Heartbreak, Hustle, Hope + Resiliency with Sarah Michelle Boes (part 2)

Fire often looks like numbers on a dashboard—until life forces you to measure heat a different way. Sarah joins us to share how selling her exam-prep company collided with a late pregnancy diagnosis: her daughter Meadow’s tetralogy of Fallot with pulmonary atresia. The celebration turned into a sprint through cardiology consults, oxygen monitors, and an unforgettable ICU stretch that included an emergency re-opening of Meadow’s chest and a brain bleed. It’s a raw, unflinching account of what it means to make the right decision when every option is bad and time is a luxury.

We talk candidly about identity under pressure. Sarah goes back to work six weeks postpartum, learning in real time which parts of leadership bend and which must break. She pushes back on being boxed in as “just a mom,” while discovering the power of a company designed to run without a single key person. Then the story pivots: advocacy becomes a throughline. With Conquering CHD, Sarah helps reauthorize the Congenital Heart Futures Act, championing long-term research and better outcomes as more children with CHD live into adulthood. We explore emerging innovations like transcatheter valve replacements that could reduce future open-heart surgeries and change the trajectory for thousands of families.

There’s another turn—one too many founders will recognize. After 18 years of misdiagnosed symptoms, Sarah receives an OCD diagnosis and enters intensive treatment. She explains why exposure and response prevention works when talk therapy can backfire, and how her definition of success shifted from revenue milestones to sustainable presence: being a steady parent, a clear-eyed advocate, and a writer building language for hard things. She previews her memoir and children’s series, including Meadow and Her Four Leaf Clover Heart, a tender reframing of rarity and resilience for young readers.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Episode Framing
• 0:18 Sarah’s Founder Story And Sale
• 1:52 A Sudden Diagnosis In Third Trimester
• 3:29 Birth, First Surgery, And High-Risk Home Care
• 6:12 Thanksgiving Crisis And Emergency Repair
• 8:49 Complications, Open Chest, And ICU Realities
• 11:49 Recovery, Pacemaker, And Stabilizing At Home
• 13:12 Turning To Advocacy And Policy Wins
• 15:15 Mental Health, OCD, And Redefining Success
• 18:05 Books In Progress And CHD Education
• 19:17 How To Connect And Closing Reflections