Jonathan Fields

So like, you're almost like you're working towards, it's almost like somebody has told you like, this is one, and I'm going to work backwards from there.

And then we fast forward to the pandemic, when now millions of people are becoming, you know, like, just deeply viscerally acquainted with their own mortality.

It's almost like, well, you've had decades of training in living in that space already.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

You know, at the same time, again, sort of just bring us back to those teen years.

It sounds like you're living almost like these two different trajectories.

Like on the one hand, you have this knowledge about what's going on in your body.

And what the science says is, quote, likely or out there on the horizon.

And that also motivates you to just really deepen into research to stay on top of this.

So it sounds like while one script was saying, okay, it is what it is.

Let me accept this and live the best of my life now.

There's another curiosity, a seed that was planted in you that said, but maybe as I close the gap between now and that date, things will change.

And I want to make sure that I'm on top of that.

Yeah.

Do you feel like being so connected to this and also then being so devout in terms of really examining what's happening on the inside as well as on the outside, as you described, every six months, that that has put you in a stance where you're so much better informed than often the typical person is about what is truly going on and in a state where you're actually accepting that rather than trying to deny it or push it off?

that it's almost led you to be able to be more proactive in making decisions about what you say yes or no to, both in larger life, but in terms of your health from the earliest days in a way where a lot of people don't get to that place unless and until something really major happens with their health, often decades later in life.

Yeah.

I mean, that makes a lot of sense.

Tell me if this is too personal, but I'm curious, as you shared, you have kids now who are sort of like similar age as you were when you were first diagnosed.

When you go back to the moment where you're making a decision about, do I have kids or not?