What if disabled people were allowed to simply exist without being expected to inspire anyone?

In this episode of The Sick & Tired Pod, Mel sits down with Laura, a lifelong wheelchair user with osteogenesis imperfecta (also known as brittle bone disease), artist and small business owner behind FairyNerdy, and host of Bad Attitudes: An Uninspiring Podcast About Disability.

Laura brings humor, sarcasm, and a refreshingly unapologetic perspective to disability. Together, Mel and Laura unpack the pressure placed on disabled people to be positive, inspirational, productive, and grateful—and why those expectations can be another form of ableism.

They talk about Laura’s relationship with disability as an identity, internalized ableism, visible versus invisible disabilities, and the invasive questions disabled people are often expected to answer.

The conversation also explores a reality many nondisabled people would rather not think about: disability can happen to anyone. Laura and Mel discuss why accessibility and universal design shouldn’t be afterthoughts—and why creating accessible spaces benefits far more people than we often realize.

Later, they get into Laura’s creative life: nearly 200 episodes of Bad Attitudes, building FairyNerdy, finding her niche as an artist, and navigating hustle culture as a disabled business owner. They also talk about perfectionism, letting yourself make bad art, learning to be a beginner, burnout, rest, productivity, and the pressure disabled people can feel to prove they’re one of the “good” or productive disabled people.

This episode is funny, candid, occasionally dark, and very much uninterested in turning disability into an inspirational story.

• Why disabled people don’t exist to inspire nondisabled people
• The problem with inspiration porn and toxic positivity
• Disability as part of identity
• Internalized ableism
• Visible and invisible disability
• Why strangers feel entitled to disabled people’s personal information
• The reality that anyone can become disabled
• Accessibility, universal design, and no-step entrances
• Laura’s Bad Attitudes podcast and approaching 200 episodes
• Creativity, perfectionism, and making “bad” art
• Building FairyNerdy as a disabled artist
• Hustle culture and disability
• Rest, burnout, and redefining productivity
• The pressure to prove your worth as a disabled person

Laura is an artist, small business owner, podcaster, and lifelong

FairyNerdy: fairynerdy.com
Social: @fairynerdy

Bad Attitudes: An Uninspiring Podcast About Disability: badattitudespod.com
Social: @badattitudespod

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If this episode made you laugh, think, or feel a little less alone, follow the podcast, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it.

What happens when you spend years being told your symptoms are anxiety, depression, or something you simply need to “heal”—but you know there’s more going on?

In this episode of The Sick & Tired Pod, Mel sits down with Erin Anderson, a nature-based intuitive, recreation therapist, group facilitator, and disability and trauma advocate.

After a lifetime of chronic pain, Erin was recently diagnosed with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (EDS) following a late ADHD diagnosis that helped her begin connecting the dots. She opens up about the validation that came with finally having an explanation for her pain, navigating an invisible and dynamic disability, and learning to trust herself after years of medical dismissal.

Erin also shares parts of her experience with trauma, domestic and narcissistic abuse, medical trauma, disability, and the shame that can come with needing support.

Together, Mel and Erin talk about the complicated idea of “healing”—including what happens when healing starts to feel like another thing you're failing at.

The conversation also explores late neurodivergent discovery, self-advocacy, boundaries, people pleasing, community, and separating our worth from our productivity.

Now living at Metonia Farms in rural West Virginia, Erin is reconnecting with one of the things that has always helped her feel grounded: nature. She shares how her background in recreation therapy shaped her understanding of disability, accessibility, movement, and the importance of giving disabled people opportunities to experience community, recreation, and joy.

In this episode, we talk about:

• Late ADHD and EDS diagnoses
• Years of unexplained chronic pain and medical dismissal
• The validation that can come from finally having a diagnosis
• Trauma, shame, and the pressure to “heal yourself”
• Invisible and dynamic disability
• Learning to trust your own body and experiences
• Late-discovered neurodivergence
• Boundaries, people pleasing, and choosing supportive relationships
• Disability, productivity, worth, and purpose
• Nature as a source of grounding and connection
• Recreation therapy and accessible movement
• Why community and the right support matter
• Sharing our stories so other people feel less alone

Erin’s story is a reminder that sometimes getting answers doesn’t make the pain disappear—but it can change the way we understand ourselves.

🎧 The Sick & Tired Pod is a space for honest conversations with people living with chronic illness, disability, and neurodivergence. We’re talking about the hard parts, the wins, and everything in between—because none of us should have to explain our way into belonging.

If this conversation resonates with you, subscribe/follow the podcast, leave a review, share this episode with someone who needs it, and follow @thesickandtiredpod on Instagram.

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New episodes every Monday.

Content Note: This episode includes discussion of trauma, domestic abuse, mental health hospitalization, medical trauma, and suicidal ideation. Please take care of yourself while listening.

The experiences shared on The Sick & Tired Pod are personal experiences and are not intended as medical advice.

In this episode of The Sick & Tired Pod, Mel sits down with Maggie Boxey—author, podcast host, pop-up bookstore owner, disabled veteran, and TEDx speaker—for an honest conversation about what happens when you’re an ambitious person living in a body that doesn’t always cooperate.

Maggie’s life changed dramatically after becoming sick in 2020. Once a long-distance runner who loved fitness, hiking, jiu-jitsu, teaching, and constantly saying “yes," she eventually received an ME diagnosis after years of searching for answers.

Maggie opens up about the grief of losing the life—and version of herself—she thought she would have, including becoming disabled just as her book, The Three Things: A Practical Path to Collective Recovery, was being released. Instead of the book tour and events she had imagined, she had to learn how to pace, adapt, and create within a completely different level of capacity.

We also talk about the complicated relationship between ADHD, ambition, overcommitting, productivity, and chronic illness; grieving your former self; learning that your worth isn’t determined by how much you productivity; and finding new ways to make meaning when you can no longer do things the way you used to.

For Maggie, creativity became one of those new paths. Writing and art gave her moments of connection and purpose during some of the hardest parts of her illness, eventually leading to her book and allowing her to continue creating—even if creating now looks very different than it once did.

In this episode, we talk about:

✨ Becoming chronically ill after years of being highly active
🧠 The years-long journey to an ME diagnosis
♿ Becoming a wheelchair user and adjusting to a new level of disability
⚡ Post-exertional malaise, pacing, and learning your body's limits
💭 ADHD, overcommitting, and the gap between ambition and capacity
💔 Grieving your former life and identity
📚 Becoming disabled just as The Three Things was launching
🎨 Using writing, art, and creativity to find meaning
📝 Redefining productivity, success, and self-worth
🤝 The importance of connection, community, advocacy, and healthy allies

Maggie also shares why connection has become so important to her and how community, storytelling, advocacy, and service can help fight the isolation that so often comes with chronic illness and disability.

One of the biggest reminders from this conversation: your worth does not come from how productive you are. Your goals may have to change. Your timeline may have to change. The way you create, work, parent, or participate in the world may have to change—but that doesn’t make your life or your contributions less meaningful.

📖 Maggie’s book: The Three Things: A Practical Path to Collective Recovery is available wherever books are sold. Maggie also encourages listeners to support independent bookstores.

Purchase here: https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-3-things-a-practical-path-to-collective-recovery-maggie-boxey/5ea53bee1b7ac371?ean=9781959524021&aid=117758&listref=published-by-rise-literary

New episodes every Monday.
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In this episode of The Sick and Tired Pod, Mel sits down with Aiyannah, host of Black Girl With Sickle Cell, to talk about what it’s really like living with sickle cell disease—and what happens when the people you're relying on for care don't believe your pain.

Aiyannah shares her experience learning about her sickle cell diagnosis as a child, the symptoms and pain she experiences today, and how she has learned to navigate life with a condition that can affect everyone differently.

We also get into a much bigger issue: medical bias.

Aiyannah opens up about going to the ER in pain and being stereotyped as someone seeking drugs rather than a patient seeking help. She shares why she now waits for healthcare providers to ask what medication she needs, what it feels like when doctors don't believe her, and the importance of having someone in your corner who will advocate for you when you aren't being heard.

We talk about:

🩸 Growing up with sickle cell disease
🏥 Navigating sickle cell pain and ER visits
💊 Being stereotyped as “drug seeking”
🖤 Racial bias in healthcare
🗣️ Learning to advocate for yourself as a patient
❤️ Why compassion and better bedside manner matter
🎙️ Turning personal experiences into sickle cell advocacy
🤝 Creating community so others feel less alone

Aiyannah also shares why she created her own podcast, Black Girl With Sickle Cell, and how her experiences with mistreatment inspired her to use her voice to spread awareness and advocate for others living with sickle cell.

If this conversation resonates with you, like the video, leave a comment, and subscribe to The Sick and Tired Pod for more honest conversations about chronic illness, disability, neurodivergence, mental health, and the experiences we aren't talking about enough.

What is it really like to grow up with an invisible learning disability?

In this episode of The Sick and Tired Pod, I sit down with Michelle Steiner, a writer, photographer, paraeducator, speaker, and disability advocate living with dyscalculia.

Michelle was diagnosed with a learning disability in kindergarten and grew up struggling with math, telling time, distinguishing right from left, and other things many people take for granted. She shares what it was like to receive learning support in school, struggle to fit in socially, experience bullying, and eventually find a community where she felt like she belonged.

We also talk about what happens when you stop focusing on all the things you can't do and start asking, “What CAN I do?”

Michelle shares how she found alternative paths toward her goals, earned her bachelor's degree after being told college might not be possible, built a career working with students with disabilities, became a published writer and photographer, and learned to see the beauty in experiencing the world differently.

We also get into:

✨ What dyscalculia actually looks like beyond “being bad at math”
✨ Growing up with an invisible disability
✨ The importance of early diagnosis and accommodations
✨ Bullying, belonging, and finding your people
✨ Why disability doesn't define your capabilities
✨ Finding creative ways to work with your disability
✨ Michelle's journey into writing and photography
✨ Her children's book about a ladybug with dyscalculia
✨ Redefining what success can look like
✨ Learning to see yourself as different, not deficient

Michelle's story is a reminder that success doesn't always come in the package we expect—and sometimes finding a different way forward can lead us somewhere we never expected.

🎙️ THE SICK AND TIRED POD

Real stories. Different bodies. Divergent minds.

Conversations about chronic illness, disability, neurodivergence, mental health, and the realities that don't always make it into the highlight reel.

If this conversation made you feel seen, like the video, subscribe, and share it with someone who might need to hear it.

#Dyscalculia #LearningDisability #InvisibleDisability #DisabilityAwareness #Neurodivergent #Neurodiversity #DisabilityAdvocacy #TheSickAndTiredPod

What happens when you're in excruciating pain—but the people who are supposed to help you don't believe you?

In this episode of The Sick and Tired Pod, Mel sits down with Janiya of Pretty Penny Girls Co. to talk about what it’s really like growing up and navigating adulthood with sickle cell disease.

Diagnosed as a baby, Janiya has spent her life learning how to balance chronic pain and unpredictable sickle cell crises with school, work, relationships, and simply being a young person trying to live her life.

She opens up about growing up with classmates who didn't understand her illness, teachers who questioned her symptoms, and the exhausting reality of repeatedly having to prove that she's sick—even with accommodations in place.

Janiya also shares her experiences navigating the healthcare system, including the difficult transition from pediatric to adult care and being stereotyped as “drug-seeking” while seeking treatment for severe pain.

Together, Mel and Janiya talk about invisible illness, medical trauma, self-advocacy, chronic illness and mental health, finding ways to care for their bodies, and why connection with other chronically ill people can be so powerful.

At the heart of the conversation is something that shouldn't be complicated at all: believing people when they tell you they're in pain.

🎧 Enjoyed this episode? Follow The Sick and Tired Pod wherever you listen so you don’t miss what’s coming next.

⭐ Leave a rating or review. It helps more people in the chronic illness, disability, and neurodivergent communities find the pod.

📲 Share this episode with someone who needs to hear it—or someone who could benefit from understanding these experiences a little better.

💬 Join the conversation. Follow The Sick and Tired Pod on social media and let us know what resonated with you from this episode.

🤝 Support our guest. Check out Janiya and Pretty Penny Girls Co. and follow along with her work and advocacy.

💌 Have a story to share? If you’re chronically ill, disabled, and/or neurodivergent and interested in being a guest on The Sick and Tired Pod, reach out—we want to hear from you. At this time, we are currently building a waitlist for our next season.

And remember: we may be sick and tired, but we don’t have to do it alone.

In this episode, you will meet the host of “The Sick & Tired Pod,” Mel. She explains why she started this podcast and what to expect as you tune in to new episodes every Monday!