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Welcome to you , betcha , she Did . Today

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, we're diving into the story of Emily Fell

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, who's all about shaking things up and

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building big dreams for autistic adults

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. You know we often get caught

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up in the tales of women who've

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already made it big or halfway there , but

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what about those starting out ? Well

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, emily's here to show us that journeys

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, their journeys , the people who are just

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beginning , are just as vital . Emily

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is on a mission to open doors for autistic

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adults , paving the way for more housing

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and career training opportunities . She

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is a superhero for inclusivity , taking

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on the world's norms and fighting for a fair

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shot for everybody . Emily's

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story proves that dreams don't have to have

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an expiration date and that even the smallest

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voice can make a big impact . Ready

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to be inspired , let's dive

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in . Did

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she really do that , you , betcha

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? She did . Hello , and welcome back to another episode

1:06

of you , betcha , she Did , the podcast where

1:08

women entrepreneurs

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, changemakers and leaders , especially from the Midwest , share their wit and wisdom . I'm your host , raina

1:16

McKickey , and today in the studio I have Emily

1:18

Fell . She is the CEO of Website

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Designs that Shine , but also

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she is on a mission to help

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adults with autism , and that is what we're going to

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dive into today . Emily , welcome

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to the show , thank you . So

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Emily is a fellow Wisconsinite

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from the Milwaukee area and Emily

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, let's just dive in with you , sharing your personal

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journey and experiences you know , as

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a single mom and autistic daughter , and

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what led you to this goal of creating careers

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and affordable housing for autistic individuals

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.

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All right . Well , I was a stay-at-home

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mom slash teacher back in the day

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. So picture this my

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first daughter passed away back in 2008

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from a fatal birth defect , and then I

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got pregnant again in 2010

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. And then that same daughter ends up

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in the NICU after I find out that

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she has an adverse reaction to a vaccine . Like

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I find this out like way later Then

2:11

at the NICU she got another vaccine

2:13

, the same one , but another dose of it , because

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they didn't talk and because it was at a different hospital

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. So so that's like stressful

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already , you know . First you know a daughter that

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passed away , and then a daughter end

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up in the NICU and

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so fast forward a little bit

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. She ends up in birth to three . She

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has in home therapy , she has

2:34

. She has schools , like part time school , part

2:36

time therapy therapy or

2:38

full time school , but it's at the special autism

2:41

school that does it like ABA therapy

2:43

version of it .

2:44

Yeah , I'm just gonna interrupt for a second . Did you know

2:46

right away that she was autistic , or that's

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something you found out after a couple years ? She

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?

2:51

had some developmental delays

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and then after she got

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vaccinated again , she stopped

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. Her delays kept happening , like

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she stopped talking , and then she

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was diagnosed at age two and a half . Okay , so

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I kind of had some inklings

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. And then all in this hot mix

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of autism , stuff Right , figuring

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everything out , yeah , super hard . Yeah

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, very hard . And then I got divorced . So

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, like you know , add that to the

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craziness . So then I became a single

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mom . So then I had to work . So

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trying to be a single mom , working with a kid with a disability

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, plus another kid , it was tough . It's gotten easier

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and better , I would have to say that , definitely for sure

3:31

. But when she got diagnosed at age

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about two and a half , I was like you know what my

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mission in life is ? To start

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a center for ? At first I thought I was going to

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do like for kids , but then , as

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you know , I learn more

3:45

and find out more that the

3:47

kids are pretty much well served . We have

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to think ahead , like as moms , like when

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I'm gone I'm probably sad , of course , when I'm , you

3:54

know , old and dead and gone and stuff . But like

3:56

, but my daughter , you know , to

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plan for the worst case scenario

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I'm , I want to make sure that everything

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is in place for her , so like housing

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. I mean she can live with me if she wants , but I

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would like her to have a place to live eventually

4:09

. Career training like my

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reasoning behind the career training being added to the center

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that I want is because back

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in the day . People I won't name any names but

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people thought that because she's nonverbal

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, she won't amount to anything , she won't be able to have a

4:22

career . Options , like you know , typical

4:24

people like us , you know like . So

4:27

she's musical , she loves music , so

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she will be fine . I'm not worried about that part .

4:33

Yeah , let's circle back to that , because you

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know you've obviously experienced the system . You

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know being a mom to a child who has autistic

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tendencies and what that's like as

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a parent , and then for your daughter . So

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then look into the future , like you said , when

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she's older and could be independent

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. What specific challenges have you encountered

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? You know , like what's currently out there

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, does anything exist for autistic individuals

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in terms of housing and career paths ?

4:58

So there are places already and

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some schools , like the school district that

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she's in now Greendale School District it's really good . They

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have a great like after 18 kind

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of transition program that

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I'm not worried about that , Like she can use if she

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wants to and then , or if we

5:14

, you know , if we don't have this in place already

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. I have a name

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picked out for my center . It's called Amazing Grace

5:21

because her name is Grace . So

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there are places already that exist and

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are in the works of becoming housing

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and like career training . I think

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like there's a couple that are more focused on other things

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and like they have like housing as the main thing and they're

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focused on other things .

5:36

So where do the gaps begin ? Like where you're

5:39

like . This is why I need to fulfill my mission

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of supplying autistic housing

5:43

and career paths .

5:45

So the main reason is there's not enough . Okay

5:47

, so like even even right now

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, with the adults that are adults

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right now with autism or disabilities

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or neurodivergence , whatever you want to call it , there's

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not enough for them right now and now , like , in five

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years there's going to be even more . So

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there's no way we're going to have enough if

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people don't start building more

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. So that's my mission

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is to make sure there's more . I

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mean , I don't know if there ever will be enough , but

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that's my goal is to make enough , especially

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at least for my daughter in the Milwaukee area or

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wherever it happens to land

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. And so that's

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the main reason . But the more

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specific reason is we want

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all kids or adults to

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have a place to be . There's so many things

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that go into this right now , there's so many moving parts , but

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there's not enough . The supply versus

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demand , and then just

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making sure kids now

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and adults later will have

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a place to be yeah , exactly .

6:44

And , like you said , also feel valued be

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part of the community . Yep , exactly

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, yeah , so kind of going off of that . You know you were talking

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before about how often people have this stereotype

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of neurodivergent kids , autistic kids

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, where it's like , well , they can't do anything , they

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can't have a career and you're trying to reeducate

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people right to say that's not true

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. So what kind of steps do you think need to be

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put in place to ensure autistic adults

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feel valued and supported ?

7:09

in careers . I think it starts in

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schools . I think it starts

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in the schools , like having the

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teachers be on board , and it's

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hard for the typical students to be on board

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too . But actually there's a nonprofit called

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Good Friends . I don't know if you've heard of it . I'm

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actually good friends with the owner of it or the co-founder

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of it , so

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I talked to her a couple times and

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we're just trying to get

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the schools on board . Like the mindset

7:36

of people , like , I think , just changing

7:38

people's perspective and maybe

7:40

not changing their minds , but at least having them be more aware

7:43

of it . Yeah , more open . Yeah

7:45

, so it starts at the schools , but also for

7:47

the employers , like we need to start in

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the community and try and get them more on board

7:52

with hiring people . I

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think that's her next step and I need to talk to her about that more

7:56

because she'd be a good ally to have

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to like partner up together . As

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autism we kind of stick together and we

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definitely need

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to do more of that to give the employers

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the benefit like to see , hey , this

8:10

kid or this adult will you know if you

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train them right and we will help you

8:14

actually to . It's something that

8:16

will benefit you .

8:17

Yeah , benefit both parties in the end . So

8:20

I know you're you're just kind of in the

8:22

initial stages of building Amazing

8:24

Grace , this home and center for autistic

8:26

adults . Talk to us about what you

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have done so far and then what you're hoping

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to do next and maybe ways that

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the public could get involved , and

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then what you're hoping to do next and maybe ways that the public

8:39

could get involved , if this is something that lights them up , definitely

8:42

.

8:42

We got to get like people like excited about this and I was actually in I don't know if you're

8:44

familiar with Pat Miller . He does

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the idea , the small business idea collective

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. That's a good networking thing

8:50

, and so he's in Milwaukee , excuse

8:52

me and so I was just talking to people

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and I met more people that have kids with autism

8:57

. Like oh my gosh , I like knew them but I didn't know

8:59

they had kids with autism . So it's just like open the world

9:01

. Yeah

9:03

, the autism rate is like one

9:05

in 36 . So that's a lot .

9:07

That is a lot yeah .

9:09

So one in 36 kids people have

9:11

it . So yeah , If , if you're living

9:13

, you should have some connection

9:15

to autism .

9:16

Autism , basically , yeah , exactly , you probably know someone somewhere

9:18

through some association . All right , so

9:21

yeah , what ? What have you got done so far ? What

9:23

are we ? What's in the works ?

9:25

I have in october . Back in october I

9:27

went to a housing um

9:30

conference in milwaukee at the italian community

9:32

center and they they

9:34

discussed like the state of housing in Wisconsin

9:37

and the USA in general for people with

9:39

um autism , but also like

9:42

other like intellectual disabilities as well , Um

9:44

, and then I got a lot

9:46

of information , a good like starting point , Cause

9:49

I didn't know where to start . So that that was my starting

9:51

point to figure out where I wanted to start or

9:53

how to start . And so then I got some great

9:55

foundation of how to start . And

9:58

I met other parents as well

10:00

and so they

10:02

had some good focus and some good input

10:04

and actually their kids slash adults

10:06

are older than mine . So I kind of got a

10:09

head start . So I was very excited for that

10:11

and so because then hopefully

10:14

by the time like she's 18 , I can have

10:16

like at least a , at least like

10:18

a blueprint and like it was like a location

10:20

for it and hopefully break ground , and so

10:22

the housing conference was first back in october

10:25

and then I also went to

10:27

yesterday I went to a , the founders

10:29

day in milwaukee at in ward four , um

10:32

I went to just to

10:35

like meet other founders and then mentors to founders

10:37

because it's like being a solopreneur

10:39

, being the CEO of your own

10:41

business . It's like a lot of work but

10:44

like you wear all the hats on top of each

10:46

other . It's stressful and

10:49

but it's also like so meaningful

10:51

. But you like you need to bounce off

10:53

, you know , ideas off of other people , and so that's

10:55

what that was , and people that had been through

10:57

it before and like way ahead of you

10:59

, and so like just learning so much , yeah , Like almost

11:02

having a yeah Mentor right To kind of

11:04

guide you and give advice . Yeah

11:06

, it was . It was amazing , my like

11:08

. The next step , the next right step for me

11:10

, is to find my people , and I'm already

11:12

doing that . I , this morning I found more people

11:14

, and so it's just amazing

11:16

Like everything is happening the way it's supposed to

11:19

.

11:19

Good , so with all those people ? Um , how

11:21

are you keeping everyone connected ? Do you want to do like

11:23

a newsletter or a website or a Facebook

11:25

group ?

11:26

Good question . That's like

11:29

my brain has been trying to figure that out and you

11:31

just kind of like reminded me hey , I have

11:33

to keep all these people together . Thank

11:35

you , I needed that . I needed that , that bringing

11:37

me back into , like , what I needed to do . So

11:39

, thank you . Um , so yeah

11:41

, I'm thinking , oh , maybe

11:45

like uh , because

11:47

I wanted to maybe use like social media , maybe

11:50

like a Patreon group or like a . I mean

11:53

, facebook is okay , I guess there's more people on Facebook , but

11:55

I don't know . I'll have to think

11:57

about that . I got to ruminate on that one a little bit

11:59

. So , yeah , probably like a newsletter

12:02

, for sure , email like on a regular basis . And then

12:04

another like networking opportunity

12:06

or like community building opportunity kind

12:08

of thing , because I think it's not necessarily

12:11

networking but community building , I think . So

12:14

, yeah , that's my next endeavor on that list too

12:16

.

12:16

Yeah , building like a cohort of supporters

12:19

. And then from there you guys can you know

12:21

? Really start digging into like , okay , let's find a location

12:23

for this housing , let's find an architect

12:26

, let's work on funding , Exactly .

12:28

Yeah , there's so many moving parts to it . Oh

12:34

, I wish there was like a book on this .

12:35

Maybe I'll have to write one

12:37

. Emily , I think you're definitely highlighting the

12:39

viewers , the listeners . It's like when

12:42

you have a passion for an idea and you're so excited

12:44

about it . But there are a lot

12:46

of moving pieces and there's a lot of things that have

12:48

to happen in order to get the

12:50

ball rolling . But it is important to take

12:52

that first step , to start doing your research , to

12:54

start finding your people and then

12:57

from there you can you can start building

12:59

the dream that you want to build . How

13:01

can , from , how can people get in

13:03

touch with you if they're interested in joining you

13:05

with this project ?

13:07

I'm on LinkedIn . I'm

13:09

on Facebook . My business

13:11

is Website Design that Shines .

13:14

I was going to say in the show notes , I can link your

13:16

LinkedIn and your Facebook and your

13:18

business website . So , yeah

13:21

, if you want to get in touch with Emily , just check the show notes

13:23

. You'll find that link directly and you

13:25

can help her get the ball rolling on this . As

13:32

always , if you like what you're hearing on you , betcha , she Did don't forget

13:34

to share the show with a friend , a neighbor , a colleague . Like Emily was

13:36

saying one in 36 people has

13:38

autism , so I bet there is someone who

13:40

definitely needs to hear this episode . Make sure

13:42

you share it , you don't hold it to yourself

13:44

. Before we say goodbye , I've

13:46

got an exciting announcement for you . Next

13:49

week , we are delving into the world

13:51

of social media engagement and

13:53

the power of a small but mighty audience

13:55

. And guess what ? I will be

13:57

sharing some insider tips from none other

13:59

than my monetizing tiny audience coach

14:02

, ina Kovany . I have been working

14:04

with her for the past month and a half and she is

14:06

a dream . She has tons of tips and

14:09

great tidbits that I am thrilled to share with

14:11

you guys . So , whether you're looking

14:13

to boost your online presence or

14:15

maximize your impact with a smaller following

14:17

, you won't want to miss next

14:19

week's episode . Tune in , take

14:21

notes and get ready to level up your social

14:24

media game . See you next week

14:26

. Bye .