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The Girl With The Colourful Leg and Wrapsthetic! | Bernadette on Tilly Talks Tech · Tilly Talks Tech

0:00
SPEAKER_00: The girl with the colourful leg.
0:02
SPEAKER_00: You guys know we're all about technology and expression on this channel.
0:05
SPEAKER_00: She had her leg amputated, turned it into R, and now has the goal of seeing those prosthetic eggs and the beautiful humans who wear them glistening down the Victoria's Secret fashion show Runaway.
0:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness, yes.
0:16
SPEAKER_00: She founded Rapstet, which basically makes self-applicable prosthetic wrap kit.
0:21
SPEAKER_00: Turning someone that used to feel purely clinical into a canvas for self-expression, identity, and pride.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: And she looks incredible today.
0:29
SPEAKER_00: Hello Vincent! Welcome to Tweet's Tech.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: I am so excited to host you.
0:33
SPEAKER_00: I've heard so much about you.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: How are you feeling?
0:36
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm so excited to be honest.
0:37
SPEAKER_00: I feel like you're someone that's really, really inspiring, so I'm excited to get chances.
0:40
SPEAKER_00: No, because our I just feel like our life stories have so many parallels in like so many ways.
0:46
SPEAKER_00: I think there's one bit of like relatability when it comes to, you know, growing up, like having a limb difference.
0:52
SPEAKER_00: Immediately something that is very niche, you know, not many people can relate on.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: But you have the exact same sort of approach to prosthetics that I do.
1:02
SPEAKER_00: You're known as the girl with the colourful leg.
1:04
SPEAKER_00: That's something that kept popping up when I was researching you.
1:08
SPEAKER_00: Did you ever think you would be her?
1:10
SPEAKER_00: That would be your like your title.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: No, I had no idea.
1:14
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was it was so funny because it kind of came about accidentally.
1:17
SPEAKER_00: Um, I was getting pitched at the time, like by all these channels.
1:21
SPEAKER_00: They wanted to do like a documentary on me.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: And I always I was turning them all down because I kept saying, like, if you want to do a story on me, it has to be real.
1:28
SPEAKER_00: And I don't want it to be some kind of sought-up story.
1:31
SPEAKER_00: I want it to be positive because that's how I see everything that's happened with me.
1:34
SPEAKER_00: I I see it as a positive, and um I think I say something like doesn't have to just be like a sad cancer story, like I'm I'm a girl with a colourful leg, I think that's good enough as it is.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: Yes, and then that just became like a title of a documentary that I was in.
1:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like it's it's so cool, and I'm glad, you know, you were able to add that flair.
1:52
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I imagine it did turn your world upside down a little bit, but at the end of the day, like you've you've found yourself again, and I feel like that shines through like all of your content is the fact that you know this happened, but we're here, we move, and we just try and make the best out of, I guess, on paper, negative situation.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
2:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I always knew that I I was never gonna be ashamed of having a disability.
2:15
SPEAKER_00: I knew when I was gonna lose my leg that I was I was excited to experience life with a prosthetic leg.
2:20
SPEAKER_00: Whereas a lot of other people are like, yeah, I was so excited.
2:22
SPEAKER_00: But then I have people being like, oh, don't worry, you can you can hate it and stuff, you can wear jeans, no one, no one's gonna know.
2:28
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, why would I hate this?
2:30
SPEAKER_00: It's so cool.
2:31
SPEAKER_00: Like, this is such a good trade, and it's part of my story, and I can't wait to show it off.
2:35
SPEAKER_00: And this is what I had too growing up.
2:36
SPEAKER_00: It's like other people's immediate reaction because you know they they theorize that this is the most devastating thing to ever happen.
2:43
SPEAKER_00: Like that's that's kind of what they go to.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: It's like, don't worry, like, we can act like it never happened.
2:48
SPEAKER_00: And I feel like that is so, so damaging.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: Thankfully, for you, obviously, you're like of the age where you know you were very like you had your mindset all figured out and you were like, hell yeah, like I'm so happy for you that you had that going into like having the amputation.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: Because for other people like myself, like growing up with prosthetics, your mind is still being tall.
3:10
SPEAKER_00: And when you're constantly being told, don't worry, there's these super realistic prosthetics, and they'll look so real and nobody will even realize, it's like, oh, are people not meant to realize?
3:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: I feel like for Shaolan society, I've just felt like disabilities have to be hidden, and you have to try to make it seem like it's something that's like real when it's like it's fine being robotic.
3:30
SPEAKER_00: But I went to get my first prosthetic.
3:31
SPEAKER_00: I remember I really wanted like a chrome silver leg, and I kept making a joke about becoming the burninator instead of the terminator.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: And do you remember they were like, that's not a thing, like that we don't do that?
3:42
SPEAKER_00: And um, they were offering me like a foam covering to make it look like a real leg or like skin colour.
3:47
SPEAKER_00: And the most adventurous I could get was getting like a jersey molded into the leg.
3:51
SPEAKER_00: And I was just like, Wow, I was like, that's just not me.
3:54
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, why am I like I'm being forced to try to make it look like something that it's not?
3:58
SPEAKER_00: Period.
3:58
SPEAKER_00: As you showed, like, we have taste, you know.
4:01
SPEAKER_00: And I'm so grateful that there were more options available now because it's your body at the end of the day.
4:07
SPEAKER_00: Like, you wanna feel good in it, you want to be able to design that, you know.
4:11
SPEAKER_00: I was wondering if you could take me back to, you know, why you had to have your leg amputated at all for people who don't know the story.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: What happened?
4:19
SPEAKER_00: Toward the end of 2017, I was getting a pain in my leg and I had a lump in my leg.
4:23
SPEAKER_00: And I'm just kind of just keeping an eye on it, and then it got to January of 2018, and I finally went to see a doctor, and I was saying, like, I have this lump on my leg, it's um it's getting quite sore and everything to walk.
4:33
SPEAKER_00: I can I can see that I'm starting to lose weight and everything, and I'm extra tired, things like that.
4:37
SPEAKER_00: It was like a maybe like a student doctor or something in the room at the time, and she got in a hire doctor for a second opinion because she thought something was wrong.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: And then he came in and I remember he squeezed the lump on my leg and it was so painful.
4:48
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Oh my god, please don't do that, like that's so sore.
4:51
SPEAKER_00: Um and he was like, It doesn't hurt, it's fat.
4:54
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, What do you mean it doesn't hurt?
4:55
SPEAKER_00: I'm telling that it hurts.
4:57
SPEAKER_00: Why?
4:58
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he was like, fat doesn't hurt.
4:59
SPEAKER_00: Um, pretty much made out that I was lying.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: So then he told the the female doctor then to print me out a sheet of paper about fat.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: So he left the room and she started going on to Google to print out this sheet of paper, and I said, If he's telling me that it shouldn't hurt, why does it hurt?
5:13
SPEAKER_00: And I I'll never forget it because she just like kept looking at the computer and she just shrugged as I was behind her because she didn't want to go against this higher doctor.
5:21
SPEAKER_00: Um so then over the next load of months I kept going back to see my doctors and it I started to feel like I was annoying them a bit.
5:27
SPEAKER_00: I I started going back for other things just to kind of also bring up that like this lump was getting bigger.
5:31
SPEAKER_00: Like, can you please take this?
5:33
SPEAKER_00: Because I just would not check it.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: They just kept saying you were already changed at the spot.
5:36
SPEAKER_00: So it took them maybe about six months or so before they would actually send me for a scan.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: They I pretty much got instantly red flagged and sent to the hospital because whenever they finally checked my leg, they realized that something was actually wrong.
5:47
SPEAKER_00: I was being self-sent for an ultrasound in my leg.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: They instantly realized something was wrong too, told me to go in for an x-ray, had to go for my x-ray.
5:53
SPEAKER_00: Then I was being I was told I was going to be sent for an MRI and a TT scan.
5:58
SPEAKER_00: And I remember being told then that I would get my results within three weeks.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: So I waited the three weeks and I didn't hear anything.
6:03
SPEAKER_00: So I gave it an extra week, still didn't hear anything.
6:05
SPEAKER_00: I started ringing my doctors again saying, Do you have my results?
6:09
SPEAKER_00: I would like I would like to know what's going on.
6:10
SPEAKER_00: And they said, We don't have it, try the hospital.
6:13
SPEAKER_00: So I tried the hospital, they were saying, We passed all that information on to your GP, we can't try that over the phone.
6:17
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
6:19
SPEAKER_00: So I was trying another hospital that's like, Do you have my information?
6:21
SPEAKER_00: And they were saying everything is on a system and it has to come from your GP.
6:24
SPEAKER_00: So I contacted my GP again and I said, Can I please have my results?
6:27
SPEAKER_00: And they were just like, We don't have them, we don't know what they are.
6:30
SPEAKER_00: So a lot of weeks passed anyway, and then I remember I pulled up outside work because I just parked my car outside it, and my phone rang from a web-pelt number, and they just said, Oh yeah, you've got a tumour, you need to come in and have a biopsy and see if it's cancerous.
6:43
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, What is going on?
6:44
SPEAKER_00: What on earth?
6:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so then I went in for my biopsy, and then I ended up getting my letter then to come and get my results, and then I went and got my results, and they told me that I had synovial sarcoma, which is a really rare and aggressive type of cancer.
6:58
SPEAKER_00: It's like one in a million in Reddy.
7:00
SPEAKER_00: And they basically said that at the stage that mine was finally caught, it had wrapped itself all around the nerves and blood vessels in my leg.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: So the next course of action that they were thinking was amputating my leg.
7:11
SPEAKER_00: So it was deadly.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: So, all in all, it took almost nine months to get a diagnosis.
7:15
SPEAKER_00: So that was the end of August, and then throughout September, I had different scans to make sure that the cancer hadn't spread to anywhere else.
7:21
SPEAKER_00: And there were some spots in my lungs that they just kind of wanted to keep an eye on, um, but they weren't overly worried about them.
7:26
SPEAKER_00: And then they were double-checking that an amputation was definitely the best course of action because obviously you can't really just reattach it.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: Um so I remember then in October I got a letter and it said that I was booked for amputation the next week, so I had a week's notice in and I'm dining the day before Halloween and got my leg amputated.
7:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
7:43
SPEAKER_00: It's all pretty crazy.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: The way that like that went from zero to a hundred.
7:50
SPEAKER_00: And you like you spotted the sign, you walked in, you showed them it.
7:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
7:53
SPEAKER_00: It's like, you know, just kind of shunned, pushed to the side.
7:57
SPEAKER_00: And then low-key like radio silence.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: Until all of a sudden they take it seriously.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: And next thing you know, you have your appointment to get your hair your leg amputated.
8:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: It's insane.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: Because I even um I see like whenever I got my leg amputated then as well.
8:14
SPEAKER_00: At one point I had to go back to get like medication.
8:16
SPEAKER_00: And um, I think they had tried to book me an appointment on the top floor of the doctors when I clearly couldn't walk anymore.
8:21
SPEAKER_00: I did no leg.
8:22
SPEAKER_00: They just really handled the situation so yeah, it was so bad.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I've to this day, I've never actually had an apology from them with this kind of crazy case.
8:29
SPEAKER_00: So but I think that comes from like me being a young girl and they just assumed that I was like healthy and complaining for the sake of complaining, so they just would not hit all the time.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: It's really sad.
8:40
SPEAKER_00: You're like literally giving me chills right now because hope it's not anything crazy.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: But I've just recently like had the most similar thing happen with an injury in my shin.
8:50
SPEAKER_00: I had an injury in my shin, which I went to the doctor about.
8:54
SPEAKER_00: They were like, We'll get your appointment, they forget about it, and then they remember, and it's like already two weeks later, and it's like, okay, you're gonna come in for an x-ray, we referred you here, then you never hear anything, and then I I like call up that hospital, and they're like, we haven't got the details that oh I call my GP again, they're like, Well, they should have them, and I'm just like, Oh my goodness, no, it's like that, and this has literally been happening for the last like six to twelve weeks.
9:20
SPEAKER_00: I won't even keep any of this in, this is such a tangent.
9:22
SPEAKER_00: It gets so frustrating.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: I needed to call them again, but I was literally like, I need to not call them now because I'm like literally like at the point of tears, all right?
9:31
SPEAKER_00: It's just so frustrating that like you're not being listened to.
9:37
SPEAKER_00: Because I can't be like to me, that's so scary.
9:40
SPEAKER_00: Right?
9:41
SPEAKER_00: Because I didn't trip and I didn't call I just a healthy age and I look alright.
9:47
SPEAKER_00: It's like frustrating.
9:50
SPEAKER_00: Anyways, that's ridiculous.
9:53
SPEAKER_00: That's a such a little side tangent, but it's so real and it's important.
9:56
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was also misdiagnosed when it came to meningitis.
10:00
SPEAKER_00: Like, yeah, like I lost my answer to meningitis.
10:03
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you even knew that.
10:05
SPEAKER_00: But um yeah, I was initially diagnosed with an ear infection and sent home.
10:10
SPEAKER_00: So it is it is serious, like you've just gotta check yourself and like trust your intuition.
10:16
SPEAKER_00: And I really applaud you for being like dissistant with it.
10:20
SPEAKER_00: Because what could have happened after that, you know?
10:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I with my type of cancer as well, like the survival rates aren't actually that good.
10:27
SPEAKER_00: Um, so if I hadn't left it any longer, I probably wouldn't be here right now.
10:30
SPEAKER_00: So I'm really glad that I'm advocating on myself.
10:32
SPEAKER_00: So but yeah, it's just ridiculous that they just don't take our serious.
10:36
SPEAKER_00: No, seriously, like just while you were telling that story, it gave me chills because of how how I've experienced it, and I feel like it's so important to talk about in case anybody is like, you know, we we all have a I feel like a lot of people have been, oh, it's just like medical anxiety and stuff, but like no, get that, get that, get that shit checked.
10:51
SPEAKER_00: Do you have every right to we just talked a little bit earlier about like prosthetics?
11:03
SPEAKER_00: The choices were limited.
11:05
SPEAKER_00: Um, I remember like I have an anecdote of wearing these realistic prosthetics and like actively being like, wow, what the hell am I doing when I was younger?
11:13
SPEAKER_00: And I was just wondering if you could share your thoughts and feelings going through that process.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: Like you were saying you were you're excited to like kind of have a prosthetic leg, but then what you're looking at does not match what doesn't match you, the bottom line.
11:29
SPEAKER_00: I remember being like disappointed because I was just like, this doesn't feel like me, and it doesn't represent who I am as a person, and I want to have fun with it, and I didn't think it had to be this like medical thing, I wanted it to be my accessory.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: Um and I just remember thinking like I'm a young girl, I like I like dress and up and everything, and I want to do the same with my leg.
11:47
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, it just it just wasn't an option, so I was like, okay, well, how can I make this an option?
11:52
SPEAKER_00: Yes, exactly.
11:53
SPEAKER_00: Um I wanna get into that because I'm so so so freaking excited.
11:57
SPEAKER_00: Like, tell me about the first time you wrapped your leg and you just it became part of you, really, truthfully, this time.
12:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so I I knew I wanted to try ways of customising it, but I was always told that I couldn't do any permanent changes to my leg.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: Um my leg was from an NHS clinic, so I was told, okay, it's not really yours, so you're not you can customize it, but you're not gonna do anything permanent or anything that could damage the leg.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: So I thought, okay, let me see about this then.
12:23
SPEAKER_00: So I was looking up different methods of like sort of customisation, and I realized there was like nothing really online.
12:28
SPEAKER_00: So I was talking to my daddy and he was like, why don't we try like wrapping it and stuff?
12:32
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, that sounds really good, let's try it.
12:34
SPEAKER_00: So we started trying all this different material from like Amazon and eBay and wherever else, and like it was really hard to use and it wasn't lasting very well, and it was like pinning and stuff, but like I could see like straight away that I was still happy that it like was like the colours and everything and the designs that I wanted, even though it didn't look very good.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: I realized that nothing online was like really good for doing it, so I I decided to reach out to this car wrapping place, and I said, Well, you can wrap a car, do you want to try wrapping my leg?
13:03
SPEAKER_00: And uh I remember like Carson got his name was Carson because this the place was called Art and Motion, and he was like, Wait, that sounds really, really exciting.
13:10
SPEAKER_00: Come in and see me and we'll see what we can do.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: So I went to see him and we started wrapping my leg, and over the years then we were able to sort of work out what worked best on my leg, and it was really nice as well because I started sharing like that I was changing my leg colour and everything, and I was motting into my different outfits, and I could see that other people around the world wanted the same thing because it just wasn't offered before, which is kind of crazy because when you think about it, like we have so many options for so many different things, then when it comes to prosthetics, there isn't that same level of options, which is just unfair because like we're people with our own individuality and everything, too.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: We should have those options, and so locally, like whenever children were going through treatment of losing their legs or their arms or ending up in a wheelchair, we started doing the same process that we were doing for my leg onto their mobilities, and we were customizing them too to help them embrace life with a dis with a disability.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: So hot woman.
14:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we were doing it completely like out of our own time, out of our own money, and we did that for maybe like seven years, and I could see the difference it was making for me, I could see the difference it was making for them, and it was just really, really lovely to see.
14:11
SPEAKER_00: So there was just so much demand.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: We literally had people flying over to get it done.
14:15
SPEAKER_00: Um, and we realized that like not everybody has the ability ability to do that.
14:19
SPEAKER_00: So we wanted to try to find a way to make our our wraps more accessible.
14:23
SPEAKER_00: So we decided to keep it, and now the template allows people to wrap their legs at home and we now ship our kits worldwide crazy.
14:30
SPEAKER_00: What?
14:31
SPEAKER_00: That is so cool.
14:32
SPEAKER_00: Wait, so I can wrap can I have mine?
14:35
SPEAKER_00: Good, yeah.
14:36
SPEAKER_00: You want to get your son?
14:38
SPEAKER_00: Hell yeah.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: 100%.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: I would love, love, love, love to death.
14:42
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because we have like magnetic covers and things like that.
14:45
SPEAKER_00: We don't have wraps.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure it would work in the same way, but hell, I'm up for it, you know.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, do you know um like Bionic uh Barbie Ashley?
14:54
SPEAKER_00: Yes, Ashley loves Ashley.
14:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we did hers as well.
14:57
SPEAKER_00: So she's she's wore a kit because she always has her arm gold.
15:00
SPEAKER_00: Um, a pink kit as well.
15:02
SPEAKER_00: She was actually one of the first people to ever try one of our kits on a prosthetic arm.
15:05
SPEAKER_00: Because No way.
15:06
SPEAKER_00: Like I've had loads of legs lying about, but I don't really have anyone local with prosthetic arms, so we needed to try to get them tested to make sure that our like methods still worked with arms in the same way.
15:15
SPEAKER_00: Um she tested it for us.
15:19
SPEAKER_00: I saw in my research that you wanted to like wrap your prosthetic to match your dress for an event.
15:25
SPEAKER_00: That is what I do.
15:26
SPEAKER_00: I like I match it to everything, I get the nails done because why the heck not?
15:31
SPEAKER_00: How did that feel for you?
15:32
SPEAKER_00: Like walking into that event.
15:34
SPEAKER_00: Did you get like a sort of reception?
15:36
SPEAKER_00: Did you just feel really good?
15:38
SPEAKER_00: Like, how was it?
15:39
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it was the best reading because then it's like before wrapping it, it like it felt like my outfit wasn't complete.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: So then having my leg match my outfit, it was like the final accessory that just made it all seamless, and I loved it.
15:51
SPEAKER_00: Um I loved it for me.
15:52
SPEAKER_00: I loved how confident that that it made me feel, and I loved showing it.
15:56
SPEAKER_00: But it was really, really nice walking into a room where people were looking at my epesthetic and they were actually happy, like they knew that they could look at it, they knew it was like a topic.
16:03
SPEAKER_00: People become up to you and say that looks really cool.
16:05
SPEAKER_00: Like, how did you do that?
16:06
SPEAKER_00: And it's really nice then to talk about it because I feel like for so long people will like look out of the side of their eye and think that they can't approach you to talk about your your disability.
16:14
SPEAKER_00: But then, whenever you make a kind of fun game and more your own, people are more willing to approach you and say, Wait, that looks really, really cool.
16:19
SPEAKER_00: Tell me all about it.
16:20
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, the difference I've made for me in that sense was really, really cool.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: I really like how you phrased it, like it kind of feels incomplete because it feels like okay, we're just sticking something on the end.
16:29
SPEAKER_00: Body language makes up like I can't remember what it was like 70% of communication, and you're like your outfit, like the fashion you choose for yourself, that is like the first creative decision you make in the morning, and that's kind of the only thing you have to control people's perception of you in public.
16:46
SPEAKER_00: I always found like having a disability, it comes with a lot of assumptions immediately, or it's like it's like click kind of kind of pitiful, you know what I mean?
16:55
SPEAKER_00: But we can actually take our power back through that fashion in general, and then when we're able to like slide that into our medical device that we only have because of our disability, suddenly like everything just sort of clicks, and it just changes it from like being like a steroid thing to being this really, really cool accessory.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: It jumps, oh I love it, I love it.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: I wanna talk about your career post-al this because you got Rap Static, you're like co-founder of that, which is already super cool.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: You've also got a super successful career in like modeling.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: I saw that you were the first MBT ever to qualify for a Miss World pageant.
17:41
SPEAKER_00: I yeah, I think so to people were telling me that.
17:44
SPEAKER_00: So um I know I'm pretty sure I was the first ever like finalist to be ever besured on our socials as well.
17:50
SPEAKER_00: Like usually they will all be sure the winners.
17:51
SPEAKER_00: Um but I was shared by them even whenever I was a finalist, which was kind of crazy.
17:56
SPEAKER_00: Um but that whole process was insane.
17:59
SPEAKER_00: You know what's so funny about it?
18:01
SPEAKER_00: Competing in Miss Northern Ireland, which is part of this world pageant, um, it wasn't something that I ever saw myself doing.
18:07
SPEAKER_00: I didn't ever care about winning it.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: But then I got approached um by them to see if I would consider competing in it, and I just kind of thought to myself, if there's a young girl with a disability and this is her dream, she doesn't have anyone like her that has gone before her to show that's possible.
18:22
SPEAKER_00: Maybe she'll pull the shelf best for applying.
18:24
SPEAKER_00: So I was like, you know what?
18:25
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna take part, see how far I can get and see how well I can do just to show that people with disabilities can take part.
18:31
SPEAKER_00: We're here to compete too.
18:32
SPEAKER_00: Um so I did it, and I always I always remember saying I was like, my goal is to come forth because I want to like show that I can do well, but I don't want to win because it's I was thinking to myself, I don't want to win it because it's not my dream.
18:44
SPEAKER_00: I want someone else with a disability dream it is to win that title.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: And um I remember then going through it and I managed to win the Beauty with a Purpose Award, which is really cool.
18:52
SPEAKER_00: That was the one part I cared about because that was like showing your character thing that you do for others around you.
18:57
SPEAKER_00: So I won that.
18:58
SPEAKER_00: Um and then I ended becoming second runner-up in the whole pageant, which was insane.
19:02
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it was such a such a good process, and the whole way through it, I was matching my leg to all my different outfits and everything.
19:08
SPEAKER_00: And on the on the day of the actual like final itself, I was wearing a different leg, and I remember I was keeping my the what my leg separate, like hidden from everybody, the one that I was actually gonna wear with the finale leg, yeah, the finale leg.
19:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, and my dress was this like gorgeous rose gold dress, and it had a slick right up to my hip.
19:27
SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking, like, because nobody was expecting me to do that, people thought that I would just hide my leg.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I was thinking that's the one thing I I want to show.
19:34
SPEAKER_00: I'm so proud to be here.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: I'm so proud to show it off and show down here to compete.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: And I got my leg rose gold chrome to match, and that leg, that one, that one leg, I feel like if there was any of the legs I've ever done, that's the leg that's most me because that's the one that's been at been with me with like really, really big moments.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, I did my rose gold leg and people were just people went crazy for it.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: I I love it, like it's incorporable, it's so cool.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, I'm so glad that you won that award.
20:03
SPEAKER_00: And I have no doubt that anybody, you know, a young person or whatever seeing that, like that I bet that has a massive impact.
20:12
SPEAKER_00: Like, because I I never knew, you know, that I'd never seen a little different person compete in like Miss Universe.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: The whole thing is like you're like kind of perfect, yeah.
20:24
SPEAKER_00: You know, you have to be like completely like this like idea of like perfection, like an angel.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's the same thing I kind of posted actually.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've seen it, but um in the last Victoria's Secret fashion show, there wasn't I couldn't see any models with any physical disabilities, and I posted about it.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: And funny enough, actually, I posted a video of me walking from the Miss World Pleasant in my swimsuit, and I posted that and I said I want to see some disabled angels.
20:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: And that went crazy around the world.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: That I was like millions of views, hundreds of thousands of likes and comments and everything, and um other people related.
20:58
SPEAKER_00: Other people wanted to see it too.
20:59
SPEAKER_00: Um there's clearly a demand there, and it shows that people want to see people that they relate to.
21:04
SPEAKER_00: A million percent.
21:05
SPEAKER_00: And you know what I love about that post?
21:07
SPEAKER_00: The way you literally you just showed them the vision.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: Like you it was it was you starting your stuff down.
21:15
SPEAKER_00: I chronic, iconic, like you know, we haven't seen it before, but it's right here, and you showed them like you doing that and killing it, like the proof, the visual is there.
21:25
SPEAKER_00: So a million percent, it's something I totally agree on.
21:28
SPEAKER_00: Like, I watched that fashion show as well, I was thinking the same thing, and there's just too many baddies on the internet, even like even in the modeling world, separate to the internet, but there's even those on the internet that I'm like you could do that show, and you could that link like I whenever I was watching it at the time, all I was picturing was Daniela Albus, and I was thinking she was she was literally like she was a Miss Universe pageant like a queen before she lost her leg, and I was like, She's clearly capable, she has the experience.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Experience, she has a disability now.
22:01
SPEAKER_00: Why is someone like her not on that stage?
22:03
SPEAKER_00: She deserves to be there.
22:04
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I was cut out that she wasn't there.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: So I remember I was like, get her on that stage.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
22:09
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, oh my god, please, Victoria's Secret.
22:12
SPEAKER_00: Everybody help us reach out to Victoria's Secret and make sure that Yeah.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: It is that serious.
22:16
SPEAKER_00: Like because that's the thing.
22:17
SPEAKER_00: I feel like people don't think about it.
22:18
SPEAKER_00: People are like, well, why would someone with a disability be there?
22:20
SPEAKER_00: And it's like, well, why wouldn't they be?
22:22
SPEAKER_00: Why wouldn't they be?
22:24
SPEAKER_00: We we were fashion too.
22:25
SPEAKER_00: We need to see ourselves in that fashion.
22:27
SPEAKER_00: I can see someone wear an outfit and think it's absolutely gorgeous on her.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: But if I don't see it on someone with a disability, I'm gonna think, well, maybe I can't wear that.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: So that marketing doesn't work for me.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the day, fashion is marketing as well.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: Because if they're trying to sell a product and there are so many disabled people in the world, it's like they have exactly that market too.
22:45
SPEAKER_00: We shoot to people with disabilities in media more.
22:47
SPEAKER_00: Precisely.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: Like, and it's like, yeah, we we wear that fashion, we deserve the same market, we deserve the representation.
22:52
SPEAKER_00: But then the other thing is like I think it's like one in four people are disabled.
22:56
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: Like people act like it's like a ridiculous minority.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, oh chances are a couple of us would be disabled on that one way.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: Matter of fact.
23:07
SPEAKER_00: And it's the only minority that anybody could join and it's in their life as well.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: I love that one.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: It's a market that needs to be catered to.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: And I I yeah, I really, really cross my fingers.
23:20
SPEAKER_00: We see it more on catwalks.
23:22
SPEAKER_00: Catwalks is one of those things where I get like most excited to see it.
23:25
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's just really, really good because it takes talent and it's like it can be hard to walk a runway and to handle that level of stress and to make sure that you're doing it right and following all the right techniques and everything.
23:34
SPEAKER_00: So it's like disabled people that are talented in that way deserve to be there too.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: Like I was key saying about her.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: She has no idea.
23:40
SPEAKER_00: I'm so like, I'm like, get her on.
23:44
SPEAKER_00: I think like a big takeaway from this episode and your message in general is the fact that your body doesn't need to be hidden in any way, shape, or form.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: And matter of fact, and I feel like you've probably experienced the same thing.
23:56
SPEAKER_00: I feel like once I like stepped into the authenticity of yeah, this disability, but making it your own, like that's when the opportunities sort of start to come.
24:06
SPEAKER_00: And like you're saying earlier, there is a change that people actually want to see.
24:10
SPEAKER_00: How do you hope people see prosthetics differently after this?
24:15
SPEAKER_00: I think my goal is just to try to keep people that having a disability, it's not a bad thing, and being disabled is not a taboo subject.
24:23
SPEAKER_00: People just need to realize that having a disability is okay.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: Um sure there might be some some things that some people can't do with their disabilities.
24:30
SPEAKER_00: For the majority of ways, it's like we just do things a bit differently, and there's nothing wrong with that.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: I think people just see it as this like dreaded thing, and it doesn't have to be that way.
24:38
SPEAKER_00: So I've always just tried to show that like I'm still living a completely healthy life, a completely happy, healthy life with my disability.
24:45
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't hold me back in any sort of way.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: Um, I've done so many things that people would never have imagined I would be able to do because people just get this in their mindset.
24:52
SPEAKER_00: They think that you be if you have a disability, you can't do certain things.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: I actually had this talk, I go into um like I would talk to like groups of children and stuff, and like I also go into prisons and talk to like prisoners and stuff to teach them about disabilities.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: Um before even I was worn treasures, so they can see that I had a obsetic leg.
25:08
SPEAKER_00: And instantly I say, What do you think of when you think of disability and someone being disabled?
25:12
SPEAKER_00: And some of the answers were like, Oh, they can't do things, they can't do this and they can't do that.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Okay, so you think they can't do things, then I'm gonna just show you.
25:19
SPEAKER_00: And then I've gone back and like explaining all the things that I have done, and I was saying, I was saying, you have this in your mind because you don't you're not aware of it, you're just assuming something, and it's just yeah, sometimes that disabled people can do just as much as everybody else.
25:31
SPEAKER_00: People just don't want to believe whenever I got sick, it made me realize that I was like holding myself back my whole life, I wasn't trying anything.
25:37
SPEAKER_00: Then all of a sudden I had like a disability, and then people assumed I wouldn't be able to do things, so I've just always tried to make sure I try to do everything that comes my way to like prove that I can do it.
25:46
SPEAKER_00: The same with the whole misboard thing.
25:47
SPEAKER_00: It's like it wasn't my goal, but I wanted to show that someone like me could do it.
25:51
SPEAKER_00: Um I think I've skydived and everything and landed standing on my one leg in like a flamingo and washed, yeah.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: I went off-road rallying and stuff in a in a car, in a manual car, which with a prosthetic leg you have to drive automatic.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: Because I drive with my left leg, a left accelerator, yeah, and I drove a manual car, which I don't know if it's legal, but I did it um just to prove what I could.
26:11
SPEAKER_00: Um I've done so many things, and then obviously like London by showing like that was such a cool experience, like getting to walk a catwalk, and people would never have assumed that someone like me would be able to do that.
26:20
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, it's just like people wrong and showing that like we're here just the same as everybody else.
26:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I love how you mentioned like driving and that because we have to talk about the fact that you've just got back from Silverstone, right?
26:32
SPEAKER_00: Where you were the first Irish MPT to drive around those secrets.
26:36
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
26:38
SPEAKER_00: I love F1, so immediately I was like, What you know how that all came about?
26:42
SPEAKER_00: You should try it.
26:43
SPEAKER_00: Can you drive?
26:44
SPEAKER_00: Can you have a license?
26:45
SPEAKER_00: Oh well.
26:47
SPEAKER_00: Can you try it?
26:47
SPEAKER_00: I've I've done like my assessment, but I'm at the mobility stage where you need the car to get the blessings, but don't have the space for the car, so that's where we're at.
26:54
SPEAKER_00: Um well, if you get a license, you need to try it.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: There's this amazing charity called Spinal Trek, and they allow people with disability disabilities to drive their adapted cars on on Substrums track.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, so it's really, really, really cool.
27:07
SPEAKER_00: I watch it all the time and I love it.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: I love driving, I love cars, and I always thought that's the same mindset.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: I was like, can someone can someone with a disability drive a car like that?
27:16
SPEAKER_00: Can they compete on a track like that?
27:17
SPEAKER_00: I had never seen it before, and I was thinking, is this possible?
27:20
SPEAKER_00: So I started researching it and I found out about that, that Charlie.
27:23
SPEAKER_00: I reached out and asked Johnny whether I could drive one of their cars on the track, and it all ended up clicking and filled the place, and I got approved, and yeah, I got to drive one of their adopted cars on the track.
27:32
SPEAKER_00: So it's amazing.
27:34
SPEAKER_00: And even what they do for people with disabilities, they gave them that chance.
27:38
SPEAKER_00: Because again, there could be so many people that have disability around the world that had a huge interest in motorsports, someone maybe super super super talented that could compete on that track and they're just not getting that handship because it's not being seen as something that's needed, and it is.
27:50
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, they're they're gonna really hard to change that, which is really, really cool.
27:54
SPEAKER_00: That must have felt amazing.
27:56
SPEAKER_00: Do you know how fast you went?
27:58
SPEAKER_00: Oh god.
27:59
SPEAKER_00: Well, there was other oh my god, and you know it's so funny during the um during the briefing, the guy was like, Is there anybody who's driving a Silverstone for the first time?
28:06
SPEAKER_00: So I was like, Me, and he's like, Is there anybody who's driving at a track for the first time?
28:10
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Me, and then he was like, If this is anybody's first time ever under driving at Silverstone on this day, you're very, very brave because there was a week, there's a race this weekend and there were so many professional drivers on the track at the same time.
28:23
SPEAKER_00: I was like driving alongside like Ferraris and Lambos and everything, and I was just there, I was like, Oh my god.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I I loved the experience, it was it was crazy driving against people like people that are so fast.
28:34
SPEAKER_00: It was my first ever time driving on a track like that.
28:36
SPEAKER_00: Um, because it's so different from driving on a road.
28:40
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I feel like if I had more like more chances to go back and practice there, I could maybe actually be good because I had an instructor in the car with me and he was he was laughing and he was like, Well, you're clearly you're clearly really good at it with a throttle, but you're not so good with a brick because I was just like speeding the whole time.
28:56
SPEAKER_00: So I'm I would need to get better at my braking, but I didn't love the experience.
28:59
SPEAKER_00: It was like a bucket list thing for me for sure.
29:01
SPEAKER_00: No, that sounds incredible.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: Like, I feel like once I get my license, we need to go back and like race each other.
29:07
SPEAKER_00: You would love it.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: It's so so kill.
29:09
SPEAKER_00: Your social media is just a whirlwind.
29:11
SPEAKER_00: I like I love it so much.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, I still keep chatting.
29:15
SPEAKER_00: I've seen your stuff reshared like all over the joint, all throughout, like for for years, you know, not not realized, and it was you doing all of these crazy things, right?
29:24
SPEAKER_00: Which is really cool.
29:25
SPEAKER_00: And one thing I saw which I really want to talk to you about was like the road leg.
29:29
SPEAKER_00: I actually had a moment like way back when, ages ago, which I don't know, I don't know actually how ethical it was, but like genuinely I was like, oh my god, no, because customized prosthetics are the future of marketing.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: I was like, Louis Vuitton arms, let's go, get me on the fillboards.
29:48
SPEAKER_00: And then somebody was like, Don't you think that's a bit bad, like you're promoting brands on your arms?
29:53
SPEAKER_00: But I love the fact that you know it's it's a brand you obviously really like, yeah, and the arm looked beautiful.
30:00
SPEAKER_00: And I was wondering if you could tell me about that.
30:02
SPEAKER_00: Did you literally just like look road and were like, hell, let's put it on my leg?
30:06
SPEAKER_00: You know what?
30:06
SPEAKER_00: It kind of stemmed from I just had the idea.
30:09
SPEAKER_00: I was thinking there's so many marketing elements where people could be including people with disabilities, and they aren't.
30:15
SPEAKER_00: And there's so many people that are are massive fans of brands, could like to do something like that, like the road leg.
30:20
SPEAKER_00: It's like I love the brand, I would happily have a road leg.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: I think that's so cool.
30:23
SPEAKER_00: And people realize when it comes to brands like that, there's like there's like fan, there's like fans, fan groups that like love the product, people that collect every single launch and they love being a part of it in that way.
30:33
SPEAKER_00: And then when it comes to people with disabilities, it's like an extra wee thing to have.
30:37
SPEAKER_00: I think I think I just think it's so so cool.
30:39
SPEAKER_00: And I was thinking the option of customising your mobility aid in a way for a brand that could work so so well in a campaign.
30:48
SPEAKER_00: It's good advertising for them.
30:49
SPEAKER_00: If you're a fan of the brand, you obvious you obviously love it, but then for other people with a disability seeing that I feel like is really really cool.
30:57
SPEAKER_00: And then you're seeing all these groups of people that collect all the things from all the launches, but then as a disabled person, if I seen someone with obsetic leg that had like the Rogue logo on it, I'd be like, Oh my god, they're just like me and they love the brand too, that's so so cool.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: So my thought process behind it was just like it's an it's another way to include the the disabled community, but it's also really really cool technique for the marketing girls or boys.
31:20
SPEAKER_00: So I'm seeing it from my my mindset, but um, but yeah, it's just like it's just kind of trying to make that obvious and say, like, you're messing out somewhere that you could be missing out.
31:28
SPEAKER_00: Like I imagine your arms, for example, imagine your your arms done on all road and you had the products in your hand.
31:33
SPEAKER_00: Imagine that how sick would that be.
31:35
SPEAKER_00: I would love to do that.
31:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I would love to say that.
31:38
SPEAKER_00: That it was just like showed that as a thing, and it was so cool because I posted it and I had the idea and I th I thought it would be cool, but I wanted to post it as well to show like how other people would think of it too.
31:49
SPEAKER_00: And so many disabled people loved that.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: It it did so so well on social media, like I couldn't believe how well it actually did.
31:55
SPEAKER_00: It did amazing, um, and it all worked out in the end anyway, because I I just got LinkedIn at the start of this year, um and I have a friend who's like the head of their like marketing people, so I'm like in my team, roads team.
32:07
SPEAKER_00: So I'm like, remind me to connect with you on LinkedIn.
32:11
SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes.
32:12
SPEAKER_00: I'm very new to it, I don't really know what I'm doing.
32:14
SPEAKER_00: But um, yeah, so that's so cool.
32:17
SPEAKER_00: And like I I kind of always thought of it the same way.
32:19
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes brands are a little flashy, and we're when we're like like we wanna customize, like we're m turning our medical devices into like cool accessories as well as like functional devices.
32:30
SPEAKER_00: It's like it's just like having a cool handbag, except a million times cooler.
32:35
SPEAKER_00: That's exactly how I see it.
32:36
SPEAKER_00: It's just another accessory, and we can have it customized to things that we love too.
32:40
SPEAKER_00: Um people wear outfits of brands that they love.
32:42
SPEAKER_00: I show my leg all the time.
32:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm not always in trousers, so maybe I'll have my trouser my leg designed in like a brand similar to like trousers that I like.
32:50
SPEAKER_00: Like we have wheater discs and stuff, and um like we have a denim disc and everything too, like the same way that like people wear jeans, but it's like given to like different reasons, so yeah, I can't think they hear them.
33:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh my goodness.
33:03
SPEAKER_00: Okay, I have like two last questions.
33:06
SPEAKER_00: One for fun, one's a bit more you know, future focused.
33:10
SPEAKER_00: But um I imagine that you have quite the collection of legs like I do of um.
33:17
SPEAKER_00: And I was wondering if you had a favourite.
33:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I think out of all the legs that I actually have my ble my blade is sitting right in front of me, actually.
33:26
SPEAKER_00: My blade poked up blade.
33:28
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god.
33:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I I just love changing them all, but um I would say out of all the legs that I've done or ha or had, I would still say my rose gold is my complete favourite.
33:39
SPEAKER_00: Because like my my instant when I first found that I was like my egg, I obviously wanted a chrome.
33:43
SPEAKER_00: I love that really robotic look.
33:45
SPEAKER_00: Um, so the chromes are definitely my favourite foot.
33:47
SPEAKER_00: The the rose gold is just like the one for me, I think.
33:50
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
33:51
SPEAKER_00: Is there anything that you've seen other people make using the kits where you're like, oh my god, I wish I would have thought of that, or is this really weird or really cool?
33:59
SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't know.
34:00
SPEAKER_00: People people always send us different suggestions and everything about what they want, like for new kits, which is really cute.
34:04
SPEAKER_00: Like I've had people say I'm like gingham and stuff, like they want things like that.
34:08
SPEAKER_00: Um because right now we've launched like pretty plain ones and we've launched like mini kits so people can add on to it and take it off whenever they want.
34:14
SPEAKER_00: Um but yeah, there's there's so many ideas coming about, but um it's like trying to get it all done for everybody.
34:19
SPEAKER_00: Like we're only we should I need to get like more people with me.
34:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, oh my goodness, you're gonna take over the world with this.
34:26
SPEAKER_00: I literally cannot wait to see all of the killer proset eggs, and I feel like I bet they'll they'll show up on Victoria's Secret runway at one point in the last time.
34:36
SPEAKER_00: I love like that's my goal with like the discs and stuff too.
34:39
SPEAKER_00: Like, I love the thought of like someone in a wheelchair being on a catwalk, and then the disc is representing the brown in the same way that the clothes would things like that.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: And the way you can see like that would look so curtain, so seamless, and I just don't see why they wouldn't have people with disabilities and wheelchairs and stuff on the catwalk when there's like options like that available.
34:58
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, it's just showing that that it's there.
35:01
SPEAKER_00: It's definitely there.
35:02
SPEAKER_00: And this is just the beginning.
35:03
SPEAKER_00: It's so excited.
35:04
SPEAKER_00: I'm literally gonna have to figure this out and get my own hand done.
35:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm literally gonna be, I don't know, I'll be I don't know if you have like a catalogue or something, but I'll go, I'll go have a little gander.
35:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, you're the epitome of what happens when you refuse to let like a medical label decide how something gets to look and how you're gonna live.
35:25
SPEAKER_00: What is like your next steps for RhapSthetic?
35:29
SPEAKER_00: And is there anything coming up that you can tell us about that's like, I don't know, just in the pipeline?
35:35
SPEAKER_00: Well, with RaphSthetic, um, we've actually just partnered with a shopping centre locally, but it's the biggest shopping centre in Northern Ireland, um, because we've noticed that like venues and shopping centres arenas, they'll always have waiters on site for the disabled customers, but they're never really branded in the same way that everything else in the venue is.
35:50
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of time when you're on the weacher, you're still having to go around far to find the signs to find all the information that you might need.
35:56
SPEAKER_00: So I'm not able to change that.
35:57
SPEAKER_00: So I tried to reach out to them, um, and I pretty much pitched the idea of getting like branded discs in the same way they would brand everything else in the center.
36:05
SPEAKER_00: But not only that, we wanted to have a QR code on disk with direct access to the information that any disabled person might need.
36:11
SPEAKER_00: Um link directly to their accessibility page and the facilities.
36:15
SPEAKER_00: And I meant then that people aren't having to go around the centre, they can literally just stand up straight away on the phone where they are and have that information when they need it.
36:22
SPEAKER_00: Um and that's something that's never been done before.
36:24
SPEAKER_00: So it's like it's trying to and make sure it's available for disabled people all around the place in different shopping centres, supermarkets, arenas, venue, any venue.
36:33
SPEAKER_00: Um, that's like a big rapsetic goal for me, I feel like.
36:36
SPEAKER_00: And for me, I actually just showed you my blade.
36:39
SPEAKER_00: So I haven't learned to run yet.
36:41
SPEAKER_00: It's just so funny because that was like quite hard for me to actually get started with all that there.
36:46
SPEAKER_00: I I wanted to learn to run because I'm a very sporty person, and when I first got the chance to run, I had to run on a small training blade that was for kids, and that running on that was such a good experience, and that was recorded, and then that was sent to Team GB and Team Ireland, and they both at the time wanted wanted to meet me and wanted to train me for the Paralympics, but I was so busy that I didn't do it.
37:04
SPEAKER_00: Um girl, that that proof meant that I was able to get my blade.
37:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then with my blade, I've just been so busy that that I've never had the chance to actually learn to run.
37:13
SPEAKER_00: And we have this incredible athlete here in Node Island called Lady Mary Peters, and she has a track and everything here, and she's such an icon here, she's so so cool.
37:22
SPEAKER_00: The best athlete I feel like I know from here, and I've said to her, would she be the one that's willing to train me by learning to run?
37:28
SPEAKER_00: And she said yeah, which is really really cool.
37:30
SPEAKER_00: So I think I'm gonna do a series with her as I learn to run and learn all the techniques everything from her.
37:34
SPEAKER_00: She's literally like a sporting legend, so um I feel like there's no one better.
37:38
SPEAKER_00: So I feel like that's my next little mini mini-series I'm gonna do.
37:40
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be learning to run with Lydia Marie Peters.
37:42
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, that is so exciting for you.
37:45
SPEAKER_00: I cannot wait.
37:46
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, that is so cool.
37:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, like congratulations.
37:51
SPEAKER_00: And like best of luck on that journey, because I imagine it's like not the easiest thing to like, you know, relearn to do all of that again.
37:58
SPEAKER_00: But you're in you're in good company.
38:00
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, imagine we actually saw you in like a paralympic to the crazy about the crazy mad.
38:07
SPEAKER_00: I see it, I see it happening and a leg, a big sporty leg.
38:11
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, yes, you can have a little leg.
38:13
SPEAKER_00: You can decorate however you want.
38:14
SPEAKER_00: That's a killer.
38:15
SPEAKER_00: Brennadette, thank you so, so, so much for taking the time to chat to me.
38:19
SPEAKER_00: And for anybody who wants to follow along with this journey, the incredible content you already post, and this new series of you learning to run, I think that is so cool.
38:28
SPEAKER_00: Where can we find you and follow your story?
38:31
SPEAKER_00: I'm at Brennadette Higgins on everything that I have.
38:34
SPEAKER_00: So I'm mainly on Instagram and TikTok, but yeah, just that.
38:37
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for having me.
38:39
SPEAKER_00: Of course, thank you.
38:40
SPEAKER_00: Honestly, it was so, so, so nice to finally meet you.
38:42
SPEAKER_00: Best of luck with everything.
38:44
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
38:45
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
38:46
SPEAKER_00: Bye.
38:46
SPEAKER_00: Bye.
38:55
SPEAKER_00: What a gal.
38:56
SPEAKER_00: She is literally a girl of my own heart.
38:58
SPEAKER_00: Like, what do you mean?
39:00
SPEAKER_00: Just have the exact same takes on so many things.
39:03
SPEAKER_00: She really didn't let any of the stigma or like the taboo stop her from like stepping into herself after amputation.
39:09
SPEAKER_00: Like, it just hurt through and through.
39:12
SPEAKER_00: And that really shines through in like all of her content.
39:15
SPEAKER_00: So, so super inspiring.
39:16
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Telly Talks Tech.
39:19
SPEAKER_00: Please do let me know if you enjoyed it.
39:21
SPEAKER_00: Make sure to like, comment, subscribe, share with a friend.
39:24
SPEAKER_00: Stay tuned because I have new ambitions to go learn to drive and go on solid stone tour.
39:30
SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for listening, and I'll see you next time.