I think the thing that really kept me going being a paralympian was people telling me that I couldn't do it, and that's that was the big motivation. I just get really excited throughout my life by really challenging situations or really challenging moments, and being bad at something is the most challenging thing we can face at times, So I love being bad at things.
Welcome to the sees the Yay Podcast. Busy and happy are not the same thing. We too rarely question what makes the heart seeing. We work, then we rest, but rarely we play and often don't realize there's more than one way. So this is a platform to hear and explore the stories of those who found lives They adore the good.
Bad and ugly.
The best and worst day will bear all the facets of seizing your yay. I'm Sarah Davidson or Spoonful of Sarah, a lawyer turned fu entrepreneur whos wapped the suits and heels to co found Matcham Maiden and Matcham Milk. Bark Czya is a series of conversations on finding a life you love and exploring the self doubt, challenge, joy and fulfillment along the way lovely neighborhood. I am so excited about our guests this week. I know I say it about every single guest, but it truly is a privilege
to get to sit down with such incredible people. I'm just especially excited about this person because We've been trying to line it up for such a long time, and I've been fangirling over her for even longer than that. But as always, the Universe, in its infinite wisdom, worked out the perfect timing for us in the end, so that this chat would come out the very same week
as her first incredible book. Most of you will already know Ellie Cole as one of many things, our most decorated Australian female Paralympian of all time, a sought after public speaker, a talented TV presenter, and for around the same time as me, actually a boy mum, which I've loved bonding over with her over the past year or so. But as of this week, she can now add published author to the lineup, releasing her beauty full book Felix and His Fantastic Friends into the world, with the main
character based on her son Felix. The book was born out of Ellie's passion to change the way we think about difference and to do so from a young age. So it follows able bodied Felix through the playground, teaching him how to make playtime magical with all kinds of different friends who have all kinds of differences. It's such a heartwarming, powerful extension of Ellie's already passionate advocacy. And of course you'll hear more about how it came about
and why she's excited in the episode. But I got mine or Teddy's copy this morning, just before I recorded this intro, and it was so special to pour over the beautiful, colorful pages. It's illustrated by Carolyn Keyes, and the pages are just filled with color and joy. But to pour over those pages having just had this chat
was really special. And of course Teddy isn't reading just yet, but to have this tool to introduce him to kinds of differences with the right language and with the right magic is I'm just so grateful to Ellie and so
excited for this book to come into the world. I also love that instead of recording this during her decorated swimming career, which was when we first started talking about the podcast, we ended up chatting after her retirement turned reinvention, which touches on all the themes we love on this show about identity, definitions of success, and finding new happiness. I had about two hours sleep though the night before, and you'll hear me apologize to her multiple times but
not doing what I felt didn't do her justice. But luckily she's as eloquent as she is talented, so my terrible questions were no obstacle to her sharing so many pearls of wisdom. It was such a great episode, and I hope you guys enjoy as much as I did. Ellie Cole Welcome to Ceza.
Oh yay. I actually did that ironically quite naturally.
It's so on brand.
I'm so excited for this. This has been years in waiting.
It has, but I also feel like our relationship has kind of been like years in development, Like we followed each other for ages on social media before we met one day at that event, and it was just so nice because I gave you a big hug and I felt like we'd known each other for ages, and I've still kept following from afar.
I know, you know what I love about going to social events now in twenty twenty five is you're surrounded by usually a lot of people that you don't know, but thanks to social media a lot of the time, you do follow quite a lot of people who might be in the same room as you, so you've got a lot of conversation starters.
I know, and I'm that person who's like, I just met someone I've never met them before. But how is your dog's bet appointment two days ago that I.
Know all about?
Because I'll just out myself for being a stalker, which is kind of creepy, but I actually really like it because I think you know, with us, for example, we both became mums at the same time, and even though we don't live close together, we've been able to share that chapter kind of following each other's journeys online.
I know, I think I've related hard to all of your social media content.
You're not getting any sleep.
Oh my god, I feel like I was at Teddy's first birthday party, even though I wasn't.
But I'm definitely riding the journey with you. Oh my god.
You guys were there in spirit and it.
Yeah, has been really nice to have this motherhood journey in common with you. But one thing we don't have in common is that I would call myself the opposite of an elite athlete these days, and yet you are the most decorated Australian female paralympian of all time and it has been a joy to follow your career. Congratulations on everything that you've achieved. We're so lucky to have you.
Thank you. It's strange.
I retired about two years ago and I reflect on my career now and you know, I hear things like what you've just said, and I feel like a completely different person, Like my whole swimming career never even really happened. But it's nice because you know, I've got my metals framed. They're hanging up in my gym. They look pretty impressive obviously on my wall, and it is a nice reminder
of what I once was. I don't know, just even just after tears for like a completely different person and gives you a bit of perspective I think on just how people can really reinvent themselves and change so much based on you know, where they tie their identity to now. Obviously uptime, my identity very closely to being Felix's mum and working in the media now, and I suppose Yet, like I said, when I look back at my career, I'm just like, that doesn't feel like that was me
doing all of those things. Like I watch videos of my racism, like that's not me, but it is.
Yeah, that's so fascinating.
I kind of had the same even a couple of weeks after Teddy, that I didn't remember the person I was before or the life that I had before, even though that'd be my whole life up into that time. And for you, it's not just motherhood but also retiring from a career that had been your whole life up into that point.
Yeah. Now I just kind of watch sport as a fan the same as everybody else does. But I, yeah, definitely have an understanding of the hard work and effort and sleep deprivation and exhaustion and pressure that you put on yourself when you go through that experience. But definitely still in my honeymoon phase like two years after. Although I still wake up quite early with Felix, I'm not waking up at four o'clock in the morning anymore.
So.
I think being an athlete for like almost twenty years prepared me so well for being a mum, because like being a mumm is exhausting, it's very similar to actually being an athlete. And I feel like, you know, if you've gone through all of the experiences of training for a Paralympics or training for an Olympics, and you know, being so exhausted but having to pull yourself out of bed and getting the job done anyway, that's exactly what being a mum is.
It's a perfect training ground. Well, I'm actually really glad that it ended up taking us so long to record this because when we first started talking, you were still an elite athlete in the heights of your career, and that would have been amazing to catch you in the moment for many reasons. But I actually think it's more powerful to talk to you now when you're a couple of years into a whole new chapter, because what comes up the most on CZA is the idea that our
life and our ya unravels in multiple chapters. You can spend your whole life in one mindset, but often life will lead you into something else completely where you have to let go of an old identity and form a new one, and let go of old ways of looking at success and joy and fulfillment and metrics for measuring your life to find new ones. But that transition can be so difficult. So I'm so grateful that we've caught
you at this particular time in your life. But the other thing we look at is the flip side who you were before that, who you were leading up to that moment, because we can walk into your life at this chapter, and all the dots make sense looking backwards, of course they do, but I'm sure there were many times going forwards that you had no idea where you would end up. So I like to go all the
way back to childhood earlywhere it all began. But particularly for you being diagnosed with a neurosarcoma at two years old and having a part of your leg amputated at such a young age, I would love to start there. Your childhood in the Lilyddale and Howard all unraveled.
Yeah, lily Dale.
So most people probably don't know where lily Dale is, but it's in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. I grew up in this place called Mount Evelyn, rightnear lily Dale, and it was in a log cabin that my dad had built, and I even slept on these like beds that my dad had made out of logs, Like it was very rustic, like that experience would go for a lot on Red Balloon or Airbnb right now. And I even had like stained glass windows and just lived in this beautiful hills of Melbourne.
But it was kind of pretty idyllic.
However, I suppose the experience of being diagnosed with cancer when I was too maybe wasn't as idyllic as the kind of environment that I was growing up in. So my childhood did start off pretty rough with a cancer diagnosis. I underwent a whole year of chemotherapy. But at the age of two when this all happened, I wasn't really sure what was happening at the time. Like I knew that I was sick and there was something wrong, but I didn't really understand the gravity of a cancer diagnosis
at the age of two. And I feel for my parents, especially now that I am one looking back, you know how they supported not only me going through that, but my other siblings. When I had three other siblings back at home. That whole journey of my family's life being turned upside down must have been awful for them to go through and then yeah, I woke up one day and my parents were told that I would need to
have my leg amputated. This is when I was just turned three years old and went into the operating theater and came out and all of a sudden had a disability and was devastating for my parents because they didn't know anybody that had a disability.
This was in nineteen ninety four.
You didn't see anyone with a disability on television or really in the communities, being successful in the workplace or anything like that.
And I think that was the thing that.
Really scared my parents is that I was this young three year old girl who was going to go through my whole life and against all of the odds all of the time, and not really have any opportunities. But I was really fortunate that I have a twin sister. Her name's Britney.
Oh my gosh, I didn't know that.
I do have a twin. Say.
She was amazing for my recovery. You know, she taught me how to walk again. There's like these really cute FAMS videos where I'm wearing my prosthetic and I have to learn how to walk again. There's a video of her like when I'm falling over, she picks me up, gives me a cuddle, and encourages me to keep going.
Oh Early, I think back to those like those videos and the support that I had around me, and I know, for me, I just had my family there, and it was my family who were picking me up literally every single time that I fell over, teaching me that I could do or be anything that I wanted to be. And so I was really fortunate to have a really good family support network there. And then my sister and I we just went exploring, you know, we went out
into the big wide world. I was a little bit different obviously than I had been before, but we rode our bikes, we jumped off you know cliff faces. We went out into the world and didn't come back until dinner time. And as far as I was concerned, I was exactly the same as every other kid. I didn't really understand the social stigma around disability because I was in my bubble of my family and it wasn't really until I went to school. The kids were great at
my school. Like when you introduced disability to a child and you explain it to them, they get over it and move on.
Very quickly.
It was actually more the teachers that were probably a bit cautious about letting me do things that other kids were doing that they perceived could have maybe hurt me, or you know, I think they were scared about putting me in an environment where I was most likely going to fail because of my disability. And it's almost like the teachers had this preconceived idea of what I could or couldn't do, and that was probably the thing that damaged my confidence the most. But then I always had
my family to come back to. So yeah, it was certainly a really interesting time to grow up with a disability. In nineteen ninety four, we were kind of on the brink of people even knowing that people with disabilities existed. But I was really fortunate, actually to lose my leg at a young age and to not know any differently, and to grow up probably learning the lesson about adaptability and really being agile and being really creative with problem solving.
I think learning that from a really young age set me up really well for the rest.
Of my life.
So I've always seen my disability as a real blessing, and I know that that can be really confusing for people who have just nearly acquired a disability. But from every paralympian that I've ever met, or anybody that I've known that has had a disability for a really long time, they are the most resilient, creative, impressive people that I know.
And that's because we have had to overcome a lot of hardship, and we have had to be so self confident in what we can achieve, and we put ourselves in positions that not many people go through in their whole life, and so I've really been blessed with it in the end, my hips not so much, in my back not so much. But I look back at the success that I had in my swimming career and wonder if I would have achieved that being an able bodied athlete,
and probably not. I probably would have given up when I was like ten years old, because I think the thing that really kept me going being a paralympian was people telling me that I couldn't do it, and that was the big motivation.
Well, you have well and truly proven anyone wrong who's ever doubted you even for a moment, with your incredible achievements. I was reading your Wikipedia trying to put together the buyer for this episode, and I mean it'd fill an entire episode. You've not just been a retired Paralympic, you've been a wheelchair basketball player as well, So talk about multi talented, but I mean in the Paralympics alone, seventeen medals, six gold, five silver, six bronze from four different Paralympic games.
Such an incredible career and an amazing example as well that so much of our confidence and our belief, even what we will attempt to try in our lives, can be shaped by what other people perceive to be possible. So interesting what you said about your teachers, that them trying to stop you trying things because they thought you
couldn't did really affect your confidence. But then on the flip side, have such amazing family support and your twin just believing you could do anything and letting you try. How powerful that can be. And I think outside of disability extrapolating for anyone in anything they attempt to do that other people's beliefs can be so limiting, but they
can also be full of possibility. And I think I was reading that, you know, after your amputation, they said it would take a year to regain certain types of movement, but that you were back in the swimming pool eight weeks later.
Yeah, it wasn't anything to do with my parents being like, right, let's make her a Paralympian straightaway. No, the swimming lessons
all started because of rehabilitation. Rehabilitation happens a lot through swimming because it's an environment, aquatic environments, you know, they take the pressure off all of the joints and you learn how to use your body again without having to fight with gravity so much so, a lot of our Paralympic swimming superstars actually all started in rehabilitation pools, which
is pretty incredible. It's probably very insensitive for me to go down to a rehabilitation pull and find our next paralymic superstar, but yeah, it's fascinating that, you know, I was thrown into the pool for rehabilitation, and never would I have imagined in those moments that it was going to open up all of the opportunities for me that my parents were scared that I was never going to have.
It was amazing. I did go around in circles for a while.
I related very heavily to finding Nemo when it came out, But that's so cute, but yeah, it took me I think six or seven weeks of swimming a straight line.
Wow, that's fast.
It is fast, And I think the big reason being is because I was chasing my twin sister. You know, she was thrown in there with me actually for a bit of support. Then I went through the normal learned to swim program that all able bodied kids go through, and yeah, I was kind of just integrated into able bodied land, which now I guess in a way, I'm fortunate that I have a type of disability where I can do a lot of things that able body people can do.
I don't have.
I'm not higher needs. So I did just kind of fall into that mainstream able bodied swimming and was very competitive. So I wanted to be as fast as all of the kids that had two arms and two legs. And I think even things like when I was just doing kick so only using legs, it's like a drill that we do in swimming, I wanted to be the fastest and I knew that I had like fifty percent less power than they did, but I managed to be like the fastest kicker in my program.
With one leg.
No way, little things like that really set me up to be really successful in the Paralympics. I never imagined the Paralympics when I first started swimming, because I didn't know about the Paralympics.
All I wanted to.
Do was just be the fastest kid in the pool, and it just opened up all of these doors.
It is so crazy that you barely knew about the Paralympics and then went on to become our most successful female Paralympian in history. And it gives me goosebumps to think just the importance of visibility and how little Ellie couldn't aim to be a Paralympian if she'd never seen anyone do that or didn't know they existed. And there might have been other young people who grew up at the same time who didn't aim for greatness like you
have because they didn't think they could. I love that your family, and especially having a twin sister, who just didn't sort of allow it to be a limit, just let you go and try and see what you could achieve. I love that that meant you weren't hampered in the
way that other people might have assumed you were. And I also love thinking that there are young people who have followed your career in this day and age and started forming their dreams and sense of possibility for themselves, which I know has become a passion in this next chapter of your life as well, which will come to But just that importance of visibility and trying and seeing what you can do.
Yeah, and I think I love that definitely does come down to mindset. And it's something that you know everybody struggles with, is not being good at something. No one likes to pursue any kind of hobby or any kind of skill if they're not that good at it, because we've been reinforced for our whole life that if we're not good at something, we maybe shouldn't fee so good about ourselves.
But for me, I think.
Being an athlete and then also having a disability as well, I really craved the opportunities for the self improvement. You know, when you're an athlete, you change something within your technical abilities, or you change something within your physiological makeup if you can to try and get that zero point zero one percent faster, and that could be the difference between winning
a gold medal or not. I think most people look at elite athletes and look at particularly ones that have been really successful in their careers and think, wow, like all of this success has been amazing. But if I reflect on my career, out of the thousands and thousands and thousands of races that I swam thousands, I would say that only two of them I would have considered to be perfect, if not close to perfect.
Wow.
We want to try and be the very very best versions of ourselves and in terms of athlete, and then when we see data that says this is an area that you can improve on, we like through everything that we can at that. And it was it's amazing to see the way that my idea of success shifted over my time being an athlete, and that was an area that was one of them.
It wasn't necessarily about the outcome.
It was more about the process and the approach of being an athlete that I really fell in love with towards the end. But it's kind of translated into everyday life for me as well, where I actually really enjoy being bad at something because the idea of improvement is
like so exciting to me. And I knew, you know, when I started in media there were some small things that I could improve on and my partner, Sylvia, watches all of my interviews and gives me like the smallest zero point five percent of feedback, like even the way that I'm leaning into someone or leaning away from someone, like the smallest things. And I crave that and I love it because it's exciting to be to put that
in action for next time. So that mindset is so important, that to lean into things that you might not necessarily be so good at, and then to start teaching yourself to really embrace that challenge and embrace the excitement of getting better at something. I think being good at something that's boring.
I mean, says the person who was literally the best in history at what she does.
It was a big part of the reason why I did retire, because I had pulled everything out of assuming that I had wanted to, and I wanted to be challenged in a whole new way. Like the whole reason why I went into the jungle from a celebrity to get me out of here last year is because I really wanted to be challenged.
I knew that being I'm actually quite an introvert.
A lot of people don't believe me when I say that, but being in an environment with twelve people twenty four hours a day was going to make me extremely uncomfortable. I just get really excited throughout my life by really challenging situations or really challenging moments, and being bad at something is the most challenging thing we can face at times. So I love being bad at things.
I wouldn't say I love it.
I'm still pretty a type, but I am trying to embrace that mentality more because, similar to being an athlete, my first career was as a ballerina, and that's the pinnacle of perfectionism and not feeling worthy unless everything is absolutely perfect. But I've tried to let go of that and learn to enjoy the process more because there is
so much beauty in being a beginner. I think there is a lot of pressure in society on success looking a perfect way, or success looking a certain way and being perfect and being these metrics of a certain wage or a certain job or a title or a house or whatever. And the problem with goal setting that way is then when you do arrive at that so called perfection or success, what else is there? Where else do
you go from there? That's why there are so many chronically unhappy, wealthy people or famous people, because if you don't learn to enjoy the journey, what else is there. But I'm so glad that mentality led you to the Jungle because that is actually where my love affair with Ellie Cole started. Do you know this how intimately involved I got with that season. For those who don't know,
I did. Khan't social media while he was in the jungle from the hospital bed because Teddy arrived early, so I was literally lying on my back recovering from giving birth.
I couldn't do anything except.
Watch I have a salop, get me out of here, and get intimately acquainted with everyone in the jungle.
It was an amazing time.
I was super excited, actually because obviously with Cann I became very close with him in the jungle, and we did speak about you a few times, and.
We'd always be like, I wonder if she's had.
The baby yet, because I was following your life so close to your social media and we didn't know, like we get told nothing in the jungle. We didn't even know, you know, about the Bondai shootings. We didn't know about Princess Kate having cancer, like there were just so many big news stories that happened that we were not aware of. And another big news story was whether you had given birth or not according to Karen and I, And when we received.
Those letters from home, it was so exciting, and yeah.
It's just you know, that's what I mean when I was going back before about how you feel like you get to know someone through social media or following somebody's story, and you did get so invested into people.
So it was a nice moment Teddy had her eye.
I was so glad. It was such a big highlight for everyone.
You guys, when I'm in the jungle, it was I guess that was the time where I became a big fangirl. And that has continued so much to the point today where I've been so engrossed in your eloquence and your incredible pearls of wisdom that I have not actually made it to have the questions I had for this part of your life. What it was like to get a prosthetic as a child, when you realize that swimming was a career that you wanted to have, How you made
it to the Paralympic because I'm lucky. I guess that a lot of that's been documented elsewhere so I'm sorry for having overlooked all those questions, but I do want to move on at this point to the part that I think is so powerful, and as I mentioned, that is your reinvention the new chapter. In the past couple of years post swimming, of finding a new identity, of having little Felix, becoming a mum, embracing a new juggle,
and of course Felix and his fantastic friends. This beautiful first book of yours that comes out next week.
Tell us all about this latest chapter.
Yeah, well, so Felix is very very similar age to Teddy.
He just turned one in February. He was only five weeks.
Old when I went into the jungle. So I kind of agreed to do this, the whole jungle thing. I think it was at the very beginning of the pregnancy, and it was one of those moments where I was like, oh, say yes to it. I'll deal with it when I get there. Yeah, that's a later Ellie problem.
Yeah, I did the.
Whole that's a later Elie problem thing. And then Felix ended up actually coming a month early. I actually did not time that well, like high risk, I could have missed the bath.
Yeah, Oh my god.
I honestly have only just realized this right now. So he ended up being only five weeks old when I left. Being a mum was amazing for me because throughout this whole process of I'm in a same sex relationship. So my partner, Sylvia, carried the baby. She's always wanted to
be a mom ever since we met her. We've been together for twelve years, and I knew that I would enjoy being a mum, but it's not something that I ever pined for in like personally speaking, but I knew that I would really embrace being a mum and would love being a mum and everything. So when she became pregnant with Felix, it was a really exciting moment for me, but I almost had the role of being a dad where I wasn't going through, you know, the attachment to
this baby that was growing inside of Sylvia. Like I was excited for him to come, but it was a very different feeling than what Sylvia was feeling. And then the moment that he was born, it was incredible. We had an emergency sea section, and the morning that Silver went into labor, I told her that she just had Braxton Hicks and to go back to bed.
So I'm supportive.
Yeah, I really supported.
Well, well, we were so early and she had never even had Braxon Hicks before, so I'm like, God, I must be Braxon Hicks because I was like, there's no way he's coming now, and we're holding him like three hours later. It was crazy, but yeah, to have the
sea section, I'll never ever forget. The next morning, I was like sleeping on this trundle bed in the hospital room and I woke up and I peeked up, my head up and I saw Sylvia laying in a hospital bed, and I looked over at the bascinet where Felix should have been, and he wasn't there.
And then so I stood up and he was.
Cuddled into Silvia and they were both asleep, and it was like that, you know, the mental snapshot you take in life, like those little mental that was one of them. It was like the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. And then since that day, he's just been everything to me. So having to leave him, going to the jungle at five weeks old was so hard. And one of the hardest moments that I had in the jungle was I was trying to remember what his face looks like.
But when you have a young one month old.
Their faces changed so quickly that I didn't have an exact idea of what he looked like, and I actually forgot what my own son looked like. I could remember his eyes, I could remember his nose, what his lips looked like, but I couldn't remember his face as a whole. And that broke my heart, like it broke my heart so much. I'm so happy that I had Cahn in the jungle. And then Sandra Sally did her messages from home and I got to see him. He had learned how to smile since I'd been in there, and I.
Could see his face again.
He looks so different, and I was like, I have to get out of here, like I have to leave. But the thing about the jungle is if you say to the television cameras, stop voting me in, like I don't want to be here anymore, stop voting me in, then they don't play it.
To the DV.
So Australia kept voting me in because I decided to teach this adult who couldn't swim how to swim, and apparently Australia loved that, and I kept getting voted in, so I was there for a lot longer than I thought that I was going to be, but.
Coming home and seeing him was amazing. But the idea of this book.
That I I've just written actually came about in the jungle because I was speaking to Britt Hockley while I was in there about how Felix will one day grow up.
He'll go to school.
And someone one of his classmates is going to point out that his mum is different.
And I always approached that idea.
And that conversation that he was going to have with one of his classmates, it was going to be a negative conversation. But then I started thinking, and you have a lot of time in the jungle, I started thinking, maybe it doesn't have to be like a negative conversation that he has to have with his classmate that his mum's different. Maybe that being different is actually really cool
and it's amazing and it's so unique. And I really want Felix to grow up meeting all of my paralympic friends and really embracing people that are different to him. And so I thought, why not write a book about this for kids? Because from what I've seen being a Paralympian. Kids are so pliable with their world and how they see their world, and watching the Paralympic Games in particular, they see people they have disabilities that are world champions.
And I never had that when I was young.
And the way that kids are growing up perceiving people who are different to them that you can have a disability, you can still be a champion.
It was so different.
And if my parents had that message when I was losing my leg, they would have approached my whole disability journey very differently. So I wanted to be able to target kids who are going to school. They're going to be in the playground with people who are different to them, and I want them to be equipped with the skills and the knowledge to be able to go up to someone who is different to them and to just invite them to play. And that is the whole idea of
my book is My main character is Felix. He's able bodied. A lot of books around disabilities that main character's disabled, but he's an able bodied kid that goes to school. He comes across six different types of disabilities and he learns to communicate with each of them. In a very different way, but the end story is always the same, is that he ends up playing with them and learning something from them, and he goes back home to Sylvia and I and he teaches us about all of the
things that he learned about his new friends. And so that was the whole idea of the book, is that I wanted able bodied kids who are going to school to be able to embrace differences, because that's where they're going to, you know, be in their first team environments. It's where the kids are going to learn and to share, to play, and to support one another. And I want them to be able to embrace and lean into those differences. So that's why the book was written.
Oh Ellie, that's so beautiful. It makes me want to cry well.
An incredible culmination of your experience and dedication to Felix and the world that he will grow up in. It's so true that children are They just are so pure the way they see the world. They perceive a difference in such a non judgmental way compared to adults and the sort of value judgments that we bring to our relationships. And I love that you've captured that in a book that will guide so many young people. It just really I can't wait to get a copy for Teddy.
I have put a lot of pressure on Felix that when he goes to school, he's going to have to be really nice to everybody.
I think, I don't think that's a bad thing.
Also really inspired by my niece to write this book because she's ten now, but when she was growing up, when she was about five or six years old, she really started to notice my prosthetic, Like it's a leg that's made of metal and it's all black and plastic, so of course she's going to noticed it's a little bit different. But you know, over the relationship that I had with her, I'll never forget the time I was standing out in my my parents have a sheep farm.
I was standing out in the middle of a paddock and she bought out my leg charger and tried to like charge my leg in the middle of a paddock, like it was the most normal thing in the world. And I was just thinking, like, this is the way the world should be. Like she's been exposed to this disability at a really young age, and she's been exposed to a lot of disabilities because of a lot of my friends are paralympians, and she just knows how to
talk to people with disabilities, what terminology to use. She's really comfortable about it. And because she's comfortable around the topics and people that are different to her, she just engages really well. And that's what I want every kid to be able to do. So it's a big inspiration behind writing the book.
It's interesting that you mentioned the word normal, that your niece found your disability so normal, and I think normalizing difference, and you know, disabilities or any other kind of difference, is what's so important to help alleviate the fear and anxiety a lot of people have when they broach a subject, or meet a person, or have to enter a situation
that they're less familiar with. Is there anything that you could offer as advice, perhaps to anyone listening who doesn't feel as comfortable or hasn't grown up around a disability when they have questions or when they're out and about in society. Is there anything that you find adults do that is particularly unuseful or things that is done really well.
I think when it comes to just interacting with somebody who's different to you, it's coming from my own experience having a disability, A lot of people who want to.
Come up and maybe ask questions.
Or if I'm at a dinner or something and people want to talk about what my experiences have been like, you can see that they're nervous, and I can see that they can be nervous as well.
So I think, firstly, there is no silly.
Question, and I think going into a conversation knowing that there is no silly question is really important. I am very very patient with people who show, like, genuinely show good intentions towards wanting to have a conversation. You can tell if someone's being genuine or not, and that alone
is enough for me. You can ask anything that you want to And I think a huge thing that really addresses the elephant in the room is if you do go up to someone who's different to you and want to have a conversation about their differences, you just say, Hi, I'm not really familiar with this or X or y or z, but I want to know more. Can you tell me more? And just start the conversation off like that, And then usually I would say, well, what do you
want to know? And it just opens the door up for so many questions and things that you might be really curious about. I have seen a lot of conversation change because of the Paralympic movement. You know, when I first joined the team in two thousand and six, children especially point to me on the street and say, Mum, she's got a metal leg, or Mum, she's a pirate, or she's different to you know, and they notice the differences.
And back in two thousand and eight, the children usually got hushed by their parents or you know, the parent grabbed them by the arm pull them out of that
situation because they felt uncomfortable. But now, since the our Olympic Games is becoming more and more exposed on mainstream television, parents are more inclined now to lean into the questions and to get down to their child's level and to talk to them about it, and sometimes even approach me and say, Hi, my daughter or my son is really interested in your prosthetic.
Do you mind talking to them about it? And I love that.
I love curiosity, regardless of whether you're an adult or whether you're a child. Curiosity is so important. There is no silly question, and if you can show genuine intentions, then can I really ask whatever you want to. I have a very similar uncomfortable feeling when I'm speaking to people, you know, from different cultural backgrounds, because I'm not sure what the terminology is and I'm not sure if I'm
going to say something that might offend. And it's exactly the same regardless of what minority group you're talking to or what difference a group of differences you're talking to. It's just very common and natural to feel that way. But if you can show good intentions, then that's the best thing you can do.
Yeah's such great advice.
I think people often do want to learn more and they scared to say the wrong thing or to offend. And it's great that you're so patient when people do have a curiosity and want to learn more, because, yeah, conversation is I guess, the best way for people to become more familiar with something they're unfamiliar with. And I love how much advocacy work that you are doing now.
I think one of the other roles that you have is being on the board of the Paralympics Committee, and that that's a really great outlet for your passion for harnessing the power of the Paralympics.
As we've spoken.
About So what does your day look like now that you have so many different roles in this new chapter kind of how do you spend your time and how are you managing the juggle? Tell us all about this chapter.
It's certainly very different too when I was an athlete my day. So I've been doing a few different projects since I have retired. Obviously one of them was the reality television show. But yeah, since then, I've been doing a couple of different things. So I actually sit on a council. It's called the Counselor of the Order of Australia, do.
You Yeah, it's amazing.
So we provide recommendations to the Governor General on the Australian Honors system. And I love it because We've received so many applications for Australians who are doing incredible things and I'm really fortunate to be able to read through all of these amazing things that Australians are doing and to make sure that they're recognized for that.
And I love that role so much.
Because it is bringing a group of about twelve people who are so different from very different backgrounds together and discussing what we want our Australia to look like in terms of the people who are contributing to it.
So I love that.
I also sit on the board of Paralympics Australia. And the reason why I really enjoy that role as well is because when I was an athlete, I mentioned before that my idea of success always looks so different as I progress through my career. Towards the back end of my career, in the last four or five years, I really lean into embracing the impact that the Paralympic movement can have in changing stigmas, changing stereotypes, perceptions of people
have disabilities. I absolutely love that whole aspect it. And I didn't race that well in Tokyo, Like my times were pretty good, but I won a silver and a bronze with two bronzes, which a lot of people would say is a great result.
Yeah, I'm like, that's awesome coming from.
I think my six gold Prior to that, I think a lot of people were expecting maybe a little bit more from me, but I was like thirty as well.
But yeah, I kind of lend more into the advocacy.
Role in the last four years and you know, really uplifting the people that were in my Paralympic team to make sure that everyone was seen in the same way, regardless of whether they were a seventeen time Paralympic medalist or had been to their first Paralympics, and it was a huge part of me wanting the athlete to feel like they were being seen as a person as well. So that was a big focus of me in the
last part of my career. Now that I sit on the board of Paralympics Australia, I could still do that, which has been amazing for my own transition into retirement because I haven't lost my identity of what I loved to do when I was an athlete. I'm still doing that. I just get to sleep in until six am now instead of four because of feelings, but I'm still doing what I love to do when I was an athlete.
So the Paralympics Australia board has been great for me. I do a lot of.
Keynotes speaking as well, and I enjoy that because I do love meeting people who are different to me, and I work in so many different industries doing that and so many different organizations and companies not for profits, and just meeting incredible Australians who then I receive a lot of applications for in the Council of the Order of Australia, so yeah, a lot of keynotes speaking, I've worked do a bit of work with Channel nine on wild water sports,
the Council and Paralympics Australia Board, so a little bit of everything. And now a children's book author.
Oh my gosh, you.
Can pass a lot of time being a mum as well. Yeah.
Did you feel I mean, especially for anyone who has had a career, I think there are a lot of a lot of careers like sport that are you know, for a time, they're short lived. You can't do them past a particular age, and it is really overwhelming when you do a approach that time to re craft your identity and to make a pivot. And it's amazing that you've been able to stay in and around the industry.
Did you find it overwhelming? Did you feel like you were starting from the beginning and did sort of imposter syndrome ever creep in because you had been doing something that you were so good at and so familiar with, and then suddenly you know, one day you wake up and that's not your every day. Did you find it really difficult to transition or was it just this natural How did your mindset kind of carry you through that time.
Yeah, it's a good question because a lot of people do transition into different careers now or even you know, going on maternity leave and then going back into the workplace can be a completely different transition to prior to having a baby and everything. So a lot of people
will experience something like this. And from what I've seen from athletes, athletes do not transition well because they do tie up their identity and being an athlete, but they also really heavily perceive their self worth on whether they win a gold medal or not, and that's just the
way that being an athlete is. I've got a lot of joyment out of as I mentioned before, lifting up the Paralympic movement and fighting for things like pay parody for Paralympians and doing a lot of advocating for paralympians, and so the transition out of sport wasn't too difficult for me because my focus had shifted so much in the back end of my career. I also was really fortunate to have been studying when I was an athlete.
In I did a degree in health and exercise science, which I actually have not used at all, but it always did give me a fallback plan, and I always, when I was an athlete, made sure that I was doing work opportunities or collaborating with people or networking with people who may be able to help me once I did finish sport. And one of those people were the ones that work within Channel nine. So I already had a role waiting for me pretty much as soon as I finished, and.
So that made things a lot easier. In terms of the mental shift.
That was a little bit challenging because I was training six hours a day and I found that really hard to let go of.
I was still training a lot. When I've retired, I was still doing like two hours.
Of exercise a date home was just nuts and I had to let go of that a little bit, and I found that hard. But now I am finding it hard to do half an hour a day.
It's God, I've gone too far the other way.
But yeah, the transition for me was just planned meticulously, but also allowing enough flexibility that maybe I might go off in this direction or that direction, because you just don't know, so I think whenever you're stepping into a new era of your life. Just be really open minded in terms of the imposter syndrome. I've never really felt that because I've always had to fight really hard to
get to where I have been in sport. As a paralympian who received no funding at the beginning, athlete with a disability, who got told that I was an inspiration just for showing up to a competition, I had to fight very, very hard to be able to show people how strong and fierce and everything that being an athlete was. I had to show people that I was that as well.
So I know that in any industry that I step into, I know that I'm going to deserve to be there, maybe not at the very beginning, but I'm going to work so hard to make sure that I do. And I think that's the big thing about imposter syndrome is we're all going to feel it at some time. We all have to be really patient with ourselves and be really committed to being the best that we can be
in that particular role. And if you are committed to that, you're never really going to feel that imposter syndrome.
Oh, that's such good advice. You are so incredibly well adjusted, and I have such good advice for everyone listening. What an amazing episode. What about the transition then to motherhood and the juggle? I personally have found that, especially when you do come from a career like being an elite athlete in an individual sport where all of your time and energy can be dedicated to your pursuit and what you want to do, it's a really big adjustment to become a mum and try and have a career and be
split in lots of different directions. Just listen to a snippet from.
Call Her Daddy. That podcast they.
Had Ellen Pompeio from Grey's Anatomy on, and it was just her sort of calling it and saying, if you're a working mum, you'll never really be one hundred percent there while your child you know, exists, but you know you'll be split. Your identity will be split in so many different directions. But that that's okay. It's of course parenthood involves sacrifice, but that's part of it, and the
person you lose gets replaced by someone you gain. You gain so much richness in your life, so much deeper emotion, and so much love. How do you manage the juggle. Does it feel like a split to you?
It certainly it's trying times, you know, trying to get work done and trying to fly all over the country while having a baby at home. Firstly, Sylvia has been super sip supportive of my career, which certainly does help. But I know that there are a lot of single moms out there who have to rely on their communities or the ability to be able to put their child into childcare. I was super ambitious obviously as an athlete, and I thought that I was going to be super ambitious in my career as.
Well, and I am.
But I know that there is only so much that your cup can hold, and I just go towards whatever makes me.
Happy, and being at home, being with Felix.
And seeing the way that he grows, like he took his first steps a few days ago, which I still I've watched that video like I swear to God one thousand times.
You need to send it to me.
I will, I will, But you know, those.
Are the moments that make me really really happy, and I don't want to miss them. Being in the jungle and missing his first smile killed me, and I don't want to have to miss all of these amazing milestones with him while he's still so young. And so I think, yeah, work is incredibly important, but my priorities have changed, and I think being a working mum and being comfortable with the fact that your priorities are changing or do have
to change. Sometimes they have to change a bit more towards work as well, but being comfortable with that knowing that you're providing the best home or best environment that you can be your child at that time. Sometimes you will have to work to be able to do that. That being comfortable with that is really really important. And I think a lot of mums aren't comfortable in that environment because there is a lot of judgment out there about the ways that people are parenting. But guess what
we're in twenty twenty five now. The world is looking more and more different every single year. You can be a working mum. You can be so ambitious and so successful in your role and still be a mum at home. And yes, you are going to have people that are going to comment on that, but you need to put the blinkers up and focus on your job, and focus on your family, and focus on the things that make you happy and fill your cup because the negative comments aren't going to so they can go on the bin.
In my opinion, that's the perfect way to end. Ellie.
You are one of the most extraordinary human beings. You have been so eloquent, articulate, so much wisdom in so many areas, And if I thought I loved you before this, I love you even more. I apologize for having been so oh so like my brain.
I don't even know.
You've been so articulate the entire time, and I've just been like so you No listening to is one of the worst interviews I've done, But you're.
Incredibly high expectations.
Oh so bad?
Are you serious?
Well, it makes you feel any better, It's one of the best ones I've done.
Like you are one of my favorite guests of all time.
Every single thing you have said has been just like you usually get a couple of nuggets of wisdom, but you have just been like banger after banger of things that just apply to everyone's life, Like, no matter what journey you're on, you have said so much that I think is so valuable. And yeah, like I said, if my love affair with Ellie Cole was deep before, it's now like a thousandfold. I cannot wait for the book. I'm so excited. April first, which is at the time
of recording. It'll be next week. So we'll put the links in the show notes and all the information there for everyone of where they can follow you, where they can watch you.
Thank you so much, thank you, And I am going to go back to what you said before about you thinking that you're not eloquent, but you said that there's a lot of nuggets that I have and we never would have gotten there if you didn't ask the right questions.
So you did a great job.
Oh that is so kind of you that it's true. My only excuse is that, as we mentioned before, we sarted recording Teddy's twelve month sleep progression. I was in his court six times last night. I've been like sleep deprived from maybe into the cot, like I don't fit in it, but I have to. And I think it's been maybe eighteen days or something of like not having more than two hours sleep, So my brain I thought
it could hold itself together. But I got to minute I reckon minute twelve of this interview, and I was like, oh, dear, I am not doing her justice.
I was so good at bringing it around yourself.
You know what. The great thing you just spoke about not fitting the cot, about being a leg amputee, is he like squeeze into really tiny places.
If you just take your leg off.
Oh my god, always finny a silver lining.
Yeah, it's so good, like you able bodied, You must feel like octopus.
You just have it so hard. Oh yeah, so many limbs to get tangled, so many limbs.
Oh my gosh, always one to find a civilizing You have been absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for joining us, Ellie, and I can't wait to chat again, sir.
Thank you.
Firstly, how incredible is Ellie Cole? I mean, what a woman. I was just absolutely in awe of her before this episode and even more so afterwards. And secondly, I'm so grateful that on a day when the twelve month regression was absolutely consuming my ability to articulate anything, that it was a fellow mum who I came to the table with, and you was so not only so understanding and empathizing, but also so good at having amazing answers regardless of
how babbly my questions were. But it's also funny how critical we get of ourselves I actually couldn't listen back to this because I felt like I had done such a messy job.
So hopefully you guys.
Did manage to pull out something amazing, because I felt like I had just pulled out so much wisdom from everything she said regardless, and I hope that it was the same for you guys as always if you did enjoy. We are so grateful to have had some of Ellie's time in amongst all the things that she's doing, particularly the week that she launches her book, but also of course being a mum, so to thank her for her time and wisdom, Please do share the episode, tagging at Ellie,
Coleswim and us. It really does make a difference and mean a lot. To thank our guests for their time and also just spread at the yighborhood as far and wide as possible. And if you do get a copy of Felix and He's fantastic friends, of course share that as well. I'm sure it means the world to Ellie to see where the book is landing and how you are sharing it with your beautiful little ones. I will pop the link to the show notes. Pop the link in the show notes if I've no more eloquent today.
I'll pop the link in the show notes for you all. If you haven't got a copy, I highly recommend it. It's absolutely beautiful, and in the meantime, I hope you're having a wonderful week and seizing your yea.
A regent at ver moment, removed forever in