whole thing.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

That's well, I mean, he sounds like like what an incredible, what an incredible person.

I just I just for for technical purposes, I'm just curious.

I don't know if you've ever ridden horses, but I'm wondering if the click is similar.

Is that similar?

SPEAKER_01: Oh, no.

SPEAKER_04: Okay, can we hear it?

SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna try it.

My mouth is so dry.

But so it's sorry.

SPEAKER_04: Sorry to put you on the spot.

So it's it's kind of more like a uh it's much, it's much more subtle.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and and so in you do it in in different circumstances, you can make it louder or quieter.

And so, but the whole key is is when I was learning how to do it, it come out not as a click, but a click.

Because you can't have two little clicks, just have to have one click.

And so it took it took a while to figure out how to do it, to do it really good.

And then, I mean, you know, and so yeah, most everybody when they try to do it, they instead make a clocking noise.

And I'm like, yeah, no, that's not it.

SPEAKER_04: Um that that's why you had to you had to do all that training.

And and I think it's so profound.

It's such an amazing example of the power of the human spirit.

You know, if you really want something, you you you just stay determined and dedicated and fly to the other side of the country to to figure it out.

And the power of the brain, you know, that that's yes, and and I just want everyone to also hear this.

This isn't like this is already a brain that has been through significant damage, and you still were able to develop, you know, an entirely new skill.

It's profound.

I want to ask you, sort of, I maybe it's a weird question.

I don't know.

If if you could go back and the surgeon could tell you that this is what was gonna happen, let's say the surgeon said, look, we're gonna save your life.

And this, you know, this is the only way.

We have to we have to do the surgery, it's what will save your life.

But, you know, you'll lose your sight.

What would you have done with those two weeks?

What would you have wanted to see?

What do you think you would have done?

I I I'm asking, you know, for for others, what what we can do to save her the gift of sight that we have.

SPEAKER_01: You know, Kaylee, the truth is that I I often say that um when they push me through the operating room doors that morning, I remember my mom and dad, they walked back with me.

I said goodbye to them as they pushed me through through the doors.

If I knew then that I would never get to see their faces again, I don't think I could have allowed them to push me through those doors.

Because honest to goodness, becoming blind, Kaylee, it has been the most god-awful hell on earth experience I've ever I ever even knew.

I didn't even know that such pain could exist on earth.

And so I am so grateful that God did not give me that option.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

So you're you're grateful you didn't know.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Wow.

Definitely.

Wow.

Because I don't I don't think there's any way I could have prepared myself.

And and I think it's important, I guess, maybe to even note is that when a lot of people hear blindness, there's actually a very big spectrum of blindness.

Matter of fact, it's a very small percentage of people who say they are blind that are completely blind.

unknown: Right.

SPEAKER_01: Most have some degree of sight.

Whereas me, I am completely blind.

And so I am so grateful that I that I did not have that that option.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Wow.

I yeah, I mean, I can't even imagine.

And I'll just say, like, that really hits home for me right now.

Uh, you know, as you know, I was just back in LA with with my parents and we almost lost my dad.

And so as you described that, I was like, wow, like I'm so glad we got on a plane.

And thank God, thank God he's making a miraculous recovery.

But no, there were many moments of like, wow, like this, you know, it could be it.

And it's it's a really precious thing that you just described, like just being able to see your loved ones.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

Oh, I mean, when I would pray about getting to see again, I would also always just beg God.

I would say, God, if you if you won't let me see anything else, well, just let me get to see my family.

Just let me get to see my family.

That's probably has been the hardest thing in even today, if I allow myself to go there, is the thought that I don't even get to know what my mom, my dad, my sister, my cousins who are young.

I don't even get to know what they look like.

Heck, Kaylee, I don't even know what I look like.

SPEAKER_04: Oh, wow.

I haven't even thought about that.

SPEAKER_01: You know, now my family, they think it's amazing that I remember them how they looked 21 years ago.

SPEAKER_04: They probably appreciate that.

You haven't seen them age.

SPEAKER_01: As as as my sister told me one time, she's like, Kevin, you would be really disappointed.

SPEAKER_04: I'm glad y'all have a sense of humor about this.

SPEAKER_01: We do, we do.

But but it but it it's a really weird thing.

And in memory is is something like remembering what things look like, especially people.

It's very interesting because when I when I remember, when I like actually try to remember like what somebody looks like, I always go back to a photograph that I had seen of that person.

And I think it's because like a photograph is just a snapshot of time that makes time stand still and allows you to focus on them.

And so when I think of my Nana, I think of a photograph of her standing in her kitchen with a red shirt on and her apron on cooking with her gold-rimmed eyeglasses.

I think of my mom, a picture of her that was her standing in our kitchen cooking.

And it was one like Saturday morning she had like her white robe on, her hair pulled up and with like the big gold hair clip.

Always said it looked like a whale's tail that she would pin up, you know, you know, and there's different different photos like that of like my sister or my dad.

I think I I I always think back to a photograph because sometimes sometimes it scares me when I when I start to lose that.

And I'll go back and I'll just make myself remember that photograph.

SPEAKER_04: Wow.

Do you have one of you that you go back to?

SPEAKER_01: I do.

It was me sitting in my uh my truck that I got when I turned 16.

It was taken outside of my Nana's house, and it was it's a picture of me sitting in it with the door open.

And that's the picture I remember.

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: Nice, nice.

SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

SPEAKER_04: Oh wow, Kevin.

Um, I mean, just talking to you is such a such a journey, and yeah, I've got tears streaming down my face as as we talk right now.

You know, like I said, there's there's so much.

I I've literally got a list here of just topics we didn't even cover.

And and yet I sort of feel I feel a sense of peace, I guess I would call it.

I think that when we talk about, you know, today or whenever this is gonna air being, you know, close to your anniversary or on your anniversary, and and and you shared, you know, you were chosen, God chose you for this.

This day, this day was also chosen.

This anniversary was chosen.

And the day that your life was saved in turn became a blessing for i innumerable amounts of people.

Like we can't, we can't even count how many people's lives you've touched.

And the way that you share it's like it's like profound.

Like you're so real, you're so authentic and so grounded while also like silly and high in the sky, like all of it, you know, so expansive, so spiritual.

It's like, it's just such a blessing, and and you are such a blessing.

And I I want to just say, like, I really want to ask, I want to ask that God, you know, continues to bless you with continued miracles.

And I do want to ask for your sight, you know, like well, let's keep asking for that.

That it's like you're still gonna be the blessing.

You're still gonna be inspiring.

I'm here, you know, to ask for that and for your health.

And more than anything, that you continue to have the energy, the desire, the willingness to to keep, you know, having these conversations, inspiring others to keep showing up every day, even on the hard days.

And I just want to thank you.

Uh uh it's a weird moment.

I'm like, can I thank you on behalf of like the thousands of people who've experienced you?

I'm gonna do that.

I'm doing that.

Like, that's that's my thank you, you know, and I'm grateful to God for bringing you on this journey.

SPEAKER_01: Oh, Kaylee, you know, I always say that we we don't get to always choose what happens in this life.

You know?

But uh But but I think we do get to choose what we do with it.

When I started this podcast, I had no idea that I would get to meet people like you.

And I've come to understand that in this life, the things that matter the most are the people we meet and the experiences we have.

Well, this podcast, I say it checks both of those boxes because I get to meet people like you.

I get to have an experience with you.

And I can't think of a better thing to do.

And the fact of getting to meet you, to have you do this amazing episode today on such a special occasion for me personally, it means the world to hear you coming from the person who you are, and how highly I think of you, I thank you in the most sincere way possible.

SPEAKER_04: You know, I think Kevin, we um we established the last time we spoke, or not the last time we spoke, the first time we spoke.

Clearly, we are soul family.

And what one of the things that I've learned through my journey is that we come here with a mission.

Our souls come here with a mission, and our soul groups sort of go, okay, I'm gonna help you with this, I'm gonna help you with that.

And and let's hope along the way we remind each other of our mission, of our path.

And you do your best to hope that you actually, you know, live your purpose and fulfill your mission.

Maybe even get to a part of it, maybe not all of it, but okay, some of it is so success.

And being able to know you and having this conversation with you today on your anniversary is one of those moments that makes me feel like, you know, the fact that we met, the fact that we get to have this connection, to then have this conversation and inspire others is like we must have planned this, you know, our souls must have said, like, all right, then you're gonna talk and then you're gonna do this and you're gonna do that.

And like it just, that's all I feel right now.

I feel like this is a moment of confirmation that you know our souls are doing what we're supposed to do, that we are that that we're showing up for the for the mission that we set out to to do.

It's and it's it's really amazing when you get it, when you get those those little glimmers and kind of you know can peek behind the curtain and go like, oh, okay, yeah, this was that.

This is what we wanted.

This is what I I came for.

So it's really special to get to share this moment with you, and everyone gets to to hear us have this moment.

And if it's appropriate, you know, I want to tell you happy anniversary.

And yeah.

And what what are you gonna do for with it for yourself, for your family?

Because I know obviously this changed your whole family's life.

How will you guys be marking this day off air?

SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness.

Well, well, first I will say that I echo everything you say.

And I believe that I put it maybe a little less elegantly than you in the fact that I believe that you're my sister from another mother.

And I have to believe that it's all part of the plan.

And it's all working out.

SPEAKER_04: Yep.

SPEAKER_01: It's all working out for our good.

For celebration, well, we have a thing we do that we don't do it every single anniversary, but we do it a lot, is we kind of go back to where it started.

SPEAKER_04: I was hoping you were gonna say that.

Tell me it's Outback.

You gotta have Outback sponsor your podcast.

SPEAKER_01: I should.

So I hope they're listening right now.

I'll reach out to I will definitely have to reach out.

But but the funny thing, Kaylee, is when we go, is you know, obviously the waiter, waitress, when there's a big party, oh, what are you guys celebrating?

Oh wow.

That's when it gets awkward.

SPEAKER_04: And we're like, What are you celebrating?

What do you say?

What do you say?

SPEAKER_01: Well, I say it's the 21-year anniversary of Bob's death, which then they're like, What?

Okay.

Like Bob, Bob the tumor, Bob the Tumor.

Bob the tumor.

Okay, that's a good answer.

But um, but no, it it's you know, as I said, the the anniversary, it's a celebration, it's a celebration of the fact that that I'm still here today.

SPEAKER_04: Yes.

SPEAKER_01: As I said, I they said I had less than six months and I would have died.

unknown: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: At 17 years old.

And so for me, it's a celebration that I'm still here with my family.

SPEAKER_03: Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: A celebration that I just still get to be here on earth.

And you know, Kaylee, even on the hard days, I always just want to make a difference in somebody's day.

That's the whole mission of this podcast.

It's to just make somebody's day a little bit better because they hear something that I say or you say, and that's what it's all about.

SPEAKER_04: Oh wow.

Amen to that.

Amen to that.

I I know that that's what you are doing and may it continue.

And for all of those listening, you know, tell Kevin.

Let him know the impact.

You know, you you you don't realize how much it means to hear these stories.

And it's, you know, he deserves to know.

He deserves to know.

So let him know.

Wow, Kevin, thank you for this opportunity.

Like, I I'm so I'm like amazed that we got to do this.

It's like so special.

So special.

And the one thing I just want to say, we didn't have time to talk about your family.

You keep referencing them.

And and I, you know, I know it goes without saying this affects everyone.

And I know how special they are to be on this journey with you and to also have been chosen for this journey.

Um, so I just want to also acknowledge them also because you know, today also is a big day in their lives.

So I just want to take a moment.

I know that that's also important to you.

So I just wanted to make sure we got that in there.

SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely.

And and that kind of brings up a good point is I will say that anybody who would love to meet my mom or to meet Nana, I'll uh link interviews with both of them in the show notes today that you can go listen to.

SPEAKER_04: That's awesome.

Oh, that's so cool.

I'm really excited about that.

Yeah, your mom is so special.

I love talking to her.

Loved it.

SPEAKER_01: Yes.

SPEAKER_04: Amazing.

Amazing.

Is there anything else that you would want to share, Kevin, on your anniversary before we close?

SPEAKER_01: I think we covered it all.

I think this was amazing.

SPEAKER_04: Wow, Kevin, I feel so honored and humbled.

This has been so, so special.

I'm sure that all your listeners agree with me that you truly are a blessing, not just because you're always strong and optimistic, because you're real about the challenges as well.

Thank you for being you.

On behalf of all of those whose lives you've touched, we wish you a happy anniversary.

And we look forward to celebrating this anniversary in complete health and complete eyesight.

And we're always wishing you nothing but health and happiness.

Thank you so, so much for this incredible opportunity to be the host of your podcast and to share your story in this amazing space that you've created.

Kevin, you truly are the epitome of grit, grace, and inspiration.