November 21, 2024 • 52 mins
In this special two-part episode of Solving Healthcare, hosted by Dr. K, we are joined by Shayna Fairbank and Sean Kehoe. Shayna discusses youth mental health, social-emotional learning, and her innovative Icky Girl planner. They highlight tools and strategies for fostering emotional intelligence in children through proactive education and community support. Then we sit with Sean who shares how he empowers children with disabilities through fitness. Drawing from his own journey, Sean highlights the transformative impact of inclusive fitness programs in fostering strength, confidence, and social connection for individuals with disabilities like autism, cerebral palsy, and Down syndrome.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
Saga nine sixty am or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Turned my music.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
Ha ha ha, sure I do.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
I'm from the street. Swere to folks. Today we have
a special two part episode of Solid Healthcare Radio co
organization Welcome back. We have a great episode today with
an old friend of mine, Seena Fairgrys and her and
her colleague Megan created this incredible company, Ikey Girl, trying
to empower kids and improve their mental health and their
(00:45):
wellness by incorporating a daily practice that addresses their mental health.
And you're going to hear about their their handbook and
how it's changing lives. And I think they take home
the guys is that if we need to be more
proactive when it comes to our mental health. And so
I'm hoping after this, everyone's going to be inspired to
(01:07):
check in not only with themselves, but with their family,
with their kids, colleagues, so that we could dress this epidemic,
get on top of this bad boy for real. All right.
So before jumping into it, we'll hear a word from
our sponsors. First off, better help. This is the largest
online counseling platform worldwide. They change the way we get
(01:29):
help with facing life's challenges by providing convenient, discrete, and
affordable access to licensed therapists. Better Help makes professional counseling
available anytime, anywhere through a computer, tablet, or smartphone. Sign
up at betterhelp dot com backslash Solving Healthcare. That's better
help dot com backslash Solving healthcare and get ten percent
(01:49):
off sign up fees. Or go to better Help and
use this promo code solving Healthcare. Next, I want to
tell you about elements. That's LMNT for real. The key
to proper hydration isn't just water, it's water plus electrolytes.
This balance is vital to avoid issues like muscle cramps
energy dips often caused by dilution of electrolyte levels. So
(02:13):
enter Element, an electrolyte drink mix that's tasty, convenient, and
free from sugar and artificial additives. Co created by my Boy,
Rob Wolf and Lewis and Element provides optimal ratios of sodium, potassium,
and magnesium, ensuring not only health and performance benefits, but
also a delightful tasty experience like orange salt citrus salt
(02:35):
and the new and delicious water melon salt my favorite.
And for those that sign up, you get a free
sample and to celebrate our partnership right now, we're offering
a free sample pack on your first order. So you go.
You simply have to go to Drink Element dot com
backslash quadcast. That's Drink Element dot com backslash KWA d
(02:57):
C A s T. Last one is our twenty eight
day reboot course. A lot of people feel stuck, a
lot of people not sure how they get out of
this rut when it comes to their health and wellness.
So we created a twenty eight day reboot course to
just rejuvenate folks. We talk about our principles of nutrition, movement,
stress management, and community. We give you a guy on
(03:19):
a daily activity to be able to try and achieve
those goals. So go to twenty eight day Reboot dot co.
That's twenty eight day Reboot dot Co. All right, folks,
without further ado, here's an episode with Shana Fairbanks from
Achy Girl, a long term friend whom I haven't connected
(03:39):
with in a very long time, but she is doing
some incredible things in the mental health space that I
had to have her on. So Shana, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Thanks so much, thanks for having me.
Speaker 5 (03:53):
It is a blast from the past, but I am
grateful to be here today. So thanks so much for
inviting me to come on.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Before I forget, you're still teaching, correct, So yes and no.
Speaker 5 (04:06):
So taught for twenty five years and as you know,
I have four boys who were in multiple sports, and
so as a phyzed teacher, I was struggling to coach
all sports and have my children at a certain location
by four o'clock in the afternoon. So I just recently
transitioned to the Alberta government where I am working with
(04:29):
some spaces in that area with education.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Amazing, amazing. I was going to go with that. You
were a teacher at our old school for a.
Speaker 5 (04:38):
While, just for a whole minute, mostly just so my
kids were going there and so I could teach again
parenting with kids, right, trying to teach and parent at
the same time. So yeah, I taught my own kids
at our old school. It was quite the interesting moment.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Oh my goodness, we have a lot to talk about,
I really did. But well, our achy girl, So tell us, Shana,
how this came to be, because this is making a
lot of of of strides in terms of the mental
health space for our youth. So tell us tell us
about it, key girl.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Yeah, okay, So, like back this story up.
Speaker 5 (05:15):
Just prior to COVID, we know that there was kind
of a pandemic already occurring in the sense of mental
health in the schools and mostly you know, I don't
want to generalize one thing, but a lot of things
came from social media and telephones and that era was
the kids kind of started getting that. So we were
seeing kind of an epidemic of loneliness already and then
(05:39):
the pandemic hit.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
And in that time, one of.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
My like my role at that time, I was a
social emotional learning coach, and so social emotional learning in
the education world, it it's kind of, I guess you
could say a buzzword essentially, but it's the foundational tools
of a good mental health. And so, you know, they
tasked me and said, like, okay, you're in charge of
all the schools in this area from grade seven to
(06:04):
grade twelve, all the junior highs and high schools go
out and just teach them about mental health and social
mostional learning.
Speaker 4 (06:09):
And I'm like, that's a big job.
Speaker 5 (06:11):
So it was a grant, and so I only had
that job for a year. And at the same time,
my business partner, Megan, she had just finished a master's
degree in comprehensive school health and she had struggled with
mental health herself after her third son, to the point
where she was hospitalized and was trying to commit suicide.
(06:35):
And so we went on a run one day and
I was, you know, we were having this discussion about
my job and her, you know, research and learning, and
I just said, there's no resources. And when you look
at the foundations of mental health, it's something that needs
to be practiced daily, just like physical health, right, Like
mental health is part of our health. It's not like
separated from our body. And so if you think about,
(06:56):
like I want to be a healthy person, historically we
said eat properly, you know, work out, do all those things,
but we've neglected the mental piece. So what did those
practices look like to incorporate into your daily practice. And
so we came up with this idea that we were like, okay, well,
all kids in elementary and junior high have these like agendas,
So what if we incorporate something into this agenda that
(07:19):
the kids have to use, the teachers have to use
and parents have to use. That really incorporates it all together.
And so we did a lot of research. I don't
know if you are, like if you've heard of Castle.
The Castle comes from the United States and they have
a foundational model for social emotional learning and there's five
different competencies. So we kind of built it off the
research of that, and Canada doesn't really have anything like
(07:41):
that at this point. So we've been you know, we
focused a lot on Castle, and the schools in Canada
also used the Castle research and so from there we
built a planner. And so we built a planner our
first year, thinking like, well, if we just use it,
this is great, right, and so we built it around
the research, and we have like intentional days and a
(08:02):
one to four minute activity that tacher can do with
their class that it's intentional. And then on the right
hand side, like along with all the things you have
to put your daily reminders in your homework, you've got
a gratitude checklist, you've got a movement minutes checklist, you've
got a water intake checklist, and a feelings checklist, so
how you're feeling that day, and so then like as
a parent, my kid comes home and I'm like, oh,
(08:24):
you had a really sad day, and I can have
that conversation with him, be like, how come your little
happy face is so sad? Like what happened today that
made you sad? And are you still feeling that way
or has your emotion changed? Right? And so to really
like have that conversation, because I think a lot of times,
you know, we may do it like we just might,
you know, we have those conversations, but are they intentional?
(08:45):
And same with teaching, right, so you go throughout your
day and you're like, oh, buddy, you like your haircut
or oh I love your shirt, and you make these comments,
but are they intentional and so and have you reached
every student and even in your own house, like and.
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Your emotions change.
Speaker 5 (08:58):
So we just kind of came up with a tool
really and there's challenges for families during the weekends and
stuff like that. So we made one for kids and
so we started and so schools can customize them, they
can buy them for their whole school and some schools
in Edmonton have done this and it's been really really successful.
And then because we came from a French background, I
(09:19):
had to translate it into French. So then we had
our French version, and then we started doing a whole
bunch of workshops with teachers and workplaces, had us into
do staff so talking about all these pieces, and it
was even more interesting from there because then people would
come up to us after, you know, they would come
back for repeat workshops and they're like, you saved my life, Like, pardon,
(09:41):
I made a planner. But more than once we've had
people come back and say, those little things that you
asked us to do in the planner allowed me to
take the time to reflect. I was struggling with depression,
I was struggling with anxiety, and those pieces really helped
build my toolbox. And that's the goal, right to build
that tool And so then of course we made one
(10:01):
for adults so that everybody can benefit from mental health.
And so yeah, so we made those three planners kind
of to start, and now we do do workshops and
schools and workplaces to talk about mental health and then
we've kind of branched from there. I did do some
training with the Mental Health Commission, so I'm trained in
(10:23):
a few different areas like the working mind and mental
health fir Sted and so from there we've been able
to kind of explore a little bit more and when
we do our workshops. There's this one piece that I
absolutely love and it's from the Mental Health Commission of
Canada and they have a continuum. I don't know if
you've ever seen it, but it's in colors, and so
you go from green to red. So green is your
(10:45):
optimal mental health and red is your struggling and perhaps
even need a medical intervention. But what's really cool about
it is you talk about your mental health on a continuum,
just like your physical health. So if I broke my ankle,
that doesn't mean man, cale's always broken right and be
able to rehab that and get it back, and your
mental health is the same. But under the under their
little chart that they have, they have lots of different
(11:08):
like flags, if you will, So like if I'm starting
to maybe have trouble sleeping or perhaps I'm not going
out as much, there's little indicators that say, like, oh,
I'm in the yellow, I should know about that and
then I can help myself with my tools to get
back to the green. And you know, I think if
the kiddos are taught these pieces and their emotional understanding
early on, it becomes more natural and part of everybody's vocabulary,
(11:32):
right because right now we still have quite a lot
of stigma on mental health, and so teaching them younger
to be able to use these tools, then it becomes
more natural, because it's not when if we have trauma
in our life, is when we're gonna have trauma in
our life.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Right.
Speaker 5 (11:45):
Everybody has different amounts of trauma, but everybody faces trauma,
and so do you have the tools to get through it?
Speaker 4 (11:51):
Right?
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Amazing? So like I think you alluded it to it
right there. So for like the the Mindful Pride, this
mindfulness practice, there's a maybe a breathing focus on breathing
as an example or breathing.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
So there's lots of different ones. So like there's one
in there and all like this is one's my one
of my kid's favorite. So like with your hands, you
just there's a little picture and it shows you how
to breathe up. You hold your breath for three seconds
and then you breathe out. You breathe in, breathe out,
and so they.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Do the whole hand.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
So there's one for a hand and for adults, of course,
we've got like a little bit more complicated, it's a
box instead of a hand, but the same idea, right
to be able to regulate your breathing. And then there's
a little explanation of why it's so important.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
I love it because it's so practical and beneficial. And
I'm curious you said, great, was it grade sevens as
low as we go or is there?
Speaker 5 (12:43):
Yeah, we have a kinder in the grade six so
that one's even got like the interspace lining so they
can practice their printing, and we have of course ties
to literacy numeracy, and we also have we actually have
a first nation meeting in you it piece in the
planners for the for them as well, which was written
by a chief in our local area. So on three
(13:04):
D six just for a little bit of those wellness
practices from the land as well. So there's some there's
lots of different ideas in the planner. And what was
your original question, because I've already forgotten, No.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
That was but this is this is oh man, this
is gold. So what like you you you struck me
with this amazing story just a second ago about the
impact that people have has had on people. But I
just want to maybe elaborate a little bit on this,
like in terms of the impact, whether anecdotal or whatnot,
(13:38):
whether it comes to the kids or adults, Like what,
what are you seeing change from your perspective?
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Well, you know, here's like I don't know if you
know anybody, like if you've if you struggled with mental
health at all yourself, and so like when Meghan, I
had a postpartum after my second child, and but it
took me a really long time to actually know that
it was postpartum because I just like was very anxious,
but didn't really I think I just did everything at
(14:06):
higher speed until that happened for quite some time, until
I actually did stop sleeping. And to get help is
really hard in our system. And Megan had the same issue,
but hers was much worse. In mind. I was still functioning,
whereas she had to check herself into an institution and
she was medicated.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
I was not.
Speaker 5 (14:28):
But both of us when you actually have to go
and do the work on mental health, it's not like
you would love it to be like here's your blue pillar.
Now you're better, right, But it's not like that. It's work.
It's little tiny things. It's journaling, it's figuring out what
your triggers are is trying to fix. So you have
to write things down, you have to breathe through that
panic feeling, and they're just little tiny tools. Drinking enough water,
(14:54):
going for a run even when I don't feel like
I need to go for a run, connecting with a friend, right,
all those things that we kind of think like, oh,
those are easy. When you're in trauma, they're not easy.
And so if you have these as daily practices when
you get into trauma, it makes it doable because it's
(15:15):
like something you've practiced, right, there's a word for that,
and my brain has escaped to me right now, but
it's like that rote memory. So when it's something that
you've practiced when you're in trauma, you can actually do it.
And so when we've had people come to see us
and say like I forgot about these pieces, or I
haven't done these in a long time, or this really
helped me, Like the journaling piece, a lot of people
will come back and say, I wrote it down and
(15:37):
I realized what the problem was because I started to
see that there was something happening every day, right, Because
sometimes you know you're in this moment of panic and
you're just like your brain's just going and it's like, hey,
write it down. What's the problem. I don't know what
the problem is. It's like, hey, we'll just write down
what you're feeling. And then once you start writing that
down on a daily basis, you start to see some
key components.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
And so I think that's.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
The per of the planner. And so, like you know,
people have said to us you, well, does it come digital?
And I'm like, sure, I guess, send it to you digital,
but it's not going to work because you need to
actually write it down right and have that moment of
taking the time to reflect and think and to slow
things down a little bit. And our world and our
society everything's really fast and quick, and you know, instant
(16:21):
gratification on our phones, it's right there all the time,
and that increases our dopamine and our brain, which actually
puts us in overdrive. So being able to back up
and take that time to d screen and decompress really
allows your mental health to improve.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
We'll we write back also of a healthcare radio with
our special guests Shana from Itchy Girls.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot cl.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
We are back on SOLVEIGN Healthcare Radio with our special
guests Sena from Ikey Gurl. I love the fact it's
not on a screen, like it was part of me
challenge I was. I was thinking to myself, like, oh,
for the kiddies, maybe maybe this would be more appealing
to them. But they spent enough time on screens, and
there's something there's I think there's data that support that
(17:41):
there's something about physically writing stuff down that is therapeutic.
And so I mean, to me, this makes a lot
of sense to keep it physical. I'm curious in terms
of your workshops, So the workshops that you guys have
been doing, that's been not just in with kids, right,
(18:03):
Like it's not so.
Speaker 5 (18:04):
Actually we've done a whole bunch of different ones. So
the ones we do with the kids, we go in,
we play games, and we have it's called an Emotional
Ninja Workshop, which we're developing a resource for h so
that will get exactly you get a belt every level
that you complete, you get a built and then there's
like a little work, a little challenge at the end.
But anyway, so they have fun with that. So as
(18:25):
teachers and physeet teachers, that's kind of our jum so
we like to go in and play with the kids.
So that's one thing that we do offer for schools,
but we do a lot of workshops with teachers and
how to be intentional in the practice because as teachers
as we all, I'm sure you've heard, it's like, oh,
not another thing, like I'm overworked, I'm overwhelmed that, like
(18:47):
I don't want to do something else, like now you
want me to do their mental health too, Like this
is becoming ridiculous, right, And so we hear that a lot,
and so it's like, well, it's not really anything that
you need to do extra, it's how to be intensional
while teaching. And so we go in and try to
help teachers understand like it's not a lesson plan. It's
just little teeny tiny things that you need to do
(19:08):
during your day to incorporate it so that the kids
feel heard. They have some tools. The planners are an exact, sorry,
excellent example of something they can just incorporate.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Right, It's like takes one to five minutes.
Speaker 5 (19:22):
But even if they don't purchase our planners, we still
try to give them a whole pile of strategies that
they can do to incorporate even just working in groups
different ways so that they're able to incorporate these pieces,
So we do workshops with them. We also do workshops
with just normal like everyday staff on wellness and how
to balance their lives better, how to incorporate physical activity
(19:43):
and nutrition. So we also have that background, so we
try to bring in the whole piece, not just the
mental health, because physical health is related to mental health,
so we try to bring all that in when we
do workshops with corporations as well.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Amazing, amazing, So if you are that teacher or you're
that parent that wants to be a little bit more
attentional and bring these concepts right and center, what what's
some of the what's some of the ways that we
could we could do that.
Speaker 5 (20:15):
So one of my favorite activities, So you can do
this at home. So if you just honestly, if you
google meme feelings or emotions, and then you can get
lots of little pictures with like cats with happy faces
or sad faces. You can get little you can get
actual happy faces. Just print them off, put that on
your fridge. Okay, so do this today, and then you
can get a little magnet and put it on how
(20:37):
you're feeling, So you just put the magnet on your fridge.
You don't even have to say anything, just put the
picture on the fridge with a magnet on, like the
crazy face of like excited, right, And then one of
your kids will walk by and I'll be like, what's up.
I had an awesome day. This is how I'm feeling.
And then you tell them the story and they'll be like,
huh okay, dad's doing something weird. And then you then
(21:00):
you ask the questions, say which one are you, move
the magnet to you, and then they'll move the magnet
to them and then they can tell the story. I
love doing this like morning and night. So like in
the morning we'll check in, my kids will put it
on the fridge, and then after school I'm like, hey,
are we the same people that we were this morning?
And they're like, oh my gosh no, And then they
all move their little magnets. I have them all color
coded with different color magnets so they know who they are.
(21:22):
And then I try to switch the picture quite often,
like we usually do it once or twice a week.
The other thing you can do is as the kids,
like if you have little kids, pictures are perfect if
you have bigger kids, words are even better. So the
other thing, as we talk about in teaching and for
parents is emotions.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
Always when we.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Talk about them, you're angry, sad, mad, that's about it, right,
But there's actually a lot of words to emotions. I'm frustrated,
I'm anxious, I'm confused. So if you can also print
these off, like you just google emotion chart words and
then they have a lot of different colored words and
they'll have different colors, so it'll be like red, green,
and yellow, blue, and then the words within the chart.
(22:01):
Put one of those on your fridge, because then they're
like blue, they're sad, but they could be frustrated, they
could be complacent, they could be all these and then
they learned the vocabulary right, so that when you actually
see a child and their first a usually their first
emotion will be anger, and so they'll come out really
fiery and you're like, okay, you're angry, But then when
(22:25):
you actually get down to the story at the bottom,
they're upset, they're confused. It wasn't fair, you know, there's
all these pieces behind it, and so when they can
actually identify that emotion, it really helps the conversation and
it helps them understand. Right, Megan's son, this is like,
I don't know. Last summer, they went for a bike
ride and she didn't wear helmet. He wore his helmet,
(22:48):
and so by the time they got back, he was
just irate, like so mad, and she's like, buddy, like
what is actually going on?
Speaker 4 (22:57):
He's just like, I hate you.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
You're the worst.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
Mom.
Speaker 5 (23:00):
So angry, right, just freaking out, and she's like, okay,
where's take some breaths. So then she did some breathing
with him. That's the other thing you can use for this, right,
like teaching breathing techniques to your kiddos when they're before
we don't talk to them until they're like calmed down.
Speaker 4 (23:13):
It's just not worth it.
Speaker 5 (23:14):
So get them to breathe, have some water, whatever it
might be. And then once they've calmed down, then you're like, okay,
what was the actual issue? Like why were you so
angry at mom? So she asked that question. He's like,
you weren't wearing your helmet and she was like, well, buddy,
we're just going down the park, and like you know,
she thought he was going to say it wasn't fair.
I had to wear mine, and he actually said, but
(23:35):
you could have gotten hurt. So there was fear that
his mother was going to get hurt, not that he
he had to wear one, but that she wasn't. He
was worried about her, right, So like, but there's the
then of course she's like, oh, I'm so sorry, right, Like,
of course I'll war's her helmet, right, So there's the
communication piece. But like, his anger wasn't anger, It was
fear and worry for the fact that his mom could
(23:57):
get hurt.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
Right, So when we unpacked.
Speaker 5 (24:00):
The emotions, what we display isn't always what we're feet
actually feeling.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
I love that story because.
Speaker 4 (24:06):
It's I got a lot of them.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
Yeah, I know that it's a key lesson there that
often we got to get past angele, right, Like that's
often there's an underlying, more more descriptive emotion happening underneath that.
And also that story of how you get through to
your kid and taking that time and gending them to
(24:30):
calm down, breathe have some water. I think that that's
that's great.
Speaker 5 (24:35):
Yeah, we work a lot with the new thing we
started doing last year is we've been working with hockey
teams as well, and so this one I really like.
So we built which I don't have on me, so
I can't show you. But we built like a pre work,
a pre shop and after shop kind of like checklist
for coaches to put in a little planner for their athletes.
(24:57):
And so it does like I go in and I
te them about their mental health and I teach them
about like their feelings and their emotions because everything is
based on that. That is the key to all of
it is the emotional piece. And so when they go
into a game, what is that emotion, like where they are,
what color are they at, how are they feeling, what
is their heightened feeling at that moment? And then after
(25:18):
the game, what's their feeling Is it the same? And
a lot of times, especially the older ones, are very
competitive and they're mad if they don't win, right, But
then you also talk about that feeling on ice, so
you get cross check from the back. You just want
to turn around and slug somebody, Right, what do you
need to do? You don't go slug somebody. You need
to take that breath. So we try to teach them
(25:40):
from that moment of feeling to take that breath before
you have your reaction, which is really difficult to do
even as adults. And so it's that practice of like
I'm mad, I need to breathe, but I don't want
to breathe, but I got to breathe. And then so
the coaches last year we actually did like a little
data on it, and it was really interesting because at
the beginning of the season it was all like red red, red,
(26:02):
red red, But then they noticed that there was a
shift as they started practicing it, and then they were
able to use their.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
Tools to like breathe.
Speaker 5 (26:09):
They had less kids in the penalty box, so it
was actually like it was interesting that it worked, but
it was that it's the mental piece of saying like nope,
I have to take five seconds. And they would tell
them like, if you don't take your five seconds to breathe,
you're on the bench, right, So they had there was
consequences from the coach involved, but it was a learned practice,
(26:30):
so it was quite it's quite neat to like add
those pieces and parents, we need to do the same
thing right instead of like yelling at them, which often happens.
I may have yelled at my children too, I'm not perfect,
but to stop and be like okay or if you
do something like in our house, we often like if
something isn't quite right, I just stopped and I'm like, okay,
(26:50):
we got to rewind that, and we'll like literally rewind
and we'll leave it. And so it's like, Okay, I
made a mistake, Admit that mistake, embrace it.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
Breaks.
Speaker 5 (27:00):
We're human and it's okay to make mistakes and then
back it up and try it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Yeah, I see so many applications, like so many groups
that could benefit, like even healthcare providers. That this is
where I was saying, like, uh before online we're talking
about market areas to penetrate too. You come and do
this to a group of healthcare professionals, especially that are
(27:25):
burned out. Such damn y'o. Like that's a massive market
to tap into. But we would love to. But Sha,
where do you see, Like if you could like have
a magic wand and have an outcome here in the
(27:47):
next few years, whether it's through Itchy Girl or in
the mental health space, what would you like to see?
Speaker 5 (27:55):
Honestly, my utopic vision is every school in Alberta and
across Canada has one of these planners. But there's no money,
so I don't know how those things ever come to be.
But I think it's a tool that all teachers could use.
So from the like, from that perspective, I would love
(28:16):
to go and educate leaders on how to implement this parents,
you know, like and I don't know where the biggest
umbrella is to tackle on that, but I really feel that,
you know, just like healthcare, if you have the preventative measures,
then you're not dealing with the outcome at the end.
And like when we talk about in education, which is
probably very similar to health you have your universal supports,
(28:38):
and if those supports are being taken care of, then
when you have to deal with all your individual and
target sports, you don't have to go there as much.
Speaker 4 (28:47):
And those are the expensive ones.
Speaker 5 (28:48):
When we're talking about psychologists, we're talking about and they're
hard to find.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
Right.
Speaker 5 (28:52):
So if I can help my kids as a parent
to have these tools that they can go through with life.
And I know that you're going to have hard step,
It's going to be a bad day one day, or
something terrible is going to happen.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
What I mean, for my kids, one day I am
going to die. That's going to be a hard.
Speaker 5 (29:06):
Day for them, right, But if I know that I'm
leaving you with tools. That's super important, right, and so
you know you topically, I would love all the kids
to have tools in their little toolbox so that they
can pull them out and be ready at every stage
in their existence, and adults too, Like we see so much.
There's so much going on in everybody's lives. You know,
Facebook is not exactly what it's represented, and there's a
(29:30):
lot of stuff that people go through every day. And
if we can be kind to each other and we
can help each other through it, it's really important.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I love I love it and as you probably can
appreciate them all about the preventative side, and to me,
this is a this is a great weapon to be
able to put in the arsenal that we could lean
on to avoid going into that expensive side or or
that even that side where I'm not saying it's too
(30:00):
far gone when you end up needing to be seek
medical attention and so forth, but it's.
Speaker 5 (30:06):
No, and it's important, like it's part of the process
for sure, and some people will need it way more
than others, right, But it's.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Like you don't want to go there if you don't
have to, you know what I'm saying, so like to me, like,
let's be proactive with our health. We don't even to me,
I don't even call them mental health anymore. Just be
proactive with their health and like let's start winning because
it's time. It really is. Absolutely yeah, So shada, where
(30:34):
can people learn about ekey Girl and work.
Speaker 5 (30:37):
They So we have a couple of things. So we
have a website and it's Ekeygirl Wellness dot com so
it's I K I G I R L and then
wellness dot com. We're kind of load tech, so don't
expect a million dollar website, but we do what we
can from our basement. And then the other thing is
(31:00):
we actually do our adult planners. They are on Amazon.
Don't google Wellness Planner for somewhere reason. Amazon put it
as Bringer because our title is called Bringer of Sunshine
because we have this little tree here and so like
these are our roots. But you guys, we bring sunshine
to allow the trees to grow. So there's like a
(31:21):
little theme behind it. But anyway, so if you google
Bring your Sunshine, they are on Amazon as well, so
you can get yourself one. But they're the adult ones
and they they're not dated there January through to December,
but you put the dates in it so you can
buy it whenever. So those are our planners. But yeah,
you can reach out to us on our website for sure.
(31:42):
But we are happy to travel. We'll go anywhere to
do workshops and yeah, and you can customer order planners
as well.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
And shannef I'm not mistaken. You're also on Instagram, correct.
Speaker 5 (31:54):
Yeah, and you can find us on Instagram. And it's
just if you grow.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Wellness, beautiful, beautiful, shame know we're gonna say blast from.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
The past totally. Thanks so much. It's been awesome.
Speaker 5 (32:06):
I'm getting to talk to you for the last hour
about something I'm so passionate about.
Speaker 4 (32:10):
So thanks for the invite. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
And thanks for doing all you do for our kids.
That means the world. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (32:17):
Yeah, no worries.
Speaker 6 (32:19):
Out of the night, into the water we pushed from
sure breaking in and the stillness of the.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
No Radio No Problem stream is live on SAGA ninety
sixty AM.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Dot c A one am Jewels Fast one and one
dam Jewels Fast one and.
Speaker 4 (32:48):
The slow.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
All right folks on Soga nine sixty listening to Solving
Healthcare Radio with doctor k Yo featuring our special guest,
Sean Keyhoe Quocast Nationen. We have a special guests, a
guy that I have been looking up to in many
ways over the last year plus since we met at
Activates last year twenty twenty three. Sean is a change
(33:15):
maker man. He's, as we like to call it, changing
the bully, and the work he's doing with some of
our disabled children is incredible. So Sean, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Absolutely So, how did the story start for you? How
did you get involved in fitness, How did you get
involved in helping kids with disability? How did this all begin?
Speaker 3 (33:45):
It's a bit of a story, so brace yourself. So
I went through some very challenging medical battles throughut my life.
I was diagnosed with this animal blood vessel in my
brain runs in my family called the cameron is angioma,
and then it ruptured. But I was six months old hydrocephalus.
I had two brain surgeries right away. They weren't even
(34:07):
sure if I was gonna make it. Then they put
a VP shunt in saved my life. And then for
thirteen years I had nemriia every year and they kept
seeing this one spot that didn't look right. Then it
happened again and I had another brain surgery, and then
the scar tissue from that brain surgery started me with
epilepsy when I was around seventeen, and I had five
(34:31):
more brain surgeries for that. So how does this fitness
connect to that? I fell in love with Liton when
I was maybe five years old. I was a big
WWE wrestling fan. Paul Cogan was my hero, and I
saw this video promo of him training to get ready
to go against Audrey to Giants. It was squat and
deadlist and I just saw that video. I'm like, I
(34:51):
want to do that, and I just fell in love
with it. I couldn't play a lot of sports that
I loved, football hockey because of my brain surgeries. I
fell in love with gym. When all my friends were
getting Nintendos and NERF guns for Christmas, I was getting
bar bells and dumb bells and benches and it helped me.
It gave me a reason to work hard. I couldn't
play the sports I wanted to, and I fell in
(35:12):
love with something else. And later on in life, when
my uplifs had got out of hand to the point
where I was having fifteen to twenty caesars a day.
I couldn't go to school, I couldn't go to work.
I have a son who's now in his twenties. I
couldn't be alone with him anymore. I had to have
supervise visits. I just didn't feel like I had much
(35:33):
of my meaning in life. The one thing that I
could do consistently was go to the gym. My friends
would pick me up, they would take me to the gym,
and it just kept me going. It did so much
more for me than just build muscle. It kept me
going Emotionally, it motivated me. It just gave me a
reason to function. And later on in life, I just
sort of realized, shouldn't I transfer this to other people
(35:56):
that have been through challenges?
Speaker 2 (35:58):
A guy I have.
Speaker 3 (35:59):
My very first person whole training client was the bomb
that went off in my head because my friend Dana,
who I met at f F c Autawa, also had
sub posy and when she started with me, she just
I want a six pack. I did a bunch of
bunch reaches about rebel policy. I can't fix these things,
but we can get some strength back on your right side,
get some ability, no, no, no, no. I've had all
(36:20):
this treatment for thirty years. Nothing's going to change. I'm like, okay.
So I kind of tricked her. I told her we
were just trying to make a six pack, and then
one day she came running into the gym, jumped on
my back and said, Sean, I picked up the recycle
bit when I got home with my CP hand and
I was able to cure it all the way home
without dropping it. And then right in that moment, I'll
remember that till I'm dead. My brain just went thing,
(36:43):
this is my purpose in life. This is what I'm
supposed to do. I'm here to change people's lives that
think they can't work out I think they can't change,
and it just became my mission in life.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
I honestly I get chills here in that, Sean, about
not only your journey through health no one that you've
had to go through a number of surgeries and health scares,
and certainly it's amazing that you've pulled through, and not
(37:13):
only pulled through, you started to give back and find
that mission, find that purpose, and people are reaping the benefits.
We have a we have a few couple of family
members with disability and we see, we see how important
(37:35):
it is to try and maintain that function to be
able to do the things that they love to do.
So hearing how you could help clients get through some
of these challenging obstacles is incredible. It really is so
(37:56):
absolutely so when we look when you look at you
know the journey. So you were working, for example, with
this this patient with CP and so what were the
next steps for you? Were you was it at the
point where like I'm going to reach out to more
folks that are that are struggling or do they come
(38:16):
to you like over the next what was the next stage?
Speaker 3 (38:20):
So the next couple of years were a battle because
I had tons of people in one year saying I'm crazy,
this is never going to work. This business is not
gonna make any sense disability that there's no money in
there sean you can't have a future that I had
myself sort of going I want this. So what I
did is I worked a government job for fifteen years.
(38:41):
I was a personal trainer on the side and I
did that for FIT and then COVID was actually the
slap in the face that I needed to go, No,
I have one life to live I have been through
nine branch surgeries, thousands of seizures. I have not let
any of this stuff stop me. Why am I going
to let these people in my ears listen to me? Why?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Why? Why am I going to let them tell me?
Why am I doing this?
Speaker 5 (39:00):
No?
Speaker 3 (39:01):
I sat out with my girlfriend. We worked a plan,
and I said I'm leaving. I quit the government during COVID,
and I rebranded my company to this Enabled to Disabled,
and I focused everything towards disabilities. It took some time,
but now it's developing into my dream and it was
the smartest decision ever made in my tired life.
Speaker 2 (39:21):
Wow and so and so with your company, what are
the typical clients that you're seeing? Like you mentioned initially
having that first super palsy patient, But what other what
other areas are you helping folks with?
Speaker 3 (39:38):
So that's the other beauty about my job is the
variation is crazy. So I'm an autism exercise specialist. I
got my certification to the American Sports Medicine College, and
I have a lot of autistic clients. The age range
is all over the place. I've gone as young as
six year old and I've gone as older as someone
in their sixties angel and syndrome. Didn't even know it
(40:00):
was before I met this client. I was terrified because
the first three says he pushed me in the face.
But we've developed such a fantastic relationship and he's come
so far. It's been amazing. I've worked with syndrome, he
had a lot of people with epilepsy, just basically everything.
(40:20):
I've chicked my nose in a little bit of everything.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
Wow, wow, And what I guess, what are some of
the principles. What are the considerations you got to do
to be able to work with these different populations. Let's
let's focus on autism like that. There are a lot
of kids on the spectrum because we've seen over the
last few years, so I can imagine the need would
(40:44):
be high. But what are some of the nuances or
considerations when you gotta You've got to treat someone with autism.
Speaker 3 (40:55):
So the first part of working with someone with autism
has absolutely nothing to do it being a personal trainer.
You need to build a good, solid relationship with them
or that wall they have up is never going to
come down. So my first couple of sessions, it's all
about getting to know the person, getting to see what
they're interested in getting to see what motivates them and
makes them happy, not be some exercise robotic coming here
(41:18):
lifting weights. They're not going to have anything to do
with that. So I have a client that i've worked
with that he was upset with blay Blade, that whole
game where.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
My kids were all over may Blades. All my kids
were infatuated with that.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
So I had him bring that in. You wanted nothing
to do it weights, you wanted nothing to do it
working out. We played blay Blade and the deal was,
whoever lost, we'd have to do ten reps of this
and ten squads and ten this. And he eventually just
built some confidence, fell in love a way.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Of that thing. Now he loves it.
Speaker 3 (41:48):
It's about doing that part first. But a lot of
people aren't willing to leave there all the work they
put in towards being a personal trainer aside and do
that part of the work to start off. It's not
an easy thing. And then there's days where they are
just not there. There are days where I have to
just usually when you're when I'm training every day, Joe,
you were first part of the workhouse. The hardest part
that's been Shashy work. These guys might be the complete
(42:09):
on the way around. I might have to work them
in very slowly. I may have to talk about Fortnite
and video gaming and yettayada YadA, just to get them
motivated and back into the system, and the whole second
half of the workout might be great. I just had
a session yesterday with one of my clients. First half
he was not there. Second half he's sprinting up these
hills and flipped the logs. It just took some work
(42:30):
to get him in there.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
All right, We'll be right back on Solimon Healthcare Radio
with Doctor Kate featuring our special guest Sean Keyhole. You
must better if you get.
Speaker 5 (42:39):
Jobbing grown up and sell be growing up, then I
take the tote the thing, hope that it's so nuts.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Let's take the sip of it yet, let's take the
hit that cat spook Billy.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
The streamers live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C.
Speaker 5 (43:02):
Yeah, I'll build with Israelies.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
Wrap up fabulous job by You're on Solder Healthcare Radio
with our guests Sean Keyhole. What does the future look
like in terms of your business? Are you? Are you
seeing more and more clients? I mean, have you been
building since inception? Are you? Is there a next phase
in terms of trying to build awareness towards having more
(43:26):
clients get strong, Like where are you at in your
journey right now?
Speaker 3 (43:31):
So I hired two trainers. I've been by myself forever,
and last year I hired two trainers, So I actually
have a team now and I'm interviewing another one at
the end of the week.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
So we're growing.
Speaker 3 (43:43):
If I'm not trying to toot my own own or anything,
but my name's getting around and anybody who's creating any
kind of an adaptive training program, they're always coming to me.
So I have a meeting coming up with Awesome. I
just had one with them a couples ago. They're the
sports program for people kids with autism, but they don't
have a program to grandfather the kids out after they're
not under the kid qualification. So we're working on having
(44:05):
everybody to come over to me. I'm going to be
running their fitness program. I work with Fostering Forever Friendships
Today program for adults with disabilities, so I need more help.
The goal now is being more people in to work,
and then the next phase is a lot of these
people don't think they have futures because of their disabilities,
but because they become more comfortable in the gym. I
(44:27):
want them on my team. So I'm going to bring
them with me to do the group training sessions that
I do. They're going to work with me in the gym.
I want them to know that they have more than
just an hour of a workout future with Schean. They
have a future of working with me.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
And what kind of what kind of transformations are you seeing, Sean,
My kid's been a few years now since you really
focused on the business. Any kind of stories come to
mind in terms of people that have really really changed
their course, whether it's mentally, physically, holistically.
Speaker 3 (45:09):
Well, I'm gonna get emotional here because it's about my
favorite part. I'll give you one of my favorite examples.
So I have two clients, all Went and Zach, and
they were in an evening social program and they were
not getting along. They were fighting all the time. And
I started my first group workout sessions last year and
(45:29):
they were both in it. So the parents were terrified.
They were We did the first ass that both of
them stayed outside looking into the gym and if the
Johnnies were gonna jump in. I'm gonna try to cry
because it's one of my favorite moments.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (45:42):
So I had them pushing the sled on the on
the track and Owen pushes it to the other end
and he starts stopping away. Usually that means like they
break it away from me. He turns her out to
the other side of the track. It's Zach's turn, the
one that he wasn't getting along with, and let's go,
buddy there put a budget push it. I started crying,
the bob started crying. I couldn't hold up together. And
(46:04):
the two you should see how they functioned together in
the gym. It's been unbelievable. Their attitudes have changed. I've
got and it's just been one of the most inspiring
moments of my life. And then I have clients that
are that are working now that we're sitting at home
watching YouTube all day when I met them. I've got
clients after and the oppressiants. I've got clients that have
career ideas now. When I was asking them when we met,
(46:27):
what do you want to do later on? And all
I was good was uh because they didn't think there
was anything there.
Speaker 6 (46:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Wow. So it's like, sorry, No, this is what it's
all about, Seohn. It's people want to know what life
could look like after working with you and knowing that
these kids can have could could be more functional and
be more content for being more fulfilled. I can just
(46:56):
imagine those parents seeing seeing that or hearing about that.
Uh like that would be so I don't know, it
would be so moving. It's it's unreal. Any other stories
that come to mind, Sean.
Speaker 3 (47:11):
In terms of uh, David's he's in his thirties. He's
my first who was my first ever autism client, And
I'm not gonna lie. I didn't know anything about autism
when when I met him. I met his mother at
a fundraiser and she asked me to try it out.
And okay, Uh, he's he's vernable, but he doesn't say much.
(47:34):
And we started the gym, there was just too much
going on. And then during COVID we had to switch
our workouts to outside.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
And he.
Speaker 3 (47:44):
Is a very he's a wonderful person, but he doesn't
like people in his bubble. And when we started training outside,
he got more confidence flipping logs and over him pressing
them and doing all this stuff. And now he'll do
anything in the gym, but also he'll there's a little
minus fim Like he would always walk ten feet in
front of me, and he walked ten feet to everybody's mom, stepdad, everybody.
And one time we were working out in the woods
(48:06):
that his parents came by. Do we see David Sady
said what I'm like? Yeah, say Sean, he doesn't let anybody.
He doesn't even let us do that. You've gotten through
this wall that he hasn't he puts up on us
his parents.
Speaker 5 (48:22):
How do you do this?
Speaker 3 (48:23):
So that was one of my favorite ones too. And
David's been involved in so much stuff. I played in
a fundraiser tournament motion Ball for the Special Olympics. He
came with me, it was on my team. He's involved
in way more sporting events and social events now with
me now instead of just being a homeless by himself.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Wow, Wow, that's transformative for real. It's so like, what
would be the message you want to send out to
the world for when it comes to some of the
some of the disability population is like, because what you're
doing is pretty be incredible then and I'll forgive me
(49:03):
for my ignorance, Like I don't know if this is
happening throughout the country. I don't know if this is
like how unique you are in terms of offering this
kind of thing, but what kind of what kind of
messages you want to send out to the to the
world here.
Speaker 5 (49:20):
Well, I have.
Speaker 3 (49:21):
My message is I'm on a mission to show people
that they can do things that the world tries to
sell them they can't do. I'm trying to show them
that there's other aspects to the gym than just the
ones that see on social media, losing weight, getting the
other part of my business is to create a social
aspect for these guys. A lot of these people they
don't have much for social life. So once we create
(49:43):
the confidence, the one on one training and move them
over to groups, they become friends, They've got more of
a life, and they feel more more valued. So there's
just more to it. And I'm trying to spread the
word and get it out that there's so much more
to offer and there's so much help more that the
gym can do to change people's lives than the everyday
flow Smith we see stuff on social media.
Speaker 2 (50:06):
Yeah, I think I think that's a great message, Sean,
And I really think what you're what you're doing is unbelievable,
and this is why we have to have you on
the show, just to amplify what you're doing and continue
to change lives. To my friend, So, how do people
get a hold of you? Sean? I want, I want,
(50:27):
I want you to blow up. I know you've got
already two trainers that you got in the mix. How
do we how do we get this going?
Speaker 3 (50:34):
Well, my my website is just w w W Sean
Keyhoe dot com. I'm actually I just met with someone
yesterday to get a revamped the Dylan Capital content. The
guy that did the video for activating he does have
to work with him for years. He's going to redo
my website for me. And then I'm all over social media.
(50:54):
The one I use the most of his friend, it's
just Sean Underscore Keyho Underscore Personal Training.
Speaker 2 (51:00):
I'm on.
Speaker 3 (51:01):
I used to take that not that often, but I'm
and then I have a couple of locations. So my
gym that I worked out it was cup Point one.
It's a private gym that I rent out of. It's
over by train yards. I have a garage gym out
here in Rockland, and I have I deal with a
bunch of other facilities that I can rent here and
there when I need them to have to go west
(51:21):
to end or east or like that.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
Glauria, Sean, well, listen, we really appreciate you jumping on
the podcast. And once again, folks, Sean Keyhoe is a
boogie changer. Okay, this is what we're talking about on
not you know, seeing an issue and not just sitting
on the sidelines but being the catalyst of change. This
(51:45):
is where we want to see folks. So Sean, thanks
so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (51:49):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
If you enjoyed that, please leave us any comments at
podcast nine nine at gmail dot com. Leave a five
star rating. Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter
at quodcast, jump on our newsletter, jump on our community
at quodcast, the subject dot com, all things healthcare solutions
all on one site. Y'all gonna love it. All right, people,
(52:14):
I hope you're feeling a little bit more jumping your
step after that episode. Thanks for listening, talk real so peace.
I remember seeing you when Spaghetti Strappy snapsack helst up
by your fact.
Speaker 4 (52:26):
When I've seen it, I was like, damn, girls, do
you have a man buddy?
Speaker 1 (52:30):
No radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
six am dot C
The views expressed in the following program are those of
the participants and do not necessarily reflect the views of
Saga nine sixty am or its management.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Turned my music.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
Ha ha ha, sure I do.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
I'm from the street. Swere to folks. Today we have
a special two part episode of Solid Healthcare Radio co
organization Welcome back. We have a great episode today with
an old friend of mine, Seena Fairgrys and her and
her colleague Megan created this incredible company, Ikey Girl, trying
to empower kids and improve their mental health and their
(00:45):
wellness by incorporating a daily practice that addresses their mental health.
And you're going to hear about their their handbook and
how it's changing lives. And I think they take home
the guys is that if we need to be more
proactive when it comes to our mental health. And so
I'm hoping after this, everyone's going to be inspired to
(01:07):
check in not only with themselves, but with their family,
with their kids, colleagues, so that we could dress this epidemic,
get on top of this bad boy for real. All right.
So before jumping into it, we'll hear a word from
our sponsors. First off, better help. This is the largest
online counseling platform worldwide. They change the way we get
(01:29):
help with facing life's challenges by providing convenient, discrete, and
affordable access to licensed therapists. Better Help makes professional counseling
available anytime, anywhere through a computer, tablet, or smartphone. Sign
up at betterhelp dot com backslash Solving Healthcare. That's better
help dot com backslash Solving healthcare and get ten percent
(01:49):
off sign up fees. Or go to better Help and
use this promo code solving Healthcare. Next, I want to
tell you about elements. That's LMNT for real. The key
to proper hydration isn't just water, it's water plus electrolytes.
This balance is vital to avoid issues like muscle cramps
energy dips often caused by dilution of electrolyte levels. So
(02:13):
enter Element, an electrolyte drink mix that's tasty, convenient, and
free from sugar and artificial additives. Co created by my Boy,
Rob Wolf and Lewis and Element provides optimal ratios of sodium, potassium,
and magnesium, ensuring not only health and performance benefits, but
also a delightful tasty experience like orange salt citrus salt
(02:35):
and the new and delicious water melon salt my favorite.
And for those that sign up, you get a free
sample and to celebrate our partnership right now, we're offering
a free sample pack on your first order. So you go.
You simply have to go to Drink Element dot com
backslash quadcast. That's Drink Element dot com backslash KWA d
(02:57):
C A s T. Last one is our twenty eight
day reboot course. A lot of people feel stuck, a
lot of people not sure how they get out of
this rut when it comes to their health and wellness.
So we created a twenty eight day reboot course to
just rejuvenate folks. We talk about our principles of nutrition, movement,
stress management, and community. We give you a guy on
(03:19):
a daily activity to be able to try and achieve
those goals. So go to twenty eight day Reboot dot co.
That's twenty eight day Reboot dot Co. All right, folks,
without further ado, here's an episode with Shana Fairbanks from
Achy Girl, a long term friend whom I haven't connected
(03:39):
with in a very long time, but she is doing
some incredible things in the mental health space that I
had to have her on. So Shana, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Thanks so much, thanks for having me.
Speaker 5 (03:53):
It is a blast from the past, but I am
grateful to be here today. So thanks so much for
inviting me to come on.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
Before I forget, you're still teaching, correct, So yes and no.
Speaker 5 (04:06):
So taught for twenty five years and as you know,
I have four boys who were in multiple sports, and
so as a phyzed teacher, I was struggling to coach
all sports and have my children at a certain location
by four o'clock in the afternoon. So I just recently
transitioned to the Alberta government where I am working with
(04:29):
some spaces in that area with education.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Amazing, amazing. I was going to go with that. You
were a teacher at our old school for a.
Speaker 5 (04:38):
While, just for a whole minute, mostly just so my
kids were going there and so I could teach again
parenting with kids, right, trying to teach and parent at
the same time. So yeah, I taught my own kids
at our old school. It was quite the interesting moment.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
Oh my goodness, we have a lot to talk about,
I really did. But well, our achy girl, So tell us, Shana,
how this came to be, because this is making a
lot of of of strides in terms of the mental
health space for our youth. So tell us tell us
about it, key girl.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
Yeah, okay, So, like back this story up.
Speaker 5 (05:15):
Just prior to COVID, we know that there was kind
of a pandemic already occurring in the sense of mental
health in the schools and mostly you know, I don't
want to generalize one thing, but a lot of things
came from social media and telephones and that era was
the kids kind of started getting that. So we were
seeing kind of an epidemic of loneliness already and then
(05:39):
the pandemic hit.
Speaker 4 (05:40):
And in that time, one of.
Speaker 5 (05:42):
My like my role at that time, I was a
social emotional learning coach, and so social emotional learning in
the education world, it it's kind of, I guess you
could say a buzzword essentially, but it's the foundational tools
of a good mental health. And so, you know, they
tasked me and said, like, okay, you're in charge of
all the schools in this area from grade seven to
(06:04):
grade twelve, all the junior highs and high schools go
out and just teach them about mental health and social
mostional learning.
Speaker 4 (06:09):
And I'm like, that's a big job.
Speaker 5 (06:11):
So it was a grant, and so I only had
that job for a year. And at the same time,
my business partner, Megan, she had just finished a master's
degree in comprehensive school health and she had struggled with
mental health herself after her third son, to the point
where she was hospitalized and was trying to commit suicide.
(06:35):
And so we went on a run one day and
I was, you know, we were having this discussion about
my job and her, you know, research and learning, and
I just said, there's no resources. And when you look
at the foundations of mental health, it's something that needs
to be practiced daily, just like physical health, right, Like
mental health is part of our health. It's not like
separated from our body. And so if you think about,
(06:56):
like I want to be a healthy person, historically we
said eat properly, you know, work out, do all those things,
but we've neglected the mental piece. So what did those
practices look like to incorporate into your daily practice. And
so we came up with this idea that we were like, okay, well,
all kids in elementary and junior high have these like agendas,
So what if we incorporate something into this agenda that
(07:19):
the kids have to use, the teachers have to use
and parents have to use. That really incorporates it all together.
And so we did a lot of research. I don't
know if you are, like if you've heard of Castle.
The Castle comes from the United States and they have
a foundational model for social emotional learning and there's five
different competencies. So we kind of built it off the
research of that, and Canada doesn't really have anything like
(07:41):
that at this point. So we've been you know, we
focused a lot on Castle, and the schools in Canada
also used the Castle research and so from there we
built a planner. And so we built a planner our
first year, thinking like, well, if we just use it,
this is great, right, and so we built it around
the research, and we have like intentional days and a
(08:02):
one to four minute activity that tacher can do with
their class that it's intentional. And then on the right
hand side, like along with all the things you have
to put your daily reminders in your homework, you've got
a gratitude checklist, you've got a movement minutes checklist, you've
got a water intake checklist, and a feelings checklist, so
how you're feeling that day, and so then like as
a parent, my kid comes home and I'm like, oh,
(08:24):
you had a really sad day, and I can have
that conversation with him, be like, how come your little
happy face is so sad? Like what happened today that
made you sad? And are you still feeling that way
or has your emotion changed? Right? And so to really
like have that conversation, because I think a lot of times,
you know, we may do it like we just might,
you know, we have those conversations, but are they intentional?
(08:45):
And same with teaching, right, so you go throughout your
day and you're like, oh, buddy, you like your haircut
or oh I love your shirt, and you make these comments,
but are they intentional and so and have you reached
every student and even in your own house, like and.
Speaker 4 (08:57):
Your emotions change.
Speaker 5 (08:58):
So we just kind of came up with a tool
really and there's challenges for families during the weekends and
stuff like that. So we made one for kids and
so we started and so schools can customize them, they
can buy them for their whole school and some schools
in Edmonton have done this and it's been really really successful.
And then because we came from a French background, I
(09:19):
had to translate it into French. So then we had
our French version, and then we started doing a whole
bunch of workshops with teachers and workplaces, had us into
do staff so talking about all these pieces, and it
was even more interesting from there because then people would
come up to us after, you know, they would come
back for repeat workshops and they're like, you saved my life, Like, pardon,
(09:41):
I made a planner. But more than once we've had
people come back and say, those little things that you
asked us to do in the planner allowed me to
take the time to reflect. I was struggling with depression,
I was struggling with anxiety, and those pieces really helped
build my toolbox. And that's the goal, right to build
that tool And so then of course we made one
(10:01):
for adults so that everybody can benefit from mental health.
And so yeah, so we made those three planners kind
of to start, and now we do do workshops and
schools and workplaces to talk about mental health and then
we've kind of branched from there. I did do some
training with the Mental Health Commission, so I'm trained in
(10:23):
a few different areas like the working mind and mental
health fir Sted and so from there we've been able
to kind of explore a little bit more and when
we do our workshops. There's this one piece that I
absolutely love and it's from the Mental Health Commission of
Canada and they have a continuum. I don't know if
you've ever seen it, but it's in colors, and so
you go from green to red. So green is your
(10:45):
optimal mental health and red is your struggling and perhaps
even need a medical intervention. But what's really cool about
it is you talk about your mental health on a continuum,
just like your physical health. So if I broke my ankle,
that doesn't mean man, cale's always broken right and be
able to rehab that and get it back, and your
mental health is the same. But under the under their
little chart that they have, they have lots of different
(11:08):
like flags, if you will, So like if I'm starting
to maybe have trouble sleeping or perhaps I'm not going
out as much, there's little indicators that say, like, oh,
I'm in the yellow, I should know about that and
then I can help myself with my tools to get
back to the green. And you know, I think if
the kiddos are taught these pieces and their emotional understanding
early on, it becomes more natural and part of everybody's vocabulary,
(11:32):
right because right now we still have quite a lot
of stigma on mental health, and so teaching them younger
to be able to use these tools, then it becomes
more natural, because it's not when if we have trauma
in our life, is when we're gonna have trauma in
our life.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
Right.
Speaker 5 (11:45):
Everybody has different amounts of trauma, but everybody faces trauma,
and so do you have the tools to get through it?
Speaker 4 (11:51):
Right?
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Amazing? So like I think you alluded it to it
right there. So for like the the Mindful Pride, this
mindfulness practice, there's a maybe a breathing focus on breathing
as an example or breathing.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
So there's lots of different ones. So like there's one
in there and all like this is one's my one
of my kid's favorite. So like with your hands, you
just there's a little picture and it shows you how
to breathe up. You hold your breath for three seconds
and then you breathe out. You breathe in, breathe out,
and so they.
Speaker 4 (12:18):
Do the whole hand.
Speaker 5 (12:20):
So there's one for a hand and for adults, of course,
we've got like a little bit more complicated, it's a
box instead of a hand, but the same idea, right
to be able to regulate your breathing. And then there's
a little explanation of why it's so important.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
I love it because it's so practical and beneficial. And
I'm curious you said, great, was it grade sevens as
low as we go or is there?
Speaker 5 (12:43):
Yeah, we have a kinder in the grade six so
that one's even got like the interspace lining so they
can practice their printing, and we have of course ties
to literacy numeracy, and we also have we actually have
a first nation meeting in you it piece in the
planners for the for them as well, which was written
by a chief in our local area. So on three
(13:04):
D six just for a little bit of those wellness
practices from the land as well. So there's some there's
lots of different ideas in the planner. And what was
your original question, because I've already forgotten, No.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
That was but this is this is oh man, this
is gold. So what like you you you struck me
with this amazing story just a second ago about the
impact that people have has had on people. But I
just want to maybe elaborate a little bit on this,
like in terms of the impact, whether anecdotal or whatnot,
(13:38):
whether it comes to the kids or adults, Like what,
what are you seeing change from your perspective?
Speaker 5 (13:44):
Well, you know, here's like I don't know if you
know anybody, like if you've if you struggled with mental
health at all yourself, and so like when Meghan, I
had a postpartum after my second child, and but it
took me a really long time to actually know that
it was postpartum because I just like was very anxious,
but didn't really I think I just did everything at
(14:06):
higher speed until that happened for quite some time, until
I actually did stop sleeping. And to get help is
really hard in our system. And Megan had the same issue,
but hers was much worse. In mind. I was still functioning,
whereas she had to check herself into an institution and
she was medicated.
Speaker 4 (14:27):
I was not.
Speaker 5 (14:28):
But both of us when you actually have to go
and do the work on mental health, it's not like
you would love it to be like here's your blue pillar.
Now you're better, right, But it's not like that. It's work.
It's little tiny things. It's journaling, it's figuring out what
your triggers are is trying to fix. So you have
to write things down, you have to breathe through that
panic feeling, and they're just little tiny tools. Drinking enough water,
(14:54):
going for a run even when I don't feel like
I need to go for a run, connecting with a friend, right,
all those things that we kind of think like, oh,
those are easy. When you're in trauma, they're not easy.
And so if you have these as daily practices when
you get into trauma, it makes it doable because it's
(15:15):
like something you've practiced, right, there's a word for that,
and my brain has escaped to me right now, but
it's like that rote memory. So when it's something that
you've practiced when you're in trauma, you can actually do it.
And so when we've had people come to see us
and say like I forgot about these pieces, or I
haven't done these in a long time, or this really
helped me, Like the journaling piece, a lot of people
will come back and say, I wrote it down and
(15:37):
I realized what the problem was because I started to
see that there was something happening every day, right, Because
sometimes you know you're in this moment of panic and
you're just like your brain's just going and it's like, hey,
write it down. What's the problem. I don't know what
the problem is. It's like, hey, we'll just write down
what you're feeling. And then once you start writing that
down on a daily basis, you start to see some
key components.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
And so I think that's.
Speaker 5 (15:59):
The per of the planner. And so, like you know,
people have said to us you, well, does it come digital?
And I'm like, sure, I guess, send it to you digital,
but it's not going to work because you need to
actually write it down right and have that moment of
taking the time to reflect and think and to slow
things down a little bit. And our world and our
society everything's really fast and quick, and you know, instant
(16:21):
gratification on our phones, it's right there all the time,
and that increases our dopamine and our brain, which actually
puts us in overdrive. So being able to back up
and take that time to d screen and decompress really
allows your mental health to improve.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
We'll we write back also of a healthcare radio with
our special guests Shana from Itchy Girls.
Speaker 1 (16:58):
Stream us live at SAGA nine sixty am dot cl.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
We are back on SOLVEIGN Healthcare Radio with our special
guests Sena from Ikey Gurl. I love the fact it's
not on a screen, like it was part of me
challenge I was. I was thinking to myself, like, oh,
for the kiddies, maybe maybe this would be more appealing
to them. But they spent enough time on screens, and
there's something there's I think there's data that support that
(17:41):
there's something about physically writing stuff down that is therapeutic.
And so I mean, to me, this makes a lot
of sense to keep it physical. I'm curious in terms
of your workshops, So the workshops that you guys have
been doing, that's been not just in with kids, right,
(18:03):
Like it's not so.
Speaker 5 (18:04):
Actually we've done a whole bunch of different ones. So
the ones we do with the kids, we go in,
we play games, and we have it's called an Emotional
Ninja Workshop, which we're developing a resource for h so
that will get exactly you get a belt every level
that you complete, you get a built and then there's
like a little work, a little challenge at the end.
But anyway, so they have fun with that. So as
(18:25):
teachers and physeet teachers, that's kind of our jum so
we like to go in and play with the kids.
So that's one thing that we do offer for schools,
but we do a lot of workshops with teachers and
how to be intentional in the practice because as teachers
as we all, I'm sure you've heard, it's like, oh,
not another thing, like I'm overworked, I'm overwhelmed that, like
(18:47):
I don't want to do something else, like now you
want me to do their mental health too, Like this
is becoming ridiculous, right, And so we hear that a lot,
and so it's like, well, it's not really anything that
you need to do extra, it's how to be intensional
while teaching. And so we go in and try to
help teachers understand like it's not a lesson plan. It's
just little teeny tiny things that you need to do
(19:08):
during your day to incorporate it so that the kids
feel heard. They have some tools. The planners are an exact, sorry,
excellent example of something they can just incorporate.
Speaker 4 (19:20):
Right, It's like takes one to five minutes.
Speaker 5 (19:22):
But even if they don't purchase our planners, we still
try to give them a whole pile of strategies that
they can do to incorporate even just working in groups
different ways so that they're able to incorporate these pieces,
So we do workshops with them. We also do workshops
with just normal like everyday staff on wellness and how
to balance their lives better, how to incorporate physical activity
(19:43):
and nutrition. So we also have that background, so we
try to bring in the whole piece, not just the
mental health, because physical health is related to mental health,
so we try to bring all that in when we
do workshops with corporations as well.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
Amazing, amazing, So if you are that teacher or you're
that parent that wants to be a little bit more
attentional and bring these concepts right and center, what what's
some of the what's some of the ways that we
could we could do that.
Speaker 5 (20:15):
So one of my favorite activities, So you can do
this at home. So if you just honestly, if you
google meme feelings or emotions, and then you can get
lots of little pictures with like cats with happy faces
or sad faces. You can get little you can get
actual happy faces. Just print them off, put that on
your fridge. Okay, so do this today, and then you
can get a little magnet and put it on how
(20:37):
you're feeling, So you just put the magnet on your fridge.
You don't even have to say anything, just put the
picture on the fridge with a magnet on, like the
crazy face of like excited, right, And then one of
your kids will walk by and I'll be like, what's up.
I had an awesome day. This is how I'm feeling.
And then you tell them the story and they'll be like,
huh okay, dad's doing something weird. And then you then
(21:00):
you ask the questions, say which one are you, move
the magnet to you, and then they'll move the magnet
to them and then they can tell the story. I
love doing this like morning and night. So like in
the morning we'll check in, my kids will put it
on the fridge, and then after school I'm like, hey,
are we the same people that we were this morning?
And they're like, oh my gosh no, And then they
all move their little magnets. I have them all color
coded with different color magnets so they know who they are.
(21:22):
And then I try to switch the picture quite often,
like we usually do it once or twice a week.
The other thing you can do is as the kids,
like if you have little kids, pictures are perfect if
you have bigger kids, words are even better. So the
other thing, as we talk about in teaching and for
parents is emotions.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
Always when we.
Speaker 5 (21:40):
Talk about them, you're angry, sad, mad, that's about it, right,
But there's actually a lot of words to emotions. I'm frustrated,
I'm anxious, I'm confused. So if you can also print
these off, like you just google emotion chart words and
then they have a lot of different colored words and
they'll have different colors, so it'll be like red, green,
and yellow, blue, and then the words within the chart.
(22:01):
Put one of those on your fridge, because then they're
like blue, they're sad, but they could be frustrated, they
could be complacent, they could be all these and then
they learned the vocabulary right, so that when you actually
see a child and their first a usually their first
emotion will be anger, and so they'll come out really
fiery and you're like, okay, you're angry, But then when
(22:25):
you actually get down to the story at the bottom,
they're upset, they're confused. It wasn't fair, you know, there's
all these pieces behind it, and so when they can
actually identify that emotion, it really helps the conversation and
it helps them understand. Right, Megan's son, this is like,
I don't know. Last summer, they went for a bike
ride and she didn't wear helmet. He wore his helmet,
(22:48):
and so by the time they got back, he was
just irate, like so mad, and she's like, buddy, like
what is actually going on?
Speaker 4 (22:57):
He's just like, I hate you.
Speaker 5 (22:58):
You're the worst.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
Mom.
Speaker 5 (23:00):
So angry, right, just freaking out, and she's like, okay,
where's take some breaths. So then she did some breathing
with him. That's the other thing you can use for this, right,
like teaching breathing techniques to your kiddos when they're before
we don't talk to them until they're like calmed down.
Speaker 4 (23:13):
It's just not worth it.
Speaker 5 (23:14):
So get them to breathe, have some water, whatever it
might be. And then once they've calmed down, then you're like, okay,
what was the actual issue? Like why were you so
angry at mom? So she asked that question. He's like,
you weren't wearing your helmet and she was like, well, buddy,
we're just going down the park, and like you know,
she thought he was going to say it wasn't fair.
I had to wear mine, and he actually said, but
(23:35):
you could have gotten hurt. So there was fear that
his mother was going to get hurt, not that he
he had to wear one, but that she wasn't. He
was worried about her, right, So like, but there's the
then of course she's like, oh, I'm so sorry, right, Like,
of course I'll war's her helmet, right, So there's the
communication piece. But like, his anger wasn't anger, It was
fear and worry for the fact that his mom could
(23:57):
get hurt.
Speaker 4 (23:58):
Right, So when we unpacked.
Speaker 5 (24:00):
The emotions, what we display isn't always what we're feet
actually feeling.
Speaker 2 (24:05):
I love that story because.
Speaker 4 (24:06):
It's I got a lot of them.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
Yeah, I know that it's a key lesson there that
often we got to get past angele, right, Like that's
often there's an underlying, more more descriptive emotion happening underneath that.
And also that story of how you get through to
your kid and taking that time and gending them to
(24:30):
calm down, breathe have some water. I think that that's
that's great.
Speaker 5 (24:35):
Yeah, we work a lot with the new thing we
started doing last year is we've been working with hockey
teams as well, and so this one I really like.
So we built which I don't have on me, so
I can't show you. But we built like a pre work,
a pre shop and after shop kind of like checklist
for coaches to put in a little planner for their athletes.
(24:57):
And so it does like I go in and I
te them about their mental health and I teach them
about like their feelings and their emotions because everything is
based on that. That is the key to all of
it is the emotional piece. And so when they go
into a game, what is that emotion, like where they are,
what color are they at, how are they feeling, what
is their heightened feeling at that moment? And then after
(25:18):
the game, what's their feeling Is it the same? And
a lot of times, especially the older ones, are very
competitive and they're mad if they don't win, right, But
then you also talk about that feeling on ice, so
you get cross check from the back. You just want
to turn around and slug somebody, Right, what do you
need to do? You don't go slug somebody. You need
to take that breath. So we try to teach them
(25:40):
from that moment of feeling to take that breath before
you have your reaction, which is really difficult to do
even as adults. And so it's that practice of like
I'm mad, I need to breathe, but I don't want
to breathe, but I got to breathe. And then so
the coaches last year we actually did like a little
data on it, and it was really interesting because at
the beginning of the season it was all like red red, red,
(26:02):
red red, But then they noticed that there was a
shift as they started practicing it, and then they were
able to use their.
Speaker 4 (26:08):
Tools to like breathe.
Speaker 5 (26:09):
They had less kids in the penalty box, so it
was actually like it was interesting that it worked, but
it was that it's the mental piece of saying like nope,
I have to take five seconds. And they would tell
them like, if you don't take your five seconds to breathe,
you're on the bench, right, So they had there was
consequences from the coach involved, but it was a learned practice,
(26:30):
so it was quite it's quite neat to like add
those pieces and parents, we need to do the same
thing right instead of like yelling at them, which often happens.
I may have yelled at my children too, I'm not perfect,
but to stop and be like okay or if you
do something like in our house, we often like if
something isn't quite right, I just stopped and I'm like, okay,
(26:50):
we got to rewind that, and we'll like literally rewind
and we'll leave it. And so it's like, Okay, I
made a mistake, Admit that mistake, embrace it.
Speaker 4 (27:00):
Breaks.
Speaker 5 (27:00):
We're human and it's okay to make mistakes and then
back it up and try it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:05):
Yeah, I see so many applications, like so many groups
that could benefit, like even healthcare providers. That this is
where I was saying, like, uh before online we're talking
about market areas to penetrate too. You come and do
this to a group of healthcare professionals, especially that are
(27:25):
burned out. Such damn y'o. Like that's a massive market
to tap into. But we would love to. But Sha,
where do you see, Like if you could like have
a magic wand and have an outcome here in the
(27:47):
next few years, whether it's through Itchy Girl or in
the mental health space, what would you like to see?
Speaker 5 (27:55):
Honestly, my utopic vision is every school in Alberta and
across Canada has one of these planners. But there's no money,
so I don't know how those things ever come to be.
But I think it's a tool that all teachers could use.
So from the like, from that perspective, I would love
(28:16):
to go and educate leaders on how to implement this parents,
you know, like and I don't know where the biggest
umbrella is to tackle on that, but I really feel that,
you know, just like healthcare, if you have the preventative measures,
then you're not dealing with the outcome at the end.
And like when we talk about in education, which is
probably very similar to health you have your universal supports,
(28:38):
and if those supports are being taken care of, then
when you have to deal with all your individual and
target sports, you don't have to go there as much.
Speaker 4 (28:47):
And those are the expensive ones.
Speaker 5 (28:48):
When we're talking about psychologists, we're talking about and they're
hard to find.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
Right.
Speaker 5 (28:52):
So if I can help my kids as a parent
to have these tools that they can go through with life.
And I know that you're going to have hard step,
It's going to be a bad day one day, or
something terrible is going to happen.
Speaker 4 (29:03):
What I mean, for my kids, one day I am
going to die. That's going to be a hard.
Speaker 5 (29:06):
Day for them, right, But if I know that I'm
leaving you with tools. That's super important, right, and so
you know you topically, I would love all the kids
to have tools in their little toolbox so that they
can pull them out and be ready at every stage
in their existence, and adults too, Like we see so much.
There's so much going on in everybody's lives. You know,
Facebook is not exactly what it's represented, and there's a
(29:30):
lot of stuff that people go through every day. And
if we can be kind to each other and we
can help each other through it, it's really important.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I love I love it and as you probably can
appreciate them all about the preventative side, and to me,
this is a this is a great weapon to be
able to put in the arsenal that we could lean
on to avoid going into that expensive side or or
that even that side where I'm not saying it's too
(30:00):
far gone when you end up needing to be seek
medical attention and so forth, but it's.
Speaker 5 (30:06):
No, and it's important, like it's part of the process
for sure, and some people will need it way more
than others, right, But it's.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Like you don't want to go there if you don't
have to, you know what I'm saying, so like to me, like,
let's be proactive with our health. We don't even to me,
I don't even call them mental health anymore. Just be
proactive with their health and like let's start winning because
it's time. It really is. Absolutely yeah, So shada, where
(30:34):
can people learn about ekey Girl and work.
Speaker 5 (30:37):
They So we have a couple of things. So we
have a website and it's Ekeygirl Wellness dot com so
it's I K I G I R L and then
wellness dot com. We're kind of load tech, so don't
expect a million dollar website, but we do what we
can from our basement. And then the other thing is
(31:00):
we actually do our adult planners. They are on Amazon.
Don't google Wellness Planner for somewhere reason. Amazon put it
as Bringer because our title is called Bringer of Sunshine
because we have this little tree here and so like
these are our roots. But you guys, we bring sunshine
to allow the trees to grow. So there's like a
(31:21):
little theme behind it. But anyway, so if you google
Bring your Sunshine, they are on Amazon as well, so
you can get yourself one. But they're the adult ones
and they they're not dated there January through to December,
but you put the dates in it so you can
buy it whenever. So those are our planners. But yeah,
you can reach out to us on our website for sure.
(31:42):
But we are happy to travel. We'll go anywhere to
do workshops and yeah, and you can customer order planners
as well.
Speaker 2 (31:50):
And shannef I'm not mistaken. You're also on Instagram, correct.
Speaker 5 (31:54):
Yeah, and you can find us on Instagram. And it's
just if you grow.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Wellness, beautiful, beautiful, shame know we're gonna say blast from.
Speaker 4 (32:02):
The past totally. Thanks so much. It's been awesome.
Speaker 5 (32:06):
I'm getting to talk to you for the last hour
about something I'm so passionate about.
Speaker 4 (32:10):
So thanks for the invite. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (32:12):
And thanks for doing all you do for our kids.
That means the world. Thank you.
Speaker 4 (32:17):
Yeah, no worries.
Speaker 6 (32:19):
Out of the night, into the water we pushed from
sure breaking in and the stillness of the.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
No Radio No Problem stream is live on SAGA ninety
sixty AM.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
Dot c A one am Jewels Fast one and one
dam Jewels Fast one and.
Speaker 4 (32:48):
The slow.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
All right folks on Soga nine sixty listening to Solving
Healthcare Radio with doctor k Yo featuring our special guest,
Sean Keyhoe Quocast Nationen. We have a special guests, a
guy that I have been looking up to in many
ways over the last year plus since we met at
Activates last year twenty twenty three. Sean is a change
(33:15):
maker man. He's, as we like to call it, changing
the bully, and the work he's doing with some of
our disabled children is incredible. So Sean, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (33:30):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (33:31):
Absolutely So, how did the story start for you? How
did you get involved in fitness, How did you get
involved in helping kids with disability? How did this all begin?
Speaker 3 (33:45):
It's a bit of a story, so brace yourself. So
I went through some very challenging medical battles throughut my life.
I was diagnosed with this animal blood vessel in my
brain runs in my family called the cameron is angioma,
and then it ruptured. But I was six months old hydrocephalus.
I had two brain surgeries right away. They weren't even
(34:07):
sure if I was gonna make it. Then they put
a VP shunt in saved my life. And then for
thirteen years I had nemriia every year and they kept
seeing this one spot that didn't look right. Then it
happened again and I had another brain surgery, and then
the scar tissue from that brain surgery started me with
epilepsy when I was around seventeen, and I had five
(34:31):
more brain surgeries for that. So how does this fitness
connect to that? I fell in love with Liton when
I was maybe five years old. I was a big
WWE wrestling fan. Paul Cogan was my hero, and I
saw this video promo of him training to get ready
to go against Audrey to Giants. It was squat and
deadlist and I just saw that video. I'm like, I
(34:51):
want to do that, and I just fell in love
with it. I couldn't play a lot of sports that
I loved, football hockey because of my brain surgeries. I
fell in love with gym. When all my friends were
getting Nintendos and NERF guns for Christmas, I was getting
bar bells and dumb bells and benches and it helped me.
It gave me a reason to work hard. I couldn't
play the sports I wanted to, and I fell in
(35:12):
love with something else. And later on in life, when
my uplifs had got out of hand to the point
where I was having fifteen to twenty caesars a day.
I couldn't go to school, I couldn't go to work.
I have a son who's now in his twenties. I
couldn't be alone with him anymore. I had to have
supervise visits. I just didn't feel like I had much
(35:33):
of my meaning in life. The one thing that I
could do consistently was go to the gym. My friends
would pick me up, they would take me to the gym,
and it just kept me going. It did so much
more for me than just build muscle. It kept me
going Emotionally, it motivated me. It just gave me a
reason to function. And later on in life, I just
sort of realized, shouldn't I transfer this to other people
(35:56):
that have been through challenges?
Speaker 2 (35:58):
A guy I have.
Speaker 3 (35:59):
My very first person whole training client was the bomb
that went off in my head because my friend Dana,
who I met at f F c Autawa, also had
sub posy and when she started with me, she just
I want a six pack. I did a bunch of
bunch reaches about rebel policy. I can't fix these things,
but we can get some strength back on your right side,
get some ability, no, no, no, no. I've had all
(36:20):
this treatment for thirty years. Nothing's going to change. I'm like, okay.
So I kind of tricked her. I told her we
were just trying to make a six pack, and then
one day she came running into the gym, jumped on
my back and said, Sean, I picked up the recycle
bit when I got home with my CP hand and
I was able to cure it all the way home
without dropping it. And then right in that moment, I'll
remember that till I'm dead. My brain just went thing,
(36:43):
this is my purpose in life. This is what I'm
supposed to do. I'm here to change people's lives that
think they can't work out I think they can't change,
and it just became my mission in life.
Speaker 2 (36:53):
I honestly I get chills here in that, Sean, about
not only your journey through health no one that you've
had to go through a number of surgeries and health scares,
and certainly it's amazing that you've pulled through, and not
(37:13):
only pulled through, you started to give back and find
that mission, find that purpose, and people are reaping the benefits.
We have a we have a few couple of family
members with disability and we see, we see how important
(37:35):
it is to try and maintain that function to be
able to do the things that they love to do.
So hearing how you could help clients get through some
of these challenging obstacles is incredible. It really is so
(37:56):
absolutely so when we look when you look at you
know the journey. So you were working, for example, with
this this patient with CP and so what were the
next steps for you? Were you was it at the
point where like I'm going to reach out to more
folks that are that are struggling or do they come
(38:16):
to you like over the next what was the next stage?
Speaker 3 (38:20):
So the next couple of years were a battle because
I had tons of people in one year saying I'm crazy,
this is never going to work. This business is not
gonna make any sense disability that there's no money in
there sean you can't have a future that I had
myself sort of going I want this. So what I
did is I worked a government job for fifteen years.
(38:41):
I was a personal trainer on the side and I
did that for FIT and then COVID was actually the
slap in the face that I needed to go, No,
I have one life to live I have been through
nine branch surgeries, thousands of seizures. I have not let
any of this stuff stop me. Why am I going
to let these people in my ears listen to me? Why?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Why? Why am I going to let them tell me?
Why am I doing this?
Speaker 5 (39:00):
No?
Speaker 3 (39:01):
I sat out with my girlfriend. We worked a plan,
and I said I'm leaving. I quit the government during COVID,
and I rebranded my company to this Enabled to Disabled,
and I focused everything towards disabilities. It took some time,
but now it's developing into my dream and it was
the smartest decision ever made in my tired life.
Speaker 2 (39:21):
Wow and so and so with your company, what are
the typical clients that you're seeing? Like you mentioned initially
having that first super palsy patient, But what other what
other areas are you helping folks with?
Speaker 3 (39:38):
So that's the other beauty about my job is the
variation is crazy. So I'm an autism exercise specialist. I
got my certification to the American Sports Medicine College, and
I have a lot of autistic clients. The age range
is all over the place. I've gone as young as
six year old and I've gone as older as someone
in their sixties angel and syndrome. Didn't even know it
(40:00):
was before I met this client. I was terrified because
the first three says he pushed me in the face.
But we've developed such a fantastic relationship and he's come
so far. It's been amazing. I've worked with syndrome, he
had a lot of people with epilepsy, just basically everything.
(40:20):
I've chicked my nose in a little bit of everything.
Speaker 2 (40:22):
Wow, wow, And what I guess, what are some of
the principles. What are the considerations you got to do
to be able to work with these different populations. Let's
let's focus on autism like that. There are a lot
of kids on the spectrum because we've seen over the
last few years, so I can imagine the need would
(40:44):
be high. But what are some of the nuances or
considerations when you gotta You've got to treat someone with autism.
Speaker 3 (40:55):
So the first part of working with someone with autism
has absolutely nothing to do it being a personal trainer.
You need to build a good, solid relationship with them
or that wall they have up is never going to
come down. So my first couple of sessions, it's all
about getting to know the person, getting to see what
they're interested in getting to see what motivates them and
makes them happy, not be some exercise robotic coming here
(41:18):
lifting weights. They're not going to have anything to do
with that. So I have a client that i've worked
with that he was upset with blay Blade, that whole
game where.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
My kids were all over may Blades. All my kids
were infatuated with that.
Speaker 3 (41:34):
So I had him bring that in. You wanted nothing
to do it weights, you wanted nothing to do it
working out. We played blay Blade and the deal was,
whoever lost, we'd have to do ten reps of this
and ten squads and ten this. And he eventually just
built some confidence, fell in love a way.
Speaker 2 (41:46):
Of that thing. Now he loves it.
Speaker 3 (41:48):
It's about doing that part first. But a lot of
people aren't willing to leave there all the work they
put in towards being a personal trainer aside and do
that part of the work to start off. It's not
an easy thing. And then there's days where they are
just not there. There are days where I have to
just usually when you're when I'm training every day, Joe,
you were first part of the workhouse. The hardest part
that's been Shashy work. These guys might be the complete
(42:09):
on the way around. I might have to work them
in very slowly. I may have to talk about Fortnite
and video gaming and yettayada YadA, just to get them
motivated and back into the system, and the whole second
half of the workout might be great. I just had
a session yesterday with one of my clients. First half
he was not there. Second half he's sprinting up these
hills and flipped the logs. It just took some work
(42:30):
to get him in there.
Speaker 2 (42:30):
All right, We'll be right back on Solimon Healthcare Radio
with Doctor Kate featuring our special guest Sean Keyhole. You
must better if you get.
Speaker 5 (42:39):
Jobbing grown up and sell be growing up, then I
take the tote the thing, hope that it's so nuts.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
Let's take the sip of it yet, let's take the
hit that cat spook Billy.
Speaker 1 (42:50):
The streamers live at SAGA nine sixty am dot C.
Speaker 5 (43:02):
Yeah, I'll build with Israelies.
Speaker 2 (43:03):
Wrap up fabulous job by You're on Solder Healthcare Radio
with our guests Sean Keyhole. What does the future look
like in terms of your business? Are you? Are you
seeing more and more clients? I mean, have you been
building since inception? Are you? Is there a next phase
in terms of trying to build awareness towards having more
(43:26):
clients get strong, Like where are you at in your
journey right now?
Speaker 3 (43:31):
So I hired two trainers. I've been by myself forever,
and last year I hired two trainers, So I actually
have a team now and I'm interviewing another one at
the end of the week.
Speaker 2 (43:41):
So we're growing.
Speaker 3 (43:43):
If I'm not trying to toot my own own or anything,
but my name's getting around and anybody who's creating any
kind of an adaptive training program, they're always coming to me.
So I have a meeting coming up with Awesome. I
just had one with them a couples ago. They're the
sports program for people kids with autism, but they don't
have a program to grandfather the kids out after they're
not under the kid qualification. So we're working on having
(44:05):
everybody to come over to me. I'm going to be
running their fitness program. I work with Fostering Forever Friendships
Today program for adults with disabilities, so I need more help.
The goal now is being more people in to work,
and then the next phase is a lot of these
people don't think they have futures because of their disabilities,
but because they become more comfortable in the gym. I
(44:27):
want them on my team. So I'm going to bring
them with me to do the group training sessions that
I do. They're going to work with me in the gym.
I want them to know that they have more than
just an hour of a workout future with Schean. They
have a future of working with me.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
And what kind of what kind of transformations are you seeing, Sean,
My kid's been a few years now since you really
focused on the business. Any kind of stories come to
mind in terms of people that have really really changed
their course, whether it's mentally, physically, holistically.
Speaker 3 (45:09):
Well, I'm gonna get emotional here because it's about my
favorite part. I'll give you one of my favorite examples.
So I have two clients, all Went and Zach, and
they were in an evening social program and they were
not getting along. They were fighting all the time. And
I started my first group workout sessions last year and
(45:29):
they were both in it. So the parents were terrified.
They were We did the first ass that both of
them stayed outside looking into the gym and if the
Johnnies were gonna jump in. I'm gonna try to cry
because it's one of my favorite moments.
Speaker 2 (45:42):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (45:42):
So I had them pushing the sled on the on
the track and Owen pushes it to the other end
and he starts stopping away. Usually that means like they
break it away from me. He turns her out to
the other side of the track. It's Zach's turn, the
one that he wasn't getting along with, and let's go,
buddy there put a budget push it. I started crying,
the bob started crying. I couldn't hold up together. And
(46:04):
the two you should see how they functioned together in
the gym. It's been unbelievable. Their attitudes have changed. I've
got and it's just been one of the most inspiring
moments of my life. And then I have clients that
are that are working now that we're sitting at home
watching YouTube all day when I met them. I've got
clients after and the oppressiants. I've got clients that have
career ideas now. When I was asking them when we met,
(46:27):
what do you want to do later on? And all
I was good was uh because they didn't think there
was anything there.
Speaker 6 (46:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Wow. So it's like, sorry, No, this is what it's
all about, Seohn. It's people want to know what life
could look like after working with you and knowing that
these kids can have could could be more functional and
be more content for being more fulfilled. I can just
(46:56):
imagine those parents seeing seeing that or hearing about that.
Uh like that would be so I don't know, it
would be so moving. It's it's unreal. Any other stories
that come to mind, Sean.
Speaker 3 (47:11):
In terms of uh, David's he's in his thirties. He's
my first who was my first ever autism client, And
I'm not gonna lie. I didn't know anything about autism
when when I met him. I met his mother at
a fundraiser and she asked me to try it out.
And okay, Uh, he's he's vernable, but he doesn't say much.
(47:34):
And we started the gym, there was just too much
going on. And then during COVID we had to switch
our workouts to outside.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
And he.
Speaker 3 (47:44):
Is a very he's a wonderful person, but he doesn't
like people in his bubble. And when we started training outside,
he got more confidence flipping logs and over him pressing
them and doing all this stuff. And now he'll do
anything in the gym, but also he'll there's a little
minus fim Like he would always walk ten feet in
front of me, and he walked ten feet to everybody's mom, stepdad, everybody.
And one time we were working out in the woods
(48:06):
that his parents came by. Do we see David Sady
said what I'm like? Yeah, say Sean, he doesn't let anybody.
He doesn't even let us do that. You've gotten through
this wall that he hasn't he puts up on us
his parents.
Speaker 5 (48:22):
How do you do this?
Speaker 3 (48:23):
So that was one of my favorite ones too. And
David's been involved in so much stuff. I played in
a fundraiser tournament motion Ball for the Special Olympics. He
came with me, it was on my team. He's involved
in way more sporting events and social events now with
me now instead of just being a homeless by himself.
Speaker 2 (48:39):
Wow, Wow, that's transformative for real. It's so like, what
would be the message you want to send out to
the world for when it comes to some of the
some of the disability population is like, because what you're
doing is pretty be incredible then and I'll forgive me
(49:03):
for my ignorance, Like I don't know if this is
happening throughout the country. I don't know if this is
like how unique you are in terms of offering this
kind of thing, but what kind of what kind of
messages you want to send out to the to the
world here.
Speaker 5 (49:20):
Well, I have.
Speaker 3 (49:21):
My message is I'm on a mission to show people
that they can do things that the world tries to
sell them they can't do. I'm trying to show them
that there's other aspects to the gym than just the
ones that see on social media, losing weight, getting the
other part of my business is to create a social
aspect for these guys. A lot of these people they
don't have much for social life. So once we create
(49:43):
the confidence, the one on one training and move them
over to groups, they become friends, They've got more of
a life, and they feel more more valued. So there's
just more to it. And I'm trying to spread the
word and get it out that there's so much more
to offer and there's so much help more that the
gym can do to change people's lives than the everyday
flow Smith we see stuff on social media.
Speaker 2 (50:06):
Yeah, I think I think that's a great message, Sean,
And I really think what you're what you're doing is unbelievable,
and this is why we have to have you on
the show, just to amplify what you're doing and continue
to change lives. To my friend, So, how do people
get a hold of you? Sean? I want, I want,
(50:27):
I want you to blow up. I know you've got
already two trainers that you got in the mix. How
do we how do we get this going?
Speaker 3 (50:34):
Well, my my website is just w w W Sean
Keyhoe dot com. I'm actually I just met with someone
yesterday to get a revamped the Dylan Capital content. The
guy that did the video for activating he does have
to work with him for years. He's going to redo
my website for me. And then I'm all over social media.
(50:54):
The one I use the most of his friend, it's
just Sean Underscore Keyho Underscore Personal Training.
Speaker 2 (51:00):
I'm on.
Speaker 3 (51:01):
I used to take that not that often, but I'm
and then I have a couple of locations. So my
gym that I worked out it was cup Point one.
It's a private gym that I rent out of. It's
over by train yards. I have a garage gym out
here in Rockland, and I have I deal with a
bunch of other facilities that I can rent here and
there when I need them to have to go west
(51:21):
to end or east or like that.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
Glauria, Sean, well, listen, we really appreciate you jumping on
the podcast. And once again, folks, Sean Keyhoe is a
boogie changer. Okay, this is what we're talking about on
not you know, seeing an issue and not just sitting
on the sidelines but being the catalyst of change. This
(51:45):
is where we want to see folks. So Sean, thanks
so much for joining us.
Speaker 3 (51:49):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (51:50):
If you enjoyed that, please leave us any comments at
podcast nine nine at gmail dot com. Leave a five
star rating. Follow us on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter
at quodcast, jump on our newsletter, jump on our community
at quodcast, the subject dot com, all things healthcare solutions
all on one site. Y'all gonna love it. All right, people,
(52:14):
I hope you're feeling a little bit more jumping your
step after that episode. Thanks for listening, talk real so peace.
I remember seeing you when Spaghetti Strappy snapsack helst up
by your fact.
Speaker 4 (52:26):
When I've seen it, I was like, damn, girls, do
you have a man buddy?
Speaker 1 (52:30):
No radio, no problem. Stream is live on SAGA ninety
six am dot C
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.