How One Mom Built Life-Changing Tools for Her Autistic Son

Rachel Estes Leyk is a mother, businesswoman, coach, and advocate who delivers heartfelt and highly practical strategies for raising emotionally resilient, self-aware children. In this conversation, she opens up about a moment of crisis in her family that became the catalyst for her advocacy, which has led to helping others to do the same.

Her upcoming book, Response-ABILITY: How the Need to Unlock a Child’s Ability to Respond Shapes the Way We Love, Care, Support, and Uplift, is available for pre-order and launches on January 18, 2026.

How One Mom Built Life-Changing Tools for Her Autistic Son

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  Richie Ploesch

  Hey, Rachel, thanks so much for joining us this afternoon.

  Rachel Estes Leyk

  Thank you for having me. I'm super energized to be here and to share a little bit more about my story.

  Richie
  Great I want to dive into it and I want to hear about you've got a book coming out that you just finished writing. It's called responsibility. How the need to unlock a child's ability to respond shapes how we love care support and uplift. Do I get that right? I think I got that right. Can you thank you? I got one. It's one for today. I nailed one thing today. Will count that as a win. Can you tell us the back story of writing the book like you know? I'm always curious how these come.

  Rachel
  Yes, you did. You nailed it. Nailed it.

  Rachel
  you

  Richie
  from thought to paper.

  Rachel

  Yeah, I always knew I had a story in me. But I didn't know exactly what it was. And I guess I was patient and allowed time to unveil it to me. It started to really come together after a really horrific event with our son Cooper. Cooper was 13 years old, and he was at middle school lunch. And you can just imagine middle school lunch for an autistic with audio sensory and other censories, just pretty chaotic. And he and Logan were standing in line. And they were talking, chatting, and another individual turned and got into Cooper's bubble. And Cooper, there was an exchange and the detail is in the book, there is an exchange. And this other child came when Cooper finished getting through the line and he was settling his tray at his table. He said, you know, what'd you say, what'd you say, say it to me. And he just started beating Cooper. And, Cooper lost his hearing. Cooper was in crushing pain and the child continued like Tasmanian devilish, circling around, dodging the adults. And he kept coming back and beating on Cooper and. Cooper in that moment, as he would say, he didn't do anything. And I recognized for Cooper, you know, when I picked him up.

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  that he did everything. He did everything that we had taught him. And it was the series of appointments with specialists that I can recall them all saying consistently and individually, you have to write a book about this because people need

  Richie
  Hmm.

  Rachel
  to hear about your tools that you leverage because it helped Cooper remain who he was. He stuck to his values, his character. He emotionally regulated and probably the most difficult life experience anyone could experience. And they just have never seen that. And they were really impressed. So they're like...

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  what have you taught him? And so I started telling him my different methodologies and frameworks and they're like, you gotta write a book girl, you've got so much here. And so I was like, okay, I'll take the torch and do it.

  Richie
  Gotta write that down. Yeah.

  Richie
  I think for, for our listeners, you know, I appreciate, I had a chance to read your book. Thank you for that. but for our listeners who don't know, I mean, this was not an insignificant fight. mean, he ended up, Cooper was in the hospital. I mean, there, there was afterwards he had to see specialists. There was, mean, lawsuits and other things all happened. Like there's a lot to this event. So I just want to make sure that people understand that because that's a big deal.

  Rachel
  There was a TBI. Yeah.

  Rachel
  Yeah, yeah, part of the journey, you know, there was the physical harm and healing that had to occur from the attack. And then there was there was the court proceedings because the district attorney brought criminal charges against a 12 year old boy and the 12 year old boy was found guilty and charged and convicted on third degree assault felony charges. So it was quite significant and that the court process took about six months. And I think that there was such healing in that for Cooper, that day of court as we sat in that courtroom and he saw accountability for that other person's actions against him. It was very healing.

  Richie
  Hmm.

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Richie
  I imagine that process was healing for you as well, but also being able to take your thoughts, put them on paper, share the story plus, right? It's not just the story of that event. It's also the teachings that you had leading up to it. I imagine that was a healing process for you as well, right?

  Rachel
  It was, it took me many years to write this book because it was so emotionally charged. I had to, I had to walk away from it so many times and I would take months and months of a break from it. And each time I would come back to it, re-energized and confirming and validated that I need to get this content out in the hands of people and this isn't just for neurotypical, this is for everyone. Everyone can use responsibility, that really that truly that ability to respond with intention versus just reacting. And that's what it's about. It's about building that skill, both for adults and for kids.

  Richie
  Can you explain a little bit more what you mean by the ability to respond instead of just react?

  Rachel
  Yeah, I think as as a mom of an autistic, our journey has been a lot of learning how to teach emotions, learning how to teach emotional regulation, learning how to apply those skills in different settings. And when you're doing that, you're teaching, at least we taught Cooper, this is how we expect you to show up. And we couldn't calculate every situation. Clearly, we did not calculate that lunchtime situation, right? But we at least gave him the tools and an assortment of tools to be able to call upon so that he could, in his mind, know even though he was being beat brutally. I don't touch people and I don't hurt people. And I don't need to come out of my character. I don't need to come out of my value set of how I show up just because this is happening to me. So I think that is in a super important part of the ability to respond. How are you showing up? What are your values? How are you holding yourself to a standard in the situations that you come into life at?

  Richie
  Yeah, I appreciate that explanation so much. think one of the things I've heard a lot is, you know, when we react, tends to be our, our emotions kind of take over and they kick in and then we're thinking, you know, we're not even thinking we're just, you know, reacting emotionally versus responding as a very intentional thing. and we allow for space and we allow to time to recognize our emotion and what we're feeling kind of on the inside, but also then choose the way that we act. I - I heard that a lot in the, in the book that you wrote. heard a lot of that, or I read a lot of that, I should say, in that moment for Cooper.

  Rachel
  Yeah. Yeah, and it's super important. I hope everyone out in the world can develop a little responsibility. Let's just all get our responsibility put together.

  Richie
  We all need that. Absolutely.

  Richie
  Yeah, so I, you know, gosh, I have a few, I have so many questions, but I'm going to start with this one. You know, responsibility, like when, when you look at everyday moments from a responsibility perspective, what does that mean for people in their daily lives? Like how, how can I bring that concept to work or the commute to work?

  or the grocery store or dealing with my children or my siblings or my parents or whomever it may be around me. I didn't mention my wife, but I probably should.

  Rachel
  Yeah. We have all our people, right? I think fundamentally, when we were on Cooper's journey, I learned early on about the four functions of behavior. And that was a powerful aha for me. And I think parents...

  Richie
  Right, right.

  Rachel
  you know, whether they're introduced to that concept of four functions behavior, it's super powerful once you learn it and once you apply it. And I think that helps me as a mom respond.

  Richie
  Hmm.

  Rachel
  Because if I can understand, is this seeking attention? Is this avoidance? Is this tangible? I want that. Is this sensory? And I can calculate and I can gear my response to align with that. There would be many times when people would come over to visit and Cooper would act out because he's seeking that attention, right? The attention was pulled to someone else. But Instead of sending him to his room, which is the complete opposite of what he wants, I had to say to him, I see you. And I want you a part of this conversation or would you like to come outside and sit with us on the porch while we visit? Right? Like I had to fold him into that and learn how to bring him into it. And I think the four functions of behavior are at the core of it. And then the framework of AMP which is advocate, motivate, participate. I think for both the adult and the child, that's super important to understand. How are you advocating? How are they advocating? How are they motivated? Are you hitting on the things that motivate them? How are you motivated? And how is that different from how they're motivated? And then what's the participation look like? What are the triggers or the sensory elements of it? And how are you participating? a coach, I coach basketball and soccer, and you know, a coach has to get out on the court or out on the pitch. And you have to do the drills with the kids. You can't just be like, okay, now do a layup. Well, wonder if they've never done a layup.
  
  

  Rachel

  They don't know what it looks like. They don't know what good looks like. They don't even know what a layup feels like in their own bodies. And so you have to be willing to participate and you're going to get it wrong and you're going to brush yourself off and be like, well, we're not going to do that again. But I think that's just, that's like, you have to build it within yourself. And I think you have to help your child build it within themselves as well.

  Richie
  Yeah, one thing that I'm hearing you describe is those teachable moments, right? And when you understand when you understand somebody's why, you know, you mentioned it. If he's if Cooper's misbehaving and he's trying to get that attention and you understand why that's happening, then you can you have that as a as an opportunity to teach the appropriate behavior or say like, hey, I understand this is you're looking for. You know, let's try this instead. You know, and there's lots of ways to teach in that moment. But really, it's knowing.

  Rachel
  Yeah.

  Richie
  right, knowing the root of the cause of what's happening.

  Rachel
  Yeah, I also think we don't do enough reflecting. Every day on the drive to school, and this was middle school, every day, we would go over the three things of how we would show up. Be fair and just, be kind and loving, and be humble. And we review those things and we'd say, which one are we gonna have to really work on today? And be mindful of that and intentional of that as you start your day. When I'd pick Cooper up from school, I'd go over each hour of his day. Because in middle school, you come into contact with a lot of different teachers because now your schedule is different, right? So you can have five, seven different teachers, different personalities, expectations, classrooms. And we go over every hour and say, what did you practice? How did it go? What what stood out to you, right? Reflection was a huge part of his learning and growth and how to respond and really getting feedback like I didn't hold back. You know, you might have autism, but I'm going to tell you the truth, buddy. And I'm going tell you with love, it's going to be wrapped up in all sorts of love. But I got to give you the feedback because I want you I want you to be awesome. Like, you know, you are awesome. I want you to be even more awesome. Like, you're awesome.

  Richie
  Right. Is that excuse me, is that what you mean when you say creating mindset shifts for parents? Right. That that idea of instead of just how is your day? OK, good. Great. Let's keep going. Like really pausing, reflecting, thinking about what could have been done differently, not always better or worse, just sometimes differently. And but that's a deliberate time you set aside. Right.

  Rachel
  Yes.

  Rachel
  Yeah, and I think, you know, I think it's easy, right? I work as a professional, I'm a mom, you know, and I think we can get busy in our daily lives and our daily lives can create all sorts of busy for us, but we have to be willing to be curious with our children because they're our future and we have to be willing to watch them, observe them, coach them.

  Richie
  Hmm

  Rachel
  ask the questions, ask the challenging question, and just be really curious in that. And that does take time. And one thing that I found worked really well with Cooper, it's in the back of the book as worksheets, is setting goals and developing capabilities that has to be intentional. He did not develop his self advocacy skills out of the blue. They just didn't drop in his lap. He had to work really hard at it. And he's still working really hard at it because now he has great self advocacy, but he could probably polish it a little bit so that people could receive the information. and have a better interaction. But hey, I'm not judging it because I'm like, dude, you found your voice. I love it more of it. So there's that part of it too, is really setting those goals of what do I need to work on next? And we would do that at his birthday every year. We set goals. And if he meets them in three months-
  
  

  Richie

  for sure.

  Rachel

  - three weeks or in that year marker, set another goal and we develop on those capabilities.

  Richie
  I think that's, you know, it's just a little bit similar to what people do with a New Year's resolution, right? You know, and they have the idea of like, I'm going to do this every New Year's, but like, I like the idea of it being tied to birthdays. I think like there's some newness there also. And it just gives you, yeah, I'm older. I ask my kids every year on their birthday, like what's different now that you turned whatever age than it was last year.

  Rachel
  Yeah!

  Rachel
  and growth. You're a year older. You know, you're a year... We're growing up.

  Richie
  And sometimes they throw out things like, I can stay up later. And it's like, well, maybe that's true. But also sometimes it's my school is harder or I have to navigate different friendships and things like that. I mean, it's, it's a great time to have that conversation. Rachel, I want to switch a little bit. so much of the, of, of your book outlines some, the toolbox, right? Some of the things in the toolbox. And there are some that really stood out to me. And so I just want to chat about a couple of those, but,

  Rachel
  That's right.

  Richie
  The first one that comes to mind is the odd and even days. This one is something that I use in my house and we don't quite use it the same way, but like can you explain for everyone what you mean by odd and even days?

  Rachel
  Yeah, so it was rooted out of

  There was chaos in our car trips because our daughter Charlie, who's about two years older than Cooper, loved to sing. She has a love for singing. And so she was always wanting to sing. Well, Cooper in his sensory, he wanted it quiet. And I quickly realized after months of this tug of war occurring that I was squashing Charlie's ability to sing for Cooper's desire to have silence. And that wasn't fair to Charlie. And so I thought about it and I thought, you know what, we can do odd and even. And Cooper, you were born in September, so you're odd.

  Richie
  Mm.

  Rachel
  And Charlie, you were born in February and that's an even month. So you'll be even. So we look at the day of the week now when they were really little when we were doing this, man, they woke up and they said, mom, what day is it? Is it or even? I mean, they live for odd or even. And that means that their choice is primary. They get now, you know, as teenagers, they can drive, but when, when they could actually were promoted from the backseat to the front seat,

  Richie
  What day is it? Yeah.

  Rachel
  and sit in the front seat safe, they could sit in the front seat. And they literally still ask me if I'm driving and we're walking out to the car, mom, what day is it? Is it odd or even? And so it really became part of our DNA. We do it on movie night. Mom, it's an odd, it's an odd day. I get a pick. It's my pick. And they just know that there's choice in that. And what I like about it is they get to feel the days that there's their choice in its primary.

  Richie
  you

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  But then there's the days where they have to compromise. And the compromise became so much easier because they knew that they just had their choice and they were gonna have their choice again tomorrow. And so it took away that chaos, that frustration and fighting with sibling rivalry, right? It took that away, yeah.

  Richie
  thinking about the chaos of the ride from our house to soccer practice and just that alone, you know, it's 15 minutes or whatever. And just that alone, it's like, okay, just stop, right? And this is a way to control that, which, you know, for a lot of parents gives them a few minutes of like, all right, I don't have to have this argument. It doesn't mean you're not going to have others. It just means you don't have to have this one.

  Rachel
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  Yeah. And I think, you know, I'll work myself into the odd or even schedule, right? Mom's choice or Sean's, big dad's choice, right? Cause I think they need to know parents also get a choice too. Now my husband, big dad, he doesn't get many choice. Like we always steal the remote from them poor guy, but we, you know, we try to distribute it as, as best we can, but odd and even as a lifesaver, I'm telling you makes car rides just a dream.

  Richie
  Yeah Yeah. The other one that stood out to me, thank you for diving into that. The other one that stood out to me, and this is something that I think all of us should be working on and really paying attention to, is the idea of scaled responses, right? So can you explain that and give us an example also?

  Rachel
  Yeah, so, Cooper was in lunch line and he has this social justice, right? He's a rule follower. He likes everyone else around him to follow the rules. And his teacher asked everyone to line up single file, they were leaving from lunch to go back to class and these two little girls were running around not listening and they were running, they were running and Cooper yelled at both of them and he's like, you need to stop running, you know, and the teacher was like, Cooper, you don't have to be the police of the classroom. You know, let let miss Spanovich do that. You know, she's doing a beautiful job. Let her do that. And he's like, but they're not listening and they're not following the rules, right. And it was a bigger response than really what the problem warranted. And so Miss Partington was his special ed teacher at the time. And she said, you know, Coop, I want to work with you on -

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  on scaling your responses. If we have a small problem, we want a small response. If we have a big problem, we want a big response. And so we still use that to this day. we'll say, know, and instead of asking, you know, what's the scale, it's more of was that really a big problem?

  Richie
  Yep.

  Rachel
  because we get this big response, right? And it's like, is that really a big problem? Just curious here. And allowing him to say, yeah, you're right. I mean, I use that on colleagues and coworkers. It's great because it's like, is this really a big problem? I don't think so, but maybe, maybe I'm not informed on something. Yeah. So it's a fun...

  Richie
  Yeah. For us, we define small, medium, and big problems and what they look like for our kids. And we have that conversation all the time. And so if they're having a big response to something, I'll just ask small, medium, or big, or small, medium, large is what we say. And they'll say, all right, dad, it's a medium. OK, just make sure your response matches. And we've done it so many times that-It started off as a conversation each time and now it's a quick exchange, right? Now, now for my kids, it's I can ask and they're like, and they, know to, you know, check in. And sometimes it's the opposite where they're not having enough of a reaction or enough of a response, I should say, to something that's big. There's a big school project and I'll put it off to later. No, you should have a little more urgency about this. Right. So I think it can go in both directions. We tend to focus on a large reaction for a small problem, but we don't often talk about a small reaction for a large problem.

  Rachel
  Yes, yes, I call it the over under. Yeah, you overestimate what is really under and you underestimate what is really over. Yeah, it's so true. So true.

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Richie
  So yeah, it's true. And you know, for all of us, I'm guilty of this too. This is something that I have to take care of. You know, I got to make sure I my coffee. Otherwise it's not going to work. I want to switch a little bit. And you talked about Cooper being a great advocate for himself. And I'm curious some of the ways that you've been able to teach him to advocate for himself and some of the ways that you helped teachers, coaches, caregivers, et cetera, understand him and work with him in a collaborative way.

  Rachel
  So I heard the last part first in your question. Yeah. OK.

  Richie
  So yeah, good. Sorry, there was a lot to that question. Let's start with the advocate, the advocacy piece. How did you get him to advocate for himself? Yeah.

  Rachel
  for his voice, to find his voice. I use this simple saying at home. It's a mantra, find your voice. And I use that with our daughter, Charlie, too, because being a girl, I found that she always kind of became small in certain settings. And Cooper, he was nonverbal until he was three years old and went into speech therapy and then he became verbal and had speech. So he was always hesitant to speak because he was worried about the judgment of his articulation, pronunciation, right? And now he's so, so well spoken. It's amazing. And I use this phrase of find your voice, whatever that is. I'm not going to judge it, but just find your voice and use it. And I think also the know it, own it and share it concept that's in the book is really important. Cooper's known he is autistic since the day he was diagnosed at age seven. And now he's 17 to just kind of benchmark it's been 10 years. So he's known ever since and he didn't really know know what that meant initially.

  Richie
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  but it was in middle school, I think it was in eighth grade. He really kind of, came off the soccer field and he said, mom, what does my autism look like? And so we discussed it a little bit, like you don't always look, you don't always make eye contact. You're still refining your emotional regulation in stressful situations. And you, you you're refining that.

  response in in your self advocacy, how are you self advocating? And it was the light bulb of he really understands he is in control of how people see his autism. And he doesn't look at autism as a bad thing. He looks at it as a special power. He's got special powers that other people don't have. He reads people. And he does so many other great things.

  And so he was like, you mean that I don't have to always show my autism? I'm like, buddy, when you put on those soccer cleats, nobody knows you're autistic. And, you know, if they know us as a family, they know you're autistic, but they didn't before they knew us. And so I think there's that part. So knowing it. And then how do you share it? Right? Because when he was little, he would beg me to share

  share his needs with the coaches or the teachers, right? Mom, tell them how to work with me. You work with me so good, mom, you just get me mom, tell them how can they just get me mom, right? He would just beg for me to help them. And so I started creating PowerPoints, I started creating slide decks, because that's, you know, that's what I do for a living is, you know, consulting and solving problems. So I started putting oodles of information together and meeting with teachers and be willing to hear what they understood about it and filling in that gap of knowledge. And there's going to be some that just don't get it. And then there's others that are going to take that information. And I find what's so powerful is his high school soccer coach, Coach Trudeau is also the AP psychology teacher that he's in a class in right now for and Coach Trudeau saw that a teacher was struggling to work with Cooper this year. And Coach Trudeau, I didn't ask Coach Trudeau, Coach Trudeau took it upon himself and he went over and he talked with that teacher and he said, hey, here's a few tips of how to work best with Cooper and meet his needs. So I think like if you know yourself and the people around you know you and you're willing to speak up because Cooper and Coach Trudeau obviously have gotten to know each other on the field and off the field, then it's pretty easy for Coach Trudeau to go, you know what? I can go advocate for that kid because he's worth it.

  Richie
  So tell me about this PowerPoint. think that, you know, what you just outlined is a very powerful thought, right? For being able to own sort of who we are and be able to share it. And in doing so, having allies help us and advocate on our behalf with us, right? We all, we all need all those things. So tell us about this power. mean, this part, is it like 15 slides and then this is like, you know, details on it. Like, how did you, like, I want to know about the PowerPoint and then like, how you go about creating this with Cooper. Because it's not for him. You don't make it for him, correct?

  Rachel
  correct. It's for the teachers. It's for coaches. Yes. Yes. So again, it was all understanding his autism. Again, it's a spectrum.

  Richie
  You make it, right, you make it with him. Yeah, okay.

  Rachel
  Everyone is different. And there's different triggers, needs support. And so we really tailored it to him. I have a whole page on like, what are triggers for him and why those triggers exist. And then there's other pages within that that talk about support mechanisms and how to deploy those supports. Right? Like, I had to tell a principal one time I said, you talk too much. And he's like, Whoa. And I said, you didn't read his support mechanisms. And he's like, No, I haven't dug into that. And I said, Well, maybe you should. Because it would, you would learn the three B's in that there's, you know, many things in the support side, but you learn about the three B's. And he's like, What are the three B's? I said, Be brief, be bright, and be gone. I said, when you're dealing with an autistic, that's like a fire hose. If you're throwing all this instruction at them, right? And I said, be brief with your instruction, be bright. You can be positive when delivering feedback and be gone. Like get out of there, deliver it and go, right? And so that PowerPoint has, I mean, I bet it's 20 pages. And it's not to fire hose the teachers or the support people or the coaches. It's really to say, you can dig in as deep as you want, or you can do surface work, right? But it's it's your adventure. And whatever you choose to do, whether it's surface or deep, that's the relationship you'll have. And if you want to change the relationship, maybe dig deeper.

  Richie
  I imagine that this PowerPoint changes every year, right? Every time he gets new teachers or new coaches and maybe less so if he has the same, you know, the same coach for, you know, his whole high school time or something like that. But I imagine that this changes regularly and as he gets older will continue to change as he gets new coworkers and new bosses and new jobs and I don't know, new significant others and all those roommates, all those things, right? Is that how you kind of envision this being used?

  Rachel
  Yeah.

  Rachel
  Yes. Yes, I've updated it a couple times a year because there was such growth, right? And whenever there's growth, always produce a new one, share it out, let them know you'll take the time to spend with them. And because the last thing I want them to feel is like they're not seen, they're seen as much as I want Cooper seen. And so there's that appropriate exchange of respect and importance. And also, when he hit middle school, this is super important. In elementary school, you have your homeroom teacher, and maybe you have a FIAD teacher, an art teacher, music teacher. So there's four teachers that you have. In middle school, you can have up to seven different teachers plus your homeroom. And they all had different styles. They all had different expectations of how they operated their classroom. And they were expecting so much from Cooper. And I said, Have you ever articulated that? I said, he's trying to manage all of you, your eight people. And he's trying to manage all of you. Have you ever put a playbook together? And so I put a playbook together. And I put all the behaviors, all the things that we wanted to see across the top. And then I put across the other point, the class. And then I would put a Harvey ball, like no cell phone, no iPad, right? No gum.

  Richie
  Hmm

  Rachel
  even if it was an IEP, right? This teacher does not like gum. Don't use use a different fidget. Don't use that as that, right? So I think that that allowed me to prepare Cooper for their environment. But I also share that same thing with those teachers, because I wanted them to know, I see you. I see what you're expecting of him. And if you're expecting it, I'll hold him accountable for it. But we have to be we we have to say it out loud, we can't

  Richie
  Yeah. Yeah.

  Rachel
  just like think it and think that it's gonna be grabbed onto, right?

  Richie
  Yeah, communication has to start with where the other is, right? Otherwise, there's no understanding or opportunity for understanding.

  Rachel
  Yeah. Yeah.

  Richie
  Rachel, I got to ask. I think this is super important. I think it was such a great story in the book. There's something that you mentioned called the one thing about me worksheet. Can you tell us what it is and share the story about it?

  Rachel
  that's the AMP model. But yeah. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. This was one of the tools that Cooper gained at elementary school, Mrs. Spanovich's class. He was in third grade. And Mrs. Spanovich, it was like the first couple days of school, right? And so they were doing this one thing about me worksheet. And it says, What are five words that best describe you? And Cooper wrote in his five best words. He said he was smart. He said he was funny, athletic. And I was like, that was the first time he had articulated intelligence as part of his as his identity. The other thing was draw a picture of yourself. And Cooper drew the best stick figure that he could and they had a smile had a smile on his face. So I was like, okay, he's happy, right? Like, that's a good that's a good drawing self portrait.

  Richie
  Mmm. Yeah, two wins already.

  Rachel
  That's right. And then he says, at the last question on the worksheet is, one thing you need to know about me is, and the one thing that Cooper said that we needed to know about him was that he was awesome. It said I'm awesome in his little handwriting, I'm awesome. And I think, you know, that he brought that worksheet home that first week of school that year in his third grade. And I was impressed with the five words. I was impressed with the drawing, but I was completely stunned by the phrase of I'm awesome. And I think that every parent should, if they want to start and do one thing, and get one thing from responsibility is to sit down with their child and do the one thing about me worksheet to see what their child thinks of themselves and what the child perspective is so that they can support that. And so we that's why in the book on the spine of the book you see unleashing awesome because ever since then it has been my job as his mom to unleash his awesome. there's accountability in this journey. And, and I, I just, I hope that other parents that are out there.I hope that they rise for their children because they're worth it. And that's what it's about, right? It's for those kids that don't have a voice or they don't have the ability to fight their fight at that adult level. And man, when I walk into a room, I walk in fierce and I'm nice, I'm kind, but boy, there's a stick of accountability that comes with me.

  Richie
  That's such a great story. And I think the thing I'm hearing from you right now, and I can see on your face, is the emotion from all the work that went to get to that moment for him to feel that about himself, right? And you've expressed that he had doubts before that. So for it to be able to be communicated and expressed in that way, that's a moving story. So thank you for sharing that.

  Rachel
  Yeah, thank you for letting me.

  Richie
  Rachel, I'm so excited that we had time to connect today. I want I want to ask when when and when is your book coming out and where can people find it?

  Rachel
  Okay, so this is so awesome. I do everything very intentionally, if you haven't noticed, it's all about intention. So January 18, 2026, and you say, well, why January 18? That was the day Cooper was beat in the lunchroom. And I wanted to redefine that date for our family. I wanted to say, you know what, we've come out of it, we've rose above it, we've healed from it. And we have something of impact to share with others. So January 18, 2026, it's a Sunday, you can get it at Barnes and Noble, Amazon, bookstore.org, your local book bookstore, you can give them the ISBN number, and they can order it for

  Richie
  Hmm

  Rachel
  So super excited to have it out in the wild.

  Richie
  Great. Well, Rachel, thank you so much. We appreciate you coming on and joining us today. And also good luck as your book launches in the near future. Looking forward to hearing how it goes.

  Rachel
  Thank you. Yeah, thank you. It was awesome. Thank you for allowing me to share. I can't wait to share it with my social media and just hopefully make a difference. That's what it's about. It's about making an impact.

  Richie
  Of course, of course.