Christine Yu, UP TO SPEED: The Groundbreaking Science of Women Athletes
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[1:03]Christine Yu is the author of Up to Speed, the groundbreaking science of women athletes.
[1:08]Christine is an award-winning journalist whose work focuses on the intersection of sport
[1:12]science and women athletes.
[1:14]Her writing has appeared in The Washington Post, Time, Outside and Other Publications.
[1:18]She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
[1:19]And by the way, she and I shared a mutual, really close friend who passed away Stacey
[1:25]Sanders who I write about in bookends.
[1:27]And after we did this podcast interview, she emailed me a whole bunch of pictures of when
[1:31]they went to boarding school together, which just completely warmed my heart.
[1:35]Welcome, Christine.
[1:36]Thank you so much for coming.
[1:37]On mom's, don't have time to read books to discuss Up to Speed, the groundbreaking science
[1:41]of women athletes.
[1:42]Thank you so much for having me Zippy.
[1:44]I'm so excited to be here.
[1:45]Oh, thank you for coming on.
[1:47]And I know we have a special connection to, so, Up to Speed.
[1:54]You start this book.
[1:55]You've just heard your knee pop, right, you have had a torn ACL in the past.
[2:00]Now you have a new injury.
[2:02]Talk about how that is just such a perfect, you know, introduction to all of the science
[2:08]and everything that you've uncovered about women athletes.
[2:11]Yeah, it's funny because I was very resistant to actually including my own story in writing
[2:17]this book, but my editor very much encouraged me to do so.
[2:21]But yeah, I was running hurt my ACL for the second time and just was so mad.
[2:27]I was like so angry at myself and at my body.
[2:30]And I always had this feeling like I don't have, like I'm an injury prone body.
[2:34]Like I don't have a body that's made for sports and just feeling like at a place in
[2:39]a way and always blaming myself for it.
[2:42]And you know, I recognize in myself and then I'm a sports and health journalist and
[2:47]in talking to other athletes, you know, there's always this sense that like women kind
[2:52]of feel like they're an anomaly in sports, even though we've done so much and we've
[2:56]come so far in sports, there's still a sense that like, no, quite fit or like there's
[3:01]something wrong or there's like, you know, women are so much more prone to injury and all
[3:04]of these things.
[3:05]And so it kind of led me down this rabbit hole to really try to figure out why like, why
[3:09]is this?
[3:10]What's going on here?
[3:11]And really uncovering and realizing that we actually don't know a lot about female
[3:15]physiology, specifically within the sports science world.
[3:20]Only 6% of sports science studies focus exclusively on women.
[3:24]And this was only, you know, it was as recent as 2020 and it was just mind-boggling
[3:29]to me that this is the world in which we live in, right?
[3:32]It is crazy.
[3:33]I mean, you know, I've heard in the past, I had heard in the past that most studies involved
[3:38]men for many things, not just sports, but really like a lot of medical research.
[3:42]And I liked when you were saying, well, was it an oversight?
[3:46]Was it intentional?
[3:47]Like, do they not care about women?
[3:49]But no, your assessment in the book at least at first was it's that they assume it's
[3:55]the same.
[3:56]It's just they happen to have, you know, women just happen to have reproductive organs,
[3:59]you know, but it's not the same at all, obviously.
[4:02]Yeah.
[4:03]And I think it's just reflective of this, you know, idea or that, you know, men are kind of
[4:08]just the standard in everything, right, throughout in every aspect of life.
[4:13]And so sure, we can just apply the same findings that we see in men to women, you know,
[4:18]just, you know, it's just the reproductive organs that are a little bit different,
[4:22]but not really recognizing, right, the like tremendous uniqueness and like differences that
[4:28]can exist, you know, as well as some of the similarities that do exist, but we just don't
[4:32]appreciate kind of the overlap as well as the difference.
[4:36]And you also wrote about how doctors often miss things that they should catch about women
[4:42]athletes, which of course derailed their careers, like you had an example of one woman
[4:46]who was really anemic and somehow they had missed that.
[4:49]And so she had all sorts of fatigue and other symptoms.
[4:53]And yet she kept going to doctors and that had to miss a whole year of her career until
[4:58]they found the right diagnosis because women sometimes are just not listened to as much.
[5:02]Yeah, which is, you know, I feel like, you know, again, isn't just specific to athletes,
[5:07]but I think it can be, you know, more heightened in athletes, especially because like
[5:12]their bodies are literally their jobs, you know, if we're talking about elite athletes
[5:17]and pro athletes, like their bodies are their jobs, like they depend on it.
[5:21]And yet if you don't have the right or like contextualized research, right?
[5:26]So like in that case, her blood panels all look normal because they look normal for like
[5:31]a normal person, but for an athlete, they don't look normal.
[5:34]Like there are subtleties there that can be hidden that, you know, aren't always appreciated.
[5:40]So what are some of the takeaways for like the average athlete, the like recreational
[5:47]athletes, if you will, not the elite athlete from your research?
[5:51]Yeah, so it was really important for me that this book applied to, you know, folks like
[5:56]you and me who are kind of, who are active and like, you know, are physically active,
[6:01]who aren't necessarily out there competing at the Olympics or stuff like that.
[6:05]For me, it really was just, you know, again, reconciling this idea that like I always
[6:11]felt like there was something wrong with my body or like I always felt like I wasn't
[6:14]listened to.
[6:15]And so I think part of it is, you know, becoming, you know, what I say, like body literate
[6:20]in a sense, like really just paying attention to what is going on with your body because
[6:24]so often we're kind of encouraged or told to just ignore it, especially within sports,
[6:29]like just push through it, like it's no big deal.
[6:32]And especially if it's anything to do with like a woman specific issue, right, like
[6:37]you don't talk about it in sports at all.
[6:39]So I think like part of it is just empowering ourselves to just pay attention to our bodies.
[6:44]What is going on and asking questions and advocating for ourselves, you know, if there
[6:49]is something that comes up, right?
[6:52]And I think, you know, another big lesson really is around the one area, like whenever
[6:57]I talk to people, like, you know, and ask them, like what would you want people to know?
[7:02]And it really is about like taking care of our bodies and particularly around nutrition
[7:06]and just feeling it because I think, you know, I know that you've talked about this, too.
[7:10]So there's so much pressure around women to look a certain way or to be a certain way
[7:15]or, you know, feeling bad about the way that our bodies look.
[7:19]And we can, because of that, like, it can actually end up doing harm to ourselves, right?
[7:24]Like we end up restricting, we end up dying, like we end up on this roller coaster.
[7:27]We're not actually doing our bodies any good.
[7:29]So I think like that was another big kind of movement for me, right?
[7:34]It's like having grown up in the, you know, 80s and 90s where it was so entrenched in
[7:38]what we grew up with about dieting and local, this, no fat this and all of this and just
[7:44]really recognizing like, oh, wait, I really need to treat my body well if I actually want
[7:48]it to be healthy and to do the things that I want it to do.
[7:52]Yeah.
[7:53]And it's obviously body image issues are exacerbated and often, you know, most of
[7:59]precondition for elite athletes when they're losing, you know, you write about losing
[8:04]their periods and having these things just be like standard, like, oh, okay, sure, this
[8:08]is going to happen because I'm an athlete, like, should that happen?
[8:11]Is that good?
[8:12]Like, shouldn't we be working on things like that?
[8:14]Like, it's not such a small thing to lose our reproductive abilities because we're, I don't
[8:19]know, bicycling champions.
[8:21]Yeah.
[8:22]Yeah.
[8:23]And I mean, I think that was, you know, those myths are still so pervasive, you know,
[8:29]you know, middle school, high school levels even now, right, and above the coaches that
[8:33]think or in athletes themselves that think that this is normal, that I don't want to
[8:40]have my period because then it's a sign that I'm really fit, I'm really in shape and
[8:44]I'm training really hard.
[8:46]And I think it is like indicative of the lack of education that we give girls about our
[8:52]bodies, right?
[8:53]Like, about menstrual cycles and what it actually means because I don't think I personally
[8:58]didn't really realize or recognize until probably my late 30s, early 40s, that like, oh,
[9:04]wait, my menstrual cycle is more than just like the couple days that I'm bleeding, right?
[9:07]Like, there's actually all this whole like orchestra of hormones that are going on in
[9:11]our bodies that play a really important role in so many different aspects of our health.
[9:17]But I never learned about that.
[9:19]Like, I never learned about this in school.
[9:20]I never learned about it like when we were younger that, you know, it's important for
[9:25]bone health.
[9:26]It's important for cardiovascular health and I feel like if we provide more of this information
[9:32]at a younger age, we can set girls and women up with a solid foundation, right, to kind
[9:38]of move forward in a healthier way.
[9:41]You also wrote about kids sports, which of course is such a hot button issue and how
[9:47]much is it okay to push kids, how much, you know, all this emphasis on travel soccer
[9:52]and specializing early and the same goes for girls, like what, you know, tennis, all these
[9:58]repetitive emotions.
[10:00]It talks to me more about that.
[10:02]Yeah, it's really hard.
[10:03]So I mean, I have two boys who are 13 and 16.
[10:07]And definitely, when they were growing up,
[10:09]I felt like we're the weird parents who didn't put them
[10:13]in all the crazy club and travel basically
[10:15]play baseball mostly.
[10:16]We didn't do all that in part because I didn't
[10:19]want to tear up my weekends to travel all over the place.
[10:23]But it really is.
[10:24]There's such a pressure on early specialization.
[10:27]And I think in part, because we've
[10:29]heard stories about, like, Tiger Woods and, like,
[10:31]Michaela Schifrin and, like, all of these people who started
[10:34]really early and have, you know, gone to such great heights.
[10:38]And we want that for our kids.
[10:39]And I think, as parents too, many of us
[10:41]have had experience playing sports.
[10:44]And we loved it, right?
[10:45]And we want to give that to our kids.
[10:47]And so there's this whole, you know, one of the experts
[10:51]that I interviewed describes it as, like, the youth sports
[10:55]industrial complex, right?
[10:57]Which it really is.
[10:58]It's become this really big business.
[11:00]And it feels like, if you don't get on the, like, moving
[11:03]walkway with it, you're doing a disservice to your kid, right?
[11:07]Like, everyone else is doing it.
[11:08]So shouldn't I be doing it?
[11:10]But I think what it kind of misses is it doesn't really
[11:14]acknowledge the actual, like, physiological development
[11:19]and maturational development of kids at the stage.
[11:21]Because it's a tremendous period of growth and change,
[11:25]like, almost as much as, like, when they are babies.
[11:28]And yet these systems of youth sports, they don't pay attention
[11:31]to that, right?
[11:32]So we're almost, like, piling on all of this work and volume
[11:35]and asking them to do all this crazy stuff and training
[11:38]around and train six days a week or seven days a week
[11:42]without recognizing that, like, their bodies are growing.
[11:44]And frankly, like, really almost, like, like, I don't
[11:48]want to say fragile, like, as if they'll break.
[11:50]But it is, like, you know, this vulnerable period of time
[11:54]in which their bodies literally are morphing and changing
[11:57]in shape.
[11:58]And they are more pliable, if you will.
[12:00]They are more susceptible to injury.
[12:03]So yeah, I worry about that a lot and kind of what
[12:06]we set kids up for.
[12:08]I did a one season of travel baseball with my son who
[12:12]didn't even really like baseball that much.
[12:14]And we were at some double header that
[12:16]was, like, an hour and a half outside the city.
[12:18]And I have four kids.
[12:19]I had to leave the other three kids to, like, sit there
[12:21]and watch him, like, sit in the dugout
[12:22]and eat the snacks I packed him.
[12:23]And I was like, this is ridiculous.
[12:25]Like, yes, I'm not doing this any.
[12:27]Or like, do you like this?
[12:28]And he was like, oh, it's like, I really like football.
[12:31]So anyway, I was like, forget it.
[12:33]Like, this was fun.
[12:34]But I feel like it has to come, first of all,
[12:37]I feel like it has to come from the kids.
[12:38]I feel like so many parents are pushing.
[12:41]I mean, this could be a whole other conversation.
[12:42]But so many parents pushed their kids into a particular
[12:45]sport or to do it so competitively or whatever.
[12:49]And I feel like it's different if the kid wants to do it.
[12:53]If they're going to do more, OK, that's one thing.
[12:56]But the parent pressured on the kids
[12:58]because everyone else apparently is doing it.
[13:00]That's where you really go wrong.
[13:02]I think.
[13:03]Yeah, absolutely.
[13:04]I mean, we ended up doing like one and a half season
[13:07]of travel baseball for my younger son.
[13:08]And it was the same time, like, why
[13:09]am I traveling to Maryland to play these teams?
[13:13]I'm like, can't they just play in Prosper Park?
[13:15]Right.
[13:16]It's right there.
[13:17]There are a lot of children that play baseball in Brooklyn.
[13:20]Like, I'm sure we could, you know,
[13:21]we don't have to travel four hours or whatever it was.
[13:24]Yeah.
[13:25]Who even thought of this travel, like travel teams?
[13:28]Like, shame on them.
[13:31]Like, hey, in place, treadmill teams.
[13:34]No, I'm kidding.
[13:35]Oh, my goodness.
[13:36]You talked about in the how innovations
[13:39]and exercise things, even like sports broad technology
[13:43]and how one woman talked about how her breasts
[13:46]were different sizes and like, how do you deal with that
[13:48]in the sports front?
[13:50]Why have sports for us just been like these big shmushing
[13:52]machines for so long and all that?
[13:54]And like, talk to me about how innovation plays and everything.
[13:58]Yeah, absolutely.
[13:59]So I mean, it's wild to think that the sports
[14:01]bra wasn't invented until 1977, which is, you know,
[14:06]just about 50 years ago, which isn't, again, very long ago.
[14:09]And it was the height of the jogging boom.
[14:11]At that time, there are like these three women in Vermont
[14:14]who were like, there's got to be a better way, right?
[14:18]Like, there's got to be a more comfortable way
[14:20]and ended up sewing two jocks drops together
[14:23]and created the first sports bra, which has been in us.
[14:27]But I think it's, again, it's, you know, kind of an example
[14:31]of how we never paid attention to women's breasts, right?
[14:35]Like, you assume that it's, what does it have to do with sports
[14:39]or sports performance?
[14:40]Like, they're just, you know, I feel like breasts are so
[14:43]like sexualized, right?
[14:44]In that way, or like associated with reproduction
[14:47]that we don't consider them as an important part of, you know,
[14:51]how a woman moves, but anyone who has breasts know that like,
[14:54]it plays a big role, right?
[14:55]It can be really uncomfortable.
[14:57]It can be painful at times if it's not supported, right?
[15:00]And scientists have studied and, you know,
[15:02]breast movement can actually affect like your running gate
[15:05]and how efficiently you run.
[15:07]So it does have all of these, all of these impacts.
[15:10]But scientists really didn't have the technology
[15:13]to study breast motion in depth until like 20 years ago, right?
[15:18]So if you don't study how breasts actually move,
[15:21]which is frankly a pretty complicated pattern,
[15:24]they described it to me almost as like this like figure a
[15:27]butterfly situation going on, but like if you don't actually
[15:31]study that, if you just assume like breasts just go up and down,
[15:34]like you can actually create a garment that can effectively
[15:38]control or support that movement in a comfortable way.
[15:41]So like that's why we are stuck with terrible sports bras
[15:44]for so long.
[15:45]And so we're starting to see more brands incorporate this research
[15:49]into their product design process like from the beginning
[15:52]so that we're starting to get better products.
[15:55]And hopefully we'll continue to get better and more affordable
[15:57]products.
[15:59]I still just like bought these fourth ones this weekend,
[16:02]though over the head kind and like struggled, you know,
[16:06]we need to get out of them.
[16:07]I'll sweaty and discuss and I'm like,
[16:10]why, why, why is this still happening, right?
[16:14]You know, there are someone's hooks, but like they're few
[16:16]and far between, they're like not as you know,
[16:19]I was an athletic or whatever.
[16:21]Anyway, not to say it wasn't cute, you know, like the design.
[16:24]Yeah, you know, I don't know.
[16:26]Anyway, I still, in other words, I think it's still,
[16:29]there are still progress leaps and bounds to be made
[16:32]for the sport.
[16:33]Absolutely, well, absolutely.
[16:34]And then the other one that kind of really surprised me was
[16:38]soccer cleats, like there hasn't been a women's specific
[16:41]soccer cleat until 2020, which again, it's only three,
[16:45]you know, three years ago, and which is really surprising,
[16:48]given how popular soccer is amongst girls and women,
[16:51]how, you know, much women's soccer has grown over the last
[16:55]several decades, but the fact that there wasn't a shoe
[16:58]that's designed to accommodate a woman's foot.
[17:02]So women's foot anatomically is different from a man's.
[17:05]So there can be, you know, differences in how it feels,
[17:08]how, you know, a woman might plant and load her foot.
[17:13]And so like, even the cleats are placed in a different,
[17:15]or in the wrong spot, they can create pain.
[17:18]So it's, again, it's wild to me that like all of this has kind
[17:21]of been an oversight and women have just been like, I guess,
[17:25]you know, making do with whatever it is that's available, right?
[17:30]Crazy.
[17:31]Well, what about the benefits of people talk all the time about
[17:33]all the benefits of team sports and collaboration
[17:36]and cardiovascular health and all of that?
[17:39]What are some of the unique benefits to women?
[17:42]Yeah.
[17:42]I mean, there definitely are so many benefits to sports
[17:46]and, or just not even playing sports,
[17:48]but just being physically active, right?
[17:51]You know, like you mentioned like cardiovascular health
[17:52]and muscular health, especially as we get older,
[17:55]it being even more important.
[17:57]So exercise can help mitigate some of the symptoms
[18:01]around perimenopause and the menopause transition.
[18:03]So it can make those symptoms, you know,
[18:05]a little bit less debilitating in some cases.
[18:08]And especially help address some of the age-related muscle
[18:11]loss too that happens at that time.
[18:13]But, you know, other than that, just playing sports
[18:16]and end up itself, you know, they found there's been research
[18:19]that's found that I want to say it's like over 90% of women
[18:23]in C-suites positions in, you know, corporate America,
[18:27]all played sports when they were younger.
[18:29]So I think that sports really, you know, it's this interesting realm
[18:34]in which women can almost experiment a bit, right?
[18:38]And like test their limits, not only physically,
[18:40]but I think also in terms of like their personal limits, right?
[18:45]And there are so many lessons you learn on the field
[18:48]that you can then take into life.
[18:50]And so I think it's an opportunity to kind of like,
[18:54]you know, dismiss a lot of like the myths
[18:56]about what women are capable of
[18:58]and what you yourself think you're capable of
[19:01]in a way that is, I think, really powerful that, you know,
[19:04]that girls and women can take with them as they get older.
[19:07]So what sports are you playing these days
[19:09]and how is your knee and everything?
[19:12]Ironically, I tore my ACL again in February skiing,
[19:16]but the other side in this time.
[19:19]So currently, I am doing a whole lot of physical therapy
[19:22]and kind of figuring out whether or not I'm going to need surgery.
[19:26]But pre-injury, you know, I do mostly run
[19:30]because that's kind of where
[19:33]and how I feel most grounded in my body
[19:35]and trying to be good about things like weightlifting,
[19:38]especially as I get older.
[19:40]And I'm noticing, right?
[19:42]Like a lot of these changes that are happening
[19:44]in my late 40s.
[19:45]Yeah, they are not fun.
[19:47]I know they're really hard.
[19:50]I doubt it was literally like,
[19:51]so tell me why your body has started looking like this
[19:55]because like, I want to know what I need to do
[19:58]to not have it happen.
[20:00]and basically is what she was waiting to and I was like, well, you know, part of it is that, you know,
[20:05]your body, you know, the things you can do anymore, you know, you can't put stuff and all that
[20:11]stuff. Yeah. But like at the same time, right, it's like, we don't talk a lot about this stage of
[20:17]life. And, you know, these changes are normal and natural that happen, like with folks who have
[20:24]female bodies, right, like it's it's part of life. It's the book end to puberty, if you will,
[20:29]but it's really hard to navigate when we don't talk about it. We don't know what's going on.
[20:34]No one tells us what's going on or what to expect. And it just feels so different in your body.
[20:39]And that's really disorienting, I think. I mean, not so long ago, I would have been a grandmother by now.
[20:45]Jamie, like I went, yeah, I'm talking chair, you know, and nobody would have glanced at me twice.
[20:50]And now instead, I'm like, you know, bopping up and down a dance body with like 20 year olds being like,
[20:57]what? Like, I'm going to like dislocate again here, you know, like I can't do these burpee. Like,
[21:03]yeah, like my grandmother, you know, she did curves or whatever, but she was not like, you know,
[21:09]doing burpees and almost fishing. No, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, my mom keeps looking at me,
[21:15]funny. Yeah, my mom is in like, amazing shape. It's insane. She's like in better shape than I am,
[21:20]but yeah, I don't know. I'm like, did my grandmother have all this pressure?
[21:25]But I just brought my rocking chair with gray hair and just like, you know,
[21:29]opt out of this hole. Don't be complex, but I don't know. Doesn't seem to,
[21:34]I don't think I'm going to be changing that single-handedly. So to get with the program,
[21:40]back to Atlanta and all that. What advice do you have for aspiring authors? I mean, the process
[21:47]writing this book itself must have been a huge undertaking of so much research and data and just
[21:52]so much that you coherently put together and made engaging and informative.
[21:59]Yeah. I mean, it was it was a lot of work. It was a lot of reading very esoteric,
[22:04]scientific journals and talking to experts. But I think, you know, my advice for writers really
[22:10]is what helped me was really breaking it down into smaller chunks. So I mean, this is my first
[22:16]book, right? Like prior to this, I've written like magazine articles, which are, I don't know,
[22:21]three, 4,000 words at most. So I'm thinking about putting together a 90,000 word manuscript
[22:28]was really intimidating. And it took me a really long time to just get started because I couldn't
[22:34]get past that idea of, oh my gosh, I have to write so many words. And even if I write like a little
[22:40]bit, I still have to write so many words. So it was really helpful for me to break it up into chunks.
[22:45]So, you know, definitely by chapter, but even within that, right, breaking it up into different
[22:50]sections and almost thinking of those different sections as like mini articles, if you will.
[22:56]And so I kind of tricked my brain to get started. I'm really just, yeah, kind of getting started
[23:01]having a good support squad behind you to really help. So having writer friends that I was texting,
[23:09]you know, in the midst of this who would kind of cheer me on or like listen to me event was like
[23:14]beyond invaluable. So nice. Yeah, I have to do that too when I write. It's like, how many
[23:21]scenes? Like, I'm just going to see a scene sounds easy, you know, an essay stuff a little bit,
[23:26]but yeah, sounds like forget about it. So, absolutely. I know all the tricks to trick your brain
[23:33]exactly. And just in closing, tell me like a stacy story or something about your relationship with
[23:39]there and maybe I'll cut this part out. Yeah, no. So I mean, Stacy, I think Stacy and I really got
[23:45]to be closer friends in junior, senior year, you know, at the end of her. And I mean, she literally
[23:52]was like the rock in a way, right? Like she was so grounded and she was the one that I knew.
[23:58]Wouldn't be like totally going, beginning in a or like lose her mind about some little thing,
[24:04]right? Like she was always really steady and stable. And someone I knew that I could really count on,
[24:08]we ended up doing our, I guess I was senior year, we took, it was like a class on like the
[24:14]Vietnam War, but it was like an art in English class kind of double period mixed together. So we did
[24:20]our final project together. And it was just like, I mean, she was so like creative and helping and
[24:28]like thinking about how to like, because we ended up doing like kind of a multimedia installation type
[24:32]thing. So creative and like thinking about how to put that together. But also just like,
[24:38]down to business, she's like, we're doing this, we're going to the store, we're getting the paint,
[24:41]we're doing, you know, like we're getting this done today. And I mean, yeah, I mean, I just,
[24:48]I'm so like I can't untangle my memories of Vandover without like Stacy there. Like she was such
[24:56]an integral part of it. And yeah, I mean, amazing and incredible person. And I'm so happy to, you know,
[25:04]get a chance to talk to you too, because I remember freshman year, her talking about like
[25:08]sippy this would be, I was like, who's the sippy person?
[25:13]Oh, so sweet. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I bet she would be working out like crazy now. And, you know,
[25:22]her rowing in the, you know, in the far in the past, I bet she'd be, I don't know what would she be
[25:27]up to spinning or I don't know something. Yeah. No, absolutely. I mean, just yeah, like just her
[25:33]dedication to everything and, you know, dedication to the other athletes on her team too,
[25:40]you know, writing all of her psych notes. Like I definitely remember that. Like people talking about
[25:44]that all the time. And I mean, she was just an incredible and fierce person. I think she had done
[25:52]a summer program. Yeah, this was, she had done a summer program in Montana. I think the summer between
[25:58]it must have been sophomore and junior years. And she came home and talking, talked about it and
[26:03]was amazing. And so I ended up doing that same program the following summer. And it was just like,
[26:09]I mean, just the way like her influence is kind of just threaded. I think through my life has been
[26:15]amazing. My younger daughter this morning just finished reading a book, I think it was called
[26:22]Crush, a graphic novel. And I guess at the end of it, they said something like, it doesn't,
[26:26]it's not whether you win or lose. It's who's on your team that matters. I kind of, yeah, you know,
[26:32]that's so nice. So I love that. Yeah. Well, Christine, thank you. This was so nice. Thank you for the
[26:39]book. You're a great writer. And oh my gosh, all the information you compiled, it's really,
[26:43]really impressive and thought-provoking and needs to be discussed. So thank you for that. And thank
[26:49]you for, you know, another Stacey connection in the world just out there tackling. No, I love it.
[26:55]I think, I know. Thank you so much for inviting me. And I'm really happy to make finally
[27:01]make this connection. Now I know who this is to be person is. All right. Well, thanks so much.
[27:07]Thanks for bearing with me being like, oh my goodness. No worries at all. Okay. Bye. Thanks for listening
[27:15]to this episode of moms. Don't have time to read books. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at
[27:20]zibi Owens and at moms don't have time to read books. Also sign up for my newsletter at zibiowens.com
[27:26]and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[27:30]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound for the Sound Editing. And thank you to
[27:34]Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.