[00:00:00] Ellington Brown: Welcome to SpeakUP! International with Rita Burke and Elton Brown!

[00:00:16] Rita Burke: Well, as our name implies, SpeakUP! International have conversations with people from all over the world. We've been in almost every continent. We've been in, almost every state. We've been in New York, we've never been to Rochester. Today's guest is gonna be chatting with us from Rochester, and her name is Tess Padmore.

She's an award-winning inventor who has revolutionized inclusive headwear. She has over 30 years of experience across the private, public, and academic sectors. Tess is the pioneering, pioneering voice in the growing movement for inclusive products design and disability driven innovation. She speaks passionately about resilience and

innovation. And as we say on SpeakUP! International, we prefer our guests tell their own stories. There's so much more I could say about Tess Padmore, but I want to allow the time and the space for her to tell her story. Tess Padmore, welcome to SpeakUP! International! 

[00:01:32] Tess Padmore: Thank you for having me! I love your introduction , uh, because I consider myself a citizen of the world.

[00:01:41] Ellington Brown: That is a good thing it shows that your perspectives are wide open, you're an open-minded, uh, individual. Can you walk us through a moment when you realized there was a gap in your heat wear products or people with textured hair and medical conditions? 

[00:02:07] Tess Padmore: Well, I would say a couple of things. One, um, I had always been in the pool, swimming pool. As a child, we went to the pool all the time. We never learned how to swim, however, but we were always in the pool, so that was a risk. 

My early years in the, in my twenties, I wore my hair very short, so finding a swim cap was never an issue. Fast forward to my forties, my late forties, and having, um, survived a brain aneurysm eruption to eruptions. Part of my head was shaved, so it was an issue about finding hair coverings that would stay on number one, and then.

As a result of that catastrophic illness and also having pulmonary embolisms or blood clots in my lungs, I had respiratory problems and so I wanted to get healthy again, and I decided the best way to do that would be to get in the pool. I couldn't do laps anymore because of my breathing issues, but I could do aqua aerobics. At that time, my hair had also gotten very long. I bought a traditional swim cap, but I could, it probably only lasted maybe two weeks before it fell off. So naturally I went to the internet and said, well, I'll Google it. And what I found, this was 2011. What I found was other people looking for what I was looking for.

So that started me on the path of how could something as simple as the swim cap not exist or not be all inclusive? 'cause it had never been an issue for me before. And I just started not naively down the path of trying to create one, and I ended up actually inventing one and getting a patent for it.

So I did get a patent back in 2011, 2012. Um, there are a lot of, uh, caps on the market now. There are a lot more. And what I would say about that is I'm not envious of that. I don't feel bad about that because the one thing about that is gives us choices. So now we have choices. Instead of there not being anything beyond that, I wanted to make sure that all of my headwear was all inclusive, so no one was excluded.

And so my tagline, which I think you guys may have heard, is All you need is a head. 

[00:04:35] Rita Burke: You gotta hang on to that because I'm gonna ask a specific question to about that tagline. So I want you to park that for a little bit, please. Now you are an award winner. Talk to us about your award or awards, please.

[00:04:54] Tess Padmore: Well, I, I think the, the pre uh, press information you got the awards was the awarding of the intellectual property. Was, I have trademarks and I have a patent. My new swim cap is also, is I'm putting in a patent application for, and the new cap is based on, uh, questions and, and, um, feedback from people. Uh, and each time I get feedback from customers, I try to incorporate it into my products. One of the things I can say is that, um, what I realized early on, because I, it is sort of, I fell into the business. I didn't wake up one day and say, you know, I think I'll start this business.

I was, um, the origin story is actually that I had this aneurysm in 2001. The same week as September 11th erupted, and then it erupted again in October and in 2006 I was told I could not work anymore. By my doctors. And in 2007, while working on my doctoral program in education, I had all my courses done except for maybe two.

And then I was gonna write my dissertation, and I was told by my doctors I couldn't go to school anymore. So at that point, I felt as though I was discarded, like I was thrown away. I knew I had a disability. I knew I had a, a traumatic brain injury. I knew my life had changed, but to be told that you can't do something is very different, and that was very off offputting and I decided I had a life choice to make.

I could sit down and be sick. Right. Or I could do what I've always done, pick myself up and figure out what I'm going to do to move forward. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So I had two goals. One was to try to physically get healthier, and two, how could I pursue education? I'm a lifelong learner. But without formal educational programs.

So I joined an organization called Oser, which is for older adults over 55. They're generally located in a university. You become a member and the members teach and take classes. And so that's what I did. So it gave me the opportunity. I taught film classes, I took classes, but it's all very informal. So it allowed me to still feed my need to be a lifelong learner.

And then starting the business allowed me to prove that I wasn't someone that should just be thrown away, that people with disabilities can still have productive lives and and contribute to society. 

[00:07:52] Ellington Brown: Well, you know, I think what you've done is admirable. You as a woman of colour and you having this brain injury and you're going to school you are working, keeping that, that brain, working.

I think you've done well. So what advice would you give to inventors or entrepreneurs who are living with a disability and they're, or they may be thinking about starting a business. 

[00:08:31] Tess Padmore: The first thing that I would say is, um, research. Definitely research because there are a lot of barriers out there, whether or not you have a disability or not.

If you have a small business. 'cause really, if you, if you, if you take every business needs money, every business, right? That goes without saying. But if you take that off the table, what small businesses really need is resources. And when I say resources, I mean, okay, they're telling me I should use social media, but how do I use social media?

They're telling me I should market, but how do I market? No one tells you how to do these things. So what I did was, one, if I wanted to start a business, I didn't ask the small business administration how to start a business. I called New York State Department of State and said. How do I start forming a business in New York state and they told me everything I needed to do.

The other thing that I would tell people in terms of resources is part of the reason I moved to Rochester is that there are 17 universities in this general location, and I know from going to school, especially graduate programs, they're always looking for case studies. So I reached out, I went into the universities and said, I have a small business.

Can I offer my business as a case study because I need a marketing plan or I need a business plan. And they, they are glad to have you. I've had, um, engineering students build a machine for me at no cost to me, and that was their, uh, capstone project. So if you have any universities in your area, definitely go to those universities and you'll be surprised how much assistance in terms of resources that, that you can get.

Because what happens most times is that we worry about the money first. And that becomes a barrier because we can't find the money. I remember there's a, a retired engineer I was working with trying to develop the new cap. And he said to me, well, in the beginning you're probably gonna need a machine.

It's probably gonna cost $350,000. Right? And I said to him, don't worry about the money. How do we do this? How do we do this? And that new cat that I'm now selling, we never had to buy a machine. At all. So it did not cost $350,000. 

[00:11:10] Rita Burke: Two things, 

[00:11:11] Tess Padmore: okay. 

[00:11:12] Rita Burke: Two things. I, I must say that I, I'm admiring how you have broken yourself out of, away from the status quo and out of the box that people were wanting to put you in, and what a critical thinker you are.

You, you did not allow people to say what you're capable of doing and what you are not capable of doing, and that's the only way we can progress in this world, I believe, by thinking outside of the box and doing new things. Tell us a little bit more about the aneurysms that you had. Do you, did you do any research to find out why all.

And how, how young were you when you experienced those? 

[00:12:05] Tess Padmore: Um, I didn't know any, actually, I didn't, when it happened, I didn't know anything about brain aneurysms at that time. I had suffered with headaches since every daily headaches since I was three years old. And I had learned to live with them. And during that entire period, no doctor had ever said, you know, we should do, uh, MRI of her brain.

We should try to figure out why she has these headaches. No one. So I had learned to live with them, but then, um, I'd say five months before, before, and I always relate that first eruption to September 11th, 'cause it happened the same week. I had a headache that just. Nothing would, nothing would make it stop.

I'd gone to the doctor and after five months and the doctor said to me, well, you have fluid in your ears. Two weeks went by, it's still going on. And then I realized this doctor doesn't care about me. And so I went to a different doctor. The long and the short of it is, um, my brain was hemorrhaging for five months.

To this day, no one knows how I'm walking around. Okay. I'm a survivor. I also found out after that the aneurysm was congenital. I was born with it, and that typically they erupt in your forties. At the time that I have had it, when my sister contacted one of our cousins and told her about it, she said That's what Elaine died from, because her sister, who I knew, collapsed at the refrigerator one day.

She died from a brain aneurysm, so it was congenital. It's in my family, but who knew? You know, who knew? And I ended, I ended up hospitalized for 30 days and they never expected me to come out of the hospital, but I did. I'm here

and there's a whole, I mean, I have a, I have a book I can write about that experience.

[00:14:11] Ellington Brown: I think your attitude towards all of this has, it appears to be positive because you never looked back, you forever looking forward, uh, to doing the things that, as you said earlier, that you wanted to do. So how did your. Traumatic brain injury shift your approach to problem solving and creativity.

[00:14:48] Tess Padmore: Two things happened. One, it is difficult living with a traumatic brain injury. I'm fortunate that, um, you know, I didn't end up paralyzed or, I mean, there are a lot of things that could have happened as a result. Um, I do have difficulty seeing as, as one of the reasons, you know, attributed to it, but, and it becomes frustrating sometimes because the difficulty is multitasking.

There are things that I just can't do anymore. Multitasking in my work is very difficult. Um, what will happen is something simple that I could do, matter of factly in the past, like an Excel spreadsheet at times, becomes a mountain I can't overcome. And it's almost like spinning your wheels in snow because intellectually I know that I know how to do it, but my brain just doesn't.

Understand it. I came to understand that my brain processes information differently, and so I may repeat myself sometimes, but that's because when I say I don't understand what you're saying, that means it has to be said to me in a particular way so that I could understand my brain can process it. Now, the greatest benefit from having a traumatic brain injury is that I am an introvert.

And I very rarely spoke, but once I had the brain injury, I, which is one of the things that happens, I lost all my inhibitions. I lost all my inhibitions and it was a very freeing experience to be able to say what I wanted to say and not be bashful. And yes, one of the things that's typical is I curse like a sailor.

So I'm constantly editing. Um, I experienced, um, I, and when I was released from hospital, they didn't actually provide any services to me or my family, so we didn't even know. My family didn't even know that I was dying and they just wheeled me out of the hospital. And my now ex-husband, I've been married 30 years, kept saying to me, why can't you be like you used to be?

And I wasn't the same person anymore. I really wasn't. I wasn't the same person. But what I tell everyone is that really I am the person who was always inside and now she's outside and she's free to do what she wants to do. 

[00:17:23] Rita Burke: That's liberating story!

[00:17:27] Tess Padmore: It is very liberating. 

[00:17:29] Rita Burke: I could connect because there's a young family member.

Who had a stroke because he was hypertensive and he wasn't aware of it. And so when you see him now as if he has a completely different personality, talk about inhibitions, they're. They're gone. It, it's, his whole personality has changed. So I, I hear you loud and clear, but at least you know you're aware of it, and so you could be mindful of how you interact and behave.

Now, in your bio, you talk about conventional narratives and diversity and creativity. Expand on that notion for us please. 

I am, uh, a person who is very fortunate in having lived in so many places. And part of that, uh, curiosity came from being a nerd. As a child, I was an avid reader because my mother was an avid reader and taught history to me.

Um, I am a movie buff and my mother was a movie buff, and movies and books let you see the world. And so there were places that I wanted to see and places I wanted to go, and I was never afraid to go on the other side of the, the mountain. And my mother was one of those people who was a free spirit. And I learned early on that people come in all different.

Shapes, sizes, colors, personalities, all those things. And so I was exposed to so many different cultures and so many different lifestyles as a child. And so I came to understand that there's a benefit to that because a very, 'cause my mother would always say to me, you do not wanna be a P in a pod. You want to be different.

And so my acceptance of people who are different is okay with me. Because I know I'm different. And out of that comes a, a level of trust, a level of acceptance, a level of creativity. I would say when I lived in Alaska and, and was working professionally, that was way before anyone was talking about DEI and all those things, right?

They just, that didn't exist. But in Alaska, it's multicultural. So my work environment was very diverse. It was the only place that I've ever worked professionally where I was paid what I was worth. And I was given the respect of the level of the job I was doing the first, this is 1982, which is a long time ago.

The woman who introduced me to my first, I would say, politically appointed position in Alaska in 1984 was a black woman who was the Department of Administration commissioner. Okay? That says a lot about Alaska. And so the things I learned and the things we were able to accomplish in those groups is incredible because you had so many different ideas from people, from so many different cultures.

[00:21:08] Ellington Brown: I, I think that having, um, a multicultural environment only makes. Things easier because you're looking at things not only from your perspective, but the 10 or 15 other people who have come from other parts of the world. Well, they're coming in with their perspective too. So, uh, I remember a friend of mine, he gave a speech.

And the title of it was something to the effect of, I, I always make, I always make things harder for myself. And he talked about the fact that he, at his home, he, he and his wife decided that they were going to get a fence and he got a, he put the fence up, but it took like two months because he did all these other things that wasn't really necessary. And if he had talked to someone else, maybe they would've told him, you know, you know, you don't need to do X, Y, and Z. Just, you know, stop at s and you've got this thing straight. So I think that that's really important that you are able to have that connection with other individuals.

Uh, you have this saying. That's what I'm gonna call it. Uh, you're, you belong here. So how do you define a true inclusion in design and innovation? 

[00:22:46] Tess Padmore: Well, my primary, I mean, the, the problem I wanted to address initially with my swim caps was specifically people with textured hair. And that was because there was not anything that didn't mean I wanted to exclude anyone else.

I just wanted a product that everyone could use. And then out of that, I came to learn that by going to, you know, international conferences and things like that, it isn't just black people that have long textured hair. I got responses from people who attended these, uh, conferences from Italy, from Ireland who said the same thing.

We have a lot of hair and we can't find the swim cap. The other important thing that happened, um, that was kind of an awakening for me. I had very specific ideas about the products, but then I noticed that when people would look at the products, everyone was seeing something different. Everyone, someone would say to me, I designed the neoprene swim cap and the engineer I worked with later on, he's first time he thought, he says, you know, that'll made it make a great cap for when you're riding your motorcycle.

'cause he rides a motorcycle. And, well, I never thought of that. So I started compiling a list of all the uses that people found for these caps and I said. You can use it however you want to use it. And eventually I realized because one of my target markets was chemotherapy patients, who lose their hair.

And one of my cousins, well I come from a, my mother had breast cancer. She's a breast cancer survivor. Uh, but a good friend, and also one of my cousins lost their hair to chemotherapy. And the one friend said, you know, I bought the caps, I bought the wigs, I wore all these different things, but it irritated my scalp.

So I took a cap that I was calling my spa cap, and I sent it to her and she said, this is perfect. Because it's breathable, it's soft. If they can wear it short, if they buy a longer one, they can dress it up a little bit. Because when you're dealing with chemotherapy, pa chemo patients, it, it's a lot of psychological, it's not just physical, it's psychological.

How do I feel about myself having lo, 'cause my cousin went through that. She said, I've lost all my hair. I said, listen girl. Shave it. Just shave it. I'm gonna send you some caps, put some lipstick on and don't worry about it. And she sent me pictures and she said, that was the best thing that ever happened to me.

And so this idea of not excluding anyone for anything or any reason, is how I came to, I sell headwear. All you need to head, you don't have to have hair. If you do great, if you have really, really long hair, that's great. If it's straight, okay. If it's curly, okay. There's no one, nothing that can exclude you from using, um, my products.

And as I said before, now, there's a lot of swim caps, but my hairstylist said something really good. She said, think of a fruit tree. You have a, a orchard of fruit trees. You wanna be able to pick different fruits at different times. So it comes back to choices. People have choices, and that's what we need.

[00:26:13] Rita Burke: Your story Tess Padmore, I find remarkable, and it reminds me of a statement that Tony Morrison, the author once made, that if there's a book you want to read and it doesn't exist, write it. So you found a void. And you fill that void. So that to me is quite a remarkable and intriguing story. And I'll have you know too, that I'm surprised because I took it for granted that those things existed, but obviously they did not, but Tess, something else that I read in your bio is that the drowning rates of brown and black children, the drowning rate is high. I was, I was flabbergasted when I read that. So I want you to talk a little bit about that research please. 

[00:27:02] Tess Padmore: Yeah, I, I wasn't, um, when I was developing a swim cap, I was trying to read as much as as I could about swim caps, and I did all of the legwork for the patent documentation.

And I will tell you, I never realized there were so many patent applications and patents for swim caps that we've never seen. But they're out. They're out there. But one of the things I came across at, at both, at the same time, one was a CDC report. That talked about the drowning rate among black children, that it is the highest out of any other group.

And I thought about that and I said, I thought back to my childhood. I said, you know, we used to go to the pool all the time, but we didn't know how to swim. We could have drowned theoretically. The only reason I learned how to swim was because my undergraduate school, you couldn't graduate unless you knew how to swim.

That was one of the graduation requirements. So in my senior year, the last quarter, I learned how to swim and then I never got out of the pool. But the important thing is I didn't realize that that was a problem until I read that, during that same period, and I don't know if you're familiar with it, but there was a news item that there was a black family that had gone, they had a family picnic.

And it was cousins and aunts and uncles, and they went down by the lake and one of the kids went into the lake to swim and then didn't come back, and then another child went and didn't come back. Eventually, I think there were about nine of them that drowned. The adults, all of the adults had to watch those children drown because none of the adults knew how to swim.

And that struck me. Because I thought, what is it that I could do to try to solve this problem? I know I'm not gonna be a lifeguard. I know I'm not gonna be a aqua aerobics instructor, but if I, if, if having a swim cap is an impediment for someone to be able to learn how to swim or get in the water, that's something that I could do.

That I could, that could be my contribution to the, to solving the problem. Because there are some instances you might say, well, who needs a swim cap? But some pools won't let you swim unless you have a swim cap on. So if you can't find a swim cap, then you don't swim. I mean, there are a whole host of reasons, barriers, you know, could be transportation, could be access to pools, all those things.

So what I've been trying to do is find people that are approaching the problem in different directions and how can I collaborate with them and say, this is what I can bring to the table, and how can we formalize this to try to fix it. So not only do we have a drowning rate among our children, and it isn't just not being able to swim in a pool, but it's also knowing the environment that you live in. Swimming in a lake is different than swimming in a pool. You know, do our children, if we are living in a community where there are tides and rivers, and do you understand what that means? I was living in Alaska when my daughter was little, so people go out on boats, there's water all around.

So I started her taking swim lessons at six months old. Right. So we have to be aware, and I came to find out that it isn't just here in the States. It's Puerto Rico, for example, has the same problem. I just recently, um, started collaborating with a young woman, um, and I attended one of her, her webinars, and I found out that the other population that's highly at risk is senior citizens from drowning.

Which I found really surprising. So, um, I'm about to make another move nomadic person that I am, and I'm headed to Montana, but she and I, um, and a international organization that's working to prevent drowning are gonna try to collaborate. And so I researched the drowning rate in Montana and they have a high drowning rate.

Among children and senior citizens. So drowning is one of those things that when we hear about it, we think it's awful, but how often do we think about it? We don't really think about it much, but it's the highest cause of death among children. You know what I mean? So, and, and now I know senior citizens.

So something that, um, it's almost like I felt about the caps. How could something so small. That could solve a problem, just be ignored. So drowning isn't fresh in our minds. We are thinking about it now. 'cause Malcolm, Jamal Warner just drowned and he knew how to swim, right? It wasn't because he didn't know how to swim, it had to do with the environment in which he was swimming.

So there's a lot of, a lot that needs to go into that, and I think it needs to be, um, which is what I'm hoping a coordinated effort. Kind of a bootstrap effort to take a community, and how can we reshape this and grow our own lifeguards, grow our own swimmers, and then from there we can take these kids and introduce them to careers in aquatics.

Because there are, you know, oceanography, there's surfing, there's diving, there's so much, so much opportunity out there in aquatics that we can solve the drowning problem, but then lead these kids into careers that could be very successful and beneficial for them. 

[00:32:57] Ellington Brown: Well, I, I, I agree with you. There is a lot of, uh, problems with.

Elderly individuals. I've heard of individuals, you know, elderly who are, they're in the pool and they get, they, they're do they do this every morning? They get in the pool, they swim four or five laps, maybe 10, I don't know, and then they don't come out of the water. They've had a heart attack and they've now passed, passed on, but they're still in the water.

So I've heard several cases about, about elderly, uh, children, uh, falling into the, into the pool because they didn't have the guardrail around the pool, right. To keep the kid from getting in the pool and, you know, the kid drowned. And that it's a horrible thing because now the parents have to live with this.

[00:33:57] Tess Padmore: The parent has to live with it. And then the interesting thing is, I had gone back to Drexel because one of the professors there was interested in the drowning rate among, um, African American children. And one of the other professors was interested in it, in on a global level. And she told me, 'cause she had gone to Drexel.

She's much younger than me and I told her that when I graduated from there back in 75, you had to know a how to swim in order to graduate. And she said to me, we don't have that requirement anymore so they don't have to learn how to swim. So these, this is something that's sort of fallen by the wayside.

I had an opportunity to, um, meet with some of the people in the Department of Public Health in Cuba, um, a few years back. And the professor I was traveling with brought up my swim caps. I didn't, he brought it up and the woman said to me, she said, we don't have a drowning problem because we teach our children how to swim when they're little, so our kids know how to swim.

And they're around water. The other professor I was traveling with was from Puerto Rico. She said, we have a huge drowning problem among children. So you are living on an island, but the kids don't know how to swim. So it it, it is actually, I mean, it, it's an issue in our community, but it's an act. It's actually a global problem.

It really is a global problem. 

[00:35:23] Rita Burke: That we need to start thinking about and bringing it, bringing it to our conscious, everyday way of living. Yes. Right. Could you ever think, could you think of a time in your life, either personally, perhaps, or professionally when you had to say enough? 

[00:35:47] Tess Padmore: Uh, yeah, I did. It was actually in Alaska.

I remember it like it was yesterday, it was in Alaska and I was working as the, um, I was the deputy director. Now I had a political appointment, but I was not a political person. I did budgets, finance and things like that. And in that role, you're really considered a historian. So you are the one that keeps the organization going.

So your position doesn't really change when the governors change, but who your work for does. And we had a change in administration and the woman that came in, um. That became my boss. Her husband became chief of staff, and so the governor owed him a favor and gave her that job. Previous to that, she had been a loan application.

Reviewer review. So she had no idea what to do, and at that time, you could actually smoke in the office buildings. She was a chain smoker. She was panicked. She didn't know what to do. So every morning she called me in her office and she closed the door and she smoked all day. Every piece of paper that came across her desk she gave to me and asked me, what do I do with it?

I, in order to do my own work, I was coming in at five o'clock in the morning. I was coming back at night bringing my daughter in the stroller with me to get my work done. And I, at the time, I was also paying my mother's rent. I would've left within two days, but because I was paying my mother's rent, I kept doing it and I did it for nine months.

And one day I sat down and talked to my mother and I said, I can't do this anymore. I just can't. I said, I'm doing the work of two people and I can't handle it. And my mother said, I'm gonna be okay. You don't do anything you don't wanna do. And I walked away from it. So what I tell people is, and how I've counseled younger people in situations like that, is that if you are not comfortable with something, number one, you always wanna be looking ahead.

Okay. You look, if you, if you're not gonna own your own business and you're gonna have a job, you better be looking for a job. When you have a job, you better keep your resume current if you have a good supervisor, if they're good. 'cause that's what I did with my staff. What is your goal? What is your plan?

I will help you figure out how to achieve that. Okay? I said, but if you are not happy with something, walk away. Just walk away might be tough for a while, but you'll be okay. So yes, I've had to walk away that, that's the only time I had to walk away professionally to that extent, you know? 'cause I used to say I can do anything for two years, but after that I'm bored anyway, so I'll find something else to do.

So. 

[00:39:01] Ellington Brown: So how do you define resilience? Not just, you know, in business, but in life. 

[00:39:09] Tess Padmore: Um, I am someone who, it's a, it's a gift and a curse. I've been blessed with not knowing how to give up. Okay? And it is a gift and a curse because sometimes you want to give up, but if you don't know how to give up, then you gotta suffer through it.

And I've had enough traumas and trials and tribulations in my life where I could have given up, like the choice of when being told you can't work anymore, you can't go to school anymore. Do I wanna sit here and just say, you know, I'm really sick and I really can't do this and I can't really do anything.

Or I could figure out what can I do? How do I pick myself up? How do I do this? And it's a matter of strength and determination. 'cause you really can get through it. You know, there's a saying, um, now I'm an elder basically, but my mom used to always say, this too shall pass. This too shall pass. We will get through this.

You don't give up. You just keep moving and never go back. Never go back. Just keep moving forward. Just keep moving forward. You know, one of the things I think about growing up below the poverty line, which I did, is I know how to be poor and I know how to survive. So anything else after that? I grew up in New York City.

If you can live there, you can live anywhere, right? I lived in Alaska. If you can live there, you can live anywhere. I've been in enough situations where I've learned how to survive and how to be resilient, and how to maintain my level of strength. In myself and not be swayed by what other people have to say or what other people think about me and just keep moving forward.

And, and, and I really believe never give up. You just don't. You know, 

[00:41:13] Rita Burke: That is incredible! You have, as I said before, an incredible story to tell and on SpeakUP! International, we aim to inspire, educate, and inform, and there's no question that your story is helping us to meet those objectives and those goals, but you've told us about your life's challenges and you've all, you've also spoken about some great experiences that you had, but let me be more specific and ask you the question.

Tell us what brings Tess Padmore joy? What brings you joy? 

[00:41:56] Tess Padmore: Um, I wanted to be a mother since I was a child. I have one daughter and I have two grandchildren who are 19 and 23 now, those three people, 'cause I don't have my parents anymore. Those three people are the most important thing in my life. They give me purpose.

And when they were really little. They gave me exactly what I needed. Um, the other things that bring me joy, I am a nerd. I am a nerd. I love reading. I love movies. Um, I love music. I'm my happiest when I go to a concert of musician that I love and there are 80,000 people there. I love it. That's the only time I love crowds because there's an energy source that comes through and the music is going through you and the crowds are around you, and, and I'm just in heaven.

Um, I got exci. I get, I get excited about, um, movies when I encounter another nerd, and we can speak that language together. Um, I've been fortunate to, um. Fulfill my dreams. Live my dreams because of those things. I started telling my mother that I was not gonna live in New York all my life when I was four years old.

I said, I don't belong here. When I, and I said when I was about six or seven, I knew I wanted to go to Alaska. I knew everything about it. I could quote who the governor was, the earthquakes, all that, and I wanted to go to Montana. I went to Alaska. I lived there 15 years, and then about two months I moved to Montana.

I spent the month of May there, and I, and I also found out, um, through genealogy and connecting with my father's family. My, my father was from Barbados. No, not my father. My grandfather was from Barbados. And my grandmother, uh, on the paternal side was from Montserrat. So I knew about my dad and I knew about, you know, my nuclear uncles and all of that.

And about 10 years I ago I started working on a family genealogy. And we have found all of us, all of us thinking that we were the only ones in all these places we were. And now we've come together and our family is in the States, Barbados, Mexico, England, Canada, Spain, Germany. We're all over the place.

And so I come from a nomadic family. I have a very, no matter, and we have all found each other and I must tell you the interesting thing about it is we're not distant cousins. We are first, second, third, and fourth cousins. Wow. Not eighth, first, second, third, and fourth cousins and Panama. I forgot Panama, that's as well.

And my grandfather also lived in Cuba for about 15 years. But we can't find the family there because of the restrictions. So I family brings me joy finding all those people. I found out who I was. I found them, you know. 

[00:45:19] Ellington Brown: You know, congratulations that you were able to find all of these people and, uh, relatives of yours and be able to connect the dots and, you know, pull, pull these people that you know mean something to you, closer to you.

When, uh, when people hear your story, what is the one message that you hope they will walk away with? 

[00:45:48] Tess Padmore: Well, most people who hear my story, because I'm not, I, I mean, I've lost my inhibitions, but I'm not a person who walks around with her accomplishments on her shoulders. And so unless you ask me a question, I'm not going to approach you and say, you know, I've lived in Alaska and I wrote these books, and I have these pa, you are gonna have to talk to me, and then I'll very matter of factly tell you these things.

But when I tell the stories, people always tell me that it's very inspiring. That they're inspired by the things I've done and they're inspired by the, my view of the world, my acceptance of people. And it's just, um, I think it's sort of, um, you know, you have all these sort of things that come together. Um, my mother was probably the right mother for me, right.

Um, my dad's family was probably the right family for me. All these things, it's kind of, nothing happens for no reason. Everything happens for a reason and there's no such thing as coincidence. And I am not everyone, but I am one of those people who believes when we are born and we inhabit this earth, we have come here for a reason.

And to serve a purpose, not just to eat, live, sleep and die, but to serve a purpose. I spent the majority of my life trying to figure out what that purpose was until I had the brain aneurysm and when I had the brain aneurysm. When I finally got to, and this brings up mental health. When I finally got to a psychiatrist after wandering for two years after that, one of the greatest gifts he gave to me was, he'd said to me one day you should write.

And I said to him, who would wanna read what I write? He said, that's not the point. And I started journaling and I journaled every day for eight years. And what came out of that was I found my voice. I found my voice. I no longer felt like I was at the bottom of a well, and no one could hear me, that I could speak, that I could tell my story, that I could talk about these things that I, I not repressed, but suppressed.

All of that stuff was able to come out and he helped me find my purpose, which really is to give and to heal. People had always come to me and just told me the most personal things, and I would say, why are they telling me these things? But I came to accept that people needed that from me. And so if I'm willing to sit and listen, even if they just want me to listen and they walk away and they feel better, then I know I've done what I've been put here to do.

If I need to show them the way to find what they need, then I'm still doing what it is I was put here to do. You know, 

[00:48:47] Rita Burke: And listening is a profound gift to give to the people in your tribe just listening. So, Tess Padmore, in your bio you talk about all you need is a head. Elaborate on that statement for me, please.

[00:49:07] Tess Padmore: That comes back to the caps because as I said, everyone would look at my products and see something different. And so I moved away from saying, oh, this is for when you swim, and this is for when you, when you go to the salon and you just wanna cover up your hair so you don't get the stuff in it. And so finally I started saying to people when they were coming to my studio and, and they would say, well, uh, what are these?

And I would say they're whatever you want them to be. And if they said, but I don't have any hair, I would say, well, you don't need any hair. You don't have to have hair. All you need is a head. And then I take the, the mannequins and I'll show them what they can do and I can tell them the stories. Um, and I've connected with people in different communities as well.

So for example, or they've reached out to me, I've had a great meeting with a woman who has alopecia. And she said to me, there's a difference, you know, between someone who has alopecia and someone who has a medical condition, like someone going through chemotherapy. The person who's going through chemotherapy, their scalp is very sensitive and is, and it's very important that there's no irritation or anything like that.

She said, but if you have alopecia, you can, that person can wear any of your caps because the reaction, the skin is not the same. So that's why I made, once I met her, I was very specific about medical hair loss. Because the Al Alopecia community, they could wear any of my caps. And the nice thing too is if you have no hair or if you have short hair, you could still put on a very long cap, one of the long caps, twist it into a braid, fix it up, put something on it, put earrings on, and voila, you got something completely different.

It's also all inclusive because men buy my products just like women. I learned from bald men that they like to cover their hair in the summer because the, the sun is burning the top of their head. They like to wear it at night because the head gets cold, so it doesn't matter. Male, female, long hair, short hair, no hair, all you need is a head.

That's all you need. 

[00:51:29] Ellington Brown: And, and, and all of us. Have one 

[00:51:32] Tess Padmore: and all of us have one. So whoever you are, you are my customer. You may not know about me, but you need me. 

[00:51:42] Ellington Brown: That's right out there with that, with that, uh, with that saying, uh, you, uh, I don't know you, but I love you. 

[00:51:50] Tess Padmore: Yes, 

[00:51:52] Ellington Brown: it's right up there. With that, I wanna thank you so much Ms. Padmore, um, for joining us on SpeakUP! International, we got to talk about your inventions, innovation, and how it's very inclusive and not only just the actual physical, uh, device, but the actual, uh, using it. It's, it's a, it's a mental thing as well, which I. I have to admit, I didn't. I didn't. I never thought of it. Uh, that way and the importance and the skill of being a successful entrepreneur and resilient and not allowing yourself to be broken by the situation that you, that you find your yourself in.

This has been a positive experience for me, and I'm sure that our audience will, will agree. Uh, Rita, do you have anything that you'd like to add to that? 

[00:53:06] Rita Burke: Yes. This was thoroughly enjoyable, inspiring. And I think of something you told us that your mom used to say is You don't want to be a P in a pod. That was very progressive of her to think that way because sometimes parents want to put their children in that pod, so you were fortunate to have been raised and nurtured by a woman who allowed you to think outside of the box. When you spoke at the beginning about living in Alaska, I thought, wow, let's hear this story. I'm fascinated, so thank you. Thank, thank you Tess Padmore for gracing our platform today with your story. Really appreciate that. 

[00:53:55] Tess Padmore: Well, thank you for having me, and I would really be interested now to start following you to see who's on your platform.

Um, my mom was a woman before her time and the way she talked about her mother, that her mother was a woman before her time, and so it's in my DNA. Um, it was great being here. I love talking to you guys. People can find my caps on http://eggheadsoques.com/ 'cause my mom used to say, you're such a little egghead, another word for nerd, such a little egghead, but it's http://eggheadsoques.com/. And you can see all our caps. And then we are working right now to get my author's website up and running. 'cause I write books too. And one of the things that brings me joy is when I go out and I read to first and second graders, then when I'm sitting in front of them, I say to myself, this is why you're doing what you're doing because of the kids.

And so again, http://eggheadsoques.com/. And same thing on Instagram and Facebook. You can find us there, and it's been a pleasure, pleasure, pleasure speaking to you guys. I really enjoyed it. It's great. I know you, you've, 

[00:55:10] Ellington Brown: and thank you for the, the information that you, that you're giving us in terms of how people can connect, contact you.

That information will also be under the description section on when it's online. 

[00:55:25] Tess Padmore: Tell people, I, I am a person who believes in sharing resources. Okay? If I find out something, I don't keep it to myself. I can tell 'em, if you go over here and you go find that you can get some help.

You know, I, I believe in sharing, sharing resources.

[00:55:45] Ellington Brown: Life is too short and you just told them That's right. Life is too short. Okay. So you have a great, uh, great afternoon. 

[00:55:55] Tess Padmore: You too! 

[00:55:55] Ellington Brown: And when you, uh. Have an opportunity. I would love for you to come back and for you to grab hold of one of the books you have written and just have a a few minutes of conversation to talk about that book and the importance it is in your life and how you see it fit in.

The lives of other individuals. 

That would be great. I'm working on, I have two children's books out now. One deals with Grief called Remember Rudy, and the other one is Twin Tales and it deals with adoption. I write creative nonfiction, so everything I write is about something I've experienced. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. We're working on. New children's book called Our First Garden, and I'm using my grandchildren as the cha main characters. Um, so, uh, thinking of thinking ahead about legacy, I want their names in print. And then I'm also working on a memoir. That'll be out probably next year sometime. 

Well, good. So when, when those projects come to completion, you don't have to wait for all of them to complete, but you know, as they complete, please, you know, let Rita know.

I will, you know, Hey, I've got this book. I'm done now. Yeah. Will, and I'm ready to, uh, to show the world and we at, uh, SpeakUP! International can definitely help you do just that. 

[00:57:22] Tess Padmore: Okay!

[00:57:23] Ellington Brown: Thank you for tuning into SpeakUP! International! If you wish to contact our guest, Ms. Tess Padmore, please be prepared to submit your name, your email address, and the reason why you wish to contact Ms. Padmore at http://eggheadsoques.com/. That's http://eggheadsoques.com/ Ms.. Padmore has other social media accounts you can use to connect to her. That will be listed in the description section on Spotify and other social media platforms. 

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