Ep 19 | April 8, 2026 | 29 mins

I'm very proud to share that I'll be participating in Coaching for Causes for another year. Coaching for Causes is built on two core principles, being of service and making a difference. Each May, certified coaches, like me, from various fields donate our time for virtual and in-person one-on-one coaching sessions. Clients, like you, make a donation to a selected cause in exchange for a session. This ensures that 100 % of proceeds go directly to the nonprofit.

I'm raising funds for Northwestern Medicine Malnati Brain Tumor Institute, where I've received all my treatment and care. The best part is that every coach chooses their own cause, so you can donate to another coach's cause and still coach with me or vice versa. I encourage you to go back and listen to episode 14 to hear Caroline Lehner's story. She's the founder of Coaching for Causes.

Also, visit coachingforcauses.com for details and to find your coach, make a donation and book your session.

In this episode of Rewired Minds, host Bri Salsman speaks with Theresa Harju, the spouse of brain tumor survivor Alec Harju. Theresa shares her unique perspective as a caregiver, discussing the challenges and emotional toll of navigating the medical journey alongside her husband. The conversation explores their life before the diagnosis, the impact of surgery and recovery, and the complexities of managing caregiving responsibilities while raising a young family. Theresa also touches on sensitive topics such as fertility conversations and the experience of medical gaslighting, emphasizing the importance of seeking second opinions. Ultimately, the episode highlights the resilience of families facing such challenges and the journey towards finding a new normal.
Caregivers play a crucial role in the healing process.
Life can change dramatically with a sudden diagnosis.
Navigating the medical system requires persistence and organization.
Awake surgery allows doctors to assess brain function in real-time.
The emotional impact of losing abilities is profound.
Caregiving responsibilities can strain personal identity.
Fertility discussions are important but often overlooked.
Medical gaslighting can occur, and seeking second opinions is vital.
Finding a new normal takes time and adjustment.

Resources
Check out a list of the most common medical terms relating to the brain tumor experience: rewired-minds.com/terms
Connect with brain tumor organizations here: https://www.rewired-minds.com/braintumorresources

Connect with Rewired Minds
Website: rewired-minds.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RewiredMindsPod
Instagram: @rewiredmindspod
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rewiredminds

Connect with Theresa Harju
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/omgitistheresa
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yagurltheresa
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tokinwiththeresa

Be a Guest
Interested in being a guest on a future episode? Visit rewired-minds.com/guest for more information and to submit your request.

Disclaimer
The stories shared here are personal accounts from the brain tumor community for informational and awareness purposes only and are not intended as medical advice. Always consult with qualified healthcare professionals regarding your specific situation. Most importantly, take care of yourself as you listen and process.

Transcript
Bri (00:06)
I'm Bri Salsman, a brain tumor survivor and identity integration coach, and you're listening to Rewired Minds, a podcast that shares brain tumor stories that change us. Sometimes guests use medical terminology, so I've partnered with Northwestern Medicine Malnati Brain Tumor Institute to provide definitions of common terms. You can find the full list in the show notes. Most importantly, take care of yourself as you listen and process.

Bri (00:29)
Before we get into today's episode, I'm very proud to share that I'll be participating in Coaching for Causes for another year. Coaching for Causes is built on two core principles, being of service and making a difference. Each May, certified coaches, like me, from various fields donate our time for virtual and in-person one-on-one coaching sessions. Clients, like you, make a donation to a selected cause in exchange for a session. This ensures that 100 % of proceeds go directly to the nonprofit.

I'm raising funds for Northwestern Medicine Malnati Brain Tumor Institute, where I've received all my treatment and care. The best part is that every coach chooses their own cause, so you can donate to another coach's cause and still coach with me or vice versa. I encourage you to go back and listen to episode 14 to hear Caroline Lehner's story. She's the founder of Coaching for Causes.

Also, visit coachingforcauses.com for details and to find your coach, make a donation and book your session.

Today's guest is Theresa Harju, who is the spouse of Alec Harju. If you haven't heard his story just yet, go back one episode in your feed, take a listen, and then come back to us. For those of you who have heard Alec's story, I'm happy to introduce you to Theresa for her caregiver perspective on things. Welcome, Theresa. So glad to have you as part of this conversation.

Theresa (00:53)
Hi. Thank you for having me.

Bri (00:54)
Alec and I connected first and we recorded and then it was a few weeks later that you ended up reaching out to me. What made you want to reach out and share your, your side of things?

Theresa (00:56)
I think I seen one of your posts or I was listening and it said that you were looking for stories of not only survivors, but to also get the perspective from the caregivers or the family. So that's why I kind said, let me reach out and give a different perspective for other people going through this.

Bri (01:23)
Yeah, you're absolutely right. Certainly the patient is the one who's most closely experiencing everything, but that doesn't mean that there aren't others who are impacted by this. And certainly caregivers are a huge part of carrying the extra stuff, if you will. So I'm so glad that you, I'm so glad that you reached out and that you're willing to share.

Theresa (01:43)
Yeah, not only that, just his story is a little bit more unique. He did have a stroke during his surgery, so that affected his brain and his memory. I was a little, don't want to say apprehensive, but I was wondering what he shared and what he could remember with you guys. And just to see how much of his story is different from my story, because I remember, of course, a little bit more than he does.

Bri (02:07)
That’s a similar experience that I had with my sister is, when I had surgery, I don't remember anything from being admitted into the hospital until I am home even. I don't even remember waking up post surgery being discharged or anything.

Let's back up a little bit before all of this came up. What did your all’s marriage look like? What did life look like before this came about?

Theresa (02:33)
We had just had our second kid. We had a one-year-old at the time, just had my son, and found out, let's see, our son was born in April of ‘22, and then 11 months later, we found out about the brain tumor, and we ended up moving my son's first birthday party up and had it at my mom's house. Everything was super last minute because we knew he was about to have surgery and didn't know what that was gonna look like after.

Just moved, growing our family, working, taking care of kids, typical, you know, new parents. Great, everything was great, honestly. And then, you know, we got this news and I remember he came home from his MRI and he's like, yeah, the doctor kept asking me, you know, have you traveled outside of the country? Have you traveled at all?

And first thing that comes to mind for me is you have a brain amoeba. That's what I was thinking. I'm like, why else would he be asking if you traveled outside of the country? Literally, I want to say three or four hours later, a doctor in Milwaukee was calling him at 7 p.m. at night, which I'm like, Alec, that's the hospital calling you. And it's kind of weird. It's pretty late for them to be calling. And then it was a doctor in Milwaukee who kind of gave us the news.

Bri (03:43)
And I remember in my conversation with him, he had said that, he took the call and then relayed the information to you. How much of that conversation do you remember when you really heard those words of the official diagnosis?

Theresa (03:56)
So I have a medical background myself and have worked in surgery for many years. So when I first heard about it, I don't think my initial reaction was like, ‘oh my God, what are we gonna do? Oh my God.” I was more like, okay, you have this. This is the next step. They're most likely gonna wanna do surgery. You're gonna have to see a bunch of doctors.

I was more of like, let's just tackle this and take care of it where he was probably more trying to process everything and the emotions behind it where I feel like I was more emotionless on that aspect of it.

Bri (04:30)
It's almost like your professional side kicked in it sounds.

Theresa (04:33)
Right. Exactly. The caretaker in me was just like, all right, let's get it taken care of. Let's do what we got to do.

Bri (04:40)
Yeah. And so what was it that you had to do? What were those first steps?

Theresa (04:44)
First step was literally, I don't even know if it was a week, but we were in the office with the neurosurgeon. He came and he's like, we need to do a biopsy. We do the biopsy. Then we meet for another appointment after we get the results of it. And he brings in another neurosurgeon into the room. He's like, I work closely with this doctor. He's actually going to be taking over your case. He does a little bit more complex things than I do. So then he's in the room talking and then he's like, yeah, we need to get you scheduled for surgery. So then literally almost a month after the biopsy, he's having the surgery and it was just step, step, step, doctor, doctor, doctor, all of the doctor's appointments leading up to the surgery, countless MRIs. I mean, specialties that I never even knew existed. And he's meeting with people and having all these tests done, memory recollection, all these different tests to see what he remembers so that way if he has surgery and he has defects, they can kind of see how bad they are. I mean, the amount of testing he had done and appointments we went to in a month's time was crazy.

Bri (05:50)
And this coming from someone who's in the medical field coming into something that even you are coming across things that you had not previously known. How are you making sense of all of this?

Theresa (06:01)
I feel like it was almost like a checklist for me. These are the doctors we need to see. These are the appointments we have. These are the therapies you're supposed to go talk to. These are the imaging appointments we have to get done. And we're just checking them off the list, checking them off the list. And everything is happening so fast. And there's so much going on that I don't know that either of us kind of had time to really process it in that month.

And because he was awake during his surgery, that brought about more appointments and more specialists that he had to see before.

Bri (06:36)
To your understanding, what's the significance of awake surgery versus surgery where they fully put you under?

Theresa (06:43)
Yeah, so where his tumor was, he had to be awake because they were asking him questions and talking to him during surgery, memory questions. I mean, these are appointments that he had before so doctors already knew what his answers should be to make sure that they weren't going through a part in the brain that would affect any of that.

I remember him telling me all of sudden he seen like a starburst effect in his eyes and everything just went super bright and he told them like, I can't see. All I can see is like bright light, so the doctor knew he couldn't go in that area of the brain. He also told me that when he was talking at one point he was starting to like slur his speech. So they knew, okay, we can't go through that part of the brain to get to the tumor. So it was almost like a maze to navigate the right way to get through the maze to get to the tumor.

Bri (07:32)
It sounds like the location of the tumor was in a really tricky spot. Not that the tumor itself necessarily was quite the challenge. Am I hearing that accurately?

Theresa (07:41)
Yeah, yes.

Bri (07:42)
Yeah. But then once they got to the tumor, things went pretty smoothly from what I understand from Alec. Although this might be where the memory part comes in. Maybe, maybe you have a different side of things.

Theresa (07:52)
Right, well, you know, the doctors don't, they don't wanna tell you the bad stuff. They're probably not gonna tell you the bad stuff that happens during the procedure. I'm sitting in the waiting room. I think we waited 12 hours from the he left until the time we talked to the doctor, 10 or 12 hours, something like that, which I didn't expect it to take that long.

For the most part, I think it went pretty smooth other than the fact that he had the stroke.

Bri (08:15)
And what's been the impact of that stroke?

Theresa (08:17)
I think the stroke is what has caused most of the hardship after surgery. Pretty much half of his vision is gone. He has right-sided weakness, numbness at times. His taste will go in and out. He can't taste stuff. His gait is still slightly off to me. I see him every day, so I know what he used to be and what he is now, and I can tell. To a normal person, you probably wouldn’t know much. But I think his vision is his main struggle. And he even says, if I was born this way, that would be one thing, but to have it and lose it and you can't get it back, that’s a true struggle for him.

Bri (08:57)
There's a difference between, you know, you don't know what you don't know. But this is one of those things at one point he did know. And now it's like, just out of grasp. Did he do any kind of physical or occupational therapy?

Theresa (09:10)
So we’ve actually counted, I believe he had 188 different therapies. He had physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, driving therapy.
Bri (09:22)
Oh, I've never heard of driving therapy before.

Theresa (09:24)
He had to, because of his vision, he had to pass therapy and he had to go have somebody drive with him in the car who could also give recommendations for like different disability things that could make driving easier. He had to pass that to get a proof for his license. When somebody's telling you, you could lose your driver's license. That's a big that's a big hit... What's the word I'm looking for.. their independence.

Could you imagine not being able to drive? You can't go to the gas station. You're not running down the street to the store. You're not gonna go get yourself lunch. You're not working. Literally, you have to rely on other people.

Bri (10:02)
Especially in a situation where you're not in a metropolitan area that has reliable public transit. Absolutely. That's a huge impact.

Theresa (10:10)
Yeah, from our house to the surgeon's office, 50 miles exactly.

Bri (10:16)
Yeah, that's not a short distance at all.

Theresa (10:18)
No, that's one way.

Bri (10:19)
Wow. Wow. I'm thinking, you shared, you all just started a family. These are a lot of appointments and you haven't even talked about what's going on at home and helping him around the house. Typically with these kinds of therapies, you have the session, but then they give you homework between sessions and you have children that you're raising. And I imagine you may have a job and just general life responsibilities. So as his caregiver, how are you managing this alongside all the things that you already had on your plate?

Theresa (10:49)
We weren't expecting him to have a stroke. We were expecting him to maybe be back to work in a month or two after surgery. That was definitely and something I would relay to anybody who's gonna have brain surgery or in this similar situation. Plan for the absolute worst because like us, we were not ready for him to be off of work for almost a year and he was the breadwinner for our family. I worked part-time. I raised our kids. So we are so thankful that my work actually was able to help out a little bit financially. And then also our community came together and we had a benefit for him. So that's what helped us get through the year, honestly. I mean, we went from being totally financially independent, to relying on state aid, to being on food stamps. I mean, it was rough for a year. We went from Alec making all the money for our home to Alec not working at all, and me taking care of two little kids and him. All three of them are learning how to walk together so it was a lot.

Bri (12:01)
Yeah, I'm thinking about, what you shared a moment ago about a huge shift in independence and I it's like independence responsibility, but even deeper than that, this is a change in your all’s core identity, your roles in the family.

Theresa (12:16)
Yup, exactly. He took care of most of the bills and when he had his surgery, he couldn't remember anything, let alone figure out how to log into his phone to pay a bill. He couldn't even see his phone when he came out of surgery. So I'm scrambling trying to figure out that. It was it was a lot, a lot that happens behind the scenes.

Bri (12:35)
You did mention you're, you just started a family and I just wonder if fertility conversations came up at any point through this journey about, you know, if you wanted to have more kids, what should you be doing to prepare or those kinds of conversations?

Theresa (12:51)
You know, we were two and done regardless, but I did ask him, I said, if we had the brain tumor diagnosis before we had kids, would you have wanted to have kids? Would you have waited? Would that have changed things? And I think on both of our parts, it very well could have changed our future for that, just because of how hard it was afterwards.

Bri (13:12)
I know it's such a big point of conversation for so many people your age and not even just your age. I mean, even younger when they haven't even found their partner yet, but they know they want to have kids someday and navigating that fertility aspect of things can be quite challenging.

Theresa (13:28)
Oh for sure.

Bri (13:29)
Thanks for sharing that. One of the things that you previously shared with me that really caught my attention, aside from the fact of having the caregiver perspective alongside of Alec's experience, I also wanted to touch on what you shared in terms of medical gaslighting. Of course, you know, gaslighting was a trendy word a few years ago, and I think generally we have an idea of it, but I don't know that we think about it so much in the medical setting. And so I'm curious to learn more about what happened along your own journey in that respect and what kind of prompted you to bring that to listeners attention.

Theresa (14:12)
Yeah. So Alec had… It started with a benign, small little tumor on his eye. It was just a little white spot almost on his eye. And he went for a DOT physical, which he had a CDL license to drive trucks.

Bri (14:29)
Just really quickly, Theresa, just for those listeners who don't know, DOT is Department of Transportation, right?

Theresa (14:33)
Yes. So to drive like semi trucks, big dump trucks, stuff like that. So he carried his license for that. He always kept up with it. He went for his physical to get cleared for it. And they said, you failed your peripheral vision tests. And he's like, okay, well, that's weird. You need to go to your regular eye doctor and get checked. Goes to his regular eye doctor.

From what he told me, his doctor held up his fingers on both side of his head, moved them around. Can you see my finger? Can you see my finger? Alec, yes, yes, yes. He goes, okay, you're fine. You know, sometimes the machines at the DOT places don't always work great. They're not calibrated right. So you're passed. Signed his paper, submitted his paper, turned it in. He's good another year. The next year rolls around. The same exact thing happens. Goes to his eye doctor. Same thing. Passes him.

And I'm thinking something's not right. Like there's got to be something not right. This machine can't just not be working for you. So I said, maybe it's a little tumor on your eye. Maybe that's affecting your vision. So I called over to a doctor's office who I'm familiar with. He got him in and Alec gets home and he's like, yeah, the doctor said that he wants me to go get an MRI of my brain.

And I'm like, that's really weird. And then that's kind of how it trickled into, he got the MRI, then the doctors from Milwaukee were calling him. That's how we kind of found out about the brain tumor. He said that when he looked in his eyes, there was something wrong with his optic nerve that didn't look right. That just by looking in his eye with that device, when you sit in their chair at the eye doctor, that anybody could see. And the way it moved and how confident he was in the next two eye doctors that we seen after that. It's just like, how could he have missed this? How could somebody miss this?

And Alec, he said, I thought that I kind of lost a little vision on that side, but it happened so slowly that I didn't really realize it until they've pointed it out to me.

Bri (16:32)
Yeah.

Theresa (16:33)
So when I say medical gaslighting, if you think something is wrong, if you truly feel that something is wrong, go seek another doctor because yes, doctors are very smart. I feel like when I go to the doctor, I look up to them. I feel as though they're my superior. They know more. That's just the persona that's put out into the world about doctors.

No, we hire doctors. We are paying them. If you don't like what they're saying, you can go to another doctor and pay a different doctor. Get their opinion. Ask to see a specialist. If you feel that something is wrong, go get a second opinion.

Bri (17:08)
It seems maybe elementary to compare it to this, but what's popping in my mind as you're saying this when we have an issue with our car, we go get quotes from multiple places to get it repaired. So why would we not do the same with our bodies? And I never thought about it that way, but for some reason, hearing you talk about second opinions in that way, maybe because in the automobile world or in other realms, we don't call them second opinions. But that's really what it comes down to.

When you have damage to your vehicle or you need a roof repair on your home, rarely do we just go ask one person and then go forward with that one person unless we know them very well or they come highly recommended or they have a wonderful reputation. And even still, they can have an amazing reputation and have a very high referral from someone that you know and trust. But if they say or do something that isn't quite right with you, then you got to listen to that intuition. You got to pay attention to that.

Theresa (18:07)
Exactly.

Bri (18:07)
So at some point, things start shifting into a more manageable. I don't want to say back to normal because of course we all know nothing ever goes back to normal in these kinds of situations. But you're finding a new way of living, of being a family together, supporting Alec but also having your own things as well, having your caretaker identity, How has this new role as caretaker influenced other aspects of your identity that you held prior to this showing up?

Theresa (18:40)
I've had two kids. I was the caretaker to them, essentially, I'm their mom. And then adding Alec on, I almost felt like I was a mom to three. And Alec was almost the hardest one because he's still his own person and he still had his own thoughts and he still knows what's going on, but it's totally different. It's totally different.

What I can relate it to is you have a child. It's a total different outlook on life for you. Give it a couple months, you get into a new swing of things. That's your new daily routine. Then we add on a second child. The routine is different. We get in a couple months of that. Then that's our new normal. So then we added Alec in and that was, it was a couple rough months and then you kind of get into a routine.

For me, I didn't really have a lot of emotions or anything going through the process. I was in a lot of fight mode the whole time. And I can honestly say there was one time I cried in the hospital and that's when speech therapy came in and he couldn't talk. He didn't remember our kids' names. He didn't really even know he had kids. That was the one time I cried. After that, it had probably been a year later and I was talking to somebody at work and I showed them one of the videos and I realized that I had a hard time about a year later processing everything that happened. And that's when it kind of came in to like more of the emotional side for me.

Bri (20:10)
Once you have a little bit of distance from it, it sounds.

Theresa (20:13)
Yeah, and just rewatching everything that I went through because, like I said, it happened so fast and so much all at once. I didn't have time to just sit and think. I was going up to the hospital first thing in the morning. I woke up, left the house at six, got there at seven, was coming home at 7 p.m. I'm so thankful I a great family support system to help with our kids. And, of course, it was in the middle of COVID. So the hospitals only allow two people the whole time was there and he was almost there a month. I didn't have time to process any of the emotions, nothing. I mean, even to this day, watching the videos back, I get choked up. I have a hard time watching them.

Bri (20:40)
And when did you feel like you were starting to see your husband again?

Theresa (20:56)
I wanna say it was probably, maybe two months after he went back to work, because then for him, he was getting into his new normal routine with going back to work, doing things a little bit different at work to get through the day. When you have kids, maybe when you buy a dog, when you get a new house, when your kids go to school, everything is an adjustment period for a short period of time until you get into your new normal.

Bri (21:25)
Yeah, yeah. And what do things look like today? What is your new normal?

Theresa (21:29)
For the most part, he is self-sufficient. There's a couple things to me that I know are off with him. Our kids will ask him to read a book. He can't read. Looking at the page, it's hard for him because of the vision. Adding on the reading aspect and the comprehension of the book, he can't read.

So that's a little bit struggle sometimes with the kids where I have to then pick up that. There's a couple smaller things that I noticed. His speech, his recollection, even sometimes his memory is a little off, misplacing things at home. Husbands always like to blame the wives on the missing wallet. You touch this last. Where did you put it? But with him, it's probably a little bit more than the normal.

And then just telling stories. He is a little bit slower with the speech to where sometimes I'm like, all right, can you get to the point? This was a five minute conversation that just turned into 30 minutes. So that could be a little frustrating, but I always try to remember, I know you're trying. I know this is just the way it's gonna be and bring myself down, but it's hard sometimes.

Bri (22:35)
What kind of strategies have you used in those moments that you think might be helpful for listeners as well?

Theresa (22:42)
Breathe.

Bri (22:43)
Simple, one word, huh?

Theresa (22:45)
Yes, yes. I mean, there's not much you can do. I'm not going to yell at him every day. I’m not going to, oh my God, hurry up. And it does get frustrating. It does get hard. But you always just have to bring yourself down and say, he's struggling too. He's struggling, I'm struggling. So let's just try to be patient with each other. I think that's like, just breathe. Take a minute. Breathe. Remember where he's come from.

Bri (23:08)
When you say, he's struggling too, what I hear is we're in this together. We're both struggling, but we'll figure it out together.

Theresa (23:16)
Yeah, it's hard to put yourself in somebody else's shoes. It really is. And when it's every single day, you become numb to what the other person is feeling. When I feel myself getting a little irritated, try to just breathe.

Bri (23:29)
What do you see in the future for you, Alec, and your children?

Theresa (23:34)
Keep pushing, keep going forward. You know, disability has been brought up because of the vision. And I've asked him, do you really want to live on that the rest of your life? Do you really want to… think about it? Do you really want to live off of that for the rest of your life when you can do stuff? It's different. It's hard. And you just have to think positive and you just have to give it your all. You have to try. I see us living this new normal, hopefully with no new recurrence, because I don't know if I have a round two in me. I think we're too scarred from round one.

Bri (24:13)
You know, I bet if I spoke to Theresa in 2019, she probably would say, there's no way I could face that. And yet somehow you did. And I think that's the thing about us as humans, but particularly those of us in the brain tumor community is you just don't know until you're in it. And certainly, certainly I definitely I'm on your side in terms of hope you never ever have to face a recurrence. And yet still we are a resilient community and we figure it out every damn time.

Theresa (24:50)
You can only wake up and go every single day. You can't go back. So you might as well deal with it and try to get over the hurdle and move on.

Bri (24:57)
How has all of this rewired your mind?

Theresa (24:59)
Empathy. Empathy is a big word. I've brought that a lot into work. Try to always put yourself in somebody else's shoes and treat them, treat everybody with kindness. You don't know what somebody else is going through. Even if they look fine on the outside, you don't know what's going on on the inside.

Bri (25:23)
That's so true. That's why they call this the invisible disease.

Theresa (25:27)
Yup. And kind of going back to when you said, you know, if I asked you about this in 2019, what would you say? I would say, no, this couldn't be possible for our story. We're both healthy. We're both living our best lives. I would have never thought twice about it.

Bri (25:43)
Whoo Theresa. Thank you so much. I'm so so glad you reached out because you absolutely added color to the experience that is not better or worse than what Alex shared but a different angle on things for sure. I think Alec will have a connection with part of the audience and you'll have a connection with part of the audience. And I think both of you together will have a really, really big impact by sharing your collective story in this way. I'm just, I'm so, so grateful.

If listeners want to get in touch to support, to ask questions, just to be in community with you, where can they find you? How can they get in touch with you?

Theresa (26:20)
Both of our social media accounts are open. Feel free to shoot us a message or a friend request. We're always willing to share our story.

Knowing that you're not alone and that somebody is struggling just like you. Just to be able to relate and talk to somebody who knows what's going on because yes, family knows, friends know, but they're not living it. They don't have to live with it 24/7.

Bri (26:47)
Yeah, it's different. I've said it so many times, everybody serves a certain kind of support and no one person can be every kind of support that we need. But when we surround ourselves with a variety of people, whether that's through Facebook groups or family, friends, all of that collectively is what gets us through.

Theresa (27:10)
Absolutely. I couldn't agree more.

Bri (27:11)
Well, thank you so much, Theresa, and I will share the links for your socials in the show notes for those who want to get in touch with you and wishing you and Alec all the best and your kiddos too. All the best.

Theresa (27:22)
Thank you. I was so happy to do this.

Bri (27:31)
Thank you for being part of the Rewired Minds community. Full show notes, resources, and a transcript for today's conversation can be found at rewired-minds.com. If you or someone you know has a brain tumor story to share, I'd love to hear from you. Visit rewired-minds.com to learn more about collaborating on a future episode. This podcast is a one woman labor of love. It's a true honor to bring it to your ears and facilitate connection among the brain tumor community. If this episode resonated with you, please rate, review, and share with someone who might need to hear it.

Bri (28:03)
The stories shared in this podcast are personal accounts from the brain tumor community for informational and awareness purposes only and are not intended as medical advice. Always consult with qualified healthcare professionals regarding your specific situation.