Show Notes

I had the pleasure of speaking with Sara Olsher of Mighty & Bright. She was also joined by Danielle Bettmann of Parenting Wholeheartedly. 

Sara shares her incredible story of resilience and determination as a breast cancer survivor, in addition to the challenges she overcame as a single mom of a young daughter. From those experiences, Mighty & Bright was born; a companyhelping families face though challenges with honesty and mental well-being in mind.

As my listeners may know, these kinds of resources are greatly appreciated by me as I know too well what it is like to face though challenges as a family through my mom’s metastatic breast cancer journey. Might and Bright’s products and services would have without a doubt been usseful tools to help my daughter cope with her grandmother’s cancer journey. While the experiences themselves are not always pleasant, it makes me so happy that Might and Bright exists and it is available for families and children facing challenges like divorce or cancer.

Guests

Sara Olsher

Mighty + Bright was founded by Sara Olsher, mom to a little girl with a big personality, wearer of cowboy boots, and drinker of exceptionally strong coffee. In 2012, she packed up her 18 month old and left her marriage. What followed was about four years of intense personal growth and the birth of Mighty + Bright.

Then in 2017, Sara was diagnosed with invasive breast cancer at the age of 34. Rather than choosing to keep her daughter in the dark, Sara explained the diagnosis and treatment process to her six year-old, included her throughout the year of healing, and documented her journey through cancer on her blog.

Danielle Bettmann

Danielle Bettmann also joined us in this episode. I’m excited to share that since then we have recorded a 1:1 episode together, so I will be sharing that soon. You can learn more about her below:

Danielle Bettmann is the owner & parenting coach of Wholeheartedly.  She helps families with a strong-willed toddler and a “good cop / bad cop” dynamic find sanity & solutions! Through 1:1 coaching, she helps extend your patience, rewire your parenting mindset and write your Family Business Plan.  She’s also the host of the Failing Motherhood podcast, working to normalize the struggle and share vulnerable stories of feeling like a “failure”, reminding you that YOU are the mom your kids need.

Mighty and Bright

Sara started Mighty + Bright for the same reason many parents start companies: because she wanted to help her own daughter and invented a product to do it. But since then, it’s become so much more. Sara has seen firsthand that the universe can deal some pretty harsh blows. As parents, we want nothing more than to see our children thrive – and nothing is more painful than knowing that we can’t fix everything when things go wrong.

Cancer taught Sara that what’s important in life is our relationships. From the onset, her friends and family rallied around her, lifted her up, and showed her that much of what we spend our lives worrying about is unimportant. What is important is making sure that we stand by what matters to us, we focus on what is real, and we spend our time caring for ourselves and others.

Mighty + Bright is about helping families handle the really hard things in life. We can’t control the cards we’re dealt, but we can control how we respond to it, and the message we send to our kids. For Sara, the message is this: Live your truth. Don’t hide from the hard stuff, because it’ll come whether you try to avoid it or not.

Free Resources from Mighty and Bright

You can find free resources by Mighty and Bright on their “Free Guides for Talking to Kids” webpage.

Resilience Campaign

Resilience Campaign™ provides psychosocial emotional resources to support Child Life Specialists as they help children cope with the ongoing trauma of cancer treatment — both their own treatment or that of a sibling or parent.

Our book and calendar kits were developed with the assistance of therapists, Certified Child Life Specialists, social workers, and families affected by cancer. 

The books are used to explain the science of cancer and how it will affect a child’s day-to-day life. The reusable visual calendar shows the child what to expect from treatment and provides a sense of safety and security when everything is upside-down.

You can learn more or make a donation at resiliencecampaign.org.

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