(upbeat music) - Welcome to "A Shot of AG".

My name is Rob Sharkey.

I'm your host.

I'm a farmer from just outside of Bradford, Illinois.

I started a podcast which led into an XM radio show, which led into a national television show, which led to me being right here today.

But today, today is not about me.

Today is about Donna Klostermann.

How ya doin', Donna?

- Good.

How are you, Rob?

- Yes.

Donna, this is part two.

Now, this was totally planned out to be two parts of an interview.

It's totally has nothing to do with me not being able to manage time with the first interview.

- No, it's 'cause we know each other personally.

- We're gonna roll with that.

All right.

- A very quick recap.

- Yes.

- Right, you're a farm girl from Manlius, Illinois?

- Yep.

- You're married.

You have two kids - Yes.

- And you went to school out in Iowa?

- Yep.

Iowa State.

- Because you couldn't get accepted to the real schools?

- I could not get accepted anywhere else.

(Rob laughing) That's the only one that would take me.

- You went to work at several different locations as a grain originator.

One of them being Kentucky, - Yep.

- where you lived in a trailer - Yes.

- and walked around in a housecoat.

- Yes.

- And then you moved back up to Manlius, and you work in Bradford.

Now, you were having your first little girl, Caroline.

- Yep.

- And we were talking about that.

- Yes.

- Had a lot of complications.

- Yes.

- She did pull through?

- Yes.

- But now we're to the point to where you have a daughter, you brought her home, but through the complications in the birth, you are not aware whether or not she had brain damage?

- Right, yeah.

So, like, just a quick recap.

Normal, healthy pregnancy, right?

And then meconium aspiration on delivery, ECMO, cooling.

Everything, everything- - [Rob] You really should go watch the last show 'cause that was... - Yeah.

Everything went awry in the last hour.

- Yes.

- That's what will say.

- Yeah.

And you were young?

- And I was, yeah, 20.

- You're still young.

- Not real young.

I mean, 25.

- It's pretty, pretty damn young, yeah.

Especially to go through all this.

So when she made every little hurdle, right?

- Yep.

- Once she sat up.

- So, yeah, so I mean, the last few days, like, she was in the NICU at OSF for 17 days.

And those, kind of those last, you know, those last few days after we got over the big hurdle of like, getting off ECMO and getting off cooling, you know, you're trying to wean down, like, their oxygen, you know, support and then trying to get them to eat.

So she did okay with that.

You know, and then we go home.

And so I've just been through this really...

I've just had a baby via C-section.

So I had a baby.

I've had a major abdominal surgery.

And I've had, you know, the most traumatic, you know, thing in my life ever happened.

- [Rob] Absolutely.

Yeah.

- Yeah.

- And so now, I'm, you know, you're coming home, and it's kind of like, "Okay.

Well, we're to like settle in and get back to normal," right?

And so we don't know what Caroline's normal is gonna look like.

You know, if she's going to be developmentally delayed.

So like every time that she met a milestone, you were just kind of like, (exhales deeply).

- [Rob] I can only imagine.

- Yep.

- 'Cause were you Googling all this stuff?

You know, raising a kid with?

- Yeah, well, like, you know, just kind of your, like, the longterm effects of what she was going through.

Like, I never Googled anything that she went through until after I was home.

- [Rob] Oh, really?

- No, I wouldn't do it.

I'm like, sometimes you're just better off to know less.

- [Rob] Every time.

- Yeah.

- But still I Google, right?

- Yeah.

- It's like, "My arm's hurt.

What happens when your arm hurts?"

"Oh, you have leprosy."

It's the worst thing you can do.

- Right.

Yeah.

- Those 17 days, tell me what that was like.

Because as a friend, ya never know what to say.

Is it good just to say, you know, "I'm thinking, I'm praying about you."

"What can we do for you?"

Or is it best just to wait till all that's over?

- No, I think that, you know, "I'm praying for you."

"What can I do," is the best thing ever.

Like, I had a friend that just came over and mowed my yard.

- [Rob] Yeah.

This is April.

He's like, "Well, you probably need your yard mowed."

And I'm like, "I forgot the grass grows when you don't leave the hospital."

I mean, like, that's just where I was at.

- Where you in the hospital the whole time?

- I did not leave Peoria.

- Okay.

You were telling me that the NICU actually had dorms?

- They at had dorms that they could assign based on like, you know, how sick your baby was, how far you lived.

It was kind of, you know, 'cause it was like you had to apply for them every day.

And I ended up, my mom had gone to stay at, like, the extended stay, so I stayed with her.

- Because, again, you're for Manlius - Right.

- which is an hour.

- It's an hour and 10 minutes to the hospital pretty much.

- Yeah, which is to do that twice a day when you're exhausted mentally from this other stuff, it just doesn't work.

- I didn't want to leave her.

- That probably goes through your mind too, right?

- Yeah.

- What if I need to be there Right now?

- Right.

Yeah.

I didn't want to leave her.

- [Rob] Gosh, I can't... How'd you get through this?

- You just do.

- [Rob] Just put your head down and... - You know, like, you're just so consumed by it at the time, you know.

You know, and you're just kind of, "Okay."

Like, you know, I didn't wanna leave her at night, but like I had to sleep.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- You know, stuff like that.

- How does that work?

Because everything's focused on Caroline.

I mean, you and Cameron, that had to be tough too, right?

Just like you said, the normal stuff that has to be addressed at some point.

That had to be a tough situation to actually have to step outside of this and think about some real life stuff.

- Right.

- Yeah.

I don't know how you did it.

But what's the update?

- So, she's four and a half.

She'll be five in April, and she's completely healthy and fine.

She is the definition of a miracle.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- Yeah.

- She really is because what were the chances?

- I mean, I don't even know.

I just remember them saying that, at the time, there was probably like 3000 babies born at St. Francis every year.

And let's say of those 3000 babies, five or six of them go upstairs to go on ECMO.

They do that in the PICU.

It's, like, a floor higher.

And most of those kids are congenital heart defect kids.

So like, for them to see a baby born term, at nine pounds, you know, to go on to ECMO, that had no congenital issues, no prior pregnancy issues, they're like, it just rarely happens there.

- ECMO again., we said it in the last one- - Is a heart-lung bypass.

- Yeah.

So about the worst situation you could be in.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

Okay, then you did go ahead and have Rita?

- Yes.

- How old is she now?

- Rita just turned one.

- Yeah.

And that was that pregnancy okay?

- Oh yeah.

That was fine.

- [Rob] Where you worried?

- Oh yeah.

And I was pregnant during a pandemic.

- [Rob] Oh, that's true.

- I was like, always worried about, I was worried about COVID, you know.

(Rob laughing) - Was it a deal where you, because you hear the things were they're having babies during the COVID, and the mom doesn't get to see the baby for quite awhile.

Was that the case with you, with Rita?

- No, like, they just didn't... No, I called OSF and talk to somebody.

'Cause I was very upset and worried at the end of my pregnancy, just because I was afraid that something bad was going to happen, and understandably.

- [Rob] Well, sure.

- Right?

- Yeah.

- And I told them, I was like, "I'm going to have a planned C-section."

I was like, "The baby will be placed on me.

Do not clean her up.

This is what's going to happen."

And you will not separate us for any reason."

- [Rob] Or really?

- Yes.

(Rob laughing) - [Rob] And they were okay with that?

- Yeah.

- [Rob] Okay.

- Yeah, I was like, obviously, "Unless it's medically necessary."

- So, with this whole situation with your first, Caroline, - Yeah.

- kind of came this, OSF King Care-A-Van.

- Yes.

- Tell me what that is?

- So, before I get into that, I also have to tell the story.

So my aunt and uncle, that donated the money for the King Care-A-Van, they had their son, Jacob, so my cousin.

In case you wanna know more about my family tree.

- I've got the branches.

(laughs) - He was born six weeks premature in 1983.

And my aunt had placenta previa, like, where, you know, it's like, laying wrong.

- [Rob] Okay.

- And so, she was bleeding.

And they told my uncle who's like, 19 or 20, you know, "Your wife, she may not make it.

And your baby may not make it," you know, "'Cause he's going to be so premature."

And he came out and he was a lot bigger than they ever thought he was.

I mean, he was like four pounds.

- [Rob] Okay.

That's getting there.

- Yep.

So, you know, he was okay.

My Aunt Val, you know, was okay.

And they came through that.

And so he, at the time, you know, he said he was working shoveling corn for $2 an hour.

And his hospital bill, at the time, was like $25,000.

- [Rob] That's a lot of shovelin'.

- Right.

And he's like, "I can't pay this."

Well, because my aunt was Catholic, the nuns paid for it.

- [Rob] 'Cause OSF- - 'Cause they didn't have health insurance, yeah.

You know, it was 1983.

So he called, when he sold his business to CPS in 2011, and asked to get a copy of his bill from 1983.

And they said, "Mr. King, we don't... We're gonna have to call you back."

- I was gonna say, if I was a secretary, is like, "You want me to do what?"

- Yeah.

(Rob laughing) - So they called him back and they're like, "Based on this situation, this is what we would have estimated it to be" is like the best they could do 'cause they're like, "We don't have that file anymore."

So anyway, he- - 'Cause paper degrades after so long.

(laughs) - So this is 2011, and he paid his bill back and then some, and he donated some money to the NICU, and now they have a Jacob King NICU room.

- [Rob] Okay.

- Yes.

So fast forward to 2017 and Caroline's born.

He's so moved again, that in 2018, he decides to give some money to the OSF Foundation, and they founded the King Care-A-Van.

Because, you know, we are rural people, and we have spent our whole lives in rural America, and so we wanted to help people, you know, that we are friends with, or our neighbors, our employees, people like us or people that were like those around us.

- Yeah, and sometimes, I think, our city friends don't realize that it's not convenient or it's not easy for us to get medical help sometimes.

- Yes.

So...

Right, we have different barriers to access, right?

You know, just for example, for something as simple as a flu shot, you know, like, we're not driving by CVS, or Walgreens, or Walmart, you know, multiple times a day.

- [Rob] Yeah, but you guys have livestock.

You can figure stuff out.

- Yes.

I'm gonna, no, I'm not.

(laughs) - That's a joke.

(laughs) - No.

- But like, just, you know, just to get something as simple as a flu shot, right?

You have to like think, "Okay, I'm gonna go to town.

I'm gonna get it done," you know.

'Cause it's going to be probably a 20, 25 minute drive.

- So this King Care-A-Van, it's a mobile health center?

- Yes.

- Okay, four counties?

What counties?

- Well, it covers, it's housed in Ottawa, Illinois.

So it covers LaSalle County, Bureau County, Marshall and Putnam counties, and then Henry County.

- [Rob] Okay, so kind of the Northern realm of OSF?

- Yes.

- Of course OSF, they own like Kewanee and Princeton now, right?

- Yep.

Yep.

- Okay, so that works out well for them?

- Yes.

- So this is a game changer to a lot of people.

- Right, so like they can do things like health screenings.

You know, do things like flu vaccines.

And then, of course, obviously, in 2018, 2019, when they were going through setting all this up, COVID wasn't a thing yet, right?

But you know, it's done COVID vaccines.

I think it's been out and done COVID testing.

- [Rob] Oh, they're actually doing that?

- Yeah.

- I mean, they're working with like, churches and schools and that stuff?

- Right.

Yeah.

- This is kind of like- - Or like, local health departments.

- Yeah, kind of like, it seems like, it's almost like a throwback to the old days of the mobile doctors.

- Yeah, we're coming to you, right?

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- Is it actually a van?

- It's kind of like an RV.

- [Rob] Is it?

- [Donna] Yeah.

'Cause its got, like, two doctor's offices in it, basically.

- [Rob] Does it really?

- [Donna] Yeah.

- [Rob] Geesh.

- [Donna] And they also, like, what I would call like the undercarriage, like, where you have the cargo, it's refrigerated.

So like if they wanted to come out and do like healthy cooking classes, they could do that.

- [Rob] Cooking classes too?

- Yeah, or healthy eating, yeah.

- That doesn't sound all bad.

And this was your aunt and uncle?

- [Donna] Yes.

- [Rob] Don and Val King.

- [Donna] King, yes.

- I'm surprised, you know, growing up in that area, you know, you always knew he it was like this, this captain of industry, right?

- Right.

- And to hear that he was shoveling corn for two bucks and hour.

- Well, it's like the great American, right?

Like, that's the great American dream, right?

- Yeah.

Yeah, well that's and also too, I mean, there's a lot of people that become successful.

They don't give back like he did.

They don't call the hospital, and ask for the bill from whatever years ago.

That says a lot about him.

- Right, I think that tells you a lot about him right there.

And you know, because of his generosity, he and Aunt Val are helping people they don't even know.

- Yeah, and we talked about it in the last one.

Your family is very close?

- Yes.

- Your aunt and uncles, - Yes.

- your mom and dad, your sister.

- Yep, and my cousins, my first cousins, his sons, Jacob and John, were all close.

- Yeah, and Jacob he's fine?

- Yep.

- Normal?

And everything?

- Mh-mm.

- Four pounds is pretty light though.

- Yep.

(Rob laughs) - All right, advice.

If you have someone going through this, someone's in the hospital and they find out, "Something's not right with my baby, and now I'm worried."

What do you tell 'em?

- Like, oh gosh.

I would tell them to take care of themselves 'cause I don't think I did a good job at that.

- [Rob] Do what?

(laughs) - You know, and as you go down the road, you know, you're worried about how your baby's gonna turn out.

But like also, you know, you, yourself, could have repercussions down road, you know, from that.

Whether that be like post-traumatic stress disorder, which is what I had.

- [Rob] I'd could imagine.

- Yeah, you know, so like, I just wasn't prepared for that, which sounds so naive.

But you know I got like... - No, not at all.

- five, six months down the road, and I'm like, "What's wrong with me?"

- This is kind of a tough question.

But you were waiting for all those benchmarks to see if Caroline was okay?

- Yeah.

- Do you ever look back and think maybe that took away from some of the joy that you should have had as a normal mom?

- Oh, absolutely.

- [Rob] Yeah.

I would think so.

- Yeah.

- [Rob] I mean, are you upset about that?

Does that tick you off when you think about it?

- I don't think so.

I try not to look at it in terms of like what I lost.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- Maybe at first.

But I think that's human nature.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- You know, but at some point you just, you have to just pick things up and cope.

- Are you a helicopter parent?

- No.

- Okay, maybe you didn't hear me.

Are you a helicopter parent?

- No.

- No.

- No, okay.

'Cause sometimes when you have kids that go through stuff like that, the parents are just way too, "Let's wrap 'em in bubble wrap and not let them do anything."

- No, I just was like, I just wanted her to live a normal life.

- [Rob] And she's doing that?

- And she's doing that, so.

- [Rob] What is this?

- Oh, this guy?

- Yes.

- This is my Hereford piggy bank, cow bank.

- [Rob] So Hereford is a breed?

- [Donna] Yes.

- [Rob] Yeah, and it's a bull.

It's not a piggyback.

- Yeah, and they have really curly hair, which is why it looks like he has scales.

- Did you make that?

- No.

- Did anybody that you care about make that?

- No.

- So we could talk about how honestly bad it looks?

- Yes, so, this guy came out of Mick's Lake Agra Centers, Sheffield location.

When we took it over from CGB, who was my employer before I went to go work for my uncle, so this is like 2002 that this happened, this was in the basement.

So my mom was going to be the Grain Originator at that elevator.

- [Rob] Which is what you did?

- Which is what I did, except at Bradford.

And they were cleaning out the basement, and she found this.

And I had cattle; I showed cattle.

So she brought it home for me because she thought that I might like it.

And so this guy has lived everywhere I've lived.

He's lived in Ames, Iowa.

- Including the trailer?

- He's lived in the trailer.

And now, he sits underneath my TV at my house.

- This poor thing.

So he saw you in the house coat?

- Yes.

- Yellin' at the coyote?

- Yes.

- Okay.

(object clanking) Did you put stuff in there or was that... - I think the girl's did.

I think Caroline did.

- Oh, so when you got it, it did not have stuff in it.

- No.

- We could get it out.

- No!

- Well, I mean, that could be pretty valuable stuff in there.

- No!

Do not kill Herf.

- [Rob] Herf?

- [Donna] Yeah.

- [Rob] Is the name Herf?

It is a boy.

- [Donna] It is a boy.

- Woo, it's a hell of a boy.

(laughs) - So, Herf has made it full circle from as a, you know, as a child of my mother, who worked in the grain business, all the way back to me working the grain business.

He might've actually been in my Bradford office for awhile too.

I think I might've had him in there.

- I don't, I think I would remember something- - You never came to my office hardly ever.

He was on the shelf behind me, so probably not.

- I mean, something like this is, what do you call it?

Emotionally scarring?

- Yeah.

- I mean, you see something like this.

I mean, if children see this, honestly, they're gonna have- - Caroline loves him.

- Oof, okay.

I mean, it's not that possessed, right?

- No.

- It's never like you've, it's moved unexplained or anything like that?

- No, no.

He's just along for the ride, man.

- Herf.

- He was in a lot of states.

- Herf.

- Herf.

- Okay.

Well, I'm very proud that you're happy with Herf.

(Rob laughing) So what's next with you?

- What's next with me?

- Yeah.

- Like today?

(laughs) What am I gonna do after this?

- Uh-huh, Donna.

(laughs) You got three healthy girls.

- Two.

- Yeah, that's right.

I'm sorry, I'm thinking of Cameron too.

(laughs) There's four healthy people in your family.

- Yes.

- And, I mean, is the plan just to go on with life?

- Yeah.

And- - Has this affected you that you're gonna be doing something else?

- You know, I do volunteer with an organization called Hand to Hold.

- [Rob] And what's that?

- They provide support for NICU families.

And so like, I've been a peer mentor.

They assign you with a peer mentor based on your experience.

So I've been a peer mentor, like, I would say three or four times with parents that had something similar to what happened to Caroline.

And so I've done that.

I've written articles for them.

- Did you have something like that when you went through it?

- No, but I will say, OSF does have a social worker in the NICU and that helped me tremendously.

- Really?

- Yes.

And so Cameron and I have done different, you know, donations to OSF and things like that.

Like, a lot of times when the girls have a birthday or whatever, we'll just say, "Don't bring anything for them."

Like, when Rita turned one, we said, "Bring nothing for her.

Bring bedding for the hospital."

So that the parents in the pediatric rooms, like, or the PICU, to get them bedding on their futon when they stay, so just like full-size sheets and things like that.

- Yeah, stuff you probably don't think about.

- Right.

Okay.

What's Thrive On Main?

- Oh, Thrive On Main.

That is...

So I live in Manlius, but like, my church and stuff is in Sheffield.

- Okay, nobody knows what a Sheffield is.

- Okay.

- So Sheffield is like, I don't know, it's like when a bunch of trailers, and old RVs, and old vehicles, they kind of fall down in a valley, and they're stuck together, and then people actually move into them, and then they build a cases.

- How 'bout I, yes.

How 'bout I make this easy?

So Sheffield is a neighboring community to Manlius.

But if you know where... - I mean, community is a strong word for Sheffield - Okay, if you know where the Psycho Silo is, it's like three miles to the west of the Psycho Silo.

- That should tell you all you really need to know about Sheffield.

It's by a nuclear waste site.

- There is that.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- That's why most of the people are missing stuff.

Sheffield's in odd, odd town.

- So Thrive On Maine is, you know, two ladies that have businesses in Sheffield, or three ladies got this going, and then I just kinda helped with it, like after the fact.

So what they do is they bring in local boutiques, artisans, you know, restaurants, food trucks, coffee trucks.

And the first year, we had like 35 businesses on Main Street in Sheffield, which Sheffield is a town of 800.

- [Rob] 800 people - 800 people.

- have chosen to live there.

- And so we had people from Peoria.

You know, and maybe like the Quad Cities.

So all around the area, essentially, went up to Sheffield and we had a market.

- That's kinda cool.

It brings people in.

- Right, yeah.

And like that first year, I think we had, probably, like, something like 800 people just through Thrive On Main.

- [Rob] Yeah.

- And that was in the rain, so.

- It's like, it's trying to be like other towns?

- Yeah.

- It's like, it's actually trying to say, "Hey, we're a legit community."

- Well, I think it's kind of like, you know, you know, it was just kind of like that hometown, like, what I wanna say?

Like, renovation and revitalization.

- I'm busy making fun of Sheffield.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

I do like Red's though.

They make a good burger.

- Yeah, Red's Cafe, 129, both great places to eat.

- I mean, that's about it though.

- What?

They have Casey's.

They have Belluccio's.

They have Nest, the home decor store.

They have a women's clothing store, Polka Dotted Dresser.

- Trailers and vehicles without wheels.

They kind of slid down a hill.

- It's a very nice town.

He's just hatin' on it, 'cause of Bradford.

- Old high school rivals.

- It's like old high school rivals, that's why.

- I've never liked Sheffield.

- And I am not making fun of Bradford.

- Oh, I would.

(laughs) - You can 'cause you're from there.

- Do you know if people want to find out anything about the King Care-A-Van, do you know where they go?

- Yes, so there is a special tab on the OSF website.

Honestly, I don't know the exact link.

But what I usually do is, I just Google "OSF King Care-A-Van" and you can see where it's going.

You can request it to come to your area.

- It's clever, it's King, and then it's the words, Care, dash, A, dash, Van.

- Yeah.

- Sounds like something someone from Sheffield would do.

(laughs) I'm sorry.

The name of the organization that you're doing mentors with?

- Hand to Hold.

- Okay, is that got a website?

- Handtohold.org.

- Dot org?

- Yep.

- Okay.

Do you like doing that?

- Yeah, I do.

I think, you know, when you've been through something like that, you could just say, "Oh gosh.

You know, like, it was awful."

And you could stew about it and be mad that it happened to you.

Or you can use that and help somebody else.

And so for me, that's how I cope, you know.

It was like, "Okay, so I went through this and this was awful, but what do I do to help somebody else that's going through it?"

- Yeah.

This is the first time we've ever had a two-part interview.

I would say it didn't go well.

(Donna laughing) - Probably, will not be doin' it again.

- What?

- A two-part interview.

- Why?

- Again, this is... Generally, the interview is when we talk to someone, I mean, it's like entertaining and interesting, or you learn something, and at the end of it, people end up liking the guest.

- So I'm not- - Oh, yeah.

That's understandable.

- So, I'm not sure.

- Well, maybe you'll get a better- - I think you were doing fine until you brought up Sheffield.

- Oh gosh.

I didn't bring up Sheffield, you did.

- All right, Donna Klostermann from Manlius, Illinois.

In all seriousness, you are one of the best people that Emily and I know.

You're fantastic; your family is fantastic.

- I feel the same about you guys.

- You're so nice.

(laughs) Honestly, it is an honor calling you a friend and your family too, so it's been amazing.

I am so happy that Caroline is okay.

And that you guys are doing well.

- And I did it again.

I went through the whole thing again with Rita.

- Exactly.

Donna Klostermann, thank you very much.

Everybody else- - Thanks Rob.

We'll catch you next week.

- Thanks guys.