High Powered Female CEO - Episode 5 with Kathryn Ford
Sometimes everything inside us is saying, "this isn't sustainable!" but we don't hear it until our body starts to send the message. What a miraculous journey you've been on Kathryn!
Join me today for Episode 5 of Chronicles of the High Powered Female CEO with Kathryn Ford.
Here are the links so you can connect with her whenever you want!
Episode 5: Chronicles of the High Powered Female CEO with Kathryn Ford
#FemaleCEOChronicles
INTERVIEW TRANSCRIPTION
Melisa Keenan 00:22
Welcome to Chronicles of the High-Powered Female CEO, where today I'm introducing my friend and colleague, Kathryn Ford. Kathryn. Welcome.
Kathryn Ford 00:33
Well, thank you so much for having me, Melissa, I'm super excited to be here with you.
Melisa Keenan 00:38
So who do people typically know you as? Let's just dive right in.
Kathryn Ford 00:42
Alright, well, people typically know me as the woman who designs incredible next chapters for other women, no matter what they've been through or are currently facing. And many women have seen me on, just featured on television, in podcasts, radios, interviews, all kinds of different places. And that is really all about what I do.
That's my work in the world. And I'm so thrilled to be able to and honored to be able to watch women's lives completely take off, and just transform into the life that they wish and love that they're living.
“You really can live the life of your dreams, no matter what you've been through or currently facing”
Melisa Keenan 01:19
I love that so much. And I think when I met you, Kathryn, you had just run some sort of like workshop with I don't know, was it Suzanne Somers, or something? Runs around with big-name people.
Kathryn Ford 01:37
Well, it's a lot of fun. And it's great because they have… When I'm doing… I call them celebrity chic events, I'm able to get the message out there because you know, people know who they are. And so it's so important for me to be able to communicate to other women, that honestly, you really can live the life of your dreams, no matter what you've been through or currently facing. It's just a matter of receiving the right tools. So Suzanne was a delight to be with that J and you have a great memory.
Melisa Keenan 02:10
I don't. I mean, I don't meet people who run in those circles very often. So it was like, oh, wait a second what? Suzanne Somers is one that sticks out in my mind because my mom used to curse her on the TV all the time, I think because she was jealous of like her leader attitude and her fit body.
Kathryn Ford 02:34
Lie Master, I think was one of her.
Melisa Keenan 02:38
Right? Exactly, yeah. So if I get interrupted today, which is very likely because my kids are all home on spring break, then just forgive me, I'm going to ask for forgiveness. So, Kathryn, we were talking before we came live, and you hit send. And I love to just bring this to the heart. You know, the reason I do these interviews is because I want women who are striving towards creating success, or who have created success to not feel so alone and to strip off some of these invisible pressures and have a space to talk about that. Right? So you had said, you know, kind of being surprised at what success had asked you to sacrifice. Can you share that a little bit?
Kathryn Ford 03:29
Yes, absolutely. I'll share my story, I think that will really let everyone have a great understanding of where I've been. And what I have been through. Sort of my story is a tragedy to triumph and where I am today, and I'm so deeply and profoundly grateful that I'm living the life I am now, which is why I know I'm on the planet. I needed to go through what I went through, but I honestly would have never in a million years thought that I would have to go through that to now be, you know, helping other women, but it is my purpose in life. So my journey began 33 years ago, when I was 26 years old, I was busy climbing the corporate ladder. And just to give you an idea of who Kathryn was at the time. Professionally, I was thriving, I was doing so well. I was in human resources with a large corporation, and did a lot of employee relations. And so that part of my life was amazing.
However, personally, I was very impoverished. I was a couple of years into a highly toxic marriage and really didn't see any way out. I felt very trapped. And I was driving home one day from work and had a really bad headache, didn't think much of it, took a couple of aspirin went to bed, and would end up going blind in my left eye. So it was shocking. Yes, I was living in Minnesota at the time, about an hour and a half from Mayo Clinic and I thought, Okay, I've got to go see the experts. They ran all kinds of tests and said We're so sorry to tell you but you have MS. I couldn't believe it. I had all these hopes and dreams for my life and then to be told that and before I left, I can still see myself in that exam room, I said, No, I am not signing up for that. I am going to be a medical miracle. I don't know how, but I'm going to do it.
And so I left and I set out to really find a researcher by nature, what were people doing all over the world that allowed them to thrive, even when they were facing really, you know, challenging circumstances. And in the mid-90s, I ran across Dr. Bernie Siegel. And I knew I struggled, he is still today, one of the leading experts on the mind-body connection. And it was at that point that I began to put the pieces of the puzzle together with my life and realized that, oh, you know what? this relationship is affecting my health. No, it was much more complex than that, though. Because I grew up in a family where divorce is not an option, you made that decision, you need to figure it out. And I actually had a cousin who is older than myself, and she did get divorced. And I witnessed all kinds of, you know, behavior from relatives and whatever.
“I said: No, I am not signing up for that.”
People do not want to talk to her or in talking about her behind her back all the time. And I just was like, Okay, I just need, I can't do that, I need to make this work. And so consequently, though, the harder I tried, the worse it got. So years were going by, but I was on this health journey and doing actually quite well. So fast forward, though. 22 years after that initial diagnosis, I would find out I had been misdiagnosed. And it was another blow because the actual diagnosis is far worse than an MS it's called Neuromyelitis Optica, or NMO. And it has a pretty large mortality rate in the first five years.
But now I'm 22 years into it at this point, but devastating news. I am a researcher. So I start to look everything up. And I find out that now at Mayo Clinic, 22 years later, there's an expert in the world practicing there. So I immediately made an appointment with him. And this is where my story really, I could see the pieces coming together after this meeting with him. So he walks in the room, turns around to walk out stood in the doorway, looks back at me, and says are you, Kathryn Ford? And I said yes. And he said, Oh, my gosh, you don't even look like someone who's had MS for 22 years, let alone this worst condition? What are you doing? And I literally said to him, Melissa, I said, You know what, I'm gonna take that as a compliment. Because I haven't been hearing very good news lately, with all this misdiagnosis stuff. And he said, really take it as a compliment. And I said, I'm going to and he said, I want to know everything you're doing. Everything.
So I just told him everything about the mind-body connection. I told him how I had developed tools, and practices. And he said You've got to get this out into the world. And that's where I was I said, I've just been trying to save myself. And he said, No, you've got to get this out into the world. So he was the first person that really opened it up for me to see, wow, I am onto something here that really can help other people, we had a terrific conversation about how everyone in the world, everyone has something that if they could change it in their life in the next six months to a year, it would make the biggest difference in their life. And it's either in their relationship category in their time or money freedom category, there's having a successful walk through life, right? And those things affect our health and our health affects the other categories.
So we're complex beings, spiritual beings, having this human experience. And we can't just segment one aspect of our life because everything is all connected. He said you have got to get this out into the world. And before I let you go, he said one more thing. And I could tell this wasn't going to be good. He said, When is your next injection? and at that point, I was on 16 and a half years of an every other day injection of a chemotherapy drug for MS. So I felt like I had the flu for over 16 years. But remember, I didn't really have MS. And he said you need to stop that medication immediately. It's harmful to someone with your diagnosis. I mean, literally, I felt like he energetically punched me in the stomach. I was feeling so much anger and resentment and I couldn't believe it. It was so hard to stay on those injections. And then it hit me. It's just like that. I went, Oh, I opened my eyes and I said you know what Doctor? I have a very powerful mind. I've been developing this power for the last 22 years. I believed in those injections. I know they didn't hurt me. I'll never forget, he pointed at me said we're sticking with that. And I said, Yes, we are. Because if I hold on to all this, I'll be back tomorrow with a major problem, because we all have an inner pharmacy. And that inner pharmacy is kicking out chemicals based on how we're feeling. Right?
There's that mind-body connection again. So he was the first person that really encouraged me to get that out into the world. Now, you might be wondering, whatever happened to that relationship at first marriage? Well, I will quickly tell you that I finally got the courage to ask for a divorce. I was so proud of myself, I said, if no one ever talks to me again, I have to do this. It was getting dangerous. And my then-husband had untreated mental health issues and some other things going on, that he refused to get help for. A storm happened, his wife is asking to leave, right? we're in the middle of a divorce. And he called me, we were still living in the same home at the time, we were a month away from getting the rubber stamp from the judge that we were divorced. And he called me from work to say he lost his job. So this man's whole life is crumbling in front of him.
He came home, we ended up getting into an argument, he went down to the basement, and he came up with a gun. So I am really lucky to be here for that reason too because those situations usually don't end very well. So I know the work I do on the planet, designing incredible next chapters for women who are ready to make the rest of their life the best of their life is absolutely why I'm still here for two reasons: my health and that relationship. And I'm so honored that I work with incredible women that I get to watch their life just take off and in turn and transform into something they never thought was possible for them. So I know I just gave you a lot.
But that's my story. And I never thought I would be sacrificing to be living the life of my dreams and have the success and have the incredible in my life and women in my life. I mean, I can't even tell you how amazing I'm so grateful for all of this. But I never in a million years when I was that 26-year-old woman that I would be facing these extreme health challenges and then that extreme challenge in my relationship really life-threatening. In both cases, I never thought that was going to be my path. But I can you know, I needed to do those things. I needed to experience those things. And I'm grateful, I would never sign up for them again, but I can stand here from a place of gratitude. Just feel grateful because I know it's my purpose in life. I know it's why I'm here, to help other women.
Melisa Keenan 12:52
So in such a good point because I know it's been fascinating as a coach to witness how there are things that I don't even necessarily have to talk about with my clients but their traumas that I've been through and things that I've healed in myself that automatically transfer to clients and it because I've been through how. And I don't know how people perceive me but I can tell you how I perceive you is you know in first meeting you I would have never thought like you drip with a success and affluence and joy and positivity and I think it's such a testimony to how far you've come and to what is possible to create in our life.
Kathryn Ford 13:44
I repeat myself every day I'm still here
“I'm so honored that I work with incredible women that I get to watch their life just take off and in turn and transform into something they never thought was possible for them.”
Melisa Keenan 13:51
I was thinking about this whole idea about the mind-body connection and stuff and it was just the last year so I don't know if you know this about me Kathryn but I have a bachelor's degree in biology.
Kathryn Ford 14:04
Oh, I didn't know that.
Melisa Keenan 14:05
I was pre-med all through college and then have made some different life changes and shifts. And so yeah, here I sit but I remember taking an epigenetics class and it was very new, but it's not woo-woo it's not crazy to know that it's very possible that the stresses that you were under with your corporate position and a struggling marriage and the fact that you said left side, have you thought about this? the left side of your body is the feminine right is masculine. And we know that epigenetics basically the theory behind this is that you have your genes and your DNA, and you are predisposed to different diseases and illnesses and things whether or not they get flicked on, can be based on your environment. And that can be things like what you eat, what you breathe, and the chemicals that you're around every day, what you put on your skin. But it can also be things like trauma and stress and all these things. So, that's super interesting, too, you couldn't sustain the way that you were going. And so a lot of times that happens, right? I'm sure you see this in your work all the time where your body starts screaming at you, like, not sustainable, we cannot live like this.
Kathryn Ford 15:34
Exactly. And I teach my clients a lot about the science of epigenetics, actually. And I always say, you know, and science is just coming out with more and more and more of it, and all this evidence every day almost. But we can actually lengthen our telomeres and they shorten our chromosomes as we age, right? We can lengthen those, we, I always say, if you're in a smoke-filled room, you can leave the room. If you're drinking water isn't pure, you can find pure drinking water. But we can never run away from ourselves. Right? So I actually believe that what is eating us is almost it, I believe it's more important than what we're eating, actually.
“I always love to remind the women that I work with that this is about finding the Fountain of Youth and abundance.”
But it's at least as important. Because we have this inner pharmacy, and that inner pharmacy is kicking out too much cortisol, stress hormones, other things, if we're under stress, too much stress long term, or sparkling beautiful chemicals, which is also why I always love to remind the women that I work with that this is about finding the Fountain of Youth and abundance, but it's a fountain of youth because my clients literally almost every single one of them, I could say, will have people make a comment that they're looking younger, I had one woman whose husband was on a business trip for a few weeks, he came home and she had just started working with me maybe like a month or six weeks. And he thought that he asked her if she had some work done while he was gone. And she's like, No, I'm just happy now, I'm creating my next chapter. I'm, you know, I'm doing these things for me, and I'm releasing things that are no longer serving me. And he's like, wow, keep going. Yeah. And I was gonna say too another evidence, some evidence around what you said is they've done studies on twins, and saw twin girls, identical twin girls raised in two different families, two different environments. And they both have a gene marker for breast cancer, one gets breast cancer, the other one doesn't. So very interesting.
Melisa Keenan 17:48
Isn't that? it really is and I, you know, you can go it's like you said, I even went down this path where I had an eating disorder was super focused on like, avoiding carcinogens and stuff like that. But my inner world was so toxic, like the kind of shame and punishment energy that is required for me to put myself in those boxes and eat like that, and or just not eat at all, if the food wasn't worthy of my mouth or whatever. Did far worse for me. I mean, that was the sickest time of my life. Like I was literally sick with a different virus at any given moment. And my little baby, I had just one baby. And so we were just passing stuff back and forth, back and forth. It was terrible. And, you know, hindsight, I'm like, wow, that was the sickest time of my life. You know, though, because this kind of work matters so much. So, okay Kathryn, thank you. I'm like, so loving this conversation. And as we wrap up, I'd love to ask you like a peek into, you know, just to get to know you a little bit better. What would you say is one of the most fulfilling moments of your life?
Kathryn Ford 19:07
Well, the most incredible moment of my life was the day my son was born. I have to say that 29 years ago, he still is my sunshine, still to this day and always will be so that, and witnessing the transformation of all the women that I work with, there is nothing that lights me up more than that. I mean, I live for that. I just, oh, it's just yeah, it's the most incredible thing to me. I mean, watching a woman who knows deep down she's meant for more and she embraces the tools and is able to create a life, like for herself that she needs a telescope to look back to see how far she's come. That's just, that's priceless.
Melisa Keenan 19:53
I love that I relate so much. It's beautiful. Well, I love this interview, it's so inspiring. And I hope that those of you who are watching can watch this from. You know, it's funny, because I think there has been a time in my life when I would have met someone like you, Kathryn, and thought, that's for her. It's not for me. If you find yourself watching this thinking that thinking like, oh, sure, yeah, you know, talk about your big successes like to challenge that voice. And believe that, I really believe it's our birthright to have the fullness of all that we want. And in that way, you're you and I's work is very much in alignment. It's our birthright, There's a scripture in my faith that says men are that they might have joy. I just love that. I believe that with every fiber of me, and so, in times, when you know, I've been in circumstances where it feels like the exact opposite is what I'm seeing all around me. I have to cling to that hope. And Kathryn is a beautiful example of what we can create, you know? I mean, gosh, because we can take our lives any direction, right? Like, you could have just become, you know, addicted and shut down. And all the things, right? but you chose every step along the way to become who you are. It's super.
Kathryn Ford 21:30
Yeah. And I'm here to say that if one person can do it, anyone can, we all can we just need the right tools, and the right support. It's absolutely available. To live our best life.
Melisa Keenan 21:44
Yes. Love that. Well, any last words you'd like to share? Kathryn
“You can be, do or have whatever you would love. Practice that radical self-care.”
Kathryn Ford 21:49
Gosh, just that I love being here with you. And I adore you. And this was just wonderful, thank you for just having this space for me and allowing me to share my story. And I do want to just remind people, what women especially that's, you know, you can be, do or have whatever you would love. Practice that radical self-care. And really, I guess step into allowing yourself to be supported. As women, we don't do that often enough. We are there for all of everyone else, and doing all the things right? for everyone else. And that's the first step in practicing self-love, is to allow yourself to be supported, whoever that person is on the planet. He or she is out there to support you. And just you'll know you are your own highest authority. Just check in with your heart, if it's the right person.
Melisa Keenan 22:41
I love that. Thank you guys for watching. Please go and we'll put the link in the comments to the rest of the interview series. And if you want to engage in all of these interviews, make sure you go put your email in there so that you never miss an interview. The intention here is that we actually create a community of women who are no longer backstabbing and filling competition with each other, but who are all building each other up and like all, you know, like the crabs that are climbing out of the bucket, but we're doing it all together. And I also want to just end this by saying in October, I am hosting a retreat co-hosting retreat with my friend and client, and colleague, Wendy Whitelaw, that's going to be so luxurious. And it's my hope that all those women who we've interviewed on this show and those of you who have watched and engaged will come and join us we're probably doing Mexico and it's gonna be super luxurious. So, please come stay in the loop and, you know, check the links and we'll make sure we get you all in the loop on what's going on. Thanks again so much for being with us. Kathryn.
Kathryn Ford 23:51
Thank you for having me.