a few weeks before the start of fifth
grade when I was a happy and healthy
ten-year-old fresh off of four weeks of
overnight camp I woke up in my bed one
morning and I felt a strange snap inside
my head on the left side a few seconds
later a strange tingling sensation
started creeping down the right side of
my face it continued traveling down my
right arm and then down the rest of the
right side of my body as if I was cut in
half by the time I reached my toes that
was it
in less than 30 seconds I was completely
paralyzed on my right side the medical
term for this is hemiplegia it’s what
can happen to you when you have a stroke
but I had additional symptoms about 30
minutes later I lost peripheral vision
in my right eye and about 30 minutes
after that I had difficulty speaking
which is known as aphasia and then about
30 minutes after that I got a really
really bad headache by that time I was
in the hospital my neurologist
ultimately diagnosed this is a severe in
fluky form of a migraine headache it’s
pretty rare my recovery over the next
six months restored all the sensation
and a strength but not entirely the
control so that’s why I have a tremor on
my right side since I was born
right-handed I spent the next year
becoming a lefty now I gotta say there’s
never a good time to stroke out but
doing it at age 10 definitely came with
the degree of peril I was desperately
trying to fit in and this was not making
it any easier but if we can zoom out for
a minute we realized that over people’s
lifetime they are going to experience
losses setbacks and challenges the
question is how do you take these
sources of weakness or potential
devastation and turn them into something
from which maybe you can draw some
strength in fact I dare you
to solve the riddle how do you take your
kryptonite and transform it into your
superpower pay attention I’m gonna give
you a few clues the first thing I
figured out was that people would
respond to me submitting my challenges
in direct measure to how well I handled
them so if somebody was a problem for me
it was gonna be a problem for them and
let me tell you discomfort can be catchy
and I didn’t want to spread that around
any rooms but I also figured out that
this was absolutely not something that I
could let hold me back there’s a little
competitive and I didn’t want to get
left behind by my classmates now that’s
the thinking of a 10 year old but any
age can tap into what drove it and that
was basically three things couraged
positivity and determination for example
I knew that I was no longer gonna be the
first girl picked on teams
INRI at recess and in gym class like I
had been before and that hurt but I told
myself you know what at least I can
still play so I began to wonder how far
could I go living with this condition I
gradually began to find out because I
figured out how to do things with one
hand like typing cracking eggs and
putting earring backings on which is not
easy but I also figured out all kinds of
other life hacks and work around this to
get things done and a couple of what I
call my more clever examples are
threading a needle with one hand secret
is you put the needle in a pin cushion
think you only need one hand but I also
figured out how to polish my own nails
since getting a manicure was a little
professional manicures a little awkward
the problem was polishing my left hand
and the way I did that is putting the
brush on its side and my fingernail
painted the brush instead of the brush
painting my nail so what you can detect
here is a huge sense of accomplishment
and ownership over my problems I really
began to feel like I
at best in fact I took it a little
further I felt as if there were
something like superpowers that were
enabling me to overcome adversity in the
course of a single day I could string
together numerous small victories even
what I called minor miracles and this
made me feel really good except when I
was 25 years old something happened that
finally stretched my superpowers to
their breaking point I had just given
birth to my son and in the hours
afterward I realized taking care of a
baby is a two-handed job if ever there
was one and I had no previous experience
with babies Wow and all I’ve been
thinking about was what I needed to buy
like the changing table the stroller the
crib what color to paint his room would
his son help me out the same way a
daughter might if I grow old and I’m
alone anyway mm-hmm my superpowers
completely failed me and the truth was I
couldn’t give him the Bible I couldn’t
change his diaper and I had no idea how
I was gonna dress him without hurting
him so the next morning my obstetrician
came in my room and tried to console me
because I was absolutely hysterical he
said listen all my patients feel
inadequate they wish they had three
hands to get the jobs done that didn’t
make me feel any better but then he told
me the story of Jim Abbott he’s a major
league baseball pitcher who has an arm
that ends at his wrist he played for 10
seasons he just had his own workarounds
and hacks to get the job done now that
shut down my tears so basically over the
next few weeks I figured out how to get
the jobs done and I successfully was
able to feed diaper and dress my baby
thank you but there was another layer to
my issues I had another son a few years
later and as the boys were growing up I
began to think am I going to be a source
of embarrassment to them because I’m so
clearly thought I shared this with my
dad one day and he said something very
surprising his father’s from Germany and
he had a German accent but my dad really
wasn’t aware of it until a friend came
over and met his dad and asked him about
it he caught my dad off-guard
the accent really hadn’t registered so
he was just accustomed to his dad so
what he was telling me by way of
comparison is that my kids see me as
fully functioning to them I’m still
Wonder Woman
and the more I thought about it the more
I realized I had a ton of evidence
proving this because they’ve never ever
offered to help me in any way so about
eight years ago I decided that I wanted
to stretch my superpowers further than I
had never stretched them before he had
that involved entering a bodybuilding
competition so I knew this was going to
be difficult because you have to strike
poses and hold steady and I just decided
I was gonna do it anyway and let’s just
say I survived and a few years after
that I started doing stand-up comedy
where I went around to open mics and I
delivered five-minute sets that always
included one minute of what I called my
stroke jokes and those are basically
bits where I poked fun of myself like
noting I’m not an alcoholic I swear even
though I kind of shake like one so I
wanted to offer as well as a subject
matter expert in superpowers I wanted to
offer others with challenges a few
suggestions to help them develop their
own and the first thing is to recall
that nobody is judging you only you are
judging your
so you need to stop that the next thing
is that that’s actually a lie people are
judging you all the time on how well you
handle your challenges and they will
respond accordingly so the idea is you
control the climate surrounding your
challenges the next thing I’d suggest is
having an elevator pitch that basically
describes what’s wrong
it will arrest your listeners every time
so mine goes something like this
no it’s not what you think I don’t have
Tourette’s or Parkinson’s I’m not cold
I’m not nervous I had something similar
to a stroke when I was 10 and it left me
with this tremor and no it doesn’t shake
when I sleep and the last thing I’d like
to share is that you should always think
about what you can do not what you can’t
do because you know what nobody can do
everything and I’d like to conclude by
posing a question
partly because you’re not allowed to ask
one and that is if I could be cured
would I want to be there is a treatment
called deep brain stimulation and it
would probably wipe out my tremor I’ve
known about it for probably 20 years the
answer clearly is no the truth is that
having this trauma is inconvenient and
sometimes uncomfortable but it is the
thing from which I draw up my strength
and my superpowers and if you eliminate
it you take away from me the thing from
which I draw courage and confidence and
if that’s truly how you feel if you can
push past your potential boundaries then
you can be certain you have successfully
claimed transformed weakness into some serious badass strength thank you
grade when I was a happy and healthy
ten-year-old fresh off of four weeks of
overnight camp I woke up in my bed one
morning and I felt a strange snap inside
my head on the left side a few seconds
later a strange tingling sensation
started creeping down the right side of
my face it continued traveling down my
right arm and then down the rest of the
right side of my body as if I was cut in
half by the time I reached my toes that
was it
in less than 30 seconds I was completely
paralyzed on my right side the medical
term for this is hemiplegia it’s what
can happen to you when you have a stroke
but I had additional symptoms about 30
minutes later I lost peripheral vision
in my right eye and about 30 minutes
after that I had difficulty speaking
which is known as aphasia and then about
30 minutes after that I got a really
really bad headache by that time I was
in the hospital my neurologist
ultimately diagnosed this is a severe in
fluky form of a migraine headache it’s
pretty rare my recovery over the next
six months restored all the sensation
and a strength but not entirely the
control so that’s why I have a tremor on
my right side since I was born
right-handed I spent the next year
becoming a lefty now I gotta say there’s
never a good time to stroke out but
doing it at age 10 definitely came with
the degree of peril I was desperately
trying to fit in and this was not making
it any easier but if we can zoom out for
a minute we realized that over people’s
lifetime they are going to experience
losses setbacks and challenges the
question is how do you take these
sources of weakness or potential
devastation and turn them into something
from which maybe you can draw some
strength in fact I dare you
to solve the riddle how do you take your
kryptonite and transform it into your
superpower pay attention I’m gonna give
you a few clues the first thing I
figured out was that people would
respond to me submitting my challenges
in direct measure to how well I handled
them so if somebody was a problem for me
it was gonna be a problem for them and
let me tell you discomfort can be catchy
and I didn’t want to spread that around
any rooms but I also figured out that
this was absolutely not something that I
could let hold me back there’s a little
competitive and I didn’t want to get
left behind by my classmates now that’s
the thinking of a 10 year old but any
age can tap into what drove it and that
was basically three things couraged
positivity and determination for example
I knew that I was no longer gonna be the
first girl picked on teams
INRI at recess and in gym class like I
had been before and that hurt but I told
myself you know what at least I can
still play so I began to wonder how far
could I go living with this condition I
gradually began to find out because I
figured out how to do things with one
hand like typing cracking eggs and
putting earring backings on which is not
easy but I also figured out all kinds of
other life hacks and work around this to
get things done and a couple of what I
call my more clever examples are
threading a needle with one hand secret
is you put the needle in a pin cushion
think you only need one hand but I also
figured out how to polish my own nails
since getting a manicure was a little
professional manicures a little awkward
the problem was polishing my left hand
and the way I did that is putting the
brush on its side and my fingernail
painted the brush instead of the brush
painting my nail so what you can detect
here is a huge sense of accomplishment
and ownership over my problems I really
began to feel like I
at best in fact I took it a little
further I felt as if there were
something like superpowers that were
enabling me to overcome adversity in the
course of a single day I could string
together numerous small victories even
what I called minor miracles and this
made me feel really good except when I
was 25 years old something happened that
finally stretched my superpowers to
their breaking point I had just given
birth to my son and in the hours
afterward I realized taking care of a
baby is a two-handed job if ever there
was one and I had no previous experience
with babies Wow and all I’ve been
thinking about was what I needed to buy
like the changing table the stroller the
crib what color to paint his room would
his son help me out the same way a
daughter might if I grow old and I’m
alone anyway mm-hmm my superpowers
completely failed me and the truth was I
couldn’t give him the Bible I couldn’t
change his diaper and I had no idea how
I was gonna dress him without hurting
him so the next morning my obstetrician
came in my room and tried to console me
because I was absolutely hysterical he
said listen all my patients feel
inadequate they wish they had three
hands to get the jobs done that didn’t
make me feel any better but then he told
me the story of Jim Abbott he’s a major
league baseball pitcher who has an arm
that ends at his wrist he played for 10
seasons he just had his own workarounds
and hacks to get the job done now that
shut down my tears so basically over the
next few weeks I figured out how to get
the jobs done and I successfully was
able to feed diaper and dress my baby
thank you but there was another layer to
my issues I had another son a few years
later and as the boys were growing up I
began to think am I going to be a source
of embarrassment to them because I’m so
clearly thought I shared this with my
dad one day and he said something very
surprising his father’s from Germany and
he had a German accent but my dad really
wasn’t aware of it until a friend came
over and met his dad and asked him about
it he caught my dad off-guard
the accent really hadn’t registered so
he was just accustomed to his dad so
what he was telling me by way of
comparison is that my kids see me as
fully functioning to them I’m still
Wonder Woman
and the more I thought about it the more
I realized I had a ton of evidence
proving this because they’ve never ever
offered to help me in any way so about
eight years ago I decided that I wanted
to stretch my superpowers further than I
had never stretched them before he had
that involved entering a bodybuilding
competition so I knew this was going to
be difficult because you have to strike
poses and hold steady and I just decided
I was gonna do it anyway and let’s just
say I survived and a few years after
that I started doing stand-up comedy
where I went around to open mics and I
delivered five-minute sets that always
included one minute of what I called my
stroke jokes and those are basically
bits where I poked fun of myself like
noting I’m not an alcoholic I swear even
though I kind of shake like one so I
wanted to offer as well as a subject
matter expert in superpowers I wanted to
offer others with challenges a few
suggestions to help them develop their
own and the first thing is to recall
that nobody is judging you only you are
judging your
so you need to stop that the next thing
is that that’s actually a lie people are
judging you all the time on how well you
handle your challenges and they will
respond accordingly so the idea is you
control the climate surrounding your
challenges the next thing I’d suggest is
having an elevator pitch that basically
describes what’s wrong
it will arrest your listeners every time
so mine goes something like this
no it’s not what you think I don’t have
Tourette’s or Parkinson’s I’m not cold
I’m not nervous I had something similar
to a stroke when I was 10 and it left me
with this tremor and no it doesn’t shake
when I sleep and the last thing I’d like
to share is that you should always think
about what you can do not what you can’t
do because you know what nobody can do
everything and I’d like to conclude by
posing a question
partly because you’re not allowed to ask
one and that is if I could be cured
would I want to be there is a treatment
called deep brain stimulation and it
would probably wipe out my tremor I’ve
known about it for probably 20 years the
answer clearly is no the truth is that
having this trauma is inconvenient and
sometimes uncomfortable but it is the
thing from which I draw up my strength
and my superpowers and if you eliminate
it you take away from me the thing from
which I draw courage and confidence and
if that’s truly how you feel if you can
push past your potential boundaries then
you can be certain you have successfully
claimed transformed weakness into some serious badass strength thank you
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