If you’ve ever wondered, “Is it too late for me to...” the answer’s NO and The Uplifters are about to show you why. This space is for purpose-driven women who want to do big, brave things in the second half of their lives. I’m your host, Aransas Savas, and I’ve spent the last 20 years at the intersection of behavior change research and coaching.
This month for the new year, we're exploring new beginnings with award-winning author Sahar Delijani, perimenopause expert Karissa Pfeffer, comedian-filmmaker Mandy Fabian, and today, Dawn Veselka, who co-founded Cards2Warriors. Welcome to the Uplifters!
Listen to this episode if...
You’ve been wanting to start something meaningful but have no idea where to begin
You’re navigating chronic illness (yours or a loved one’s) and feeling invisible
You’ve been telling yourself you need all the answers before you can take the first step
You’re a caregiver who never gets asked “how are YOU doing?”
You’re wondering if it’s too late to build something new in midlife
Is there any better feeling than receiving hand-written love notes in the mail? Today’s guest, Dawn Veselka, built an entire movement around this moment. For 15 years, she’s watched her daughter Sadie navigate chronic illness and rare disease. Somewhere in that long journey of appointments and advocacy, Dawn discovered that most patients, families, and caregivers don’t only need a medical breakthrough, they also need to know someone sees them.
Dawn’s Story
Dawn didn’t set out to build a nonprofit. She was a radiation therapist treating cancer patients, raising a daughter with complex medical needs, living a full life that already demanded a lot from her. But being the parent of a child with chronic illness, taught her things about isolation that most people never have to understand.
Sadie’s diagnosis took years to piece together. Even now, Dawn describes her daughter as having a “mix of diseases” that doesn’t fit neatly into any single category. That’s the reality for so many people living with rare diseases (there are 7,000 of them, and 95% have zero treatment options). These patients and families are navigating without a map, often without a community, frequently without anyone who truly understands.
Dawn spent decades in healthcare, but starting Cards2Warriors required an entirely different skill set. She grew up in the generation where typing class was the closest thing to technology training. Now she needed to build databases, manage logistics, create tech systems secure enough to protect patient information. “When you need $30,000 to build your tech to send cards, it doesn’t compute,” she laughs. “But we finally got everything in place.”
Like so many of us in midlife, who are translating our experiences into new impactful chapters, Dawn had to own not knowing. No tech background. No nonprofit experience. No clue how to fundraise at scale. Just a clear vision that people battling chronic illness deserved to feel seen, and the willingness to figure out the rest as she went. And recent neuroscientific research teaches us that our midlife brains are uniquely positioned for this kind of work. After decades of pattern recognition and problem-solving across multiple domains (career, caregiving, navigating complex systems), we’re extraordinarily well-equipped to see connections others miss and build solutions that actually work. The challenge isn’t capability. It’s overcoming the belief that major career shifts or new ventures require starting from scratch when, in fact, we’re bringing irreplaceable expertise to the table.
Today, Cards2Warriors operates with a simple but powerful model: anyone can sign up to receive cards, anyone can join their card crew to write them, and they don’t require proof of diagnosis or limit support to specific diseases. They’ve built a community of warriors supporting warriors, high school students learning how to talk to people with chronic illness, and volunteers creating tangible reminders of hope. Dawn’s goal is to send 100,000 cards, and she’s well over halfway. The stories that fuel her work are profoundly moving, so grab your tissues for this episode.
Her Courage Practice
Tethering to Purpose Through Story
Dawn’s courage practice isn’t a morning routine or meditation ritual. It’s tethering herself to the pain, both her own and the pain of the people they serve. When the tech fails or the funding falls through or she’s staring at another problem she doesn’t know how to solve, she goes back to the stories.
She thinks about the patients. She thinks about caregivers who burst into tears because someone finally acknowledged their invisible work. She thinks about her own daughter Sadie, and all those years of navigating illness without a roadmap.
This isn’t about toxic positivity. It’s about remembering why the work matters when everything in her wants to give up. As the stories keep multiplying, her sense of commitment does too. So when Dawn needs courage, she doesn’t have to manufacture it from thin air. She just remembers the last person who wrote to say “that card saved me today,” and she keeps going.
Lift Her Up
Support Cards2Warriors by donating $5 to sponsor two cards at cards2warriors.org, or via Venmo at @Cards-to-Warriors or Zelle at hi@cards2warriors.org.
If you loved this story...
Explore our conversations with other women who turned personal challenges into community solutions:Angela Wilson’s episode about sending her own version of “happy mail” to honor her late mother, Amy Cohen’s episode about co-founding Families for Safe Streets after losing her son, Janelle Hill’s episode about founding Refuge Mental Health Services as a sexual abuse survivor, and Rebecca Soffer’s episode about creating Modern Loss after losing both parents early in life.
Let’s chat about it
What is the most meaningful piece of handwritten mail that you’ve received? Share in the comments.
