WEBVTT - Gloria Feldt 0:00:03.360 --> 0:00:06.960 I'm Sam Edis and I'm Amy Nelson. Welcome to What's 0:00:06.960 --> 0:00:09.559 Her Story? With Sam and Amy. This is a show 0:00:09.640 --> 0:00:15.400 about the world's most remarkable women, their professional and personal journeys. Together, 0:00:15.480 --> 0:00:19.200 we'll hear from Gold medalists, best selling authors, and leaders 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:22.840 of the world's most iconic brands. Listen every Thursday, or 0:00:22.920 --> 0:00:27.880 join the conversation anytime on Instagram at What's Her Story Podcast. 0:00:30.400 --> 0:00:33.519 Gloria Felt was the CEO and President of Planned Parenthood 0:00:33.560 --> 0:00:38.000 from to two thousand five, the world's largest reproductive health 0:00:38.000 --> 0:00:41.839 and advocacy organization. She was named by Vanity Fair one 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:46.080 of America's Top two hundred Women Leaders, Legends and Trailblazers, 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:52.239 and the Glamour Women of the Year. Most people know 0:00:52.400 --> 0:00:57.600 you today as a women's leadership expert, but your history 0:00:58.000 --> 0:01:01.520 is perhaps one of the most fascinating things about you. 0:01:01.520 --> 0:01:08.040 You went from being a teen mom to leading Planned Parenthood. Well, 0:01:08.120 --> 0:01:10.840 I think it was very symmetrical that I would go 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:13.640 from being knowing what it's like to be a very 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:19.840 young mother to understanding the struggles that women have to 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:23.280 wanting to help all women be able to plan in 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:27.720 space their childbearing, and so it really was a fairly 0:01:27.800 --> 0:01:34.080 seamless thing. But I really got my my grounding in 0:01:34.800 --> 0:01:37.160 volunteer work that I did for the civil rights movement. 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:40.480 After I had had my three children and I was 0:01:40.600 --> 0:01:44.480 twenty years old, and I sort of woke up. And 0:01:44.560 --> 0:01:47.800 partly it was because the birth control pill came out. 0:01:48.400 --> 0:01:51.040 Right about this, share with us, what was it like 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:54.000 to become a teen mom? Was it intentional? Was it 0:01:54.120 --> 0:01:57.400 a surprise? How did people in your family react? It 0:01:57.440 --> 0:02:00.320 didn't take me long to realize I had not made 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:05.520 the wisest choice. But here's the thing. I had grown 0:02:05.600 --> 0:02:08.880 up in small Texas towns. The little town where I 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:11.880 went to high school called Stanford is very like if 0:02:11.880 --> 0:02:14.280 you've ever seen the movie or read the book The 0:02:14.360 --> 0:02:18.400 Last Picture Show by Larry McMurtry. It's one of those 0:02:18.480 --> 0:02:23.120 dying West Texas towns. And it was a great place 0:02:23.160 --> 0:02:26.040 to be a teenager because you could you know, it 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:31.520 was like everybody knew everybody and it was one great community. 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:36.680 It felt that way. But girls were not given aspirations 0:02:37.639 --> 0:02:42.840 for careers or even in particular going to college. The 0:02:43.320 --> 0:02:46.360 girls who were rewarded were those who were engaged and 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:49.600 married early, like in high school or right out of 0:02:49.680 --> 0:02:54.120 high school and having children and being a support system 0:02:54.160 --> 0:02:59.760 for everybody else. It was not unrelated that my family 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:04.280 is the only Jewish family in town in the Bible Belt, 0:03:05.080 --> 0:03:07.800 where the first question everybody asked you is where you 0:03:07.840 --> 0:03:10.880 go to church? And it was you know, even to 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:14.320 this day, my high school colleagues, who I still love 0:03:14.440 --> 0:03:16.760 and in touch and in touch with, they never let 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:20.120 me forget that I am different. They never let me 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:24.360 forget that. And I hated being different because what does 0:03:24.400 --> 0:03:28.440 a teenager want. A teenager wants to fit in. A 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:31.520 teenager wants to be the class favorite, which I got 0:03:31.520 --> 0:03:35.880 to be. A teenage girl in football crazy Texas wants 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:38.480 to be a cheerleader, which I got to be. So 0:03:39.200 --> 0:03:41.440 you know, I got to be the All American girl. 0:03:41.520 --> 0:03:44.560 And that was that was the flip side of that 0:03:44.800 --> 0:03:48.760 was that I bought the whole culture. You know, there 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:51.400 was no sex education other than a book that my 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:54.080 father gave me when I was thirteen, Bless his Heart, 0:03:54.600 --> 0:04:00.520 which made me very popular at summer camp. But and 0:04:00.600 --> 0:04:03.320 it got just completely worn out by all all my 0:04:03.400 --> 0:04:07.160 friends at summer camp. And you know, I hadn't really 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:09.680 I would say the kinds of things that we talk 0:04:09.720 --> 0:04:14.600 a lot about now, Teaching our children just didn't happen. 0:04:14.680 --> 0:04:16.920 Then you were kind of allowed to just grow up. 0:04:17.720 --> 0:04:21.520 And I made not the wisest choices, and yet at 0:04:21.560 --> 0:04:27.680 the same time life turned out pretty well. So I 0:04:27.720 --> 0:04:30.320 think that having those children at that stage of my 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:35.120 life forced me to grow up really quickly, forced me 0:04:35.240 --> 0:04:41.000 to take on levels of responsibility that taught me the 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:42.880 things that I needed to know later on when I 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:45.000 became a CEO. What kind of a mom were you 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:48.120 then in Texas? And what kind of a mom was I? 0:04:48.120 --> 0:04:53.200 You'd have to ask my children that, Um they were um, 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:55.680 you know, as one of my children said, you did 0:04:55.720 --> 0:05:00.080 the best you could. And I think that there's a 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:03.200 lot of truth of that. I was a very engaged 0:05:03.240 --> 0:05:07.640 mom and my children were the center of my life, 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:14.360 partly because I had ideas about how I wanted them 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:17.760 to grow up. And of course, your children never do 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:21.680 what you think you want them to do. But I 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:25.360 did have ideas about that that I tried to inculcate 0:05:26.120 --> 0:05:28.960 and uh to, you know, to a greater or lesser extent. 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:33.240 But there again, my children grew up in Odessa, Texas, 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:39.000 the home of Friday night lights, and they graduated from 0:05:39.000 --> 0:05:41.440 Permian High School. So I'm telling you that was the 0:05:41.480 --> 0:05:44.359 story of our life, right there, a documentary of our life. 0:05:45.320 --> 0:05:48.520 And so the culture had changed. The culture changes for 0:05:48.600 --> 0:05:51.680 each generation, and you may think you know how you 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:54.480 want to raise your children, but something will be different 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:57.480 for them that you will not understand. At that point, 0:05:58.080 --> 0:06:03.760 you were a teen mom raising kids with this husband 0:06:03.839 --> 0:06:08.279 who was also a teenager. Right. What led to the 0:06:08.440 --> 0:06:11.640 end of your marriage and what was your ambition like 0:06:11.720 --> 0:06:13.800 at that point. Did you always just think you were 0:06:13.800 --> 0:06:16.640 going to be a wife and that was it. I 0:06:16.720 --> 0:06:21.080 wanted to be the perfect Susie homemaker wife, and then 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:22.840 I found out it wasn't quite as much fun as 0:06:22.880 --> 0:06:25.400 I thought it was going to be. So I started 0:06:25.440 --> 0:06:28.440 to college when my youngest was four months old, and 0:06:28.800 --> 0:06:32.520 as I started learning about the world and being more 0:06:32.560 --> 0:06:37.680 a part of the world outside of my family, I 0:06:38.040 --> 0:06:42.039 started changing. But things were also changing in society. You 0:06:42.120 --> 0:06:44.920 asked me about my husband. He was nineteen when we 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:49.200 were married, and I would say that as parents who 0:06:49.200 --> 0:06:54.839 were that young, we did pretty well, and we were fortunate. 0:06:55.000 --> 0:06:58.640 We always had a roof over our head, and we 0:06:58.640 --> 0:07:02.040 we never had a lot of money, but we weren't destitute, 0:07:02.800 --> 0:07:06.520 and we had parents who were reasonably supportive. I always 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:09.520 say my my father had a clothing factory, so I 0:07:09.520 --> 0:07:12.840 always had fabric and I made clothes for everybody. And 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:15.960 my ex husband's family had a farm, so I always 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:18.840 had great food. So we were good. But as with 0:07:18.920 --> 0:07:22.840 most teenage marriages after eighteen years, by that time we 0:07:22.880 --> 0:07:28.080 had just become completely different people from each other. And um, 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:30.840 we still respect each other, we're still in touch, but 0:07:31.360 --> 0:07:34.240 it was time to move on for both of us. 0:07:34.680 --> 0:07:37.000 When you went back to college when your youngest child 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:42.000 was four months old, like, that wasn't probably expected, right, 0:07:42.040 --> 0:07:44.520 maybe even by yourself. It's like, how did your family 0:07:44.560 --> 0:07:46.120 react to that? How did your husband react to that? 0:07:46.760 --> 0:07:49.120 Your parents? Like, what did they think of you? My 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:54.320 family was delighted because they had always assumed I would 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:57.160 go to college, and you know that I would at 0:07:57.240 --> 0:07:59.760 least have an education, whether I did it as a 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:04.560 fessional thing or not. They they valued education, and I 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:07.400 remember my father gave me fifty dollars for my first 0:08:07.440 --> 0:08:15.000 semester's tuition, and my husband's parents were not so appreciative 0:08:15.080 --> 0:08:18.320 of it. They thought it was not a good idea 0:08:18.400 --> 0:08:20.720 for me to leave the children even the two days 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:22.960 a week that I that I took my classes. I 0:08:23.040 --> 0:08:27.000 was very careful to take my classes all Tuesdays and Thursdays. 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:30.640 And there was a lovely young woman who was a 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:33.360 neighbor who would come to our house and knew the 0:08:33.440 --> 0:08:36.240 children and took care of them. So I knew they 0:08:36.240 --> 0:08:40.520 were they were well taken care of. But my husband's 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:45.080 family was not so pleased. Although they weren't terribly vocal 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:48.200 about it, I would say that that my husband was 0:08:48.360 --> 0:08:52.320 reasonably supportive. He wasn't he wasn't going to change his behavior. 0:08:52.400 --> 0:08:54.440 As long as I was still doing the cooking and 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:57.319 cleaning and taking care of the kids, he was fine 0:08:57.360 --> 0:09:01.480 with it. So it took me twelve years to finish 0:09:01.880 --> 0:09:05.520 because I was taking courses more slowly because there was 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:09.840 only a community college in Odessa, Texas at the time. 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:12.680 And that was good, as it turns out, because it 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:15.520 gave me some time to get involved in community service work. 0:09:16.320 --> 0:09:19.760 You know, from my youngest years, I saw my grandmother volunteering. 0:09:19.840 --> 0:09:22.560 My my mother and father were you know, they volunteered 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:25.880 for things, and so following that pattern, I got involved 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.959 with the civil rights movement, and that's where I learned 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:33.880 that people can change things. People working together can change things, 0:09:34.000 --> 0:09:37.000 even if they start with very little power. At what 0:09:37.120 --> 0:09:41.360 point did you decide to join Planned Parenthood? As I 0:09:41.440 --> 0:09:43.680 was doing the work in the civil rights movement, I 0:09:43.720 --> 0:09:45.960 noticed that women were doing the frontline work and the 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:49.080 men were getting most of the leadership positions on credit. 0:09:49.800 --> 0:09:54.480 So you know, the lightbulbs start going off, and I 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:59.640 started getting more interested in helping women in general, and 0:10:00.720 --> 0:10:03.800 I was I was volunteering for a head Start, and 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:06.480 then I was offered a job at head Start, so 0:10:06.679 --> 0:10:08.880 I was. I taught head Start for five years and 0:10:08.960 --> 0:10:12.360 during that time, one of my teaching colleagues, and believe 0:10:12.360 --> 0:10:14.920 it or not, the priest of her church, we're on 0:10:15.000 --> 0:10:17.719 the local plan parented board. It was a brand new 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:23.560 little affiliate in the early nineteen seventies, and she asked 0:10:23.559 --> 0:10:26.880 me to do some volunteer work for Planned Parenthood. And 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:30.640 that was actually my introduction to the organization. So it 0:10:30.720 --> 0:10:33.960 wasn't a oh, my goodness, I'm going to go get 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:37.240 involved with Planned Parenthood. It was my colleague said, would 0:10:37.280 --> 0:10:40.400 you serve on this committee? And I said yes, and 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:44.080 I went to my first They invited me to attend 0:10:44.080 --> 0:10:46.640 a board meeting So I went to my first board 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:50.720 meeting and they were arguing about whether to serve teens 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:56.280 on their own consent. Again, as a teen mom, I'm thinking, yeah, yeah, 0:10:56.320 --> 0:11:01.040 you should. And they finally voted that after a girl 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:05.800 had had one quote illegitimate child, then she could get 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:10.160 birth control on her own consent. And the county judge 0:11:10.240 --> 0:11:12.960 was on the board, this tall, lanky guy, and he 0:11:13.480 --> 0:11:16.000 leans back in his chair and puts his boots boot 0:11:16.120 --> 0:11:18.199 up on the table and he says, well, now, if 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:20.480 that ain't shutting the barn door after the cow's done 0:11:20.520 --> 0:11:25.720 got out, And I'm like, what is this organization? Who 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:32.880 are these people? So I really didn't have anything to 0:11:32.920 --> 0:11:34.880 do with it for a while. I mean it was 0:11:35.000 --> 0:11:37.200 I wasn't that turned off, but I you know, I 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:40.199 just didn't get that engaged with it. So a few 0:11:40.280 --> 0:11:43.080 years later, the University of Texas opens a branch in Odessa. 0:11:43.280 --> 0:11:45.920 I enrolled so I can finish my degree, planning to 0:11:45.960 --> 0:11:50.120 be a high school social studies teacher. And the last 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:53.280 course that I took was an ecology course, and I 0:11:53.360 --> 0:11:56.719 decided I would do my paper on this little plan 0:11:56.840 --> 0:12:00.679 parent an affiliate. I called the executive director and ask 0:12:00.720 --> 0:12:03.640 her if I could interview her. And I interviewed her, 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:06.320 a nurse practitioner, a couple of board members, and two 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:08.640 weeks later she called me and she said, I'm leaving. 0:12:08.679 --> 0:12:12.559 I think you should submit a resume. And I thought, well, 0:12:12.600 --> 0:12:15.120 I've never had a formal job interview before. I've never 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:18.679 had a resume. I'm imminently unqualified. I am in no 0:12:18.760 --> 0:12:21.960 danger of being hired, but it'll be great experience to 0:12:22.120 --> 0:12:25.480 go and have this interview. And so I went for 0:12:25.520 --> 0:12:27.559 an interview, and then I went for a second interview, 0:12:27.559 --> 0:12:29.440 and lo and behold they offered me the job. And 0:12:29.480 --> 0:12:31.920 I have no idea to this day why I was 0:12:31.920 --> 0:12:34.240 foolish enough to say yes when I had no idea 0:12:34.280 --> 0:12:36.800 what I was doing. But it sounded kind of interesting, 0:12:37.280 --> 0:12:40.600 so I said yes, and there we are. Thirty years later, 0:12:40.640 --> 0:12:43.040 I retired as the national President. You just never know 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:45.800 where life will take you if you just say yes. Well, 0:12:45.840 --> 0:12:49.000 Amy and I always say that we're we're big yes people. 0:12:49.120 --> 0:12:51.240 We love to say yes to things. And there's so 0:12:51.360 --> 0:12:54.560 much rhetoric for women on how you should say no 0:12:54.880 --> 0:12:58.000 and say no to all these opportunities, and and doors 0:12:58.040 --> 0:13:00.120 closed when you say no, and they open when you 0:13:00.160 --> 0:13:03.520 say yes. And so when you say something, you just 0:13:03.559 --> 0:13:05.360 said something that struck me. You said, I don't know 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:08.040 why I was foolish enough to take it, But I 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:10.040 really don't think that speaks to who you are. You 0:13:10.080 --> 0:13:14.679 are such a positive person, and through all of the 0:13:14.720 --> 0:13:18.880 battles you face throughout your life, you maintain a smile 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:23.000 and a positivity about people working together. Where does that 0:13:23.080 --> 0:13:26.640 come from? It's so funny. I am often asked, particularly 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:30.280 by younger women, why I look like I'm so optimistic 0:13:30.400 --> 0:13:33.319 in spite of all of the things that they're encountering 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:37.480 every day. So when I look back, I can say, well, 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:40.000 it's because I have seen that you can make change. 0:13:40.000 --> 0:13:42.959 And again, I'll go back to those early days of 0:13:43.040 --> 0:13:47.720 seeing in the Civil rights movement people without any power, 0:13:47.840 --> 0:13:51.480 without any money, yet getting together and making some of 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:56.600 the most profound and fundamental change for our whole country, 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:59.760 and and just knowing that you can, you can have 0:13:59.800 --> 0:14:03.360 an impact, knowing that what you do does make a difference, 0:14:04.000 --> 0:14:08.000 really drives me. And I would say that the other 0:14:08.600 --> 0:14:11.920 piece of it for me is that at this point 0:14:11.960 --> 0:14:16.360 in my life, almost every day I get either an 0:14:16.400 --> 0:14:20.360 email or a call or something comes from someone that 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:26.760 says you helped me in this way. You you saved 0:14:26.800 --> 0:14:30.360 my life. You you know now with the courses that 0:14:30.440 --> 0:14:34.680 I'm teaching, I I hear, Okay, I took this course, 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:37.440 and I would have never valued myself enough to apply 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.800 for that next job. But now I know the value 0:14:40.840 --> 0:14:43.240 I bring and so I did and I got it. 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:46.320 And those are the things that you know, even the 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:53.280 small things that feed my passion, that feed my optimism, 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:56.800 and to know that that we can we can make 0:14:56.920 --> 0:14:59.120 change in this world. We can do that. And now 0:14:59.440 --> 0:15:04.440 a quick later in your life, you wrote a book 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:08.560 about power, women in power, and women's relationship to power. 0:15:09.560 --> 0:15:10.840 I think I have a good sense of where your 0:15:10.880 --> 0:15:12.880 relationship is now to power, and I think it's part 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:15.800 of your optimism. But like, where was your relationship with 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:19.000 power at that point in your life? You know where, 0:15:19.040 --> 0:15:21.560 You've graduated college, You've been part of the civil rights movement, 0:15:21.600 --> 0:15:23.800 You've worked for head Start for five years. At this point, 0:15:23.840 --> 0:15:27.000 you have raised three kids. Really, so, like, what was 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:29.920 your relationship with power? Like? Then I have to answer 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:32.320 that question by going back to my teen years where 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:36.520 I did not feel that I had power, I did 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:40.000 not feel that I had the ability to determine the 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:43.000 course of my own life. And it was obviously was 0:15:43.120 --> 0:15:49.640 very responsive instead of proactive about things. And I I'm 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.160 fortunate that my father always told me I could do 0:15:53.360 --> 0:15:57.720 anything my pretty little head desired. That was his language. 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:02.720 And I witnessed my mother a woman who felt she 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:06.640 couldn't in fact, do much of anything that she wanted 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:10.040 to do. That she was always doing what someone else 0:16:10.280 --> 0:16:13.320 wanted her to do, and it was not. Her big 0:16:13.320 --> 0:16:16.320 rebellion in life was at fifty she became a c 0:16:16.440 --> 0:16:20.520 p A and that was it was huge, but because 0:16:20.520 --> 0:16:25.040 she was extremely brilliant, So my female role model was 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:29.200 not empowered, as it were. But I did have that 0:16:29.240 --> 0:16:31.360 little voice in the back of my head that kept 0:16:31.400 --> 0:16:35.280 coming back to me. So once I had started to 0:16:35.400 --> 0:16:39.400 college and started on you know, meeting other women who 0:16:39.440 --> 0:16:43.520 were involved in the community or or involved in careers, 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:47.800 I slowly began to realize that I guess I do. 0:16:47.960 --> 0:16:51.960 I guess I can determine the course of my fate 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:55.200 as opposed to simply letting it happen to me. And 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:59.000 it wasn't any one thing. It was a lengthy process, 0:16:59.080 --> 0:17:01.720 and I will tell you to this day, I still 0:17:01.760 --> 0:17:05.639 have my moments I will catch myself, you know, I 0:17:05.680 --> 0:17:08.800 will catch myself using language that sounds like I'm a 0:17:08.800 --> 0:17:12.560 powerless little girl, and I'm like, what's wrong with you? 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:18.200 But these cultural things are hard to overcome. However, the 0:17:17.720 --> 0:17:20.440 the the other piece of that is that the more 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:26.240 you use your courage muscles, the more powerful you will feel. 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:32.880 And so taking risks. I love seeing people encouraging young 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:35.960 girls today to play sports and to take all kinds 0:17:36.000 --> 0:17:40.520 of risks, because that's how you get a feeling of 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:45.520 being powerful, and that's how you grow those courage muscles 0:17:45.600 --> 0:17:48.159 and in willingness to take on things even if you 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:51.040 may not succeed. So what was it like for you 0:17:51.119 --> 0:17:56.720 to take over a national role at Planned Parenthood. There's 0:17:56.720 --> 0:18:00.199 a story I have to tell you about when it 0:18:00.240 --> 0:18:02.720 was all happening that I was having to decide whether 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:06.359 to even apply for that position. So I ran the 0:18:06.359 --> 0:18:08.840 affiliate in West Texas for four years. At that point 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:12.639 I was ready to move to a larger community, larger affiliate. 0:18:12.840 --> 0:18:15.720 The I went to Phoenix. I I was in Phoenix 0:18:15.720 --> 0:18:18.679 and ran the Arizona affiliate for eight years, for eighteen years, 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:20.920 and at that point I was getting kind of bored 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:23.880 I was ready to I wanted to start writing books then. 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:26.840 That was actually my goal at that time, and I 0:18:26.920 --> 0:18:29.040 had set up my life so that I could take 0:18:29.080 --> 0:18:31.359 a year or two off and and write a book. 0:18:32.000 --> 0:18:34.840 And at that time there was an opening for the 0:18:34.920 --> 0:18:38.240 national Planned Parenthood position, and I was being heavily, heavily 0:18:38.240 --> 0:18:42.680 heavily recruited. About that time, my husband and I went 0:18:42.720 --> 0:18:45.360 on a hike on the Milford Track in New Zealand, 0:18:46.400 --> 0:18:51.960 and um, I discovered the first day that I would 0:18:52.040 --> 0:18:54.639 have to face some fears that I didn't know I 0:18:54.680 --> 0:18:57.600 was going to have to face. I am terrified of 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:00.879 suspension bridges, and it turned doubt that I would have 0:19:00.920 --> 0:19:04.240 to cross twenty two really rickety. I mean these weren't 0:19:04.280 --> 0:19:08.679 like nice metal big bridges like we see here, but 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:13.560 there's little rickety wooden planks with maybe one line of 0:19:13.720 --> 0:19:16.560 wire on the side that you could hold onto. Well, 0:19:16.680 --> 0:19:19.359 I mean I freeze up. I just I'm terrified. And 0:19:19.440 --> 0:19:22.320 I get to the first bridge and I'm clutching my 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:26.160 walking stick like like it will save me, and people 0:19:26.160 --> 0:19:28.320 are lining up behind me. Only one person at a 0:19:28.320 --> 0:19:31.679 time can cross this bridge. So I start across the 0:19:31.720 --> 0:19:36.440 bridge finally by by telling myself three things. Number One, 0:19:37.280 --> 0:19:40.199 you have to keep your vision, your eyes on the 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:45.040 other side where you want to go, your intention. You 0:19:45.240 --> 0:19:48.320 have to take a deep breath and have the courage 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:53.000 to believe you can get there. And then finally, you 0:19:53.040 --> 0:19:56.480 have to take the action, because without the action, none 0:19:56.480 --> 0:19:58.399 of the rest of it really matters. You have to 0:19:58.400 --> 0:20:00.479 start putting one ft in front of the other, in 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:03.439 front of the other, in front of the other, until 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:08.520 you get to the other side. And while I was 0:20:08.680 --> 0:20:12.920 doing that, my life was passing in front of my 0:20:12.920 --> 0:20:19.080 my mind, and I I was realizing that I just 0:20:19.160 --> 0:20:21.439 before I had left, I had found out that I 0:20:21.520 --> 0:20:23.639 was the candidate they wanted and I was going to 0:20:23.680 --> 0:20:27.560 have to decide if I would take that job. And 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:32.919 it was a time when there were some problems. There was, 0:20:33.080 --> 0:20:37.440 I mean, it was not only that the political situation 0:20:37.560 --> 0:20:41.280 was extremely tense, a lot like it is today. But 0:20:41.400 --> 0:20:45.800 that didn't really bother me. People were getting murdered, people 0:20:45.800 --> 0:20:49.679 were getting I was getting personally stalked at home, getting 0:20:49.720 --> 0:20:54.159 neo Nazi calls on my home phone. I had my 0:20:54.240 --> 0:20:56.440 personal I mean, you know, I have was picketers, and 0:20:57.040 --> 0:20:59.280 you know, I knew it was a dangerous physically dangerous 0:20:59.320 --> 0:21:02.000 thing to do. I knew that I would have to 0:21:02.000 --> 0:21:06.760 bring the entire organization through a process of dealing with 0:21:06.800 --> 0:21:11.440 it emotionally and otherwise. It was a time when the 0:21:11.520 --> 0:21:15.960 organization had had several leadership changes, like four leadership changes 0:21:15.960 --> 0:21:20.040 in five years, so they're all kinds of problems. And 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:21.800 this was all flashing in front of me in this 0:21:21.840 --> 0:21:23.919 short period of time that I'm going across the bridge. 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:26.960 By the time I got to the other side, I 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:30.399 realized a few things. One is that you know, I 0:21:30.440 --> 0:21:33.440 didn't lose my fear even after crossing all twenty two 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:36.719 suspension bridges, but I learned that I could do it. 0:21:37.640 --> 0:21:40.879 And the other thing I learned was sometimes you have 0:21:41.000 --> 0:21:44.879 to cross that bridge sometimes at your moment, Sometimes you 0:21:44.960 --> 0:21:47.680 have to just not worry about the raging river below 0:21:47.760 --> 0:21:50.199 or the jagged rocks on the side. If you're the 0:21:50.320 --> 0:21:52.960 right person to do something, and you know that you are, 0:21:53.119 --> 0:21:55.840 and they know that you are, you have to stand 0:21:55.920 --> 0:21:59.720 up in the moment and take that opportunity. And it 0:21:59.800 --> 0:22:02.640 was an opportunity. It was a great opportunity for all 0:22:02.680 --> 0:22:06.119 of the travails, uh, you know, it was it was 0:22:06.119 --> 0:22:10.840 a great opportunity to be able to practically reconstruct an organization. 0:22:10.920 --> 0:22:13.560 I took the whole organization through a twenty five year 0:22:13.600 --> 0:22:17.520 out visioning process, and whole sets of new programs started 0:22:17.520 --> 0:22:22.919 growth again, got contraceptive coverage by insurance plans on the 0:22:22.920 --> 0:22:27.560 political front, and that was all great, um, but it 0:22:27.600 --> 0:22:33.960 was also exhausting and very exhausting. So I wore myself out. 0:22:34.280 --> 0:22:36.879 I really literally just wore myself out. You said, you 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.920 really change the organization. You brought what I think is 0:22:39.960 --> 0:22:44.639 really an entrepreneurial spirit to a very established nonprofit. Like 0:22:44.760 --> 0:22:47.600 do those two things can they work together? I wouldn't 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:50.280 have thoughts so, but they do. I wouldn't have thought so. 0:22:50.440 --> 0:22:54.399 And you probably heard the saying that Ginger did everything 0:22:54.440 --> 0:22:58.040 Fred did but backwards and in high heels, and leading 0:22:58.080 --> 0:23:00.480 a nonprofit is a lot like that. You have to 0:23:00.520 --> 0:23:03.720 have all the business sense, but you do it where 0:23:03.760 --> 0:23:06.960 you don't have as much money or access to resources. 0:23:07.000 --> 0:23:10.200 And we we did have to be very entrepreneurial because 0:23:10.200 --> 0:23:12.639 there were so many changes in the health care system, 0:23:12.720 --> 0:23:15.960 so ways that we were able to provide women's healthcare 0:23:16.560 --> 0:23:18.959 at low fees or no fees for the women who 0:23:18.960 --> 0:23:21.760 couldn't afford it. We had to be very scrappy. You know, 0:23:21.840 --> 0:23:25.000 we we literally created you know what you see now 0:23:25.200 --> 0:23:29.720 as the on every corner little uh dock in the box. 0:23:29.760 --> 0:23:32.880 I call them the urgent care centers. I'm telling you 0:23:33.000 --> 0:23:37.000 planned parent to it, invented that little neighborhood clinic that 0:23:37.240 --> 0:23:40.000 is very responsive to the needs of people. Doesn't do 0:23:40.160 --> 0:23:43.600 every service, but you do what you do well, and 0:23:44.040 --> 0:23:46.080 you do it at a price people that can afford, 0:23:46.440 --> 0:23:49.080 and with good customer service. And you know, we we 0:23:49.160 --> 0:23:52.120 sort of invented that. And also the use of nurse 0:23:52.119 --> 0:23:56.520 practitioners as clinicians and providers and found that the patients 0:23:56.920 --> 0:24:00.399 literally like that better because nurses are trained more in 0:24:00.400 --> 0:24:03.200 an educational mode, you know, to really talk to people. 0:24:03.680 --> 0:24:06.520 So that part of it was really fun. That part 0:24:06.560 --> 0:24:08.639 of it was fun, And I guess I know my 0:24:08.680 --> 0:24:10.520 father was an entrepreneur, and I guess I had just 0:24:10.680 --> 0:24:14.400 ingested some of that in my daily life with my family, 0:24:14.840 --> 0:24:18.840