A Symbol of Courage, Strength, and Hope | Shriners Hospital | Hayes Smith | Episode 101

A Symbol of Courage, Strength, and Hope | Shriners Hospital | Hayes Smith | Episode 101
Imagine a superhero, nine-years-old, born with a right limb deficiency, inspiring us all to dream big and defy the odds. That's Hayes Smith, our amazing guest on the show today, who shares how he navigates life with his unique challenge while harnessing his resilience and infectious spirit. His parents enlighten us on their journey of acceptance, learning to celebrate Hayes' capabilities and navigating the duality of grief and joy. We also discuss the supportive communities that surround Hayes, from the Shriners to empathetic schoolteachers and a coach proficient with handling anxiety and depression.

But that's not all. Hayes is not just your everyday superhero - he's also an author, and at such a young age, he has penned two books. He draws from his experiences, promoting understanding of limb differences, and emphasizing the essence of hard work and perseverance. Hayes unfolds the empowering journey of book signings and the satisfaction he derives from sharing his story. He's an inspiration to all, demonstrating that you don't need a cape or special powers to make a difference in the world. So, get ready to be inspired and humbled, as we journey through Hayes' extraordinary life.
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Transcript

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 0:00

Welcome to the Voices for Voices podcast and TV show sponsored by Redwood Living. Thank you for joining us today. I am Justin Alan Hayes, founder and executive director of Voices for Voices, host and humanitarian. You can learn more about Voices for Voices on our Instagram, facebook and YouTube channel at Voices for Voices, and also on our website at Voicesforvoices. org. Voices for Voices is a 501c3 nonprofit charity organization, otherwise referred to as an NGO that survives solely on donations. So, if you are able to, please consider heading over to Voicesforvoices. org to help us continue our mission and the goal and dream of mine to help 3 billion people over the course of my lifetime and beyond. Or you can also send a donation to the mailing address of Voices for Voices at 2388 Becket Circle, Stow, Ohio, 44224. Or we're also on the Cash App at Voices for Voices. Are you or somebody you know looking for a volunteer opportunity? If so, you can reach out to us today at our email address at president at Voicesforvoices. org. Now. I've founded Voices for Voices to provide a platform for folks to share their stories with others as we work to break the stigma around mental health, accessibility and disabilities, helping people get the help they need and also helping them prepare or transition into the workforce with the Voices for Voices Career Center, where we connect talent with opportunity for both job seekers and employers alike, from coast to coast and in every industry and job level. And who can forget about merchandise? The Voices for Voices merchandise shop is finally up and running at Voices for Voices. org forward slash shop, where shipping is always free and, again, all donations are 100% tax deductible.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 2:26

Today we are very blessed, grateful to have our guests with us today, joining us from Louisiana and, right off the bat, his first name is my last name and so we're gonna have a great conversation with this young man about his story, the books that he's written, and is in empowering others that they can do anything, that they can dream, that they can be a superhero. They don't have to have a cape or any other special powers. That they can, they can dream regardless of how they are, and that inspiration we're gonna be bringing to you today via our guest. So I want to introduce our guest for today. Join us from Louisiana. Hayes Smith is with us. Thank you for joining us, hayes.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 3:29

I, as well as people that I know and close to, are very, very inspired by you, but by what you have done and what you're continuing to do, receiving that award at your school. I was able to find that video. That is that's awesome that you're you're able to to do that and such an inspiration. So I think anybody who who comes a comes across you. So maybe we could start out by before, before the books started to come. In your life, you were, you know you're still growing up, but earlier in life you're you're growing up and in your noticing that you can find ways to help others just by being yourself and feel free to take the conversation wherever you'd like cover everything or something else, yeah go ahead.

Hayes Smith: 4:35

Yeah, when I was born, I had a right limb deficiency or that's what my mom tells me and my whole life I've had my right leg like I didn't have my right leg my whole life. And I've done a lot of things since then. And I've done a lot of fun things, like I went, I played basketball, I played golf and I really enjoyed everything. I did karate and my whole life I've been doing good stuff. Tell them about your leg, oh, and my leg is from POA in Orlando, florida. Okay, so I have one in Louisiana.

Kayce Smith: 5:13

Tell them how long you've had it.

Hayes Smith: 5:15

I've had it for like maybe a few months. Well, when did you get your first leg? Oh, when did I get my first leg? Probably like when I was like one or two, one, mm-hmm, one, yeah. So I started walking when I was like two and my whole life I've had a robot leg. So, basically, I've never had a robot leg.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 5:38

But that hasn't stopped you from having, from what I see, a good life, a normal life. You're able to do so many things and I think sometimes and maybe your mom can answer part of this I think sometimes maybe in society and people learn about deficiency in some manner and think that, ok, they're less than or they can't do certain things. And well, maybe there are certain things that not able to do. There's a lot of things that they are able to do and haze. You are and that's, I think, just by that, by itself, is an inspiration and of just showing by the actions, by the videos, the things that you're doing. You're just being yourself, you're just being a kid, and I have a four-year-old daughter and just really hope that she has that drive and inspiration wanting to help others in whatever comes her way. So maybe you can touch on that Mom.

Kayce Smith: 6:51

Yeah, absolutely so. We found out about Hayes' leg about two weeks before he was due. So we as parents and if they're parents listening there are things you feel like you almost grieve, things that you know, being a parent, that you have these ideas of what your kid's going to do, what your kid's going to be, and they're big ideas, of course, because you want the best for them in every way. And so those first few weeks, as we were kind of waiting for him to arrive, and then, when he did arrive, you go through a little bit of a grieving process, knowing now, I mean, he's nine and so now where we are is very different from where we are 10 years ago but you have these ideas of things that he won't be able to do. Will he be able to play baseball? Will he be able to play? Because we just didn't know, it was an unknown thing for us, and I think the best thing that he's taught us is he humbled us a lot just in learning and thinking. We know nothing. There is a bigger picture here that we're not in control of, and as a parent you have to kind of let a lot of things go. I mean, you have a four-year-old, so you know, you have to let a lot of things go and a lot of your ideas don't translate, and so he humbled us in the fact of things that we thought, even whether we voiced them or not, that he wouldn't be able to do.

Kayce Smith: 8:07

He was and he surpassed a lot of things that we really weren't expecting. We didn't know anything about limb differences. I didn't know anything about pediatric prosthetics, I didn't even know what this path would look like. And so for us which was actually a blessing because he was our first child, so we didn't know what we were doing anyway, and so we just kind of said, look, we'll figure this out as we go. And what he's taught us is we really know nothing, that he will figure it out. He crawled differently, but he figured out how to do that. He walked a little bit later, but he had a walker and then one day he was at physical therapy and didn't need it anymore. He's a great swimmer. So things that you just aren't really expecting. He taught me more than anything. To just let my the things that I thought and my preconceived, to just throw him out the window and just kind of buckle up for the ride is the best way I can really describe it.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 9:02

Yeah, and in the team, not only with you as parents. There were in our team of individuals that have helped along the way. Do you want me to touch on some of those people that have been important in his life and helping Hayes?

Kayce Smith: 9:20

Yeah absolutely so. We were connected with Shriners Hospitals in Shreveport when he was a newborn. I have a relative that is a Shriner and so he said look, this is where you need to go. We were living in Mississippi at the time, where my husband and I are from, and there just weren't I didn't know any other kids that had limb differences or limb deficiencies, and so they really guided us through probably the first six years. To be honest, this is what's expected, this is what's next. This is what these legs require a lot of pieces. They require as they hit growth spurts. You're going more frequently. His prosthetist at the Shreveport Hospital is also an amputee. She's an amputee, and so that was a really special relationship and he can talk about her too for us, because there were things that we don't understand about how it feels, or right, like you always say. What do you always say?

Hayes Smith: 10:16

Don't know how it feels. Yeah, we don't know how it feels.

Kayce Smith: 10:19

And so having Jillian was a great segue for us to really understand. He felt more comfortable because he could say the things to her and she would say, yeah, I get it, I'll make that adjustment. Where we don't know, we don't know how it is, and so that created a good relationship with us. And then what it ended up doing was we met other families that had kids with limb differences some arms, some legs. We met a family in West Virginia that has the same it's the opposite leg, but it's the same hip limb deficiency. So she was a great resource for me as a parent to say, and she's about a year and a half ahead of us. So when we would get to that next stage I would call her and say, ok, what do I need to expect when I go to this appointment?

Kayce Smith: 10:58

And they're unknown to a lot of people is there is a huge community of limb difference families and there are camps and sports that they play and there's a golf association and there's adult athletes and pure Olympians that sponsor these kids, and so we just we're blind to that. We've never had anyone in our families, you know, be an amputee or anything like that, and so it's opened our eyes a lot to. You know, we thought we felt very alone at the beginning and then, as we started meeting other people, it got bigger and we realized, oh, there's a lot of us, it's just not as well known. What do you think? Tell them about Shriner's and going.

Hayes Smith: 11:38

Shriner's is awesome. So is Julian. They invited us to a 100 anniversary. It was also my head, a ton of people and the food was delicious.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 11:47

That's important, it's one in nine right.

Hayes Smith: 11:50

And they're really nice to people and they help more people than just me and I can't even count how many people they've helped so far.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 11:58

Oh my gosh, yeah, and that's just like I said, the unknowns of just going really step by step, of experience after experience and I think so in my case, with kind of my mental health story and journey.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 12:17

Talking with a psychiatrist or a therapist that has or is very familiar with depression or anxiety and those types of things, is a lot different than somebody that is book smart, and nothing against just having the book smarts.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 12:34

But, as Julian has been, it is for you, hayes. It does just create a little bit more of a bond where you can they understand a little bit more. They're not just going to go by the book work and the words and the acronyms and the definitions, they're going to speak more just like as a person, like going to the bathroom or getting something to eat or whatever these small things are, and I think that that's important really for anyone, even kind of using the analogy with a baseball team, having a coach that played the sport at some time, whether they were a pro, that doesn't matter, but just having that knowledge can have some of those conversations that you were have been able to make. Can you maybe just talk just a little bit about Julian and not that you have to know like a specific example, but just how, just how made you feel like that you were able to relate to somebody and they were able to relate to you, and not only on the deficiency, but just how, to how to live, how to do the daily things we do.

Hayes Smith: 13:46

First of all, julian knows how I feel because she is also an amputee and whenever I need something for her to adjust, she always understands because she knows what I'm talking about and we have a connection. I can't remember his name, but we used to go to a camp called Pirate Camp. That's Nick Stonewall. He is Okay. So Nick he has is an amputee too and we are friends and I have a lot more and I have more friends that are also an amputee and we have a really good connection because we both we all understand what it feels like to not have a lens.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 14:26

Wow. So the community support with, with Shriners, but then even in the school system and I don't, I don't know this. Was their support kind of from the get go, as you were stepping through the process where Hayes was growing up and starting school. Was that that embraced, or was it kind of work in progress?

Kayce Smith: 14:49

It kind of both. And so we moved to Louisiana when he was about a year and a half old and so he was in a big you know like a Mother's Day out preschool kind of program, so a few days a week and so really until he went to first grade almost we would meet with the teachers before you know, the session would start and kind of explain, because at that time he was, he was not really mobile, but he was very his leg, not all day, and so because he wasn't even two yet, and so just explaining like it is a different process about bathroom, it is a different process. Back then he was in diapers and so really kind of walking it through, what we've always tried to do is we've really tried to be an open book. I'm not easily offended and so much rather people just ask questions than them feel wary or you know. So I've always been just asked, or just just that makes me more comfortable if you just say, look, I have a question about this because it is different and it is something that we're used to it. I have a funny story about we. You know he would not wear his leg all the time and so you would find it in random places, like you might come into our house and it's on the dining room table or you know we're going on vacation and yelling to each other like, make sure you have the leg. You know things that you would never think you'll say as a parent. That's our life and so we just try to be as open with it as we can.

Kayce Smith: 16:05

And so meeting with the teachers every you know we were really lucky and that his, his, all of his preschool teachers were wonderful and he was in a really great environment and they, you know, they would ask us and they would call and say, okay, we want to run this by you or we do have a question about this. So we tried to be. You know, we knew we needed to meet them at the beginning and say, before all these other kids come in here and this is kind of how he works and how he operates, and then, being open to a lot of he was at the same preschool until he went to kindergarten and so each year they would let me come in and just talk to the kids and say, look, do you have questions about this? And that's one of the. That's really one of the things that sparked the book was. People have questions, and so we had a lot more conversations about it.

Kayce Smith: 16:50

So we were lucky in that we had a good, a good school environment with good you know, smaller classes and stuff. And then he was in kindergarten, the coven year, and so he didn't really we didn't finish that year. So he's, he's at a smaller school now and the same thing that his first year was first grade, and so we did the same thing. We met with the teachers early, we met with the administrators and said, look, this is, you know, we're, we're here. We both work from home. And so we said you know, we're 10 minutes away. If something happens, call us.

Kayce Smith: 17:21

But the school that he's in, right, he's, he goes to a school called North Lake Christian and they're wonderful and the nurse has learned how to make leg adjustments and you know, because there are things that, like the knee part at recess or you know we've been places in the foot has fallen off, and so that to us is just our lives and we travel everywhere with tools and wd 40 because things squeak.

Kayce Smith: 17:44

You know things that you we try to be as as communicative as we can, because not that it's abnormal, but we really want to normalize it and we really want people to just be everybody I don't want to say everybody, but the majority of the population has is a different, and so we're all the same and some people battle physical things, some people battle mental things, and so the more conversation that we can have, it helps us, honestly, because it gives us a place for the first little bit.

Kayce Smith: 18:17

People were scared to talk to us about it and they were scared, you know, they didn't want to hurt us and so by bringing it up, they felt like you know, I don't want to ask because I don't want to offend you and I'm like this is our every day, so there's not anything. I don't know anything either, but I think what he's always been great about and I'll tell him he may not he was so little. I was picking him up from pre kid, preschool one day and I was worried. Just he was about to and I worried. You know, is he comfortable, is he uncomfortable or kids asking questions? And he was. We were walking out by the fountain to my car and see, and a little kid said, pointed his leg and said what's that?

Kayce Smith: 18:53

and he said he looked at him and he said oh, that's what he used to say. He couldn't say T, h, so he said everything was a, d. So he was like that's my leg, that's just how I walk. And he kept walking and I thought, okay, he's gonna be fine. Do you remember that? No, I didn't think he would.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 19:11

That's awesome and probably from that day on and made you feel a little bit more at ease knowing that he was embracing and he was just living, he was just being this little life. So you mentioned sparking the conversation for the first book. Can you talk about maybe that process and what that was like and yeah, and let people know how to get it and we get in the second book? So anything you want to share you want?

Kayce Smith: 19:40

you want to talk or you want me to talk first?

Hayes Smith: 19:42

What do I talk about? Okay, well, I'll start jumping.

Kayce Smith: 19:45

So we, as he started, you know, we started reading more. I have I have a bachelor's degree in English, so my ultimate thing was I wanted a kid that was a reader, so I got a forced it in that we read a lot of kids books. We read to him before bed every night was just something that I was is important to me, and there aren't a lot of kids books with limb differences or that we could find. And so he would ask like Are there any books about kids like me? Or you know, he just wasn't seeing himself represented anything and it really started just as something as a resource for the families that come to Shriners, because because of HIPAA and things like that, they can't share information from families, and so I would always say, look, here's my information. If there's a parent that comes in with a kid like Hayes, please give them on my number, because you do feel a little isolated, especially at the beginning.

Kayce Smith: 20:35

The beginning is hard and I thought, okay, if we can make this book happen, even if it's a soft back and it's not anything big, and we can give this to the hospital and we can say, look, when a family comes in, give them this book, let the kid read it, and so that's really where it started and I wrote it quickly and then Hayes and I, you know, would run through it together and he had a lot of thoughts about the illustrations and what was in it and we wanted our dog in it and you know, we really wanted it to look as like him as we could because I just wanted him to have something to say. You know, this is my story and this is what makes me cool and different and it just became something really and it became something really fun for us to do together. You want to talk about it? Yeah, tell them about the book, the first book.

Hayes Smith: 21:20

Oh, the first book was about just like telling kids that they can do whatever they want to do with, even if they don't have a limb or something, and it was also like it was also really good because everybody started to know me and they started to not care if I had one leg. And it was just a big moment in my life because I was in a book and then what about the signs and stuff?

Hayes Smith: 21:41

that you've done In the signings. They were fun but also kind of annoying because I had to sign like 50,000, like 800 books every day and see just random people walk up and take one.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 21:56

That's so awesome. So you said it was a big moment in your life. So how can you describe maybe a little bit more like how it makes you feel that knowing that more people are going to relate to you and it might make them and their families, like your mom, be able to relate to? Okay, I have a child or I have a niece or I have a nephew and here's a book and I can read it to them. And the world isn't all perfect, it's not this idealistic. So to have you know all shapes and sizes and to have those moments, how did that make you feel besides the, the signings and that, just maybe the process of knowing that you were gonna have a book and you can literally go to anywhere a job interview and say, okay, here's my, here's the book about me and how you're helping people.

Hayes Smith: 22:51

I felt great because I knew that I was helping people and it was also really fun because I got to go a lot of places because I was in a book and it was just really fun. And I was really happy because I knew that kids like me are starting to believe that they can do more just by reading books.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 23:11

Oh, my god, and you're very articulate, for maybe that's the English in the reading coming through. Very, uh, I'm very impressed in that and very concise, and I could learn a few things of tightening up some of the, the, the ways I try to express things. So the second book how did how did that come about?

Kayce Smith: 23:35

So Hayes had a lot of input and so when I, when I wrote the book he the first book he was five, and so by the time it came out, he was seven. So because obviously the process is long, and then we were ready at the beginning of COVID and so the printer shut down and so what we thought would be early 2020 ended up being late 2020, and then we couldn't do signings, we couldn't do the traveling like we wanted to. We did it's available at Barnes Noble, on Amazon and then through our publisher as well, and then we do personal copies and so if people request that that he sign it or write a note to someone, we keep I keep a stack here at home always and so we were just, we were in a strange place for probably the first year of kind of getting accessible, and so he thought, well, I need to be older. He said, because now I'm seven and this was about, you know, five I think we did change it to six, I think, in the book but he was like, I need, I need to do something else. You know, I need to be older and, honestly, it was time.

Kayce Smith: 24:31

It was figuring out what I wanted to write about, um, what I wanted him to do next, and I had a lot. I had lots of drafts that I would work on and I travel a lot for for my job and so if I'm alone I can tend to do it better, because it's a little crazy at our house with two dogs and we both work at home and he's, you know, there's a lot happening and having the time to really think. And then one day it was he loves basketball and I thought, okay, we need to do the next one about basketball and about him having, about him having, you know, not being as good at it immediately as someone else and having to practice more and having a challenging time with it and then kind of overcoming that. So I wanted it to be more of a story about he didn't. It wasn't all, you know, sunshine and Rainbows and it's not. There are things that he, you know, wants to do faster or better and it just takes a little bit longer to make things happen sometimes. So that's kind of where we wanted to to go next, um, and so we're in the process of that.

Kayce Smith: 25:32

What do you think about the new one?

Hayes Smith: 25:34

the new one's also pretty cool because it showed a lot of people that weren't in the book. Last time, like in the last book, we did have to go our first dog, but in this one we do have our new one with Leo.

Hayes Smith: 25:46

He's not even one years old yet so he's like crazy and that, and something that I realized just today is that in this book some of my friends like neighbors or that are my friends are in this book, but in the last book they weren't in the in there, so I'm just happy that they're in the book this time yeah, and our illustrator's really been great about.

Kayce Smith: 26:09

We've just we try to make it as much like Hayes as we can, and so we really just send pictures and we say, okay, his best friends are our neighbors and they have three boys, and so they're in there, my parents are in there, his dad is in there, the dogs are in there. So we just try to make it as much of his life as we can, because that feels real to me. And so there's some newer things that are coming, because it has been four years basically, so things are a little different and they're bigger.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 26:38

Yeah, and so for the viewers and the listeners, the titles of the books and you know.

Kayce Smith: 26:45

So the first book is called what Can Hayes Be, and it is available on Amazon. It's available Barnes Noble Hazard. Our publisher has it as well. Amplify, and then we also sell it through his website as well, and so you can go to whatcanhaysbecom and then order through there, or you can, it'll link you to everywhere else. And then the next book is titled Hayes and the Big Game, and so it is in the final. We've done illustrations, we've approved that, and so we're shooting for late this year. So we're thinking we're 23, barring any print plays or anything like that.

Kayce Smith: 27:24

That's we're shooting for it to be done this year.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 27:27

Great. So we, from taping of this to when it actually comes out, that actually might be pretty good timing that we'll be able to air I mean definitely before October, but closer to that time. So we stay in contact, that we can add whether there's links or you can find it, or coming out next week and you can give the verbiage of exactly what we can do that in the launch of the podcast and the show, just to create another platform in a way to let as many people know about it. So, in closing, what do you as I mentioned before and I really mean you are very inspirational to me as a 41 year old person. I was a kid once and my daughter doesn't believe it, but she's like oh, like yeah, like daddy was a baby and grew up and you know. So, anyways, you are inspiring you to people like me as well as others. What would maybe be like a final take home message that you want to give for people that are watching and listening that you could share with them, and it could be anything.

Hayes Smith: 28:54

You can do anything that you put your mind to.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 28:57

No, love it, Love it. Anything we did didn't cover that you'd like to mom or Hayes?

Kayce Smith: 29:06

No, I think we're good. I think we got a lot. I think we covered it.

Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes: 29:11

Yeah, no this is great, yeah, well, hang on, don't close out, and we'll grab a couple pictures and do that, and then I'll close out the show. So we want to thank our guests today Hayes Smith what Can Hayes Be? Social media, videos, books, everything, swimming, golfing, basketball. Such an amazing and inspirational person, so grateful to have him as our guest, with his mom, here today on the show. And then you, our audience, and our viewers, our listeners, are checking out our transcript of the episode. I want to thank you as well for joining us and until next time. I am your host, justin Allen Hayes, founder and executive director at Voices for Voices, and we hope you have a great day and please be a voice for you or somebody you know.