May 5, 2024 • 14 mins
Original Air Date: May 5, 2024
26 year-old Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin became a household name when he went into cardiac arrest after making a tackle in a nationally televised game against the Cincinnati Bengals. Something happened to him in college that helped prepare him for his remarkable recovery.
26 year-old Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin became a household name when he went into cardiac arrest after making a tackle in a nationally televised game against the Cincinnati Bengals. Something happened to him in college that helped prepare him for his remarkable recovery.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Sunstein Sessions on iHeartRadio,conversations about issues that matter. Here's your
host, three time Grasie Award winner, Shelley Sunstein. I want to introduce
you to someone I'm lucky to haveon my show, but we're lucky to
still have with us in this world, twenty six year old Damar Hamlin,
(00:21):
Bill's number three safety. Of course, we all know what happened on Monday
Night Football, January second, twentytwenty three, when Tomorrow, after making
a tackle, went into cardiac arrestsduring the game, and it was because
of an extremely rare condition, acardiac rhythm that's disrupted by a blow to
(00:45):
the chest, and it's ninety sevenpercent fatal if it's not treated within three
minutes. So we are incredibly lucky, and Damar Hamlin is an incredibly lucky
person. And first of all,welcome. How's the off season? The
off season is was short lived,but I had a blest. I spent
(01:07):
a lot of time with family,I worked hard, had some time to
myself, but I'm back working nowto start at OTAs you have partnered with
Abbot. Abbot is a company thatbrings life changing health technologies to the people
who need them. How did theyhelp you? Well, you know,
(01:30):
me and Abbot we collaborated on acreative idea of coming up with the Heartmats
program. And you know what theHeart Mats program is is, it's a
community. It's a community for peoplethat I have experienced cardiovascular issues, no
matter what specifically it is, butit's a space that you could come into,
(01:52):
feel understood, feel comfortable, youknow, learn, learn other people's
experiences and we'll be sharing other people'sstories that have went through these cardiovascular problems.
So that's how me an Abbot gotconnected. And you know, it's
a it's a program that will honestlychange the world because the space of you
(02:14):
know, being a patient that hasbeen a person that has dealt with a
cardiovascular issue is a lonely space.It can be it can be lonely days.
It can be days where you feltmisunderstood or days where you want to
days where you want to know whyI meet so to to be so to
have the outlet that you could callout to and reach out to is very
(02:34):
important. And you just announced anumber of other people who have been added
to the program. Do people cometo you to be added to the program
or how does that all happen?So it's a it's a little bit of
both, you know, just searching. It's also searching for people that you
know deserve to be in the communityas well. But you know, people
(02:55):
can also reach out at Heart mastAbbot if they want to be a part
of the team as well. Artmatest, but I'm writing that down,
art mates, that happened. Yourlife must have total I mean, you're
twenty six years old. Your lifemust have been totally changed by this experience.
(03:16):
How do you look at life differently? Now? I could spend the
whole interview answering that question, honestly, but to keep it breathe, I
would say, you know, Imean for the most part, like my
parents, they did a good jobof, you know, teaching me,
you know, the important things aboutlife. You know things you know you
(03:37):
gotta work hard for everything that youwant, you know, don't choose the
easy route. You know, theyequipped me to, you know, be
more than an athlete and have morethan just football going on. So you
know, my plate was always fulland my parents did a good job back
preparing me for the real world andthat you know, it can go anyway,
(03:59):
and I feel like, you know, I was prepared. I was
prepared for how life is now,just by my work ethic and you know,
my dreams and my goals of life. So you know, I just
feel chosen. And there's always aresponsibility that comes with being chosen. So
you know, I just I justtake it as a chip on the shoulder
and I just keep doing my bestevery day. As a result of what
(04:23):
happened to you, you're chasing M'sfoundation thanks to a gun go fundme program.
It's up to ten million dollars atlast check. Ten million dollars that
you can use to make good.That's like, I can't even wrap my
head around that. Crazy, right, Yeah, Yeah, it's a blessing.
(04:46):
It's a super blessing. I've alwayshad dreams of leaving my impact and
you know, making the world abetter place when I'm going, So,
you know, to be blessed witha different making amount of money, you
know, it took my small visionof It took my vision from small,
which was, you know, wantingto make impact in my own community at
(05:09):
home to you know, trying tofind different creative ways to make impact across
the world and being here with Abbotand creating heart mats is one of them.
So what what do you intend todo with the money? Have you
decided yet? And I mean theremust be tons of people and organizations reaching
out to you, and that becomesa huge burden and a huge responsibility,
(05:32):
right, yeah, it is.But you know that's why I have a
proper team in place who who helpsnavigate things like that and you know,
keep the stress off off of me. But you know a lot of people
do want to work on my foundation, and we want to work with a
lot of people who are actually inthese communities that are actually already doing great
work, you know, so tocollaborate with other foundations across the world of
(05:56):
people who are doing tremendous work already. You know, I think it's just
a collaboration process to make the impacteven bigger. So can you name some
issues or some organizations that are benefitingfrom your incredible chasing MS foundation? Well,
you know you, I mean,you know that's a lump sum.
(06:19):
So you know, we we wantto make sure our foundation process is making
sure that you know, we're leavingimpact for the next fifty years, not
just the next five years. Soyou know that takes proper planning, and
that takes proper management, and ittakes you know, receiving the proper advice
and steps to do so. Soyou know, we we have a lot
(06:43):
of things in place, but youknow, we want to make sure we're
here for the next fifty years,not the next five years. That's an
incredible goal. I'm speaking with twentysix year old Tomorrow Hamlin, Bill's safety
number three, who has moved onin credibly with his life and his football
career after on January second, twentytwenty three, he went into cardiac arrest
(07:08):
after making a tackle on Monday Nightfootball. So and right now he's very
involved with the Heartmates program at Abbot, which is helping other people who have
had cardio issues and struggles, buildinga community for them so that they feel
(07:30):
supported and you can reach them ifthis if you're one of those people,
and I'm assuming this is all agesTomorrow, yes, ma'am, okay,
you can reach out to them atHeartmats dot Abbot, Right, I got
it right, Heart makes Abbit.Yes, okay, tell me about your
parents. What were they doing tomake a living? And I assume they're
(07:53):
still working because you're twenty six yearsold. Yeah, my parents are still
working now. My mom she ownsa daycare, she has two daycareess,
and my dad owns a trumping truckingcompany and together they have a team handling
cleaning company as well. That wasmy first job growing up, was working
for the cleaning company. You know, so I learned, you know,
(08:15):
you got to sacrifice time, Yougot to sacrifice a lot for one for
family, but also for the thingsthat you want in life. You know,
my dad, he's he runs myfoundation, so that's keeping him busy
as well. So you know,that's that's my parents in a nutshell.
And then also on top of that, they're raising my little brother. How
(08:35):
old your brother nine years old?Wow? Yeah, so busy, the
busy parents. On top of anine year old, they got a twenty
six year old who's traveling the worldevery weekend and you know, playing games
all across the country. So it'sa tough, it's tough to navigate.
Yes, well, they support you. You know, you have you have,
(08:56):
you have a great team behind you. So how old were you when
you were working for the cleaning business? Uh? Middle school to high school?
Middle school to early years of highschool. So about seventh eighth grade
to seventh eighth grade, nine tenth. Were you involved in other sports before
football? Yes, ma'am, football, basketball, baseball, track. I
(09:20):
wrestled a little when I was younger. I played floor hockey, did a
lot. I did a lot ofsports just to keep me out of trouble.
And how did you know that itwas football that you finally wanted to
concentrate on. Mmm, it justwas what came natural. Honestly, it
was just what was you know,everyone around me was doing. It was
(09:41):
kind of like the main thing ofall the sports, you know. I
just had a passion for it inmy heart. When did you know that
it was possible for you to gopro? Did that happen when you were
in college or did you kind ofknow before? I kind of knew I
had a chance to do something specialin high school. I felt like I
(10:03):
felt like, you know, justjust making varsity alone and starting varsity at
a young age was kind of likea special moment that let me know that
I could play with people all ofall ages, in all sizes and strengths,
you know. But you know thatstarting high school was kind of the
first time of me playing with peoplein a different age group. You know,
(10:24):
where ages weren't truly limited to justtwo years. It was the span
of four to five years in highschool. Pretty much it's the same thing
through other levels. So once I'veseen I can do that, I have
aging myself. I believed in myself. When you were little, what did
you think you wanted to grow upto be? Obviously a football player was
(10:46):
the first one, and I accomplishedthat. So I want to get myself
prout of the back, absolutely sotrue to myself. But other things I
had interested in was I wanted tostart own hotel chain. Oh yeah,
when you were a little kid,you wanted to start a hotel chain?
Yeah, I did. Where didthat come from? Do you know?
(11:09):
Well, you know, I waskind of playing au basketball and maybe maybe
my dad might have asked me thequestion about it. In the hotel party
lot, I might have just lookedout the window, started brainstorming and seen
the hotel. But that was thatwas what I wanted to do for a
while, So who knows, maybemaybe in one of my next lives I
might be a hotel. Do youhave a favorite hotel or a bunch of
(11:33):
them? A bunch of them?I don't want to. I don't want
to out anybody. Okay, okay, no, I get a bunch of
them, city to city, cityto city. I get that. So
a football career, as we know, only lasts so long, long term.
Now, what do you think youwould want to do moving on after
(11:56):
pro football? The same way thatfootball was an interest in mind, I
would want to pursue interest that Ihad my entire life that I would have
more time for, you know,once football is out the picture. But
just working with my foundation as well, and just trying to figure out different
ways to make impacts in communities,to change generations to come, to be
(12:16):
honest. So that'll be my biggestthing that I do, just to pay
back all the blessings I received.Is money still coming in for Chasing ms?
Yeah, of course. You knowit's a foundation, So you know,
people that believe in our mission,people who support what we are doing.
You know, they're investing in thatand pretty much they're investing in us
(12:37):
saving generations to come. Did Ihear right that you started your own fashion
line in college? Yes? Idid tell you about that. That's your
T shirt Chasing Millions? So howdid that come about? And what did
you do with it? I meanthat, you know, you're busy in
college, you were studying, youwere playing football, and then you start
(13:00):
fashion line. Yeah, so howthat happened? I had three surgeries my
freshman year of college, and youknow, I knew what I knew,
I could make it to the NFL, but I didn't know if the opportunity
was going to come due to injury. So I ran to the mall,
slapped the logo on the T shirt, and you know, I went with
it. And you know, chasingMS was kind of hashtag thing I was
(13:24):
doing on my pictures just to like, you know, use as a model
of chasing my dreams and making itto the NFL. And you know,
once once I was injured and Ididn't know what the future hell for me
on the football field, you know, I just got business savvy and I
took an idea and took something thatI was already creating, and now I
(13:46):
wanted to start a business with it. So I did clothing. I just
thought to myself, chasing MS couldbe chasing millions, but it also could
be chasing miracles. It's chasing MS. It applies to both. Again,
does yes? Thank you? Somuch tomorrow, Hamlin, it was wonderful
talking to you and getting to knowyou. And again, if you or
(14:07):
someone you know is dealing with acardio vascular issue and they need or you
need support, reach out to heartmatesdot Abbott. You've been listening to Sunsteen
sessions on iHeartRadio, a production ofNew York's classic rock Q one O four point three
Welcome to Sunstein Sessions on iHeartRadio,conversations about issues that matter. Here's your
host, three time Grasie Award winner, Shelley Sunstein. I want to introduce
you to someone I'm lucky to haveon my show, but we're lucky to
still have with us in this world, twenty six year old Damar Hamlin,
(00:21):
Bill's number three safety. Of course, we all know what happened on Monday
Night Football, January second, twentytwenty three, when Tomorrow, after making
a tackle, went into cardiac arrestsduring the game, and it was because
of an extremely rare condition, acardiac rhythm that's disrupted by a blow to
(00:45):
the chest, and it's ninety sevenpercent fatal if it's not treated within three
minutes. So we are incredibly lucky, and Damar Hamlin is an incredibly lucky
person. And first of all,welcome. How's the off season? The
off season is was short lived,but I had a blest. I spent
(01:07):
a lot of time with family,I worked hard, had some time to
myself, but I'm back working nowto start at OTAs you have partnered with
Abbot. Abbot is a company thatbrings life changing health technologies to the people
who need them. How did theyhelp you? Well, you know,
(01:30):
me and Abbot we collaborated on acreative idea of coming up with the Heartmats
program. And you know what theHeart Mats program is is, it's a
community. It's a community for peoplethat I have experienced cardiovascular issues, no
matter what specifically it is, butit's a space that you could come into,
(01:52):
feel understood, feel comfortable, youknow, learn, learn other people's
experiences and we'll be sharing other people'sstories that have went through these cardiovascular problems.
So that's how me an Abbot gotconnected. And you know, it's
a it's a program that will honestlychange the world because the space of you
(02:14):
know, being a patient that hasbeen a person that has dealt with a
cardiovascular issue is a lonely space.It can be it can be lonely days.
It can be days where you feltmisunderstood or days where you want to
days where you want to know whyI meet so to to be so to
have the outlet that you could callout to and reach out to is very
(02:34):
important. And you just announced anumber of other people who have been added
to the program. Do people cometo you to be added to the program
or how does that all happen?So it's a it's a little bit of
both, you know, just searching. It's also searching for people that you
know deserve to be in the communityas well. But you know, people
(02:55):
can also reach out at Heart mastAbbot if they want to be a part
of the team as well. Artmatest, but I'm writing that down,
art mates, that happened. Yourlife must have total I mean, you're
twenty six years old. Your lifemust have been totally changed by this experience.
(03:16):
How do you look at life differently? Now? I could spend the
whole interview answering that question, honestly, but to keep it breathe, I
would say, you know, Imean for the most part, like my
parents, they did a good jobof, you know, teaching me,
you know, the important things aboutlife. You know things you know you
(03:37):
gotta work hard for everything that youwant, you know, don't choose the
easy route. You know, theyequipped me to, you know, be
more than an athlete and have morethan just football going on. So you
know, my plate was always fulland my parents did a good job back
preparing me for the real world andthat you know, it can go anyway,
(03:59):
and I feel like, you know, I was prepared. I was
prepared for how life is now,just by my work ethic and you know,
my dreams and my goals of life. So you know, I just
feel chosen. And there's always aresponsibility that comes with being chosen. So
you know, I just I justtake it as a chip on the shoulder
and I just keep doing my bestevery day. As a result of what
(04:23):
happened to you, you're chasing M'sfoundation thanks to a gun go fundme program.
It's up to ten million dollars atlast check. Ten million dollars that
you can use to make good.That's like, I can't even wrap my
head around that. Crazy, right, Yeah, Yeah, it's a blessing.
(04:46):
It's a super blessing. I've alwayshad dreams of leaving my impact and
you know, making the world abetter place when I'm going, So,
you know, to be blessed witha different making amount of money, you
know, it took my small visionof It took my vision from small,
which was, you know, wantingto make impact in my own community at
(05:09):
home to you know, trying tofind different creative ways to make impact across
the world and being here with Abbotand creating heart mats is one of them.
So what what do you intend todo with the money? Have you
decided yet? And I mean theremust be tons of people and organizations reaching
out to you, and that becomesa huge burden and a huge responsibility,
(05:32):
right, yeah, it is.But you know that's why I have a
proper team in place who who helpsnavigate things like that and you know,
keep the stress off off of me. But you know a lot of people
do want to work on my foundation, and we want to work with a
lot of people who are actually inthese communities that are actually already doing great
work, you know, so tocollaborate with other foundations across the world of
(05:56):
people who are doing tremendous work already. You know, I think it's just
a collaboration process to make the impacteven bigger. So can you name some
issues or some organizations that are benefitingfrom your incredible chasing MS foundation? Well,
you know you, I mean,you know that's a lump sum.
(06:19):
So you know, we we wantto make sure our foundation process is making
sure that you know, we're leavingimpact for the next fifty years, not
just the next five years. Soyou know that takes proper planning, and
that takes proper management, and ittakes you know, receiving the proper advice
and steps to do so. Soyou know, we we have a lot
(06:43):
of things in place, but youknow, we want to make sure we're
here for the next fifty years,not the next five years. That's an
incredible goal. I'm speaking with twentysix year old Tomorrow Hamlin, Bill's safety
number three, who has moved onin credibly with his life and his football
career after on January second, twentytwenty three, he went into cardiac arrest
(07:08):
after making a tackle on Monday Nightfootball. So and right now he's very
involved with the Heartmates program at Abbot, which is helping other people who have
had cardio issues and struggles, buildinga community for them so that they feel
(07:30):
supported and you can reach them ifthis if you're one of those people,
and I'm assuming this is all agesTomorrow, yes, ma'am, okay,
you can reach out to them atHeartmats dot Abbot, Right, I got
it right, Heart makes Abbit.Yes, okay, tell me about your
parents. What were they doing tomake a living? And I assume they're
(07:53):
still working because you're twenty six yearsold. Yeah, my parents are still
working now. My mom she ownsa daycare, she has two daycareess,
and my dad owns a trumping truckingcompany and together they have a team handling
cleaning company as well. That wasmy first job growing up, was working
for the cleaning company. You know, so I learned, you know,
(08:15):
you got to sacrifice time, Yougot to sacrifice a lot for one for
family, but also for the thingsthat you want in life. You know,
my dad, he's he runs myfoundation, so that's keeping him busy
as well. So you know,that's that's my parents in a nutshell.
And then also on top of that, they're raising my little brother. How
(08:35):
old your brother nine years old?Wow? Yeah, so busy, the
busy parents. On top of anine year old, they got a twenty
six year old who's traveling the worldevery weekend and you know, playing games
all across the country. So it'sa tough, it's tough to navigate.
Yes, well, they support you. You know, you have you have,
(08:56):
you have a great team behind you. So how old were you when
you were working for the cleaning business? Uh? Middle school to high school?
Middle school to early years of highschool. So about seventh eighth grade
to seventh eighth grade, nine tenth. Were you involved in other sports before
football? Yes, ma'am, football, basketball, baseball, track. I
(09:20):
wrestled a little when I was younger. I played floor hockey, did a
lot. I did a lot ofsports just to keep me out of trouble.
And how did you know that itwas football that you finally wanted to
concentrate on. Mmm, it justwas what came natural. Honestly, it
was just what was you know,everyone around me was doing. It was
(09:41):
kind of like the main thing ofall the sports, you know. I
just had a passion for it inmy heart. When did you know that
it was possible for you to gopro? Did that happen when you were
in college or did you kind ofknow before? I kind of knew I
had a chance to do something specialin high school. I felt like I
(10:03):
felt like, you know, justjust making varsity alone and starting varsity at
a young age was kind of likea special moment that let me know that
I could play with people all ofall ages, in all sizes and strengths,
you know. But you know thatstarting high school was kind of the
first time of me playing with peoplein a different age group. You know,
(10:24):
where ages weren't truly limited to justtwo years. It was the span
of four to five years in highschool. Pretty much it's the same thing
through other levels. So once I'veseen I can do that, I have
aging myself. I believed in myself. When you were little, what did
you think you wanted to grow upto be? Obviously a football player was
(10:46):
the first one, and I accomplishedthat. So I want to get myself
prout of the back, absolutely sotrue to myself. But other things I
had interested in was I wanted tostart own hotel chain. Oh yeah,
when you were a little kid,you wanted to start a hotel chain?
Yeah, I did. Where didthat come from? Do you know?
(11:09):
Well, you know, I waskind of playing au basketball and maybe maybe
my dad might have asked me thequestion about it. In the hotel party
lot, I might have just lookedout the window, started brainstorming and seen
the hotel. But that was thatwas what I wanted to do for a
while, So who knows, maybemaybe in one of my next lives I
might be a hotel. Do youhave a favorite hotel or a bunch of
(11:33):
them? A bunch of them?I don't want to. I don't want
to out anybody. Okay, okay, no, I get a bunch of
them, city to city, cityto city. I get that. So
a football career, as we know, only lasts so long, long term.
Now, what do you think youwould want to do moving on after
(11:56):
pro football? The same way thatfootball was an interest in mind, I
would want to pursue interest that Ihad my entire life that I would have
more time for, you know,once football is out the picture. But
just working with my foundation as well, and just trying to figure out different
ways to make impacts in communities,to change generations to come, to be
(12:16):
honest. So that'll be my biggestthing that I do, just to pay
back all the blessings I received.Is money still coming in for Chasing ms?
Yeah, of course. You knowit's a foundation, So you know,
people that believe in our mission,people who support what we are doing.
You know, they're investing in thatand pretty much they're investing in us
(12:37):
saving generations to come. Did Ihear right that you started your own fashion
line in college? Yes? Idid tell you about that. That's your
T shirt Chasing Millions? So howdid that come about? And what did
you do with it? I meanthat, you know, you're busy in
college, you were studying, youwere playing football, and then you start
(13:00):
fashion line. Yeah, so howthat happened? I had three surgeries my
freshman year of college, and youknow, I knew what I knew,
I could make it to the NFL, but I didn't know if the opportunity
was going to come due to injury. So I ran to the mall,
slapped the logo on the T shirt, and you know, I went with
it. And you know, chasingMS was kind of hashtag thing I was
(13:24):
doing on my pictures just to like, you know, use as a model
of chasing my dreams and making itto the NFL. And you know,
once once I was injured and Ididn't know what the future hell for me
on the football field, you know, I just got business savvy and I
took an idea and took something thatI was already creating, and now I
(13:46):
wanted to start a business with it. So I did clothing. I just
thought to myself, chasing MS couldbe chasing millions, but it also could
be chasing miracles. It's chasing MS. It applies to both. Again,
does yes? Thank you? Somuch tomorrow, Hamlin, it was wonderful
talking to you and getting to knowyou. And again, if you or
(14:07):
someone you know is dealing with acardio vascular issue and they need or you
need support, reach out to heartmatesdot Abbott. You've been listening to Sunsteen
sessions on iHeartRadio, a production ofNew York's classic rock Q one O four point three
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