What if creativity isn’t just self-expression, but a way to heal and connect?
In this episode, I talk with Allison Sweet Grant, an author, former psychiatric nurse practitioner, and mother of three who brings deep honesty and courage to her storytelling. Her debut novel I Am the Cage wasn’t written to launch a career but to process overwhelming trauma and offer hope to others. We talk about how creativity can be both healing and hard, especially for those of us who are sensitive or introverted. But when we choose to go deeper, our stories can become acts of bravery—and unexpected gifts to the world.
Allison Sweet Grant is an author who has been published in The New York Times and The Atlantic. Previously, she was a psychiatric nurse practitioner; she holds dual master’s degrees from the University of Michigan. An introvert, synesthete, and avid poet, Allison can usually be found at home with a cup of hot tea in hand, reading or rewatching a film she has seen sixteen times. She lives outside of Philadelphia with her husband and their three children (and two cats, Pom-Pom and Jasper). I Am the Cage is her debut novel.
Zack Arnold: So Allison, first of all, I want to thank you profusely for taking the time today to have this conversation with me. I discovered you originally via your husband on his podcast where you were talking about your new book, I am the cage, and was immediately taken by that conversation, knowing that I'm not really the kind of person that reads a lot of young adult fiction, but I thought, You know what, I'll check it out. Oh, listen, I'll very much think highly of your husband's book recommendations. And I was completely consumed by your book. And ever since then, I've thought, if there's anybody that I want to have a really deep, interesting, introspective conversation with, it is Alison grant. So I cannot thank you enough for being here with us today.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, that is incredibly kind and generous. Thank you so much. I am delighted to be here with you. Zack, thank you.
Zack Arnold: So here's where I actually want to start. This is going to be an extension of a conversation that you've had. You and I have had back and forth via email and even a little bit off the record before this conversation. Why are you so nervous to be on this interview today.
Allison Sweet Grant: Why are you so nervous?
Zack Arnold: Well, the reason that I nervous is because I really, really care about sharing really important creative work where that goes really, really deep. I believe that a big part of creativity is being courageous, and I think that so much of creativity has become commerce, and your book is so courageous and so personal and so emotional, like I'm I don't remember the last time that I welled up or cried reading something. If ever you got me three times in your book, three times. So number one, I'm just immensely nervous because there is no version of the final the final version of this conversation is never going to live up to the expectations in my own mind. So that's one of the reasons that I'm nervous. The other reason that I'm nervous full disclosure, is that I've been a follower and admirer of your husband for years, and it takes a lot of trust in me to say, You know what, I'm going to I'm going to put my wife on your podcast, and she's going to be really open and personal and vulnerable. So to me, there's a lot at stake, and there's I really, really want to make sure that I do a good job today. So that's why I'm nervous now. Why are you nervous?
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, I have no doubt that you're going to do a good job, and the reason that I'm nervous is I'm just as afraid that I won't do a good job. The story is incredibly personal to me. And so it's it takes a real leap of faith to not trust you, but to trust anybody you know, to put it out there and not worry about what's going to come back at me. And so I also just don't have, you know, a lot of experience being in the public eye, and that's a nerve wracking thing on its own, so it's a real combination of factors that contribute to my nerves, but I'm slowly getting a little bit more comfortable, so hopefully both you and I can take a deep breath and have a great conversation. Well,
Zack Arnold: then we shall begin another meeting of introverts, anonymous and imposter syndrome, anonymous. So let's just dive right in. We're actually want to start is going to be pretty much at the very end, which is on the final page of your book. You basically give the origin story for it, which is, I am the cage started with just one word pressed into the top margin of a piece of loose leaf paper in dusty cursive pencil. Justine, so I want to know more about what brought you to that point of creating that post it then we're going to talk about the journey from post it note and seed of an idea to publishing a book. And you and I having this conversation today. So let's begin with, where did the post it note come from?
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, it actually wasn't a post it note. It note, it was a notebook, and it really came from a deep place of need. I felt like I had a story inside of me that was literally bursting to get out. I didn't know exactly what it would look like, but I had an idea, and it was more than an idea. It was actually really like a gift that I wanted to give myself because I was struggling and I was in pain, and I needed an outlet for that, and that's where the idea came from. Justine was really an alter ego. I never intended to publish a memoir. I never intended to publish something so personal, but once I started writing, and once I was able to use this character as a stand in for myself, it just flowed, and that's where it began.
Zack Arnold: I've heard that you say multiple times when you've talked to others, you've made sure to frame it as this is fiction, but I would say there's in I don't know your own personal story, but it seems like there's a lot of historical fiction in this, and that there's a lot of you know, whether it's the main incident with. The main character, or a lot of the things that she's feeling, the facts that she expresses herself through short stories and poetry. Let's go a little bit deeper into kind of the blurry line between fiction and how this can be some historical fiction for the story of your own life.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, it is a blurry line, for sure. I you know, it's actually something that I still struggle with, because it's not a memoir. It was inspired by my own story, but there was so much of my story in it, and when I talk about it, and when people ask very lovely and thoughtful questions, sometimes I struggle with not knowing if I'm answering the questions as a fiction, as a fictional novel, or if I'm actually answering the questions as myself, that is one of the reasons that it can be very difficult to talk about and I'm talking about why it's difficult to talk about it, but, but it is. It's something that I will work on in this conversation with you, and something that I work on on my own, because I don't know exactly where that line is. And sometimes that's okay because it is a work of art, and it's okay for it to be a little bit messy, I think. But sometimes people are looking for a real, concrete answer, and I don't always have one? Yeah.
Zack Arnold: So if we're gonna dig a little bit deeper into this idea that what I at least believe real creativity often is this act of courage where you have to put something out there into the world. And a lot of that creativity, for a lot of people that do creative work, comes from some form of trauma. So let's talk a little bit about the defining trauma in this book for your main character, Elizabeth, and how that relates to you and your story.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, for me, I feel like there were a lot of little like micro traumas that sort of melted together to make a big trauma. I mean, just to give your audience the background. You know this. This book is a story of a young woman who undergoes a pretty arduous medical procedure in order to fix a congenital malformation. It was called fibular hemomilia and congenital short femur, which essentially translates to being born with one leg that's significantly shorter than the other. And then in order to correct the problem, I and the character in the book had to undergo a procedure that is essentially a device that's called an external fixator, and it's a metal apparatus that is attached to the limb. And in my case, it was to my left leg. And the the aim of the procedure is to sever the bone in multiple places surgically, with the goal of then pulling it apart so that new bone can fill in the gaps in order to make the affected limb the same length as the other limb. And it was a very it's not sort of like a one surgery, one and done kind of a thing. It was a two year long process where I wore this external fixator on my leg, 24 hours a day. It was a permanent device, and it was really harrowing, not only the procedure itself, but sort of the the toll that it took on my life, on my family, you know, on my psychological well being, my emotional well being. And that was sort of, I guess, that sort of encapsulates the trauma, the big drama, The Big T trauma.
Zack Arnold: It's at least the place to start right is the fact, the fact that you know you were 11 years old, you have this what sounds like a very painful procedure, having both read the book and listen to you tell the story multiple times as you were retelling it. Just now, I still got shivers just thinking about it. So I can only, I can only imagine the kind of physical trauma and you talk about the amount of pain, there was no amount of Vicodin or morphine or anything else that could kind of really alleviate that pain. But what I really think about more than that is the fact that you were an 11 year old girl in middle school, and you're walking around for two years, 24 hours a day, and I don't know what the metal fixator looks like, but I can't imagine that it was great for your social life or your image. And this is having come from, if I understand it, you essentially spent your whole life up until that point with a really large lift underneath one of your feet. Correct? That's correct. Yeah. So you essentially spent the first 13 years of your life being defined by being broken.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah? Yeah. I mean, absolutely, that's certainly how I thought about it myself, how I thought of myself. And the fixator was something that was supposed to fix something that was broken. It was pretty it was laid out pretty, pretty plainly.
Zack Arnold: And one of the things that you said in your book about this is you said that because what is a fixator if it's not something that fixes, something that fixes, something needs to be fixed, and if something needs to be fixed, then that something must be broken. This is where it gets really interesting. And if something is broken, it must be inadequate, deficient, unsatisfactory, no good. Yeah, that to me is not that to me, and you can correct me if I'm wrong. That doesn't sound like fiction. That sounds like sounds like there's again, there's a lot of that gray area between creating this fictionalized story and really using your creativity to work through some stuff.
Allison Sweet Grant: Oh, for sure. I mean, writing this book was one five year long therapy session for me, you know. And it's something that took me a really long time to get to. I had been holding on to it for 30 years, because when I went through this procedure, there was very little emotional support. You know, it was, this was, and I'm aging myself, but this was in the early 90s, and, you know, there was no person centered care, no trauma informed care. I never went to a support group or spoke with a social worker. I was pretty much on my own, you know. And after the procedure, after the fixator was removed, after I was like normal again, right? I was sort of in this place where I was supposed to forget about it, and forget about everything that happened to me, forget about all the things that I went through that were so painful. And so I tried really hard to do that, but it didn't work, obviously, and there were things that I was, you know, holding on to inside that I really did need to work through finally deciding to write this book, to write down my story, was a huge part of coming to terms with it, and really, you know, processing a lot of the emotions that I had been trying to bury for many years,
Zack Arnold: and that process of going from I'm going to write, because, from what I understand, you can, you can go a little bit deeper into this, if you'd like, but you've essentially been a writer your entire life. You've written short stories, you've written poetry, you've written portions of novels, but nobody really ever saw it outside of maybe your husband or maybe your closest friends. So I'm really curious, what was the difference between I'm going to write a book someday to, I am writing a book. How did you how did you traverse that? Because for there's a good 85 to 90% of people out there that believe they have a book in them, but they never transition from I'm going to write a book to, I am writing a book, especially one this deep and this personal, yeah,
Allison Sweet Grant: I think it was really a build up of pressure. You know, I just got to this point where I had to do something. And this is the form that it came out in, and it felt very natural, because I've been a writer my whole life, the fact that I've always written for myself, you know, it's kind of it's interesting. I when I started writing the book, I really didn't know that it was a book. I just wanted to write. I just wanted to put it down on paper. Because for me, I get tongue tied a lot. I am not the best speaker, but when I write, I'm able to say exactly what it is I want. And it was helpful for me to have the freedom to do that without the pressure of thinking like, Oh, who am I going to show this to? Who's going to want to buy this book? Who's going to want to read this? I just wanted to get it out of me once I started thinking, Oh, maybe this could actually be something. And I have to give credit to my agent, Richard pine, who is amazing, and said, keep going. This is, this is a real story. You know, then it became a little trickier to be honest, right? Because then I'm, you're, you start thinking about an audience. But when I started, it was pure selfishness. I just needed I just needed it to do it for myself.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, I would argue that most of the best stories, whether they're film, television, novels, poetry or otherwise, they often come from that deep need for expression. That's something that I've talked about in past podcasts. I just had this conversation with Dr Scott Barry Kaufman, asking, what's the difference between being creative and being a creative? And the way that he defined it so perfectly was that creativity is an act of doing. Being creative is an act of being right. And I feel like, for me, I identify as a creative as a noun, rather than just. And the act of creating, and I find that it comes from this deep need for expression. There are all these ideas, there are all these problems that we want to fix. There there's this impact that we want to create in the world. And it's just, it's like this, just this endless pressure that's building up, and you just need to get it out. And it sounds like you very much experienced the same thing, and it was eventually that pressure that got you from I'm going to write this for myself to now I'm actually going to get this out into the world.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, you know, Zack, I was listening to another one of your podcasts with the guest. First name was Aaron, and I can't remember his last name, but here Aaron wealthy, yes, he was talking about suffering. Well, I was not, I was suffering, but badly and and that was really the catalyst for this creative experience. You know, in
Zack Arnold: addition to, I believe the best creative works come from this place of self expression, and you just, you need to process things for yourself, it's also about understanding things. And that's actually one of the quotes that you had in the book, one of the lines of dialog. I love the relationship that you have between Elizabeth and her mother. It's a very complicated relationship, but she had said to her at one point like, why do you write poetry? Right? It's so vague. And her response is, I do it to understand things. So what I'm curious about, what are some of the things that you started to better understand about yourself and that you processed about this experience as you were actually writing this and putting it out there, knowing somebody else would actually read it.
Allison Sweet Grant: That's a great question. I think that the thing that sticks out in my mind is for so many years, for like 3030, years, right while I was dealing with these emotions, but not actually dealing with them, I thought that it was because of something deep inside of me, not the experience that I had, that contributed to the difficulty that I was experiencing, that contribute, that contributed to the trauma, but something inherently like wrong with me as a person, I used to think, Well, the reason that there was no support, emotional support for somebody going through this type of experience At the time, or at least in my situation, was because you shouldn't need it, and the fact that I did need it, and the fact that I did want it meant that there was something wrong with me. Writing this book, working through it, remembering all of those details really helped me understand this is like, this is something that anybody might have struggled with, you know, and it's okay to ask for help. It's okay to talk about these things. It really took a lot of the self blame that I was sort of like swimming in and, you know, let me climb out of the water. It gave me permission to feel the things that I had felt all along but thought were bad.
Zack Arnold: So I'm curious, when you say this word, blame, anybody that we're standing on the outside would think, well, why in the world would you blame yourself for something like this? It was a you were born this way. It's certainly something that you wouldn't control. But you talk a lot about blaming yourself, the shame of all this again, on a logical level, you could argue, well, that doesn't make any sense, but on an emotional level, it's such a complex series of emotions. So when you say blaming yourself, what are the things that you feel you would blame yourself for?
Allison Sweet Grant: I really struggled with feeling responsible for many things, you know, for causing, you know, a disruption in my family, which you know, this certainly was, you know, for not being able to sail through it, you know, without any trouble for struggling with it, even 30 years later, after the fact all of these things, you know, it felt, it felt like something, it felt like something that I needed to hide, but couldn't there's like a shame in that. Or at least I felt that there was a shame in that right, that that I was in this position where something really difficult and and hard happened to me that left me feeling scarred, but I'm not supposed to talk about it. But it was so evident that, like, something was off, and so I had to, like, explain myself, but in a way that didn't actually explain what, you know, what I was, what I was processing. It was just sort of like a whole big mess of emotions, and like the very top of that was like this umbrella of shame that none of this should be happening at all. I don't know. It.
Zack Arnold: And one of the things that I know that you, you have mentioned before, and I can, I can, kind of sort of relate to this in certain ways, but certainly not at the level that you can, is that for everything that you went through, you don't see it, right? Somebody that would have known you in middle school, obviously very apparent. But if I were to meet you, you know, at an event or a conference or a dinner, I would never from physical appearance, like you've said, Well, yeah, if you're standing up straight, so somebody's really not going to notice. So I can see how it can be so difficult to want to hide that. How did all of that, the like, holding the shame, holding this trauma, feeling all this pressure of, Oh, I've just, I've got to get this out and process it. How did that manifest in your life, like, what were some of the things that created the pressure and were the kind of the awareness that you had of, wow, like this, this is seeping into other areas, and maybe it's time to express this.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah. You know, I think, given that this main trauma occurred when I was 11 years old, when I was in middle school, it definitely affected friendships and how I communicated with other people, self confidence, you know, and really just the way that I interacted with the world. And as I got older, it felt like, I know you've talked in the past about like the difference between disabilities, like visual disabilities and invisible disabilities. And you know, in my case, I had a very visible disability that then suddenly became an invisible disability for everybody else, except for me, and I didn't know how to go through my day living with that disability while other people couldn't see it, because I had limitations, not only physical limitations, but emotional limitations that everyone else didn't know about. And so if you're trying to hide those, but you can hide them. It's just, it's a really complicated situation. You know, as I got older, I I feel like, you know, trust was one of the biggest ways that I, the biggest areas that I took a hit, in terms of being able to trust other people, believing that what somebody was telling me was what is going to happen. I think that's something that has stayed with me throughout my, my adult life, you know, and
Zack Arnold: That's actually something that I want to get into a little bit later. We're going to put a pin in that for a second, because I I've heard you talk about the kind of your your trust, or lack thereof. With the traditional medicine, you know medical system, and you know how they advocate or don't advocate for people, and how it, at least from the outside, it seems largely apparent that your direction of profession probably had a lot to do with this experience. I very much want to get into that. I have like 87 things that I want to get into. You should see my prep sheet. But we're gonna, we're gonna stay on topic for a moment, because I have a tendency to get overly excited, but I want to stick with this idea for a second of people making assumptions about somebody that has a quote, unquote disability, because this has been a theme in my life and in my work for 15 plus years. For those that are listening, that are unaware, about 10 years ago, I released a documentary film that was called go far, the Christopher rush story that was about the first quadriplegic to become a licensed scuba diver, and, by the way, also a U of M grad Go Blue. You having your double master's degree from U of M as well, and wondering if, at some point, walking the Diag, you know, we bumped book bags, and we never knew, because I think we were there around the same time, give or take. But I want to talk a little bit more about these assumptions that we make of people that have these visual disabilities. There was a scene that you had in your book, and it was this idea that you were, I think it was shortly after. And I say you in the book I keep, there's so much, so much of a blurry line that I just feel like I'm talking about your real story. So I want to be careful if you're like, yeah, that never actually never actually happened, but I want to know if something like this has happened to you, where shortly after Elizabeth's surgery, she was having family dinner, and they put her somewhere else, and they said, we're just going to put you here. And they separated her, and logistically, it was because of the the wheelchair. But did that come from a place of truth, where somebody said, we're just going to put you here.
Allison Sweet Grant: That did come from a place of truth. Many of those, the flashback chapters, as they're as they're called in the book, came from a place of truth. There was a Thanksgiving where I was 20 feet away from the rest of my family. Yeah. I mean, I'm not sure exactly what to say. What else to say about it. I think that that scene sort of speaks for itself, but it does represent i. So, you know, the weight of, you know, the emotional toll that going through this process took on a kid took on me. It was very isolating, even when there were other people in the room, you know, oftentimes I did feel completely alone. And that's a great example of one of those times
Zack Arnold: That scene reminded me of one of the most important stories for me that I learned about Christopher when I was doing the documentary about him. Unfortunately, it was after he had passed away, and that's a whole other story which led me to deciding that I was going to take eight years of my life and tell his life story from literally a box of VHS tapes and old college papers and figure out how to weave this into a feature length film. But one of the most formative stories for me was this idea that whenever Chris would go out to dinner at a restaurant, they would, number one, not hand him a menu, but then they would say, What would you like, what would you like? What would you like? And they'd say, what would he like? And that was a very, very defining moment for him and his family. And it just, it made him so upset, because I think to this day, he's probably one of the three most intelligent, most well spoken, most kind people that I've ever met in my life. And it just, it just even talking about it now makes me angry that people would discount him because he's sitting in a wheelchair. So I know that you say that the scene at the dinner table speaks for itself, but for those that haven't actually read the book yet, even though I feel like I've ingested it and digitized the entire thing in my brain, I'm curious when you go through something like that, is it just a matter of like, oh, this. I can't believe they're not accepting me and I want to be a part of this, versus they're right, and I do belong over here.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, I think, you know, I think it, it says a lot about how, in my case children, but in Christopher's case, like you know, people with visible other, visible disabilities, right, are treated, not only in public, but also specifically, like in the healthcare system. I think you know my in my experience as a child going through the healthcare system, I was in the room, but never really in the room. You know, I was talked about as if I wasn't there. And it feels awful. I mean, it feels awful to want to contribute to conversations about yourself and not be allowed to, you know, or to be infantilized, even as an older child. You know, children are often fighting for independence and then to be sort of knocked back down. It's very demoralizing. It's something that I hope came across in the book, yeah, I mean, I can't imagine how difficult it would be to be treated as a child, you know, your entire life. And I'm, you know, that's just an incredibly, you know, heartbreaking story.
Zack Arnold: I think it's so funny that you say you can't imagine it, because it kind of sounds like you lived a lot of it,
Allison Sweet Grant: But I was, I did, but, but not as an adult, right? Like, yes, that is exactly what happened when I was 11, and probably before as well, and through my teenage years. But it's not something that I experience now.
Zack Arnold: I think this, then, is the perfect place to take the pin out of the conversation that I had sitting on the proverbial bulletin board, which is that I'm going to assume, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, it's probably not a coincidence that you ended up choosing to go into the world of medicine and specifically becoming a psychiatric nurse practitioner. So tell me a little bit more about what the journey was that led you to saying, This is how I want to spend my time and this is the career that I want to build.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, I don't think I ever said this is how I want to spend my time and this is the career that I want to build. I didn't know it at the time, but I do see it fairly clearly now that I think I went into healthcare, you know, as a way to protect myself, as a way to keep myself safe, as a way to educate myself so that other people's opinions would not stand in the place of my own. And like I said, I didn't realize that. At first I thought, you know, nursing, nursing is a great, a great career path. Nurses are always in need. I'm a sympathetic, empathetic person, you know, but once again, it was probably more selfish than anything else, and I wanted to not only understand the place that I was in, but be able to take care of myself in a different. Kind of way.
Zack Arnold: It's interesting that you say that it was to protect yourself, but something tells me that in the way that you conducted yourself as a nurse practitioner, and by the way, I want to get into the nuances of what that means in a second, because I've got a story about nurse practitioners, but I find it interesting that it's just about protecting yourself. Was there a part of it that was it about you protecting others and being able to give them what you weren't given when you weren't given when you went through this experience as a kid.
Allison Sweet Grant: That sounds really good. So I'm gonna go with Yes, absolutely, but that's not the case. Well, I did not go into orthopedics, although I tried at one point, I did interview for a job on an orthopedic floor very early in my career, and it didn't work out. But I think, you know, I think the great thing about having a healthcare background is in writing this book and in telling my story like, it's really nice to be able to have, like, three different perspectives. You know that as a patient from when I was in in the hospital, that is a parent now, and also that of a provider. And, yeah, I definitely think the experiences that I had early on in life made me a better nurse, but I don't know if I can, you know, I don't know if I can say that like, Yes, this is the main reason that I went into nursing was to help other people, but it sounds really good.
Zack Arnold: All right, we'll go with that then. So for many This may seem like we're going a bit on a tangent, but I have a feeling this will lead us right back where I'm hoping it will. I want to talk a little bit about the nuances between being a nurse, being a nurse practitioner, and being a doctor, because over the last two and a half years, I have gotten basically a master class on understanding this. Because a little over two years ago, my father, he was about 80 years old at the time, got congestive heart failure, and as soon as he got congestive heart failure, over the course of about six months, both he and my mom at the exact same time, both fell to dementia, and in six months, they all but disappeared mentally, like they were just completely different. People went from being completely self sufficient to really not being able to take care of each other at all, but no awareness whatsoever that they could take care of each other at all. And then we eventually had to move them into a memory care facility, and I was introduced to the idea of nurse practitioners, and at first I really didn't understand what it was. So for those that are not really familiar between the nuances and differences, talk to me specifically about what a nurse practitioner does.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, a nurse practitioner is a provider with a background in nursing, I think typically an RN degree, a BSN degree, who's gone on to get their masters in a specific field of nursing. So for me, it was psychiatry, but there's lots of other specialties, and nurse practitioners typically have similar privileges as physicians. You know, they can, you know, work in hospitals, they can write prescriptions, they can oversee, you know, the care of all different types of individuals, but they tend to look at things through a more like holistic lens. And I'm curious if that was your experience.
Zack Arnold: It was very much. So this is a really interesting education for me, because I really I'd never heard the term nurse practitioner before, and I thought it was just some derivation of what a general nurse would do. And then when I sat down and I started talking to one I said, do you also have a medical degree? He's like, Well, I don't actually have a medical degree, but essentially, the nurse practitioner comes in and kind of looks at it from multiple different perspectives, as opposed to here's here's whatever the disease or the symptom is, and in 15 minutes or less, we're going to figure out how to treat it. The nurse practitioner is more a storyteller. Let me understand the story here and how I can put all the pieces together, which to me, if we take out the degrees right, the like the actual medical degree, or otherwise, I think there's a lot of increased benefit to a nurse practitioner rather than a doctor, because you do ask very, very different questions. And look at it from multiple angles, the story that comes with it is that when both of my parents fell to dementia, they went in very, very different directions. With my dad, it was he is so nice. We love your dad. He's our favorite patient ever. Every single facility, rehab or otherwise that has worked with my mom has all said the same thing, this is the most difficult patient we've had in our entire careers. And what she would always say is, she's like, that's not a doctor, that's a charged up nurse, right? And I've, I cannot get that out of my brain, because I've heard her say that so many times. So I'm curious if you had a similar experience where people might underestimate you or make assumptions about you because you're, quote, unquote, not a doctor.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, I've been out of practice for many years. I actually stopped working in healthcare when my oldest daughter was born, and she will be turning 17 this year, so it's been a while. But yeah, I mean, you know, there are certainly patients who come in with preconceived notions about nurse practitioners, and that's fine, but I think the important thing to remember is there's a provider out there for everybody, right? And if you want to see a physician, see a physician, and if you want to see a nurse practitioner, see a nurse practitioner, and you know they are, you can throw pas in the mix as well, right? Like you got to look for somebody who connects with you, I think. And for me, it's less about the initials that are beside the name, and more about the personal interaction, right? Like I when I'm looking for a new provider, like, bedside manner is one of the most important things to me, and it doesn't matter if you're like, you know, one of the smartest providers out there, smartest physicians out there. If you can't talk to me like a person and make me feel good about the interaction, it's not going to work for me. So less about the less about the letters, more about the care.
Zack Arnold: Yeah. And again, the the reason that I don't feel this is a tangent, and we're just talking about the medical system is that I'm really trying to get a better sense of how trauma and past experiences really shape us and shape our decisions and shape the people that we become. So as soon as I was doing a little bit deeper dive research outside of the book, and I saw a nurse practitioner, I'm like, that makes sense, because we look at somebody that wants to take a more holistic approach. Somebody that really believes in bedside manner is like, this makes absolute perfect sense, having just read the book.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, that's really kind of you. And I, again, I'm going to go with it because it sounds great, and I'm going to give it a lot of thought. And you might be right, and that might be one of these things that I just, you know, was was sort of buried deep, and, you know, I was not sure what the motivation was for. So thank you for that. Yeah,
Zack Arnold: of course, this reminds me of what I see happen so often in the film analysis world, just to kind of go off into one of my many identities and Venn diagrams, is that those that do really deep film analysis of movies, TV shows or otherwise, a perfect example of this that happens all the time is they'll write paragraphs about at the end of this film, you know, they end on a final low angle with a canted shot with it off center, because it meant the real anguish and angst of this person's journey. And then they interviewed the director. He's like, Yeah, we had four minutes left and our tripod broke, and it's just that was the shock that we could get. You're like, what? So I kind of feel it's like, well, sure, that's, that's the reason I became a nurse practitioner. Sounds good.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah. No. I mean, I find that in my writing, like, I'll, you know, sit down and write something and, you know, come back to it later and see a parallel that I didn't even know I had created. So, yeah, I think that translates to lots of different forms of art.
Zack Arnold: I think it's funny too, because when one of the things that I think is so important about the creative process is collaboration, and when you share your work with others, other people see things in it that you didn't see. Which brings me to something that, to me, was such a no brainer connection that I realized you hadn't even made, which is that you had the scene where your fan, and again, I keep equating you as a character. So the character Elizabeth was had was going to the beach, and they were at the sand dunes, and she was just left behind. She couldn't keep up on her crutches. And having read that at the same time that I was listening to the podcast that you did with your husband, talking about how he's always driving ahead of me. And, you know, when we walk, he's walking ahead of me, like, Oh, this is where this comes from. And you were just like, what? Oh, yeah,
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, yeah. I did not put the two and two together there, but I love that you did, because now I'm able to use that. You know, whenever Adam is is walking ahead, I can, you know, I can say this. It's just like I'm right back there in the dunes. You know, you've given me a little bit of ammunition. So thank you.
Zack Arnold: You're, you're more than welcome. I'm not sure whether or not he would be thanking me for that. However, because I know that you have the ongoing debate of when you're driving in two cars, if you should, you know who should be in charge of sticking with the other one. And this is, this was one where, when I heard that, especially after reading the book, I had to completely rethink my own assumptions, because, I'll be honest, I was a little bit more on Adam's side on this one. So let's, I want to break this down for a second. For those that haven't heard that this, let's talk a little bit more about this endless battle between when you're driving in two cars. How is it supposed to work?
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, you know, first, I mean, let me preface by saying we don't do this often. I feel like we've gotten a lot of feedback about this. And I think it sounds like every day we're following one another. You know, on the road, this does not happen every day. It's sort of like maybe a twice a year thing. Driving, but yes, when I'm following, when we're driving to the same place in two different cars, Adam is always ahead, and I always lose him because he is a fast driver, and I tend to be a more cautious driver. And so it's it's a problem, right? And yeah, we were talking about it in the podcast, and we got a lot of feedback about who's right and who's wrong, and it's interesting, I think I'd have to ask him, but I think that a lot of the men who responded were on Adam's side, and a lot of the women who responded were on my side. And I don't think we really ever came to any type of conclusion, but he has been more open to taking his foot off the pedals. I appreciate that.
Zack Arnold: Yeah, of course. And I actually want to dig a little bit deeper into this, because I think it's it speaks a lot to why I gravitated to the book so much, and also why I've kind of gravitated now to, you know, both the members of the grant household, is that, if we take this as a microcosm where most of the guys said, Well, yeah, I agree with Adam, like if you're going to be driving in front I'm looking ahead, like it's your job to make sure you keep up with me, because I don't want to have to stare at the rear view mirror. It's not safe, right? That's a very logical argument. That was my very logical argument. And I think where you're coming from is a very emotional argument. It's a feeling of safety. It's a feeling of we're together. It's a feeling of, I don't want to lose you. And the first thing that this reminded me of is that in January, as I'm sure you at least saw on the news, but anybody listening, a lot of people have experienced it. We were literally outside of our window, I could see the flames from the Palisades fire. So we had to evacuate, and we had to evacuate in two cars. And that terrified me, because in LA traffic, with all the chaos going on, I just did not want to be in two cars. And I was really afraid of what would happen if we got separated, even if it's just like, you know, red lights, and you kind of miss it at the same time, or whatever it might be. And by and large, I was driving up front, and I kept thinking to myself, Oh, you got to keep up with me. You got to keep up with me. But then I thought, no, I need to slow down to make sure that she's with me as well. And again, it's that, that logic versus that emotion, and that's what I find so interesting when I look at your work is that it is so so deeply emotional and personal, and then, without bringing him into the conversation too much, but your husband's work is very well known for being very analytical, very logical. He even says, I'm a research based communicator. That's got to be tough to be in a relationship where you have somebody that's highly logical and highly emotional. Ask me how I know. So I'm curious, am I onto something in recognizing that it can be very, very challenging, both within ourselves, but both and also within relationships, when there's a lot of logic and there's a lot of emotion, because those two don't always mix.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, no. I mean, I think you're spot on. And it's, it's Adam's, sir, I call it the logic bully. Actually, I think you may have heard him use this term before, because when you know Adam is the worst person in the world for me to be in an argument with, because he's so smart about everything and logical. And I am emotional. I am emotional, and the two just, you're right, they don't mix, because he can, you know, recite back to me all of the reasons that I'm wrong, and reference the articles that say that I'm wrong, and the page numbers right, and I'm just sitting there like, sort of like pounding my fist, so it is difficult and frustrating, but I think also when we're not arguing, right when, when it's just a regular day, that's one of the things that sort of makes us work, is that he does comment things From a very analytical side, and I come at things from a more holistic side. And between the two, we seem to work things out. So
Zack Arnold: The reason that I wanted to bring this up as well, and I don't even know if this is something you can really speak to, but I find that I am equal parts very, very highly logical and very highly emotional and highly sensitive. So the reason that I kind of can relate to what that will look like is not even so much in a romantic relationship, or any kind of a relationship where, like, with with my wife and I, I feel like she could probably say a lot of the same things that you are, where she's like, you just keep pounding it in, like, can you just listen for a second? Like, that's definitely one of our challenges, where I too maybe I'm not citing research, but at least kind of citing an understanding of things on a very logical level. And I have to remind myself, maybe this is about feelings right now, and this is not about logic, and it's not about research, it's not about psychology. It's just two people that are feeling things, and we need to identify what those are. But I found that in. Internally. The struggle of being both very logical and very emotional is very, very challenging, because those two are butting heads all the time. I don't know if that's something that you experience yourself internally, or if it's just pretty much all on the emotional side.
Allison Sweet Grant: I think, I think it depends, like on the subject matter, you know, but I think that, you know, that's something that we, Adam and I deal with in our interactions with our kids a lot, which is when there's when one of them is upset. You know, Adam often goes right for the solution, right? How can we solve this? You know, and I usually come at it from a like, how, you know, let's talk about it right. Like, where's the pain coming from? How can we find some sort of, like, kinder, you know, creative, like, gentler way about things, you know? And sometimes one or the other works, but sometimes it's a combination as well. I mean, I imagine that you it sounds like you kind of have that going on in your head, like with yourself, which is really great that you, you know, you can come at both sides.
Zack Arnold: I don't know if I'd use the word great, I would say that it creates a lot, it creates a lot of anxiety and a lot of internal chaos, because I can overthink my own argument until the end of time, but a lot of times that overthinking arguments in the logic side of the brain is ignoring the emotional side, which is also very highly feeling, highly sensitive, and the two just don't want to communicate with each other. And I've spent years trying to get the two to better understand each other. And sometimes let's actually listen to the emotional side, and let's let's let the logic go in the back seat, or let's let the logic follow on the car behind for a second. So I think there are things that are great about it, but I would say that it can, it can literally be debilitating at times, like just emotionally and cognitively debilitating, for sure.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, that sounds awful.
Zack Arnold: Well, we went from it sounds great to it sounds awful. And it's, by the way, it's somewhere in between. If we're going to talk about, you know, being in the gray, it's very much in the gray. So I wouldn't, I wouldn't want to lose either of them, but it definitely brings challenges. And, you know, I've talked about a lot of those challenges with being highly creative on multiple other episodes, so I'm not going to belabor them too much, but what I did want to get into next is, I know this is something that you're very passionate about, and even wrote about this in a New York Times article, which is how your past experience has informed yourself as a parent, and how you advocate for, you know, your children in general, how you advocate specifically for their medical needs. And one of the stories that I find really interesting is your approach to how you deal with kind of warning or not warning your kids if they're going to get a shot or something's going to happen to them, that very much is informed by your past experience as a child.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, well, for me, you know, it really boils down to honesty. One of the most important things that we owe our kids is honesty when it comes to healthcare in particular, I'm very careful not to mislead them in any way you know. And that doesn't necessarily mean that they need to know everything, but I think that kids in particular, like, let me start over and say, I think that they deserve to be told the truth, even when it's something that they don't want to hear, because there's a pain right that comes, not only with the pain of the vaccination or whatever it is that's happening, but then The sort of secondary pain of being misled or betrayed by somebody who's supposed to be honest with you, some supposed to, you know, always be upfront. And I never want my kids to feel that secondary pain. I want them to know that I'm always going to tell them the truth. And I think it also gives them the opportunity to have a mature reaction, right? And to know that whatever comes, even if it is something painful, they can deal with it.
Zack Arnold: And I would argue that this works just equally well with other adults, as it does with children, but very much on the same page with you, as far as I've always said, and it's been maybe you experienced something similar, because it sounds like we're roughly about the same generation, you know, similar upbringing, and that I feel like, as we were being brought up, it was, go outside, we'll see at dinner time. Oh, you stepped on a rusty nail. Maybe we'll find time to get you a tetanus shot, drink from the garden hose, right? That was kind of the way that I was brought up. And then the pendulum swung in a very, very different direction for what would be the generation that my kids are now, where a lot of them are overly protected. And I've always said it's not our job as parents to keep our kids safe. It's our job as parents to allow them to be in an environment where they can fail safely, where we. Make sure we give them that room to fail. Obviously, we want them to be safe, so I don't want anybody to read that the wrong way, but I don't want them wrapped in bubble wrap. It's not a matter of, oh my god. I don't want to teach them to ride a bike because they might skin their knee. It's, I know they're going to skin their knee. I just want to make sure that I'm there for them when it happens, and I've got antiseptic to spray it out. And I feel like that both that honesty and creating that space is so, so important. And what I found, and I'm curious, what your experience has been, is that now that our kids are older, they're 15 and 13 through probably the last at least five years, anytime that we've gone out to a dinner, a family event or otherwise, people will literally pull us aside and they'll say, your kids are, they're so well mannered, they're so well spoken like they don't, they're they're not acting out. And I believe a lot of that is because my wife and I decided, literally from birth, we're going to talk to them like they're people. There was never baby talk. There was never, let's sugarcoat it. We just told them the unvarnished truth that's also led to them having potty mouths, because, you know, they're learning that by osmosis, but I really feel that giving them that space to just fail in a safe environment, but allowing them to fail, encouraging them to fail, and just telling them the truth, even when it's really uncomfortable, I'm really have seen that paid off. And I'm curious if you've seen the same things now that your kids are getting older.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah. I mean, you know, definitely, I think, you know, one of the things that I've sort of taken away from this experience is that, like, it's okay to grieve, you know what? I mean, it's okay to have these emotions, even when you're younger, like it's okay for kids to grieve, right? I feel incredibly grateful for the opportunities that I had. It doesn't mean everything was perfect. And so it's okay to be grateful and and grieving at the same time. And I think it's okay for kids to have a mix of emotions, you know what I mean, at the same time, and learn how to handle them. It's how they become independent. And so, yeah, I mean, we don't really, we don't really try to shield our kids for much, but when things hit them, you know, we want to be there to convert them afterwards, right? And so, yeah, I think we're very much aligned in our in the way we approach those things with the children?
Zack Arnold: Well, I have a feeling that there are, you know, many other areas that we could go, as far as parenting skills or otherwise, but there's actually I want to, I want to steer a little bit closer back to the book, but it actually I'm going to steer in a little bit of her circuitous direction, and that I had to learn a new word when I was researching you, and it's part of your bio. And I'm not even sure I'm going to say it right, but it said that you are a synesthete. Number one, did I even say that correctly? And number two, what in the world does that mean?
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, it's synesthete, but you're super
Zack Arnold: Synestite. Okay,
Allison Sweet Grant: Yep. And synesthesia is a processing sort of phenomenon where I think it affects about 4% of the population, where some of the senses cross in the brain. And so, like an example, there's many different types of synesthesia, but an example is that some people see letters and numbers in certain colors. Some people might like taste words or smell melodies. So it's like a crossing of senses, if that makes sense. And so for me, I have this anesthesia where I see numbers in color, and it's a little bit letters, but it's strongest for me in numbers. And so like when I if I'm looking at my computer screen and I see the clock, I can see that it's a black font that says 104, but in my mind's eye, the one looks white, the zero looks clear, and the four looks red, sort of just a strange little kick up in The brain. Yeah.
Zack Arnold: So I'm curious how, and I want to get back into how I think this might be connected to the book in a second. But now I'm my curiosity is running rampant. One of the things that you've talked about before, and not a lot, because you are this, you said you're very, very introverted. I myself am very introverted, and most of the people that listen to this podcast, or have heard me do any speaking, especially at a networking event, they say, What are you talking about? You're not introverted. And I say, ask my wife. I am by far the most introverted person I know. And one of the reasons that I found is that it's really about the over stimulation of the environment. It's the amount of energy that it takes me to process all the information. Because, and this is again, something I talked about, Dr Scott Barry Kaufman, where we have the salience network that's telling us, pay attention to this, don't pay attention to this, but everything is just bombarding me. I can't even imagine now having to process numbers as colors or music as smell or anything else. Does this? Does this inhibit you in any way where it just kind of feels like there's so many things going on. Did it make it difficult to do math? I'm just curious how you process the world with us.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, it did not inhibit me in any way that I know of. In fact, I didn't even know it was like a thing until I was in my 20s. Adam and I were I don't even remember what we were talking about, but I said something to the effect of No, because the three is green, you know. And he's like, Excuse me, what? Like, we figured out what was going on here. But no, I thought it was sort of a, I didn't even realize it was a thing that I did. It just felt very normal. It's not something that I try to do. I'm not like, looking at numbers or letters and trying to think, oh, what color is that? Again, it's just sort of a natural thing. I don't think that it helped me or hindered me in math, but one place where it did cause a little bit of trouble is when Adam and I were selecting names for our children, because it felt very important to me. There's, there's like a like a tactile sort of side of this, where it felt very important to me that the birthday of our children and their names matched in terms of color. So and of course, because I didn't know when my kid's birthday would be, I had a hard time picking names because I needed the colors to look good together in my mind. And I know this is like, the sounds pretty ridiculous, but
Zack Arnold: I'm fascinated right now continue. Yeah.
Allison Sweet Grant: So it was tough because, you know, we're looking at names, we're trying to pick names Adam and I have very different taste. And then on top, on top of it, you toss this sort of requirement that I have, where I need the name to look good with the birthday, which, of course, we're not going to know until, until they're born. So it was complicated to say the least.
Zack Arnold: That certainly sounds complicated. And now I'm even more curious, because you said that you see color with numbers. How do you associate color with a name?
Allison Sweet Grant: So it's the letters in a name, but also, like the general like vibe of a name has a color associated with it too. So there were a lot of different elements in play in choosing their names, you know? And I was actually ended up being very successful with our oldest daughter and our son whose names like, look good to me in my head, but we were a little bit off with my middle daughter. And you know, what are you gonna do?
Zack Arnold: So what colors did you end up on?
Allison Sweet Grant: So, like my my middle daughter's name, in my mind is like green and orange, but her birthday is like pink and white, and so in my head, like that doesn't look good, but my older daughter, like her name matches her birthday very well, and the same with my son. So
Zack Arnold: That is absolutely fascinating. I just I can't even imagine the way that you must perceive the world. But then again, I kind of can, because this is what brings me back to the book. One of the things that I loved about the book so much, it is so visual, like, you can, you can picture everything and like, even though I couldn't literally say this, because I'm not as thin a site, did I get it right that time? Yeah, okay, good. Because I'm not a synaesthete. I can't say, oh, I could smell when I was, you know, in the, you know, the room with the fire going, and maybe some people literally can, but the the description with which you're able to put us in this environment, I just, I find that so fascinating that you will then say you feel tongue tied and you feel very, very nervous when you're speaking out loud, because your your ability to communicate through words and not just communicate, but communicate visually. This is one of the reasons why I think this book would become a perfect film, because it is so visual and it is so emotional and it is so visceral. So do you think those things are connected this thinest that, or this synesthesia, and you being able to create such a vivid, imaginative world through words?
Allison Sweet Grant: Wow. Well, that's incredibly kind of you. I think when I, you know, I read a lot, and I personally really like descriptive, you know, pieces of writing. I like to read about the flowers, you know, in the meadow and and the clouds in the sky, and, you know, the color of the shirt that somebody's wearing. Like those details I find really enjoyable, and so it was, it felt very natural and organic to like weave that into my own writing. I don't know if like synesthesia itself affected those descriptive descriptions, but it. One of the reasons that I like to write is because I can take my time with it. You know, I'm part of my anxiety is feeling like I'm not going to be able to communicate in the way that I want to, that I'm going to get tongue tied, that I won't that I'll have trouble with recall, that I'll know what it is I want to say, but not be able to say it and when I'm writing, because I can take my time with it, I'm able to bypass all that and really nail what it is I want to get onto the page.
Zack Arnold: I can't speak for you, but for myself, I know that what I appreciate about writing versus speaking is that as a writer, I can really, I can really allow my inner perfectionist to flourish, because I don't have to send it out into the world until I'm sure that it's the right word, saying the right things in the right order. And one of the reasons that I get so nervous, even after 10 years of doing podcasts, having done hundreds and hundreds of these, I get one shot, the words come out of my mouth, and whatever words come out in the order that they do, my brain starts to think, Yeah, but that could have been better. You could have phrased that differently. Ooh, I want to do that over again. I'm already looking at some of the notes that I have in front of me thinking, Oh, I really should have asked that question next. Or why didn't we talk about this yet? So for me, I find the writing is a lot more comforting, but I also find that it hinders me from actually putting enough out there, whereas when I just get on the microphone, I hit record, I talk, I hit stop, there it is. Can't overthink it. Give it to my team. It's out into the world. So do you find some comfort in the ability to kind of channel your inner perfectionist with the words,
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, absolutely. But let me just say I would never know that by by listening to you, because I whether it's natural or you've got it down because of practice, like you sound incredibly like confident and sure of yourself, and like the words that are coming out of your mouth are exactly the ones that you wanted. So I would never know that
Zack Arnold: It's all smoke and mirrors. I promise it's all smoke and mirrors inside. It's a very different story.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, I do know what that feels like, you know, and I know how, how scary it can be. You know, to to feel like you have to put yourself out in a way that out there, in a way that you're not 100% comfortable with. It's incredibly anxiety provoking, and it definitely, for me, contributes to my introversion, because I'd much rather run through those words in my head than to put them out there and wish that I could take them back.
Zack Arnold: Well, I could say the exact same thing back to you that I would never know if we hadn't started this conversation with, gee whiz. We're so nervous, and we're introverts, and what's gonna happen here? I would assume that nobody would ever know, but that's really important part of the work that I do, and it's taken me years to get to this point where, if you were to had gone back even a couple of months ago, but especially a few years ago. My brand was literally called Optimize Yourself. It was all about, you know, optimizing your potential and getting better at this and that and the other thing. And I just as I was doing that, yes, I was practicing what I was preaching, but at the same time I was saying, Who am I to put this stuff out into the world when my life is an absolute show? And I realized there's real value in just being completely open and vulnerable about the process, about being creative, about putting your creative work out into the world. So I don't think I would have had the same conversation with you a year or two years ago. And I just I think that the fact that we're both talking about this kind of behind the scenes and saying some of the quiet parts out loud, I do it because I hope there's somebody else that is listening to this right now. Maybe they've got a book in them, maybe they've got poems in them, and they don't want to get them in front of people, and that, to me, was really the reason that I wanted to have this conversation, more than anything.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, thank you. I feel the same way, and that's why I've really been able to, you know, push myself to do, to do podcasts, you know, to answer questions like yours is because, you know, yes, like this book is out there, and I hope it finds its audience, you know, like, I know, there are people out there who feel the same way, right, have struggled in similar ways. And I hope that it can be reassuring for them to feel seen in a way that, you know, maybe they haven't been able to before.
Zack Arnold: Yes, and that's, that's, again, why I was so excited to be able to have this conversation today. And there's, there's one piece that I want to dig into that I didn't get a chance to and because I'm being so, you know, we're both being kind of open and honest about where our minds are. Right now, I'm immediately thinking, Yeah, but this conversation doesn't belong here. I should have done this about half an hour ago, because this is a total deviation of the flow of this conversation, but this is one of those that if I don't ask it and talk about it, it's going to drive me crazy. So this is going to be coming back to. Something very specific about the book in micro that I think is very macro about your entire journey through this process. You have this motif that's recurring throughout the book, from literally page one all the way until the very end. It's this transition from I am okay, I am safe, to I am not okay and I am not safe. And I actually went through and there, and I could have gotten this wrong. There are 18 recurrences of this throughout the book, and you find that about midway through the story is the first time that she says, I am not okay, I am not safe. And then there's this moment where she says it out loud, and this was my experience of reading it, as soon as she said the words out loud that had been this recurring motif, it said the same words, I'm not okay, but it was in quotation marks. And I literally remember stopping reading. I took my pen and I circled the quotation marks, and I said, Wait a second, that's the first time she says it out loud. And then, literally, the next sentence is you saying? This is the first time I've ever said it out loud. This is the first time I've ever admitted it to myself, I'm like, Yes, I totally noticed that. So I'm curious, where did that motif come from? Because it's a really important spine of your entire story.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah. Well, first of all, I'm just totally blown away by your attention to detail. That's like, amazing.
Zack Arnold: Well, I remember once, not to interrupt you, but I remember once an author said, and I've talked to so many people, and I've read so many things, I can't attribute it to them specifically, but they said, There is no better honor than when I'm doing a book signing and somebody comes up with my book and it is torn to shreds, and there are post it notes, and there are notes everywhere I've destroyed your book. Like it's embarrassing. Like, if you were to say, oh, where would you like me to sign it. I'm like, I don't know, like, it's going to get lost in a sea of a mess. So to me, if when the time comes that I put a book out there, I want somebody to bring it to me, and it's been absolutely destroyed because they've consumed it. And I don't do that with all books, a lot of books, especially the ones that I read, because it's going to be for a podcast interview, I've learned how to extract the key ideas, read a few chapters kind of formulate. Here's the theme of it. I couldn't do that with your book. I literally couldn't. I just had to stop everything, and I just had to consume it because it was really that good. So
Allison Sweet Grant: I'm I'm touched truly, and blushing because it's it means so much to me to hear you say that I'm okay, I'm fine, I'm safe. Are really three little sentences that I've said to myself my whole life. It wasn't something that I had to make up to put down on the page. It was sort of a mantra for a really long time, and it it felt really important to include it in the book. I think in a lot of ways, people have, you know, their own way of comforting themselves right and putting themselves at ease in times of trouble, and that was really the only way that I knew how to maintain my own sanity at times, was just to tell myself, you're fine, you're okay, you're safe, no matter what else is going on around you. For me, you're physically safe and everything else you know, nothing else is as important as that. So
Zack Arnold: So, coming back full circle to where we started, with this idea of creativity being an act of courage. Do you find that after writing this book, putting it out into the world, Rando people on the internet like me are reading all of it, having done that, do you feel more fine, more okay and more safe than you did before having the book and releasing it.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yes, 100% I've gotten some incredible feedback from some incredible people, and I, you know, am truly humbled, you know, to think that somebody might have found taken some meaning away from something that I wrote. Personally, I gained a ton of meaning in writing. It absolutely delighted if somebody finds even just like a pebble of meaning in one little sentence. It means. It truly means the world to me. And yes, I do feel now, having put it out there, like, this is, this is, like, the worst of me, right? Like, here are these things that I've kept secret for so long, things that I was embarrassed about, things that I felt shame over. And I'm putting it out there like, there's not much else that, you know, there's not much else that somebody can like do to hurt me. This is this is it. And so there it is. And I'm still okay. It was sort of an act of bravery on my part, a little one
Zack Arnold: A big one. I'm gonna correct you that this was a huge act of bravery. And I think that it I think that you didn't just write it for yourself. You really wrote it because you said you had to find a way to write for an audience. And I don't think that there's any question that somebody that's been through similar trauma, it does not have to be an 11 year old, it doesn't have to be a female. It doesn't have to be somebody wearing a fixator. That's why it was so universal to me, because anybody can associate trauma that has defined them with what she's going through. So that's again, why I'm like, it's young adult fiction and it's female I guess I'll give it a try. That's why I was so sucked in so quickly. Is number one, because it was so vivid and visual. But number two there, I can't imagine there's a single person that in some way in their own life, they can't say yes, this is how I feel, having been defined by whatever this experience might have been,
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, well, thank you again. I mean, you know I I am grateful that that is out there, and I hope that you know. I don't even know. I'm like, overwhelmed by your kindness. I don't even know what to say, except thank you. That's really lovely and much more than I you know deserve.
Zack Arnold: Once again, I'm going to, unfortunately have to disagree with you. You very much deserve it for putting something like this out into the world and for everything that you endured. But how you were able to take such struggle and circumstances outside of your control and turn it into something good, you could have become a very different person, a very different parent, and that is all based on choices. So the fact that you went through something like this and you've turned it into what you have, you very much deserve it. So thank you. Zack, thank you. You're more than welcome. So now we're going to go to the levity portion of the program. I when I say this, I firmly believe it. I would, I really, really, really, really want to see this as a movie someday. I'm not a producer or a financier. If I had the money to option it, I probably would, because I would want to hoard it, but I know that there are a lot of Hollywood filmmakers and storytellers out there that might just be listening to this. And I also know that you love to re watch movies over and over and over and over and over. So if you were to take some of these movies that you love watching and say, Oh, if it were like this, or it felt like this, or it had this character, what's your dream version of this as a movie? I'm curious.
Allison Sweet Grant: Oh my gosh, that's an amazing question that I have given absolutely zero thought to. I don't know, you know, I I'm sure there are technical terms for these things that I'm going to say that I don't know, because I know nothing about film except for what I like, but I really like what I'm like when a movie feels real, like when I'm when it looks visually like I'm sitting in the room and not like like a movie set. Does that make sense?
Zack Arnold: Sure? Of course. Can you think of a movie that that evokes that feeling for you?
Allison Sweet Grant: The first one that comes to mind is, call me by your name, which I've talked about before, because it's one of my favorite films, but it just like I feel like I am in when I'm watching that movie, like I am in Italy in the 80s, you know, Like at somebody's villa, like it just feels so I um, like, visceral. It feels visceral. Um, oh my gosh. I I feel like I'm like, going blank, um, but
Zack Arnold: Well, what are so let's make it even easier and more lighthearted. What are some of these movies that you enjoy watching over and over. I know that's kind of one of the recurring themes for you.
Allison Sweet Grant: Okay, well, lost in translation is definitely
Zack Arnold: there's a movie that feels very real where you really feel like you're in that environment and you're traveling with them. So that's a great example.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yeah, very on the spot before sunrise, which is an oldie, but a good a goodie. God,
Zack Arnold: that's one of my favorite movies of all time. Oh, my God, I literally have my own before sunrise story. I'm not even sure I've even told my wife, because it wasn't my wife, it was before I met her. So you know, nothing nefarious was going on, but I have a before sunrise story. I used to watch that movie on a loop right after I graduated from school, I literally got goose bumps as soon as you said, before sunrise, really? Oh my god. I love that movie. That is a classic that anybody that has never seen before sunrise, stop what you're doing right now as soon as you're done with the episode. Watch before sunrise. It is magical.
Allison Sweet Grant: Yes, it is magical. It is magical. And that's exactly sort of what I'm like trying. Trying to get at very ineloquently is, like these movies, they feel otherworldly, but like in our world, which is just amazing, you know?
Zack Arnold: And that's the funny thing, is that for somebody that wouldn't know it before sunrise is and we say it's magical, they'd say it's just two people walking around like, what's so magical? But there's just something about it. I was so drawn to that movie, maybe because partially I had this very, very similar experience. But, yeah, that's, that's one of my probably 10 time all favorite films is before sunrise. Such a brilliant movie.
Allison Sweet Grant: And, you know, there's a line in that movie where, where Ethan hawks character is talking about the, I believe it's, I hope I Don't misquote it, but the poetry of day to day life. And that's what those great films feel like to me, you know, the poetry of every day. Yeah. So if I could, you know, that would be like at the top of my wish list for, you know, the general like vibe that I would picture if somebody wanted to turn it into something visual. Wow.
Zack Arnold: Well, I would say that the poetry of everyday life is probably one of the most perfect way to encapsulate your book is way your book as well. So having said that, that's probably a good, good reason to transition to the shameless self promotion portion of today's program, which is for anybody, and I would hope everybody, that's interested in finding you buying the book, like they're always a bunch of different places to send people. Where's the one place that you would want to send somebody to either find your book, connect with you, or otherwise.
Allison Sweet Grant: I mean, I, I love receiving emails from people who've read my book. So people are welcome to, you know, shoot me a line anytime. I don't even remember what my book email address is. I don't have to. I think it's a dot, wait a
minute, a.suite.grant@gmail.com but also, I have a website, which is allisonsweetgrant.com and that would be probably the first place to go.
Zack Arnold: Well, I'm going to make sure that we put all those resources in the show notes, and I'm going to do everything that I can to make sure that the right people hear this conversation and are inspired by you and inspired by your work. So I will end where I started, which is a profuse appreciation for you taking the time to be here today with all the many things you're doing as an author, as a parent and otherwise, this conversation has meant the world to me and exceeded all of my expectations. So thank you so much.
Allison Sweet Grant: Thank you so much for having me. It's been such a pleasure. But before we go, I need to ask you one question, because I am everybody in my household is very much obsessed with American Ninja Warrior and so, oh dear Lord, just love to know a like, small, tiny bit about your experience, and it's if it's something you'd ever do again,
Zack Arnold: Speaking of putting me on the spot, oh boy, I'm not sure. I guess. No, no, we won't cut it. We don't talk about putting me on the spot and being vulnerable. That's my whole platform. So my my challenge is figuring out how I answer this in short form, because I could probably make this an entire two part podcast interview, but I'll keep it as short as I can. My experience of deciding to train for and beyond American Ninja Warrior is probably one of the most transformative, best decisions that I've ever made in my life, the experience of being on Ninja Warrior. And when I say being on it meaning you're thinking, wait, you were on American Ninja Warrior? No, I was not. The reason being, the way that it works is they shoot about 50% more people than make it on the show. So it's essentially an assembly line. It's a conveyor about where somebody goes, somebody else goes, somebody else goes. So what you're seeing on television is highly edited. So essentially, in a 12 hour day, they have, I think it was, they have about 80 people that run the course, and as soon as somebody falls in, they reset. Somebody goes, somebody goes, somebody goes. So if you were watching it live, you'd be really, really bored watching it. It's a very different experience in person. So because of that, you have to be able to make the cut. And those that make the cut where you're like, Well, wait, I've seen people fall on the first obstacle. I've seen people fall on the second. That's about the quality of their story and how their storyline fits into the kinds of people they want on the show, where there's always one or two people they've overcome cancer, or they've overcome some form of a disability, they're always going to get their moment as they should. And then there's going to be the Joe marovsky and the Jesse graphs of the world, where they're going to, you want them to hit the buzzer, right? So that they have a very, a very selective criteria for these are the stories that we want to share. This is the order that we're going to put them in. And I did not make the cut because in both of my appearances on the course, they both lasted about seven seconds because I fell on the first obstacle, not once, but twice. And not only that, if I were to show you the video, and I do have it, I'll actually send it to you if you want to see it afterwards, you other than the wardrobe being different, you'd say, Isn't this the same clip? And I've talked extensively on past episodes about what was happening. With me psychologically, what was happening to me emotionally, I've learned so much about myself. I've learned so much about my relationship with anxiety, my relationship to being introverted, my relationship to achievement. Because I made one decision I will never forget the moment that I sat my wife down. It was a Christmas vacation, late 2017 after I'd been through this horrible period of burnout. And I said, I've got a crazy idea. And her response was, what is it now? Like, there it was. Like, what? Zack has a crazy idea. She's like, all right, what is it? I said, I think I want to be an American Ninja Warrior. And her response was, yeah, that makes sense. And that was it. But it was because of making that decision that I made so many different Lifestyle Transformations. I've learned so much about myself. I built relationships like now a good friend of mine is Jesse graph from the show, because I said I want to surround myself with the best people in the world in what I want to achieve next, and that's taught me, how do I build genuine relationships with others? How can I build mentor relationships? So Jesse graph was literally my ninja trainer, and I you want to talk about shame, and you want to talk about letting somebody down. When I show you that clip, you're going to see Jesse's there cheering me on to fall on the Ninja Warrior course in a Superdome with Jesse Graff watching you live like I'm still processing that, and it's been, like, two or three years. So that's the shortest version that I can give you, however, I don't think the story is over yet. I think I want to give it one more try, if they'll have me. But my life, over the last two years, just personally with my parents and managing their health, I've just kind of had hit pause on just about everything else in my life. But there's just that nagging feeling. It's like you said with the book, it's like there's this pressure that's saying you got to do it one more time. This is not where the story ends. So you really put me on the spot there. But good question. I didn't know you guys were so obsessed with it, but I could, I could tell you all kinds of stories. I know multiple people that work on the show. I'm friends with a bunch of the the ninja athletes and so, yeah, I've got lots of stories we could talk about offline, for sure.
Allison Sweet Grant: Well, I would love that. And yeah, my son, in particular, he loves it. And, you know, has attempted more than once to build his own course in the backyard. But, yeah, it's, it's amazing, and that's just incredible. And if you do sign up for it again, or whatever the process is, you know, I'd love to watch it
Zack Arnold: Well. That means a lot to me. So didn't see us ending our conversation there today whatsoever. But that was a, that was a, you know, fun little deviation. So once again, really appreciate you, appreciate your work and appreciate today's conversation.
Allison Sweet Grant: Thank you, Zack, thank you so much for having me.
Edited by: Curtis Fritsch
Produced by: Debby Germino
Shownotes and published by: Vim Pangantihon
Music by: Thomas Cepeda
Jennifer reveals that success doesn’t have to come at the cost of changing who you are. We explore how introverts can thrive on their own terms, not by forcing themselves to be extroverted, but by fully embracing their strengths.
Bridget shares her own journey from being traumatized and terrified by early public speaking experiences to becoming a confident communicator.
Scott and I make the case that creativity is a way of being—one that thrives when we let go of the fear of judgment and embrace the parts of ourselves we’ve been told don’t fit the mold.
Aaron and I discuss the “terrible privilege” of his disability and how rewriting your narrative helps push through life’s adversities.
