837: Swim Towards the Shark
01:05:46 Share

Support for this american life comes from, indeed, people are driven by the search for Better. But when IT comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all.

Don't search, match with, indeed, use indeed, for scheduling, screening and messaging so you can connect with candidates faster, get a seventy five dollar sponsored job credit to get your jobs s more visibility at indeed dot com slash american terms and conditions apply, need, the higher you need indeed. A quick warning, there are curse words that are on beeped in today's episode of the show. If you prefer a beeped version, you can find that at our website, this american life, that org.

Maybe you saw this story in the news over this summer a man and is getting mod by a shark maybe hundred doors out from a beach near Sandy ago yet for help yours shark a woman swimming um also yells and some guys hear IT and swim towards the shark attack to rescue them which they do he lives so you know happy ending but here's the question I couldn't stop thinking about this.

Who does that? Who hears somebody else shark? And who is towards the shark? What kind of person is that? So work in real .

state development for a company is based out of value. In Brandon's, we build apartment hotels, resorts.

Officers meet Cameron writing thirty one single mega mode center ago. And IT was there, the morning of the shark tack with a group, the north county ocean swimmer, that means four times a week swim a mile, mile a half.

I was out of the water about one hundred yards offshore, just past the the breaking ways with another swarm Kevin buried.

And you guys had you finish your swim for the day.

Yep, we are done with our swim. Most of the group had made their way in somewhere in the showers, somewhere kind of playing in the waves, Kevin, our body surfing beyond the break. And that's when we heard .

the screaming.

How far is that from me? He was probed fifty to seventy five yards from us, so just barely within shouting reach. IT was hard for us to hear the screams, but the tone of IT was so extreme that we knew something really bad was happening.

So this is the moment I want to ask you about somebody else, shark. And then you swim towards the shark. Could you just talk about that moment?

Yeah, that's one of the moments that you know on the four weeks since this has happened that I just keep her playing. And in the moment, everything happens really quickly. And you don't only have a lot of time to psycho analyze what's going on and what you're feeling, you just kind of react on instinct.

But there there are a few options in the moment. And I think in in the second happened. First of all, Kevin berry, who is next time he just took off.

took off towards the shark, didn't hesitate. But Cameron did hesitate because coming is not only a real state guy, cameras, actually, this incredible swimmer, the fastest swimmer in this group of ocean swimmer, and also a trained lifeguard, still works as a part time life garden los Angeles. But they put you through this rigorous sort of book camp training, two hundred hours over two weekends. I got academy in all kinds .

of ocean rescues, taught us an academy that slow is pro.

slow is pro professional stop. And he says, so yeah.

there was that split second, but my head was just racing with all the scenarios. And IT was one. We need to make sure somebody he's going to get back up.

back up he is to be to see if anybody he's running to coome tic. I on the scenario too, would you was thinking about because he was actually in the middle of getting reverted fied as a lifeguard.

So it's funny. I just you have to watch all these videos in the video I just watched the night before was how as a first responder, you can swim into or you can, you shouldn't respond to an unsafe scene like seen. Safety is number one. And in fact, through our lifeguard training, they ever taught us in the academy manual that if there's a shark attack, you're not supposed as women do IT you supposed to call your supervisor and wait for help? But but that just .

didn't make sense to me in the moment.

And I think the more important thing they taught us is that you have to make a judgment call on those those difficult circumstances.

You know it's worried about that. Is that the saying like use your judgment about whether to go in. But like what does that even mean in this situation? Like what data could you be using to make a judgment?

Yeah you know for me was just years of experience with ming out there and I felt comfortable. I've swam thousands of miles out there um in way sharky waters and i've never seen or had an issue with a shark. And so even though there was a shark attacks you, i've heard that when there are shark attacks, usually they bite you and they kind of spit you out after they realized aren't what you, what they wanted to eat. And so in my head, I think, and again, I didn't have a ton of time to to analyze in the moment um but I think the risk of a start coming back in and trying to attack all of us was minimal. Oh.

that's so interesting. I think I think you see that differently than most of us civilians do know. I like the thing that i've heard, and I feel like so many people have heard. IT is like if there's blood in the water, the sharks are gonna stick around color's blood in the water.

you know, totally you, I think IT was the shark made a mistake and realized IT and probably swim away. And I think, you know, the conditions make a big impact to, I think, you know, the morning of the incident there was red tide, which is a red plankton that makes the water really markey and muddy, was going to chop y and so in my mind, the shark attack happened because the shark probably couldn't see, and I couldn't told IT was biting and attacked, thinking he was a little because there was a there that morning.

alex said he was still scared. He said, sharks are always in the back of his head as an ocean swimmer, if we would ever random reason for a couple months before this day, even having nightmares about sharks coming at them, emerging from the deep. Now you may be heading toys, what he calls a fifty hundred pound people, agitated and fighting, but in that quick moment or two, before he took action, he took note of a couple of other things.

He had Kevin with the causes to the guy who got bit, who was another swimmer from the group. No life guards were near. And I think I just .

did the math and my head and that the second of, I think, the thought of living for the rest of my life, knowing that I was in a position to help and not doing IT, would have just eaten a way at me, way more than the thought of swiming into something that's dangerous.

Let's find money when you waited up. Like, I feel like the math of IT actually seems really, really clear. You like, i'm a really good swimmer.

I'm trained for this. Other people are further away. And I really don't think the shark is gonna ite me like the matter is so straight forward.

Yeah, in my mind I didn't see luka, huge thing. I was just out there in the right place, in the right time. But again, Kevin's one that really made the first move in and inspired the courage .

and me ago and keep done this kind of training, too.

he had in. And he jokes that the reason he instantly responded, the way he did out of instinct, was because he didn't have the training.

I didn't think I really didn't. I just reacted. This, of course, is Kevin barrett, fifty hundred years old, the day he hurled his body through the water towards the shark attack, married two teenage sons, pays the business, is a financial adviser.

But I have a little start up trying to go ocean waves in their motion into a electricity used to play rugby and to triathletes, but at some point switched to ocean swimming and talking with him about why a person might swim towards a shark attack. It's pretty much to the opposite day. Upside, downside.

Mirror universe, black is White version. Talking with Cameron about IT. It's almost ignorance is bliss, right?

I didn't have that knowledge set. And so for me, IT was my friends in trouble. I just reacted and went to him.

I didn't have the same knowledge that that Cameron had. So I I just reacted well. It's funny when he describes this thing, it's almost not heroic.

He just did the math. You don't mean like whether do you described yours, it's way more here are because you just have throwing yourself at danger. Do you assume the shocked probably swim away once to beat him that one time?

Honestly, I I, I didn't I really didn't think too much, too much about the shark. I was really just focused on on a guy a bit. I was like, I need to get my friend and and you know, he is injured and how bad is injury? Let's let's get him to sure how well do you know, Caleb? I don't meet.

This was the third time i'd made him, the third time I had met. They chat a little about rug. Beyond the beach, Carols are used to play. That is the extent of the friendship for which he rist his live people.

Man Kevin and Cameron will both be very annoyed with me if I did not point out right now that other people were also critical to saving killip s wife. That day, there was the woman who, who stayed by him during the attack, yelled for help. Then when they got to K, B, he was bleeding badly.

A glm, our heads, torsos. Cameron said, shark has gone in a surfer approach with a surface. They put tab on, get him to shower. And there were medics, of course, and others who helped. Gives fine.

Now, Cameron keep both said that since this story hit the news, glos of people come up to them saying they can never have done with the two of them did they would not have swarm toward a Cameron says he tells them, you'd be surprised what you can do, Kevin. Tels them, of course you would. People, I think, and eighty good, and we will do the right thing when pressed, right? And you know, i'm just like you and and hey, you know, we we do good.

I don't know. I think you and I see people differently. I think that we are a mix of good and bad and all the people who say, like I won't do that, I think that those people, many of them were telling the truth and and I guess and I guess that's what we differ. I'm not any different to anybody else. And this is the reaction that I had .

trust that .

you would have the similar reaction. That's a that's a cool thing to think about. That is a cool thing to think about.

And we don't agree on this. I do think that there are some people who are like you and some people who aren't. But because this is your interview and not mind you get the last work. Okay, good.

They, in our show, people who decide to put themselves in danger and swim towards sharks so that you're doing IT out of idealism. But the greater good of everybody, because the good people, if such a thing exists, some sense is purely personal. And the only way they know to fix some problem in their own life, sometimes the people around them do not understand why they're doing IT at all. True stories of human peril and the people who seek IT out the bb easy chicago, it's this american life.

our glass see with us.

Support for this american life comes from, indeed, people are driven by the search for Better. But when IT comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all.

Don't search, match with, indeed, use indeed, for scheduling, screening and messaging, so you can connect with candidate faster, get a seventy five dollar sponsored job credit to get your jobs s more visibility at indeed dot com slash american terms and conditions apply, need higher. You need indeed, support for this american life comes from Better help. It's important to take time to show gratitude towards others, but it's equally important to think yourself life.

There is a lot of curve balls, and being grateful isn't always easy. Therapy can help remind you of all that you're worthy of and all that you do have. Let the gratitude flow with Better help. Try at Better help out com. Slash ta today to get ten percent off your first month.

This american live at one if I only had my brain when there was fifteen. SHE ended the weed role with a professional theatre company, playing hours, the lead role, and Alice through the working glass. And during the course of the production, SHE became petrified of going on stage, stage, right, enormous chemical level every day.

He says the very thought of doing the show again, french trains sweat, her heart pounded so hard to that might explode. SHE was afraid. IT was afraid.

People who discover he was afraid, which made IT worse and long story, but SHE lied her way out of the gig so SHE didn't have have to do IT anymore, which ended the place run early, leaving her adult cast members who needed work out of work. So not really bad about that did known up to him for years after, if anything, is Sarah. She'd actually a bunch before this and after IT in movies on TV, there's no audience with you in the room.

You may have heard of her to a poli these days. He works behind the camera as a director and scream rider. But being on stage after that one production, IT was a shark. SHE did not swim toward one of several. Yes.

i've never been somebody to push myself in general, if something makes me anxious, I don't do IT and certainly thought my acting career are a lot of things I just backed right away from the second they started to make me anxious at all, like I just didn't want the trouble. It's time to move in a different direction.

And then a couple decades later, well into adult, something, something happened that just changed. All of that made a way as appointment fearful and IT wasn't the thing that you would expect. SHE told the story ad one of our producers, shang call.

So it's october twenty fifteen. Sarah just finish swiming actually at the local rec center and was getting ready to walk home. But her hair wet and it's chilly outside. It's toronto where he lives, gets cold and SHE can't find her blow dryer, goes to the front desk as anybody seen that woman says, now I have checked the lost and found bin. So he goes over to the corner of the lobby and crotches down to rummage around in the bin, above which hanging on the wall is this big industrial fire .

extinguisher. I was overheating, and I stood up quickly to, like, toss my winter coat, oh, and a kind of tantrum. And I think what must have happened is my shoulder must have dislodged the fire extinguisher and IT crash down on the left side of my head.

So my memory after that is foggy. E, but what I do remember is I felt like all my teeth. We're gonna follow up in my head. I had a lot of thoughts about dentistry and how I wish I knew more about dentistry, because that seems like a priority at that moment.

And I kind of put together, very slowly, this terrible pain in my teeth and on the left side of my jaw and head, with the fact there is a huge claying around the same time. And I could see the fired ingush sher ruling. And I realized I should probably let someone know.

And so I started saying in a very monotone voice, to know in a particular, a fire extinguisher just fell on my head. A fire extinguisher just fell on my head, and IT was literally like listening to a robot. There was no effect in the voice that I heard coming out of me.

the woman behind the counter, and to get help. But instead of waiting around, Sarah just set off on her walk home, which was an easy. Somehow her body kept hearing to the right onto people's laws.

I felt like I was underwater. I felt like everything was way too loud. But I also felt like I have two tiny kids.

I'm in the middle of a job. Nothing can have happened to me right now because that's just not possible. I just can't make room for that at the moment. So you might .

have guessed by out that sh'd suffer a concussion, in which case you know more about serious brain than he did in the first few hours after the accident. For me, IT was one of those moments where you're not sure yet how serious, urbane and injury might turn out to be. And if you just had a cash, well, maybe you'll get Better on its own. But in the kitchen that night, making dinner, both her kids bouncing around SHE started to experience her brain like a new appliance. SHE wasn't used to yet and was kind of, in all of everything for me.

became scrambled. So I remember having the thought how my supposed to open the of and turn IT on. If they're making so much noise, wo like I and I remember going well, that's an odd thought that I couldn't quite piece to other why I was an odd thought.

And I think the moment I really had to admit something was wrong was, even though think something was obviously wrong, was I snapped at my three year old in a way that I just had never snapped before. And I remember like holding these little shoulders and these eyes, looking up at me, shocked. And then I became shocked because I was like, what am I doing?

I mean, I wasn't rough, but I was baby yond how I had ever been. And I remember just backing up and removing myself and going and sitting in a dark room and going, like something happened, like I feel like I can cut through the air with my hand, like it's butter, like it's a substance. And I remember saying to my husband, David, you know, to reality always feel like this.

you know, when they say the answer is located within the question, this was one of those times.

Sir caller sister is a doctor and who said a concussion, all the classic symptoms over sensitivity to noise and light confusion using ss SHE told her to just take IT easy, probably sh'd be back to Normal in no time. But that's not what happened. Sarah had all of those symptoms, plus fatigue, occasional nadia and terrible migraine on enough for the next three and a half years.

Some days he's just lay in a darker room for hours because the headaches were too much. The light sensitivity also meant limiting her screen time. So SHE had barely work. He was actually in the ddd of adapting the novel little women into a screenplay when he got hit on the head, a gig that ultimately went to great a girl. G instead, also very chAllenging, just hanging out with friends and family.

like in a conversation at dinner worth is things going on. I I haven't been able to follow what people are saying, and I was really good at faking IT. But half time I didn't know what that was going on. And IT was scary and embarrassing.

But the biggest heartbreak was not being able to care for her kids that much, especially in the first year, couldn't take them to school, couldn't go to their events. SHE just became less and less involved with their lives. And this is the story of how he made her way out of that hole, taking a path that was totally unexpected. At first, SHE was marching herself around the doctor after doctor SHE actually publish an essay in a book of essays about all of this, and this parts a good formation of the different treatments he tried.

So I baked red to read IT. I go to a narrow feedback specialist who tells me, after I spent an exhAusting day watching balls bounce around on a computer screen, that I am in the one percent tile for attention span for my age and gender. This will haunt me for years. A nutritionist who tells me to stop eating gluten and dry. And a co tractor who apparently helped cure hockey player sydney rosy.

sydney crosby, is hockey election just to say, in twenty eleven, he was diagnosed with a concussion that famously benched him for about a year.

I would later realize that almost everyone out there specializing in concussions has a rumor swirling around them that daycare sydney sy after a while, whenever anyone starts to rave about a concussion miracle worker, they know, I say, let me guess, he treated sydney crosby. The answer isn't variably. yes.

Out of the tangle of advice, much of a conflicting stuck this one common thread that Sarah should do as much as he felt like he could handle. But when SHE reached the point where he couldn't tolerate the stimulation or the sunlight or traffic sounds or whatever, IT was then back off. Don't try to push yourself past the point where your body is telling you to quit and make sure to get lots of arrest.

It's sound exactly rare. This condition, it's been referred to his post concussion syndrome, maybe fifteen or twenty percent of people with concussions develop some form of IT. In fact, Terry friend maritz happened to be dealing with IT at the same time, they compare notes.

Merit always wore wrap around shades and White brim hats when he went outside. And somewhere around your three, sara almost used to our limitations SHE get detail notes Better symptoms when they showed up how severe they were. And in what he calls in a rational fit of optimism, SHE and David decided to have a third kid, which would have been a huge load for anyone. But for sarra, IT was instrumental SHE felt just as bad as he did on day one and starts to give up on ever being recognizably herself again.

And then one day we're going to happy hours. Then serious mirage, her concussion body on the street, except now out of nowhere. Merit is fine, no rap around shades, no whidden hat.

SHE basically says he was cured by this doctor in pittsburgh, doctor Michael Collins, and the mother learned about him. The more snake early, the whole thing sounded. There's just so much debate around the science of concussions, and the cure seems so elusive.

And now here is this guy who was completely confident that he could fix what was wrong, that there was a method to IT, plus the way as patients felt about him and seemed cultish, weird. And besides being skeptical, sera, who remember his canadian and explicitly asked me to include this SHE, didn't want to buy into the notion that health care in the us. Is superior to what you could get in canada and literally buy in.

She's like nobody should have to pay for health care. The matter field grows. But all of that said, he had tried everything else. Maybe little snake oil was what he needed.

So SHE booked an appointment and brother friend cake down with her to pittsburgh to sit with her and take notes on what the doctor said. So she'd remember the trip itself was hugely taxing for her. And when the time came to see doctor Collins, he was not what he expected.

He kind of burst into the room in like, whatever, you know, a canadian stereotypical image of an american is IT was like, amErica came into the road. Like he, like, really direct, didn't hold back. He was loud.

He didn't have a lot of time for nice cities. Like, I literally felt like kate. I were like, our hair is being blown back by the sheer energy of this man immediately points at kate.

who's quietly taking notes in the corner, like.

that's not going to help. I read all your husband's notes, taking all these notes about you, that's not going to help and he yelled at kis like, put that pen down. You're not helping and can I dropped your pen .

and he's like talking at that volume .

of voice like, yeah, yeah, yeah no, he's really in textile and I mean, his I was used to like a lot of, listen to your body, be gentle with yourself and he was like, stop tracking your symptoms. You're not helping yourself by tracking your symptoms, which I was extremely good at. And I think he's basically like, I don't know, I don't play sports. It's what I imagine american football coaches like like the first thing he had said was um we're going have to pin our years and go after this thing, which is like my kid's favorite expression. We're going to have to Peter years and go after this thing.

He basically told Sarah that he was thinking about her concussion as something he needed to make room for in her life, which was exactly wrong.

He said, if there is one thing I need to remember from this meeting, if you don't remember anything else, and you know, there was a possibility, I wouldn't, because kate was allowed take notes, because he yeldham, if there is only one thing you remember from this meeting today, is this run towards the danger.

run towards the danger.

Anything that traditionally triggered your symptoms, you're doing more of. So now, if you're watching T, V with someone you have to ask, is a loud enough for them because they might be keeping IT lower for your concussion. You have to ask if the room is bright enough for other people, because everyone's probably gotten into a habit of lower light for you in your concussion.

You have to basically just take off all the banded. And what I was not allowed to do is every, like, if I hear that you are having a nap ever, I will yellow you. If you have an the day, I will yellow you.

And he mended and I was like, holy shit, like, like, what if I am trying to make breakfast for my kids, breast feed my baby? I'm mellon at home. I'm trying to get the model off to school.

Like, just thinking about that gives me a migraine. I mean, what if I get a migraine if i'm over extending my itself in that way and then I can't function for the rest of the day? And he just looked at me. Attack, attacks. IT was so arresting.

Remember, this was like the opposite of what every other doctor had told her. Everybody else was like, don't push past the point of your own tolerance. And dark Collins was like, push past the point of your own tolerance.

Keep going. So I asked him how long he would take for her to get Better and he said, pretty straight forward case, maybe before to six weeks, which is when he became firmly convinced that he was a Charlotte. But he's not a sharleen for all of the fear, pinning and attack atack tex deff doctor r.

Michael Collins is a world renown leading expert in concussions. He's a clinical neuropsychologist, not an M D. But he helped develop a special diagnostic tool to test the severity and type of concussion. Yes, there are different types, concussions. Six of them. In fact, these worked on hundreds of research articles and important studies in the field, and the way his team approaches treatment is becoming more and more accepted both here and in other countries. Oh.

and also we're making progress in this case. And I anticipated IT returning to hockey and playing playing well in the future.

You actually did treat hockey players sitting cross. This is from a press conference where sydney is literally sitting two chairs away from him yesterday.

Actually, I S, and I could tell that his day as the best machine .

is approaching.

I ve got to touch with Michael Collins or micky e to people who knew him. First and foremost, the last moate was going on with all the yelling.

I was having a tough day that day.

He said he had been run hours behind schedule, some really complicated cases before sing sa, but beyond that, he says he felt like he needed to get through to her, literally loud and clear. But noise and stimulation were not the, put very simply, the bash on serious head injured this part of her brain that allows you to interpret motion and busy environments. So the system gets overloaded and can't manage everything that's flying at IT.

And the injury also caused anxiety. But here's the weird part, whenever sr. A felt anxiety about like going to a social event, that anxiety alone could also trigger her physical concussion symptoms, the brain fog using us and confusion.

It's a two way conversation. And so you run toward the danger to interrupt that conversation. You just ignore your anxiety about the symptoms. And so the anxiety and the symptoms both start to fade.

You know, he had the type of concussion where it's not rest that gets someone Better. It's about refitting ation retraining. And so to make sure he was aware of that because every instinct in your body when you're going through this is the back of things.

And so yeah, a part of IT was I was having a busy day, but a part of IT was he needed to hear IT and SHE needed to understand that there's only one way out and that's through IT. We actually wanted her have symptoms. We wanted her to feel IT and .

just to say he's not yelly with every patient and some patients have completely different kinds of concussions. Please consult a physician before treating your own concussion by going to a five finger death punch concert. But with Sarah, he told her we're going to put you on an intensive retraining program exercise, including very specific exercises to get that motion interpretation system.

It's of a stimulate system working again. And all the classic exposure therapy just heard about doctor Collins weren't heard that this would be very uncomfortable. At first, he was not lying.

I was in agony like everything hurt. I had worse brain fog at times. I was exhAusting IT IT may be nauseous IT gave me headings.

Take, for example, a simple visit to the grocery store. For years, her husband had been doing most of the shopping, but now shopping was prescribed.

Just the number of things that we're happening, like the bright lights, the music, needing to make decisions about what to pull off the shelf, looking at a list, which, again, when you can see how much work each of those steps takes for your brain to process and execute IT is like an explosion of exhAusting and pain. And certainly, I remember being at like a kids, like a kids rock concert in the gym.

I think that even people without hyper sensitivity to love noises do not necessarily enjoy.

And I just wanted die. And I was like, you must have been such a site because, you know, you position you're face in a certain kind of way at a kid's performance, yes, which I was capable of doing. Yeah, my my brain was exploding a lot .

in the the first .

few weeks. And then there was this moment where we've been invited out.

This is maybe two or three weeks into the treatment.

David had this new colleague .

and his partner.

and we went to a restaurant, and I was bringing my breast feeding baby into a restaurant while having to socialize with new people with noise and light. And I said, yes, because I had to, because I was part of my program to see us to these things. And I realized halfway through the conversation that i've been following the whole conversation and that I wasn't lost and my head didn't hurt and I wasn't confused, and I express .

that to my husband .

on the wet walk home. And as I did, I started soaring uncontrollably because I suddenly realized this is what IT used to feel like to be in my brain. And I didn't even know how far off I was of being myself or being fully functioning. And so I was both an incredible moment of knowing o and I am going to get Better, actually. And also real grief for the last three half ears, and also just my lack of even having known what i'd lost.

And by the end of six weeks, just like the doctor said, he was totally cured .

IT honestly, just felt like a veil lifting of the world, like i'd been behind the screen that I didn't know I was behind, and my vision had adjusted to everything being a bit blurry. And then suddenly everything was clear and in technical or and beautiful. It's been .

five years, and a recovered and not only SHE symptom free SHE actually gained something that I never would have expected. And is the entire reason I wanted you to hear this story, that whole run towards the danger thing. It's pervaded the rest of her life instead of being all squirrely and avoided when a big chAllenge comes along. Now she's like, okay, bring IT on.

I do all kinds of things now that I am terrified of and that I would never do like I know if I asked to be on stage, it's very likely I will say yes because it's so hard for me. And I know the more I do IT and where I work with IT, the Better it's gona get. So I don't really avoid anything that bugs me anymore. I am so very honored to be asked to speak here today.

This is Sarah, a addressing graduates at the university of toronto just a couple months ago. SHE told the crowd SHE was terrified of being on stage, even as he was on stage speaking to them.

There are many things to be legitimately afraid of. Don't worry, I won't list them.

She's also taken on huge projects that would have felt insurance table to her before the concussion happened, like the movie women talking, which won her an Oscar last year for her screen play. In that book I mentioned before, it's called brand wards, the danger. And it's full of deeply personal, sometimes really upsetting stories from her life.

And he had always been scared. Detail and and is IT literally like if you are going into some sort of uncomfortable situation that you're you're thinking the words run towards the danger. Now I do think .

IT sometimes, but I don't have to because IT gets lobbed at me more than I say that to myself. Like, if you want to make your life a living hell, name a book, run towards the danger, because then anytime you express reservation about anything the person in the other coral be like. I don't want to say IT, but I don't hope you remember the title of your book so annoying.

So says she's glad now for the concussion, glad for a concussion her whole life. He says he kept mixing up, taking care of herself with avoiding anything potentially difficult or uncomfortable. Those two things can look very much the same, but they're not.

And you can miss out on a lot in life when you confuse them. So she's happy to know the difference. And all that took was a fire extinguish falling on her head.

Strong cle when the producers of our show coming up, what you do when your kid doesn't fy the coup size twice a week to head straight into danger, what parenting advice exists for that? That's in a minute which got about the radio when our program continues.

Support for this american life comes from coppell university. Learning is enough to get in the way of life. With copeland's game changing flex path learning format, you can set your own deadlines and learn on your own schedule.

That means you don't have to put your life on hold to earn your degree stead, enjoy learning your way, and pursue your educational and career goals without missing a beat. A different future is closer than you think with coppell university. Learn more at copilot edu. Support for this american .

life .

comes from square space, the all in one website platform with features to help you start a fully custom on brand website use square spaces latest AI enhanced website builder blueprint AI IT can transform basic information about your brander business into an elevated online presence with created premium quality content automatically added and matched to your profile and esthetic had two square spaced up com slash american for ten percent off your first purchase of a website or domain.

American eyes from our our glass today's program swim towards the shark stories of people who ignore all the noise that is in all of our heads. IT tells us to run away from danger, and instead the head straight towards that. We've had to two of our program, act two.

I'm doing IT alter, right, you guys? So this is about somebody i've got into an incendiary situation, and the, rather than poor self, have have decided i'm just going to hit further into that fire. And josh Johnson talked about what happened on stage recently. Here is did see .

the the White one and they got trouble for, say, they were, I know you .

say what 完了 OK 了。

okay, I say, I say the because this was the for me it's like all of people were, say, in IT people were saying in all, but this one was like this will felt, especially the crisis of all the story, because IT is captivating. Okay, so specially, okay, what do I can start? There's a thing called trad wife.

Now, trade wife is short for traditional wife, right? Trade wife is like this content thing that they you want tiktok, it's split off the instagram a little bit and it's basically women doing like stuff around the house. Well, tell them women to be Better. Women, right, is just like while to be a lady while SHE makes a part I don't get IT is not for me is not i'm not who watches IT but basically there was this Young White woman that was over here cooking something IT didn't look done and maybe IT was that maybe she's bad at IT, I don't know, but I did not look done.

But then she's talking about her friends and then SHE SHE says, you know, because then some my friends out here, just like you know out here dating these guys and you know broads, right and he says, IT SHE says, IT without missing of beach SHE says that he says, like you're not going to hear, right? So then, of course, everyone who saw this like if they start this frenzy online, right? And so there were all these people SHE didn't on tiktok.

There were all these people commenting, plan was wrong with you, what do you do and are you troll and all stuff like that, right? And then SHE makes another video, and she's like, look, I made a video earlier that offended a community or something and like and and I really listen to the feedback. I am I going, I I don't really give a care like, I don't know, thanks. So then, so then they found her job right, which which is crazy because you will try why why you working?

Why are you 那。

You, me, why are you? You're treat you are proposed by a traditional why? Why are you working? And you can try right on the side, you can, there's no such thing as half crude.

I mean, you've TNT be all the end or all out, right? And so then they found her job. Then they got fired from her job, right? go.

Then everyone was like talking about how, you know, SHE SHE clearly got fired, even though they don't say her. They issued a press release because wiles, what they do IT. And they were like, yeah certain individuals not working anning anymore.

So then so then SHE starts trying to cozy up to like, you know news max and like one nation news and then just allow the all right on twitter and everything and he takes the spin of like I was cancelled, right? But he also doesn't quite have the juice, do I mean by that, SHE doesn't quite have the like the presence and the energy of like a real race is going to be a newcaster yeah I mean, like SHE just doesn't have IT. You're watching her, you like SHE say, and bad things and they are annoying.

But i'm not angry. SHE just done. Have the off to get me there.

And I mean.

like i've just never seen diet racism before, but that was in so then SHE makes more videos trying to double down harder. And in these, an upcoming video, SHE just gets way worse with that, gets like even more big IT with this. So she's tween the inward all the time.

SHE is been tween the inward, not subject fire, right? And now she's making video. SHE is saying the effort, right? And so SHE just go in after everybody just trying to prove how terrible that he is, right? And so then he starts trying to cozy up to a lot of these, like, especially neonates, as much as you can.

And then turn takes place. An incredible turn that I could not have predicted. One of the most the same things this maybe happened so far this century, the neo nazi start rejected in her as a sigh.

Because they feel what I feel. They see the video. They're like you don't mean IT though. Like not.

It's not like coming out your stomach. You I mean like not you even saying IT with base, you know like you you know like and so so then they were like, no, no, don't trust her, okay? Don't this and her, i'll follow her.

SHE worked for the C. I, A. SHE, probably a faid.

They all turned on. They started bullying her IT. IT was absolutely insane. IT was one. Those things where then he keeps trying to cause you up to SHE keeps trying to like, take pictures with them, she's going to advance and some like that. And some of the ones are roll with her, rolling with her in real time.

You and they're like making making fun of how other people are making fun of her. But you can tell she's still not like and yet you know she's not like with them hard and you just played IT SHE played IT poorly. That's what happened.

SHE could SHE could have a real shot. SHE could, but he just SHE doesn't have enough of the wheel. You can tell she's not really races.

I know what is a weird thing to say about how he's been saying the inward non stop for a week, but you can just tell SHE didn't have the fire in her. You know that's not how you do IT. That's not.

You are making racist people uncomfortable. You are making. That's not how you do IT.

If you really want to be somebody as a races, if you really want to make waves as a bigger, you start out slow. You start with a watch, a slow and steady dog whistles over decades. You never say the word out, right?

You through out a thing or every once in a while. Ever once while like on a holiday and get real crazy with that, you you can do like our animals, something it's like get people go and you know plant your fame, but don't dig too deep. And then after a while, you know, you start to aggravate yourself.

They start to be like a she's one of us and then they bring in and maybe they bring you in on a temporary basis and they give you like a little, a little guest spot every now and again. And then after a couple of decades, you get a hosting give, you know because be honest, like if if if a week from now, Megan kelley said the inward, we'd like you. We expected that she's been earning IT over decades. Expectation lands right on the .

stress perfectly.

Then we also find out that he might be single. So you know we not a trade, you not a wife, what? What do you do? Where is your man right now? SHE really put herself in the .

position .

where he really needs a husband like.

Just Johnson performing and filled up you. He's corresponded for the daily show currently on a nationwide stand up tour to learn when he is coming to your city. Go to just Johnson comedy that com.

We did reject to the woman who he told that story about, and he is really good. Just be perfectly accurate. You was never on news max, or one nation news, but you did appear on similar athletes in for wards candis zones shorters back right away.

He said, hey, thanks for reaching out. Yes, i've seen this bit. It's fairly accurate, except for the trade wife part never claimed at any time to be a trade wife.

It's actually funny bit SHE signed. IT, cheers lily. Three, mom thinks to protest you much.

So now the story with lots of people are running towards perl. Reporter, commute. Olia grow up going to kenya every year from mother. so. And so this june, you are back like usual.

So I go to a store and do what I always do. I gotta buy sim card. And as i'm checking out, I start hearing all these noises coming from the street.

And so I step out, and it's hundreds of protesters that are spring towards me, and they are all being chased by the police. And I realized him directly in the front lines of a protest. And I have my record on me. And so I turned IT on.

i'm seeing police on .

horseback chasing protesters going on with like wooden sticks and just beating people as they wrote through the protesters, retaliating and running back and chasing the police. And then they are kind of regain in their ground.

Also, the line is like moving forward and backward.

I going back in four, and police are shooting technical. One of them hit the guy I picked IT up and drop kicks IT like a soccer ball back towards the police. And these .

protests began a couple months. O over a proposed taxi, right?

yeah. There were these really punitive tax ikes impacting a lot of kenyon. Everyday items like cooking oil, flower taps, even dies. And this is sort .

thing like the government need the money as I am, and stuff to pay. Yeah, IT was supposed to .

the solution to pay back the I M. F.

But then I became something more than that.

yeah. Became like the huge movement where people, especially Young people, rejecting just the states quo of the way that can ding governments been Operating. Politicians flying their rolex watches, their while they are being asked to pay for way more for these regular everyday items.

And Young people make up, seventy five percent of the population is under thirty five. wow. yeah.

In the median age in the country is around twenty years old. And this Young generation, they are crossing tribal lines. In the past tribes, they typically act like the fact of political parties.

And so one try will gain control. The country and the other child will be protest also. Now.

people from different tribes are protesting there. In this way, it's no, yeah.

these Young people are united, and they really just see themselves as kenyans. So.

so I know that you got interested in the front line protesters who go to the part line, which the most dangerous, and you started talking to one of them and his mom.

uh, who is he? So he goes by spin as been as twenty seven as a law student. My sister introduced me to, and he was telling me about this guy who he's in cava, which is a neighbor od in nairobi's, one of the largest slums in all of africa, really can go anywhere in the neighborhood without seeing the places is touch on the project is said.

and in these protests is going to the front lines where most .

of the violence and arrest are happening. Yeah, and because it's so dangerous, before he goes out, each time he says a prae himself.

so god doesn't live in this place, protects me. That may be with me, is our country, with my family, with my father, and nobody is bring with me.

Am he saying at the end there, bless my mother. What does his mom think of this? The fact that he goes to the front lines.

his mom does not approve. He does not want him going at all.

And you put together the story about what this is done to the relationship and how they're managing with each other. I see that now. And you're story. The named the chef to cover is anna in the beginning .

when he started going to the protest, has been adult. This mom, by lying to her, he come back home from the front lines, shower the tear gas off and drop by her house, pretending he'd been having a Normal day. But he wasn't so good at keeping IT a secret, like one day at a protest, A T, V crew put a mike in front of him and started interviewing him out. My friend .

called me and told me that they have seen been on T. V. So I was killing a spinner.

was just at the middle finishing my interview. Then the first was ring. Then I just see it's, mom, this moment is going to make IT difficult for me.

And I was like, where you and he was just not telling me and I was like, you want TV for the protest and he .

just kept laughing and i'm like, i'm just hope and this is like, you're lying. I've seen you on T. V.

Then i'm like, are you sure which which station did you see me? I'm just home. Then he is like, I did due to come back right now.

was laughing, telling his friends like, oh, my mom is like.

picked a spin. And anna always been closed. They talk all the time in the each other.

He lives at ten, and I walk away sometimes. He'll bring his friends to the food stand he runs. It's called mica party.

She's there all day in a blue or White dress. This spill looks just like her. And over the years, he's done other stuff. He didn't approve up at first. Later came around to like soccer, football, what everyone to call.

He was keen on football. He used to play a lot, and I didn't see any value in playing football. In fact, this was such a annual because he come back home so that he.

then, when a spin was fourteen and in her husband, can afford to send him to school for a year. Anna says he took a well, he said he understood, and was very grown up about IT. And then he took on odd jobs and played a lot of soccer.

And he saw a happy and made. He played so well that two soccer scouts got him a scholarship that put him back in the classroom. And IT was grateful.

SHE grew in a village and only got through the fifth grain and one or more for her kids. A similar thing happened when has been a decided to clean up their neighbors. Od CBA at the time had no roads, no street lights, no trash collection.

At first, when he told ann he was gna pick up the trash himself, he thought he was joking. But within a few years he was cording trash pickup for hundreds of houses, and SHE came around the spin. So many projects going in career these days, organizing events and meta ship for kids. A Greenhouse grows and sales food, water, sanity program. Lots of neighbors are pinning .

their hopes on him. A lots of parents are support him because he's helping their kids. What I try to tell him, and he never listens and I never get across to him, is how important he is to me.

He is very, very important to me. And he has such a wonderful dream for our future, for the future of kenya. So he told me about his dreams. He gave me his hopes .

up until now, and is like to be in his optimism. SHE liked the way he pushed her, but she's lived through years of the fact of one party rule, seem protest get ruthlessly put down and activists get killed. In this time around, SHE doesn't understand where .

space coming from. Most of the time he listens. But recently he's just been deciding that i'm just someone who's afraid all the time and i'm speaking out of fear so doesn't listen.

Why do you feel like he thinks serious speaking .

out of fear? Yeah, I think it's just a it's just an assumption because i'm a woman and i'm a mother and man. Just assume .

that we are .

we are always talking from fear.

Do you think that in this case.

IT is not fair? great.

Yes, yes, he's right.

It's yeah, he's right. Is right. IT was is fear.

For the first few weeks of the protest, anna sino went back and forth, her telling him not to go, him lying to her until things reached a boiling point on june twenty fifth.

Members of parliament have today past the controversial finance view with key amendments. The bill will now be present. William ruto.

instead of killing the textiles like the protesters is demanded, Kenny's parliament just made a few changes and push the bill through. And in response span, thousands of other protesters rushed to parliament, storm the building and some set part of IT on fire. On live T.

V. I remember I felt the whole country is watching. I got violent.

Ung kid from the neighborhood came and was buying food from me, but I was out of breath and he told me, mom, they killed someone in front of me and I saw his brains and I had to crawl out. And i'm so, so lucky to have made IT out. And you could see in his eyes that he has seen things that shouldn't see.

shouldn't have seen as media, really scared.

So what can you? Was so scared because of spin, had say that they're gonna go to parliament. And I tried calling his phone.

I tried calling his phone and is fun. I, I couldn't reach him. I kept a getting this voice message. I was, you know, restless, my stomach, heart, um I had no energy and I felt like something very body is about to happen to someone that I depend on a someone who who has my hopes with the career of my hopes.

Over a dozen people were killed, and a called a spinner over and over started asking. People who passed the party ended. IT seen in, call his siblings, call his friends. Pani pick up the phone, then her daughter told her about something. SHE saw .

on TV 历练 那个 国家 感情 比较慢。 Lilan， my daughter came and told me that he said someone who was dressed exactly like a spinner, uh, had been shot and he was wearing the exact same shoes that was spin was wearing. So I was so lux as I was.

I couldn't hadn't like everything left me all my life, left me because my hopes and dreams, and, you know, future is lies with those children. So something happens to them. how? How can I continue going on? And I kept wondering how my life will be, if, if that's actually my child.

Finally, at around nine P. M, one of his spin as friends called being was okay. And a rushed out to meet him, and he found him .

in the middle street. The thing I told him, like, I think, god, that you are still alive, but please don't ever go back to the protest and he said, I have to go and I told him, like, listen to me and your parent if something happens to you kin is not losing anything. I am person losing, i'm losing you but he was a adamant that he has to go back. He was like like high with energy, explaining everything that happened with with so much gesture. And meanwhile, i'm shaking and i'm like this child like doesn't know like what he put me through if I mean.

he just made me feel like SHE just don't understand what i'm doing, whatever i'm doing. I mean, my mom is not comfortable with me being unactive vist because she's like just a relax of a family, you know. So I mean, that is, well, sometimes you didn't get alone. Yeah and I find IT so difficult sometimes to keep interpreting .

IT a spin felt like i'm responsible and I do everything I can get home safely. He wished his mom could see that he went back to his place and turned off his phone, shutting everyone out.

Two days later has been a stopped by anastas party stan with some of his friends and told her they were headed to another demonstration in front of everyone on the street, including his friends, and he dropped to her knees.

你说。 I knew that I had to do something that will make them think boat has met mom, go down on honeys. Maybe this is something we should rethink.

That's such a vulnerable thing to do. It's most some people would feel humiliated.

非 没 啥 办法。 I didn't care about him. In fact, people are laughing. Spectators.

or were laughing. Yeah, they were laughing.

They are laughing, pointing at me, telling each other look, but is so afraid his kids are gonna go and protest. 能 不愿意 不？

What did you see in his face .

at the moment? So in his face, I so denial that's like he did not want to hear me say what I wanted to say. So yeah, just so you think I just .

start to leave .

or you walk down yeah.

I just thought .

why i've never .

see anything and from my understanding is the is not allowed to be happening like this is so we had so can I cannot just say there because I don't know the best thing to do like I can comforter, I can like explain anything. You know.

it's span, walked away, went to the protest. But that night, the image of his mom nearing digging IT wait on his mind.

That was massive because, I mean, I like she'd going to law. I actually found IT so difficult to sleep at a lot of anxiety. Then I was like, I need to take some few break, uh, reflect maker, a good choice.

The next day, spinner went to visit his mom faster.

all studied by apologizing for not listening, putting I in that situation and motion to make me feel i'm listening to her.

Did you promise anything in that moment?

Yes, first I promised just to be to tell the truth that are any time I begin for the protests are building on a then anytime I felt like you do so dangerous, I will not .

be going .

um if it's bad, i'll just be there for few moments and try to be very responsible.

Did SHE feel like that was .

good enough? no.

Do you know what else? Like what else did he wanted hear?

He just started to me. I will not go. I will never go again.

even though, and didn't get what you wanted. It's been would continue to go to the protest. SHE was satisfying.

yes. So I just, I saw that now he is listening and was so happy. I had to be happy. Do .

you celebrate .

a lot?

That night took a special meal for a spina and her entire family.

In the weeks after the parliament protest, the president actually made some pretty big concessions, but not enough for the protesters who still want him out. They're still on the streets, and it's gotten more intense. M stand international says that at least forty nine people have been abducted by the government.

Protesters have been disappeared, with a couple showing up dead. At first, the government denied any involvement, but now president rutu is at least talking about possible investigations. The spin is, skip a couple of protests because they seem too dangerous, like a plane march to the nairobi airport. But he is having a hard time keeping all of his promises. Anna.

so there are times when he disappears for a whole day. And then when he comes back, i'm like, I know you want to the protest and sometimes you let me tell me like, okay, fine, I went, but I wasn't in the front lies. I was like, at the very back. Do you .

believe that at .

the back? I don't believe IT at all, not for a second.

What does IT make you feel that he lies to you about going to the protest?

I'm so noye by that, by their lives, and i'm so afraid for him.

Know he told us that he lies to you because he doesn't want to burden you. How does make .

you feel? I just keep one dering why he wants to die so early and he has so much to do. Um why?

So here they both are. He's not onna change and she's not going to feel Better about IT. So he keeps heading off in the danger and he keeps hoping for the bus and the protest just continue.

Olia history was produced A A annual joshi with additional reporting by Henry garson venture and choo, additional translation by happiness bu.

I can run up for. The creature on this Price.

Produce by Shawn call the people been together today show could be Better and Michael comment of called saplin turn go managing editor up in our senior editor, David omb. Our ecuador dor is a manual berry special virgin ith kenya earnest coral at the kenyan man rights coalition, ani the amon and media, our website, this american life. Ord, we've been stream our archive ever.

Eight hundred episodes were absolutely free when your summer road trips or wherever. Again, this american life, that org, this american life is, took over to public radio stations by P. R X.

Public radio exchange. thanks. I always do a programs cofounder, mr.

Ariela, and I have been debating what costumes we're going aware to this year's star track convention. He always wants us to be voted mr. r. spock.

We're going have to pin our years and go after this day.

I'm a glass back next week. The more stories of this american lives.

Next week, the podcast to this american life so one morning, I mean, he wakes up, checked date and realizes how IT is her x boyfriend's .

birthday in IT all just rushing .

back to me all my god, the letter he had probably just received IT.

It's a glove letter that two years ago from a past self to her now x boyfriend and SHE does not remember what is in end that thanks back on the podcast or a local public radio station.

Support for the american life comes from solving tum. Three m health care is now solvent tum. There are a new company with a long legacy of creating breakthrough solutions for their customers and are usher in a new era of care. Learn more at all ventures dot com.