At 10 years old, Suzy Kolber put on a helmet and pads and made her peewee football team. The coaches knew she could play. The boys knew she could play. But after parents threatened lawsuits, the season was shut down. Suzy walked away so the boys wouldn’t lose their chance to play. She still has that helmet, with her name written on a strip of tape, in her workout room.

On this episode of "Sons & Daughters", Shannon Spake sits down with the ESPN trailblazer to talk about the moment that started it all and the path that took her from a young sports fan outside Philadelphia to nearly 30 years in sports broadcasting.

Growing up in a sports-loving family, Suzy was surrounded by Philly athletes, Motown music and a dad who worked as a DJ and booked some of the biggest names in music. She nearly pursued art before realizing that while her classmates were drawing in their free time, she was watching sports. A college book led her to the University of Miami, where she found herself in the middle of the Hurricanes dynasty.

But getting to ESPN wasn't a straight shot. After being told she looked too young to be on air, Suzy quit her job in Miami without another one lined up. She helped Jerry Jones build Dallas Cowboys television from scratch and even snuck onto a set to film a fake sportscast so she’d have something to send to potential employers. Then, just as she had accepted a job at CNN, ESPN called with an offer she couldn't turn down. She became the first hire for ESPN2 and went on to cover the NFL, NASCAR, the Super Bowl and Monday Night Football.

Suzy also opens up about covering NASCAR and Monday Night Football while secretly pregnant, becoming a single mom, figuring out life after ESPN and what she would tell that 10-year-old girl who just wanted to play football.

From the girl who refused to let the game define her limits to one of the most recognizable faces in sports broadcasting, this is a conversation about breaking barriers, betting on yourself and making your own way.

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Miesha Tate won the UFC Women’s Bantamweight Championship in 2016 by beating Holly Holm, and within two weeks she realized it hadn’t fixed anything. By the end of that year she had lost the belt, fought one last time at Madison Square Garden and walked away from the sport, depressed and still tied to a controlling relationship she’d been in for nine years.

On this episode of Sons and Daughters, Shannon Spake sits down with the former UFC and Strikeforce champion to talk about how she got there and how she found her way back. It starts with her first fight at 19, when she broke her nose, watched her own blood pool on the mat and kept fighting until her coaches threw in the towel without asking her. It goes through wrestling the boys in high school, where she decided a win meant not getting pinned, and a pro debut the judges couldn’t score, which sent her back out to fight another round.

Miesha talks honestly about hitting rock bottom after her last fight, the question that turned things around, and how faith, family and a two-week road trip up the coast helped her rebuild. She also explains why she treated her first labor like a fight and lost, how a new mindset made her second birth two hours long, and what she wants men to understand about women’s hormones.

Now 40, nearly six months pregnant with her third child and having just launched her own micro school, Miesha is living on her own terms. Her advice: question everything, get good at hard things, aim to be happy about 2% of the time and fulfilled the rest, and be a good best friend to yourself.

This episode includes discussion of suicidal thoughts. If you’re struggling, call or text 988 in the US to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.

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Kenny Wallace has spent his life around race cars, but his story is about a whole lot more than racing.

On this episode of Sons and Daughters, Shannon Spake sits down with Kenny for a wide-ranging conversation about growing up in Arnold, Missouri, in the Wallace racing family, working as a mechanic and crew chief, the day he found himself back home fixing vacuum cleaners, and the moment he decided he was going to become a race car driver.

Kenny also gets candid about Rusty and Mike, the role his family played in his career, making it to NASCAR on his own terms, the people who helped him along the way, the biggest regrets of his career and why he never let the setbacks keep him down.

From fighting for his dad in the grandstands to building a racing career from almost nothing, Kenny’s story is full of family, determination, heartbreak, plenty of laughs and a few things he’s never really talked about before.

Subscribe to Sons and Daughters and let us know what you think of Kenny and Shannon’s conversation in the comments.

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