There’s no barrier that we can’t bust through. And the reality is, there are some constraints that are just constraints.”
While she still believes in overcoming obstacles, she’s learned that “sometimes you just have to acknowledge them, and then work around them. And that’s okay. That’s still progress.”
Today, Casalan is back at work and leading the UPS Store network with a new perspective—and a new heart. “I used to pride myself on being the hardest worker in the room,” she says. “And now I just pride myself on being the best leader that I can be.”
For the full interview with Sarah Casalan, read the October issue of Fortune.
It really does take a village
When Casalan was unconscious and being taken out of her home by stretcher the night of her heart attack, her two boys—both on the autism spectrum—were unfortunately not asleep. “They did see the paramedics take me away, and it’s still, you know, it’s still a moment for them,” she says.
But they were quickly comforted and cared for by many people in their lives. “I am extremely fortunate. I come from the line of cast-iron women, they are quite formidable,” she says. That includes her sisters who came from the East Coast, one staying for eight weeks, and her mother, who wound up staying for a year. Plus, she has “an extraordinary nanny.”
Despite the crisis at hand, she recalls, when it came to her kids, “the most important thing was that they were surrounded by love and a sense of safety and optimism. We didn’t really talk about what had happened until I was okay—like, we didn’t talk about the severity of what had happened.” They have since—just as they recently attended a local fire and rescue open house day, where they were all able to personally thank the paramedics who were there that night, bringing some closure.
Now, she says, she openly talks about her brush with death—especially with her younger son, who, coincidentally, had corrective heart surgery at 10 months old. Sometimes they “compare scars,” she said, and they recently did an American Heart Association event together.
Both boys are even able to joke about it all. “They’re funny,” she says. “They’ll say, ‘Well, Mom, you know you only live once! Except you.’”
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