OTS 04: Interview with Kerry Mellin, Creator of the EazyHold

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Welcome to the show notes for Episode 4 of the OT Schoolhouse Podcast.

In this episode, we talk to Kerry Mellin who is a motion picture and television costume designer by day, and a creator of the EazyHold by night. The EazyHold is a universal cuff she and her sisters designed that is allowing children to access occupations they never thought were possible. Hear how this idea of a modern universal cuff came to be and why we prefer it over any other cuff we have seen available.

Links to Show References:

EazyHold.com - Use this affiliate link to get your set of Eazyhold grips and support the OT Schoolhouse while doing so.

Here is a Giff to tease one of the many fun topics we discuss in this podcast:

"Hammer Time"

Freebies!

Be sure to subscribe to the OT Schoolhouse email list & get access to our free downloads of Gray-Space paper and the Occupational Profile for school-based OTs.

Have any questions or comments about the podcast? Email Jayson at Jayson@otschoolhouse.com

Well,

Thanks for visiting the podcast show notes! If you enjoyed this episode be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts

Episode Transcript

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Amazing Narrator   

Hello and welcome to the OT schoolhouse podcast. Your source for the latest school based occupational therapy tips, interviews and research now to get the conversation started, here are your hosts, Jayson and Abby. Class is officially in session.  

Jayson Davies   

Hey there, and welcome back to the OT school house podcast. My name is Jayson, and this is episode number four already. Anywho, I hope your day is off to a great start, or maybe you are winding down the day with us today. Either way, just want to say thank you for taking the time to listen in and for supporting. Abby and I, we couldn't be more appreciative. So today, we have another special guest on the show, so Abby will not be joining with us today, but she is working on an interview with a board certified behavioral analyst of BCBA for an upcoming podcast, so stay tuned. That should be a very interesting one to say the least for this episode. However, we have Kerry Mellin, who is a Motion Picture and Television costume designer by day, and she was just telling me that she has dressed anyone from Ariana Grande to Michelle Obama and several others on Nickelodeon. And we actually get into that a little bit in the interview. It's kind of a funny story you'll hear, but today she's here to talk about the universal cuff she and her sisters recently designed actually to help ourselves, but she came to find out that there's so many other purposes for it, and now it's helping many other people. So she's going to tell us about how her easy hold cuff is helping adults and kids, especially in schools, access the occupations they never thought were possible if you work with a population who requires assistance Grabbing and holding on to objects, whether they be big or small, such as forks or bottles or even maybe a tennis racket. This is the perfect podcast for you. Before we jump right into this podcast, I do want to remind you that you can find all the links that we talk about in today's episode at ot schoolhouse.com, forward slash episode four. And these links that do send you to Amazon or to even the easy hold website, they are what's called affiliate links, which means that we do get a small commission at no additional cost to you, and this helps to support the OT school house podcast and website. And we definitely appreciate it when you do use these links. All right. Well, Carrie is absolutely fantastic and super passionate about helping others, and I know you will hear that inner voice, so let's jump right into it again. This is Kerry Mellin, one of the creators of the eazy Hold E, A, Z, Y, hold cuff that is replacing the velcro universal cuff. Oh, and my apologies for the quality of the sound during parts of this interview with Kerry, for some reason, the Internet was not fully cooperative, but it doesn't draw from the content. So please just enjoy the interview. Hey there, Carrie, thank you so much for joining us today, and welcome to the podcast.  

Kerry Mellin   

Thank you. It's so nice to be here. Jayson.  

Jayson Davies   

Yeah, I don't know if you can tell, but I'm really excited for this chat with you. I've been preparing for it all week. I hope you saw one of the emails that we sent out about your product. We're happy to have you here and share your product with our listeners. I think it's something that many people will value from hearing so yeah. 

Kerry Mellin   

Great to hear that I've found really a warm reception from occupational therapists and physical therapists regarding easy hold. So I'm excited to talk to you about it and answer any more questions you might have. I know you know a little bit about it, but feel free to ask away. I love talking about easy hold. 

Jayson Davies   

That's perfect. That's great. That you're doing something that you love. That's one thing that many of us occupational therapists can say, is that we love what we do. It's awesome. So I want to give you a little chance to say a little bit about your background. You're not an occupational therapist, so tell us about what you do. 

Kerry Mellin   

Well, I'm a costume designer for television shows, TV commercials. I have done few movies, and I've been doing this for about 30 years. So I build costumes, I dress actors, anything that's involved with making an interesting costume. So I'm very handy and very crafty. I have always had a little bit of interest in occupational therapy, because before I started my career, I was told by a counselor that I would make a good occupational therapist. She looked at my background, and we took, we took a couple of tests, occupational tests, and she had said, you know, I think you'd make a great therapist. So I did volunteer in an occupational therapy hospital for about a year in the spinal cord injury wing, and at that same time, I was also starting to work in television, a little bit, making costumes. So I was during the day. Some days I would go and work at the occupational therapy week, and I would see what kind of tools they were using, what kind of assistive cuffs and universal cuffs, and I would try and help the patients and the clients to hold implements. And I never really forgot that. 30 years later, I did decide to go into Hollywood and costume design, but I never forgot what I. In that occupational therapy wing. And you know, when I found myself just recently, about two years ago, having trouble with my own wrists and hands, I looked back at that time and wondered if they'd come up with anything new, any kind of universal cuffs or gripping devices. 

Jayson Davies   

But sure enough, there hasn't. It's still that mostly, most therapists are very familiar with the Velcro or nylon universal cuff. I want to ask you one question, sir, what one costume that you, you have designed that probably everyone knows, is there one out there? 

Kerry Mellin   

There is actually, do you know who MC Hammer was? Yes, of course. Hammer time. Yeah. Okay. MC Hammer. He had to float off of the Taco Bell with his pants needed to blow up from fill with air and float down the bell down to the ground. And I did those, I designed those MC Hammer pits. Wow. And for whatever reason, that seems to be a costume that a lot of people remember. 

Jayson Davies   

That's funny. I can't say that I've seen that, but I can imagine in my head. I'm sure many people out there have actually Hammer was a character.  

Kerry Mellin   

Yes,and you know, I've loved designing costumes and making costumes, but I'm finding out that my talents now, as I'm reaching a certain point in my life, my talents can be used elsewhere. And so I've really switched over to designing adaptive equipment. And it's really quite fulfilling.  

Jayson Davies   

Yeah, I mean, it's only natural that if you design in one area of life, then, I mean, you came up with this new product. So how about you tell us about the product. What is it? What is it made out of? What is how does it work? 

Kerry Mellin   

Well, it's a one piece silicone band, and it's soft, 100% food grade silicone. And on this band is two holes at either end. It's really super simple, and it's made of silicone, and it's slightly sticky and tacky, so it kind of sticks to your hand, and it doesn't need to be tight. So you take this one piece band and you, if we're for instance, let's use a fork. We would slip it over one end of the fork and the other end, and you would tuck your hand inside. Now with the traditional universal cuff, you might put the fork into the actual cuff, and then put the cuff on the hand so the fork doesn't actually rest in your hand. But with this simple band, the band goes over the back of your hand, and the fork would be in your hand, so you would actually feel the fork on the palm of your hand. You would feel how cold it is, how hard it is, you would feel the vibration. So it's a much greater tactile experience having this soft silicone band instead of a large, bulky apparatus that you're holding onto, and the fork would be put into that.  

Jayson Davies   

So you're saying it's we have people. Obviously, this is an all audio experience, the people that are listening to this. So are there different sizes? Is it one size fit all? How does that work?  

Kerry Mellin   

We have eight different sizes. So it can be something as tiny as an infant's hand holding a little rattle or a teether, tiny little band that's not more than an inch and a half, all the way up to a large band that's eight inches, that will hold a sippy cup or a baby bottle or even a water bottle. For a sports enthusiast, it can hold things like a row boat paddle or, I mean, it goes up to large equipment. 

Jayson Davies   

Yeah, I think I saw a picture of you someone using a baseball bat or a broom, and I think didn't you originally do it with a broom?  

Kerry Mellin   

Yes, that was my first easy hold that I crafted when I was out in my barn, and I was getting ready for a family holiday, and I went to grab my broom sweep it out, and I couldn't, because of the repetitive motion and my sore thumbs from an inheritance I got from my parents, which was arthritis, not money, arthritis in my thumbs. So I was gripping the broom, and I'm trying to sweep and sweep after sweep. It's getting more and more painful, and I have family coming over soon. So I grab a roll of duct tape, and I make a loop onto the broom handle, and I slide my hand in, and I go finish finish brooming. And it was really effortless, very comfortable. I didn't have to grip tight, but that little bit of leverage over the back of my hand just gave me enough grip to finish the job. And so I finished sweeping, and I'm thinking, gee, this is, this is really a really helpful, useful tool. I wonder if there's anything like this out there. And later that evening, after I'd been getting ready for the party, my sisters came over and we were talking about aging, but wanting to continue doing the things we loved. We're a really active family, and I've always been very active and equestrian and outdoorsman. Love sports and hiking, everything outdoors. Yeah, and I was talking to my sister, saying, gee, are we going to have to change our life? Because gals, today, I actually had to tape my hand to the. Room to clean my own barn. And so while they laughed about it, it really got us thinking. And my sisters are avid sports people. They are. They love cooking and dancing and tennis. And so we all agreed right then and there to see if we could come up with some kind of an assistive grip device that would help us maintain our activities. And at that time, we were really thinking about the aging population, and we were thinking about the population with arthritis, perhaps stroke, that kind of a thing that might happen as you're aging. But we did find out that it was going to be much more helpful for many more than than just adults, for children as well. So that, that was the day that we decided to come up, my sisters and I to innovate a new product. We did go back to our computers then and try and just to discover whether there had been any advances in assistive devices or universal cuffs since the time I knew about them 30 years ago. But we really didn't find anything. No. Nothing had really changed this. The griffin cuffs, or universal cuffs were still made of velcro and plastic or leather or elastic they had. We did find some neoprene universal cups, which were a little bit of an improvement, but we discovered the problem with them is they weren't adaptable. They couldn't fit large objects. Everything was made for a pencil or a maybe a crayon or a fork, nothing large for outdoor equipment or sporting equipment. And so they just weren't very adaptable. And then we also came to learn that not only were they not adaptable, but they were not sanitary. You cannot they harbor bacteria. You cannot clean them. You can't disinfect them. So we wanted to make something that you could keep clean, and. 

Jayson Davies   

So one thing that I've noticed that you're right, I can attest to that, is that it's very easy to clean, very easy to dry. If a kid drops it in their soup, you can just rinse it off real quick, and they can have it back on their hand in a few seconds, which is awesome. 

Kerry Mellin   

Yeah. Or you can leave it right on that fork, and you can put it right into the dishwasher. It takes high temperatures very well, up to 500 degrees. Not that you need to, because actually soap and water cleans it very well. And then hospital grade disinfectant wipes are really wonderful for it. You can use those, and you can pass them from student to student or client to client or patient to patient.  

Jayson Davies   

Awesome. So thinking about something that's rubber, how sturdy is this thing? Does it last for the long haul? What would it take to destroy one of these?  

Kerry Mellin   

They are very sturdy. Now they're soft enough where they're comfortable on your hand, so they're not indestructible. But as you can see right here, you can see how large I can stretch this hole. Yeah, so this hole might be about a half inch, but it can stretch to about two inches, two and a half inches, so the soft, elastomeric silicone stretches and grips tight but does not break. So the tensile strength is very is very strong, and it should last a whole lifetime. No, it won't degrade in the sun. It doesn't degrade over high heat, and it should last a lifetime. But, and they are guaranteed if you buy them and we'll replace them if anything happens to them, awesome. 

Jayson Davies   

So one of the things that I'm so happy that we've taken on this in Denver the podcast is hearing back from people about them, enjoying our podcast, learning from our podcast. What about you? I'm sure with these tools, you've heard a lot of not only customer reviews, but just testimonies about about your product, how it's changed lives. What would be your What's that story that always comes to your head when you think about your product and how it's changing lives? 

Kerry Mellin   

Oh, you know, early on, when we first started selling them and trialing them, I think one of the first things that sticks in my mind is a mother who wrote and sent a picture of her child, and he was holding this little giraffe, just a just an action like a toy giraffe. Yeah, and she hadn't, she said, this is the first time my son, who looked to be about four years old, has been able to hang on to that squeaky giraffe that's been in his bedroom for years. So I realized that this simple little strap was allowing children to hold toys, action figures and dolls, which they had previously not been able to do, not been able to hold a toy. You know, a mother is going to want their child to hold a toy, but she's not going to go taping a toil toy to the child's hand, and you're not even going to want to use an ace bandage to wrap a toy. No, it's not, but the easy holds are really it is too much effort, and you want it to be able to come off easily. If the child becomes frustrated or doesn't like it on it. And the easy holds, they actually feel like a toy themselves, because they're soft and stretchy and they're colorful and pretty, so they look like part of the toy. 

Jayson Davies   

Oh, definitely, I think I've caught myself fidgeting with them every once. In a while, just kind of messing around, kind of like what you are. Can see you on the screen right now, just fidgeting with it. I do the same thing every now, yeah. 

Kerry Mellin   

So I would, I would say that the first when we first started selling our easy holds, we were so heartened and kept inspired every day, because parents would post pictures saying, this is the first time my child wrote a Mother's Day card for me, or this is the first time my child has drank his own bottle or held his own sippy cup. But I would say that one of the most inspiring experiences we've had recently was a fellow by the name of Michael, and Michael, he went out for the State Board of Cosmetology exam to become a hairdresser. And Michael has only one arm, and he considers himself a lucky fin, because he has one arm, and on the other side of his shoulder is just a very small flipper, a very small flipper. He was able to pass the State Board of Cosmetology and become a hairdresser because he uses easy hold and he puts them on his flipper, with his blow dryer, with his comb, and he's able to do people's hair all day long. This is his occupation. He does hair and cuts hair and styles hair and colors hair. Wow. So he sent us videos, and I think it's just so inspiring. It's, it isn't just for eating and drinking and playing with a toy. It's actually for a career. It's, it's putting people back into the workforce who who have limb loss or grip issues. So that was a very inspiring story, and I owe him also on Facebook and watch his progress with his work. And. 

Jayson Davies   

Yeah, I wanted to point out, just for the OTs out there, that today I was talking to a teacher, and this is a teacher of moderate to severe and more severe disabilities. She wanted, she wanted to let me know, you know, this is definitely a product for a student that has the cognitive capability to want to do something, she has some kids who they put it on and they just kind of looked at it, they didn't know what to do with it, but that's also because they don't necessarily know what to do with a spoon. So you can attach it to a spoon and put this on their hand, but that doesn't mean they're going to be able to eat if they don't have that cognitive capabilities. So this is definitely a tool that you need to keep in mind that it's for people who have the desire, who have the ability to learn how to do a task, but just can't, because they can't hold on to the object, and this helps them with that part of it.  

Kerry Mellin   

Absolutely, one of the first little children that we trialed easy hold with was a little girl named Emmy. Emmy was about a year old, and she has severe cerebral palsy and other conditions, and she was able to move her arms, but she has no grasp. She's very tiny and very weak. So what her mother did, her mother did want her to be able to to hold a teether or a pom pom or a shaky noise toy. So at that age year, we do have tiny little cuffs. She put a teether in Emmy's hand, and Emmy was able to get that to her face and to her mouth. And even though she wasn't cognitively aware of what she was doing, that instant reward of her actually getting something into her mouth taught her this eye hand coordination and to try harder. So her her mother, from that from one year old, has used easy hold on musical instruments, on teethers, on on on spoons, on plush toys. And throughout her infancy, she's now three years old, she has used and uses the easy hold with spoons and forks and toys and musical instruments and drumsticks. So even before she was really aware of what to do with the easy hold, she was able to play with it, shake a pom pom, and hear the music. So I've heard, I've talked to other OTs who have said that if a parent can put use easy hold with a small child first, they are less adverse reactive to it later. Because some OTs have said, well, what if my my older child does not want to put it on that's something you can't you can't help if a child is by the time a child is seven or eight years old, if he has some type of an adverse reaction, to have some something on his hand, you may need to work with him a little bit harder, like putting the spoon in front of him with a favorite food, or having a musical instrument that he loves the sound of or or with older children, we find that the drumsticks work really well because that's something they really, really would like to do is play a drum, so that gets a lot of the students interested. 

Jayson Davies   

Awesome. All right, so first of all, I did want to give a shout out to Wendy and Marilee, who are your sisters? Right? Yes, exactly. And correct me if I'm wrong, but Wendy is an artist and a chef? 

Kerry Mellin   

Yes, she is awesome. Wendy is an artist and a chef. So when we were starting our easy holds, she was able to steer us in the right direction when it came to colors, the color palette, what's attractive, what children would like. She was also able to draw our prototype drawings and then get our patent drawings. She was able to assist us with that. And then also, she gained gave us a lot of insight into the sizes for cooking, because a lot of the easy holds are wonderful in the kitchen for pots and pans and cooking and household equipment. So you Wendy was very instrumental with the artwork and the sizing and coloring and then the kitchen utensils. 

Jayson Davies   

Okay, cool and and Marilee, your other sister, I'm sure she came in to be a big part of this is she's an She's the director of early education facilities, right? 

Kerry Mellin   

Exactly. She worked as an early educator director for 30 years or so, and so she knew firsthand what it takes, what it took for a teacher to actually assist students in the classroom, and how a teacher may have 20 to 30 students, and what kind of implements might be helpful to her, and especially in a special, special needs classroom, where there is one teacher and an assistant teacher, and there may be several students who want to do something at once, easy hold can be very helpful, because one student can have it on their paint brush, and another could have it on their pencil, and another could have it on their musical instrument and then that same implement, because it's washable and you can sanitize it. You can switch them up and give them to another student, or use them over and over. Actually, that's that's one of the best things about easy hold, is that it is the only universal cuff that is currently being stocked and and bought by educational facilities because it is the only cuff that can be disinfect. Disinfectant.  

Jayson Davies   

We definitely have a few of the old traditional ones lying around. And to be honest, I've never even thought about the ability to disinfect it, but you're absolutely right, and and I know that while I don't think about that, I've given it to a teacher, and then I noticed that it quickly is no longer being used. And I asked them, and they're like, OTs just too dirty. So completely understand that. Well, very cool. Yes. All right, I have one last question before I let you go browsing your website. It did come across something called the small things program, and it looked like a really cool idea, and I wanted to get more information on that. What is the small things program?  

Kerry Mellin   

Well, we noticed a lot of people following our Facebook page and Instagram, we have about 12,000 followers, and we noticed a lot of people follow, but they didn't themselves. Have children with special needs, or they were not special needs, but they were always giving a lot of support. And then we had some inquiries about how they can help. So we started a program that would benefit California Children's Services, United Cerebral Palsy. We have Maya's hope, which is in the Ukraine, which aids children who have been abandoned and have no means of any income or support support them. So we have sent Maya's hope easy holds, and we continue to support them. So our program is, if you donate an easy hold strap, we'll double that and then send that to California Children's Services, United Cerebral Palsy and Maya's hope and other local charities here that ask us for easy holds. We try and send them them whenever we can.  

Jayson Davies   

That's super cool. And where are you guys located? Again, we're in Simi Valley, California. Oh, you're right down the street from me.  

Kerry Mellin   

Yeah, we're not too far. 

Jayson Davies   

Depends on the traffic, I guess.  

Kerry Mellin   

Yes, yeah, we have noticed we do get a lot of requests from for Special Needs foundations, which we we really do want people to know the different opportunities people can have with that. It isn't just because the old universal cuffs were basically for feeding and grooming. We do want people to know that that individuals now are they're skiing with them. They're sit skiing. They're doing adaptive skiing, adaptive rowing, adaptive horseback riding. We even have a Paralympic equestrian who is using ours on the on the rains and the crops, so they go on to just about any implement. So there are really no limits to what a person who has lost their grip through limb loss or stroke, arthritis, Parkinson's. There's no limits anymore to what you can hold. Yeah, from, you know, from the time you're a baby to adulthood.  

Jayson Davies   

Yeah. And I definitely want to stress just that. The coolest thing I find about the easy hold is how just about any size thing can go into it, versus the traditional cuff, universal cuff. It's designed like you said, just for sometimes even a full size spoon won't fit into it. It's like a plastic spoon has to go into it with the easy hold just about anything I could put my entire pint sized cup into one, and it'll keep my hand nice and secure to that cup. 

Kerry Mellin   

Absolutely and then it puts the two. Tool in your hand. So if you are, if you're trying to have a child that is needing to learn to explore and discover and play, part of that is also feeling the vibration of the drum beat, or feeling the softness of the fabric or the coldness, or actually feeling the paint brush running across paper on off the table. And you can't really feel that with the old cuffs, but with this, you can, because the actual tool is in your hand. 

Jayson Davies   

That's super cool, alrighty. Well, thank you, Carrie, so much for joining us. Very much appreciated. Would you like to share where they can find more about you? 

Kerry Mellin   

Yes, absolutely. You can find it at our website, at easy hold.com and that's e, a, z, y, H, O, L, d.com, and if there are any questions from OTs that would like to have some personal answered, I can also be reached at Kerry@easyhold.com, that's k, e, r, r y @ easyhold.com. 

Jayson Davies   

Awesome, and definitely do check that out. They have a variety of options for you, starting with like a two pack all the way up to a full seven pack, that's designed for teachers that have multiple sizes of hands and tools to be using the Easy hold with. So be sure to check that out. We will put a link to that up on the show notes. So Alrighty, well, have a good night. Carrie, thank you so much, and take care.  

Kerry Mellin   

Wonderful to talk to you. Jayson, we'll talk to you again. Bye, bye. 

Jayson Davies   

Hello. I'm back, but no wrapping this time for those of you who listen to episode three already. So shortly after recording the episode, Carrie emailed me, and one of the things she wrote really stood out. I wanted to share that with you. It was that the easy hold cuff is allowing parents to see what their child with severe disabilities or or a missing limb, perhaps, is actually capable of when given an accommodation. And as teachers and school based OTs, you know, adapting the environment is a large part of our job, but it isn't always easy to convince someone that an adaptation is going to work. The Easy hold, though it's different, it's so quick, it's obvious, and it's a lasting change for that individual. This is something that they can use day one or 510, 1520, years down the line. It's something that's so easy to see how well it works, and it can help an individual in almost every occupation. And that's why, exactly why I wanted to bring Carrie on today. I hope you enjoyed hearing from her as much as I did today. I look forward to having many more conversations with her as we continue on this, this new friendship, alright. Well, that is all for today's episode. As always, you can find all the notes for this episode@otschoolhouse.com forward slash Episode Four for this one. And if you know someone that may benefit from hearing about the easy hold or our podcast in general, you know we'd ask that you guys, please share this with them, send them a link on Facebook, or even just mention it to them, to them at work. So thanks again, everyone for listening, and we'll see you on the next episode. Take care.  

Amazing Narrator   

Thank you for listening to the OT schoolhouse podcast for more ways to help you and your students succeed right now, head on over to otsoolhouse.com. Until next time class is dismissed

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