00:00Even though we are fraternal twins, we do still look very different.
00:03I was born with a condition called Golden Heart Syndrome.
00:06I'm missing an ear.
00:07My right eye is underdeveloped.
00:09My jaw is very underdeveloped.
00:11As a little kid, I never registered that Liz looked different until we got to school.
00:16Other kids had no idea why she looked the way she did.
00:19That's when I really realized, oh gosh, I look really different.
00:24I get the question a lot, what's wrong with my face?
00:27Why did you look like that?
00:28Why were you born?
00:30Really nasty comments.
00:32Sometimes kindness is not easy and we need to find that courage within ourselves to spread
00:37kindness and make the world a better place.
00:40I don't know if I'd be here if I didn't have Maddie as a sister.
00:44I think she was meant to be my twin to help me out.
00:48I think my eyes are a little bit of a catch-22 because they are different.
00:54I have, like, star tissue on this eye and I have a little dot right there, so they're very noticeable.
01:02Hi, I'm Maddie.
01:03And I'm Liz.
01:04And we're twin sisters.
01:05We're 19 years old and we're from New York.
01:07When you think about twins, you have this image in your mind of two people that looked exactly alike, which
01:13is not true.
01:14There are fraternal twins out there that look different.
01:15But especially in our case, even though we are fraternal twins, we do still look very different.
01:20I feel like makeup was never something that either one of us felt like we had to wear.
01:27It really was just kind of something we could play with and have fun with.
01:30You shouldn't feel like you have to do any sort of correcting or fixing to your face if you don't
01:36want to.
01:36Right. Wear it because you want to wear it.
01:38Right. Exactly.
01:40I was born with a condition called Golden Heart Syndrome.
01:43It's classified as a craniofacial birth defect, meaning craniohead facial face.
01:49I'm missing an ear on my right side.
01:52My right eye is underdeveloped.
01:55My jaw is very underdeveloped.
01:57I'm missing part of my mandible.
01:59As a little kid, I never registered that Liz looked different until we got to school.
02:03And I realized that other kids had no idea why she looked the way she did or what the story
02:10was.
02:11We always used to play princesses, all the girls in my class.
02:15And there wasn't a princess for me to play.
02:18Getting hit with questions like, what's wrong with your face?
02:21Or why do you look like that?
02:23When I was four years old, I did not know how to answer that.
02:26Kids don't know how to include people that look so different.
02:29And that's when I really realized, oh gosh, I look really different.
02:34I really didn't start to have a lot of self-confidence until high school.
02:37I found theater, and I loved being on stage.
02:41I'm so used to people staring at me, but the beautiful thing about being on a stage is that
02:45they're staring at you for a good reason.
02:48So that's where my confidence came from.
02:50You've got my computer here, which you can't see a notebook at all times.
02:54We're big into note tape.
02:57Together we run Courageously Kind podcasts to promote kindness, acceptance, and inclusivity.
03:02Typically, we'll do a little journey for us, and then we'll come together and bring for
03:07what we've been thinking about for a week.
03:10We started Courageously Kind back in August of 2020.
03:14Liz did a video for Face Equality International in the spring of 2020.
03:19Say hi.
03:20Be friendly.
03:22People who look different just want to be treated equally.
03:26I kind of saw this spark in her.
03:29She got really excited when she went to film this interview, and I kind of said to her,
03:33maybe you should think about really speaking up and being an advocate for this.
03:38I was so scared to put my voice on tape.
03:41I worked really hard to have a clear voice.
03:44I went to speech therapy for years.
03:46I've had lots of surgeries.
03:48So just putting my voice out on the internet for anyone to listen to was terrifying.
03:54I had a topic in mind that we've been talking about a lot, and that's imposter syndrome,
03:59which I think we all feel and can be really detrimental to our image of ourselves.
04:05The ultimate goal is to get some positive and accurate representation of people with
04:10facial differences into mainstream media.
04:13Most of the questions we get are really well-intentioned.
04:15But sometimes, particularly on live streams, we get a lot of questions that are not so
04:22kind and are kind of like trolling comments.
04:24I get the question a lot, what's wrong with my face?
04:27And that might seem like a harmless question, but just a connotation that different equals
04:32wrong.
04:32Why did you look like that?
04:34Why were you born?
04:35Really nasty comments like that.
04:39We try and turn everything into like a teaching moment or a learning moment if we can.
04:43Sometimes people are not open to receiving that sort of feedback, and in that case, we just
04:48kind of move on and go on with our lives.
04:51We've gotten so many messages from people who have facial differences or just have disabilities
04:56in general, and it's really heartwarming to read messages of people saying that they
05:01feel a little bit more confident or a little bit more comfortable with themselves because
05:05of what we're doing.
05:06I wish people would know that people with facial differences can live happy lives.
05:11We can be happy with the way that we look.
05:13I think beauty is a feeling rather than a characteristic.
05:17It's not about what you're wearing or how you look.
05:20It's about how you feel.
05:22I admire Liz's courage.
05:25I admire her perseverance and also her outlook on life.
05:29Eventually, I think we will branch out and do different things, but I think in a perfect
05:34world, we would work together in some capacity.
05:37I think we just make a really great team.
05:39I don't know if I'd be here if I didn't have Maddie as a sister.
05:43She has been my best friend, my therapist.
05:49She has just walked through life with me the whole time, and I'm so, so grateful.
05:54And to have such a fierce advocate and protector next to me has made this condition so much
06:02easier.
06:03I think everything happens for a reason, and I think she was meant to be my twin to help
06:08me out.
06:08Thank you very much.
Comments