He faced harrowing personal tragedy and turned it into triumph 🏆. Much later, he became the first man to make a guest appearance on Bad Women 💃🏾. Mark Raymond Jr. may be a taker of chances 🎲, but he always ends up with a win. In the hot seat on this episode, he talks with us about dating, disability, the woman who made him who he is today, and how he’s built an empire out of an accident. From leading his own philanthropic organization, The Split Second Foundation, to serving on the National Board of Easterseals, he calls himself the “Disability Ambassador.” “You're influencing a lot of people, you're touching a lot of lives,” said Tetiana. “It's actually amazing.” “It was all by accident,” said Mark, Founder and CEO of The Split Second Foundation. “It was all by design,” Tetiana replied. Watch the full episode or read the transcript below. Anybody's life can change in a split second, Mark says. I learned how valuable life was at a young age. And I honestly, I felt like I died and I didn't leave a legacy behind. Find out more about Mark’s mission to give care to a community that’s sharing his trauma, his philosophy on mental health 🧠, the importance of caregivers, and how his mother set her life aside to make sure he can have his. Full Show Transcript Tetiana Anderson, Bad Women Host (00:01) Okay, we have Mark Raymond Jr. with us and we're just gonna jump into what the most important and interesting things are, which are you are a very young guy, you're very attractive, I think you're very charismatic, dare I say like ladies man? I don't know if I can say that, but you know, tell us more about sort of how you approach dating and how dating approaches you. Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (00:26) Dating, first of all, dating in your mid 30s is just interesting. ⁓ Especially for me, because I'm very mission driven, focused. So I don't relate to a lot, I think of pop culture stuff. ⁓ So I'm looking for like a very specific someone. And that makes it tricky. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (00:50) So Mark, when you talk about mission driven, are you talking about the mission to date or your own personal mission? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (00:59) Definitely my own personal mission. I'm dating is secondary to the work that I'm doing, unfortunately. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (01:06) and what work are you doing? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (01:08) Well, I help a lot of people with disabilities, depending on, not even depending anymore, in a lot of different spaces. So we started an organization years ago called Split Second Foundation I'm sure we're going to talk about the work that it does, but I'm on so many boards. I feel like I'm just like the disability ambassador for the country or something. Tetiana Anderson, Bad Women Host (01:28) So wait, I have to stop. That's a perfect place for me to say how I know Mark. which is I was an outgoing board member of Easterseals which is an organization that's been around for a hundred plus years and works in the disability space to help people and their families, ⁓ people with disabilities and their families, you know, lead better lives, to thrive, to progress. So I was leaving the board as Mark was coming in and we met at a board dinner where I was sort of being honored as part of my outgoing and as part of a sort of Capitol Hill day that Easterseals having here in Washington, D.C. And when we met, I was just like, my gosh, this guy is amazing and he's wonderful and we have to talk. So quick, quick, quick backstory on that. And yes, to your point, Mark, about what you do for our audience if they don't know you, you know, you really, you. really need to know Mark. He's the CEO of the Split Second Foundation . It's a nonprofit. It helps keep people and patients with paralysis, stroke, amputation, get inpatient rehabilitation treatment. So he knows a little bit about all the things that we talk about here on Bad Women, whether it's mental health, physical health, community, family, all of those things. So Mark, before we get any deeper, just thank you from us for joining us. Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (02:46) Thank you for having me. I mean, when you asked me to do this, I was like, absolutely. I'm a bad guy. Of course I would do this. It's like perfect. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (02:54) So what was your initial reaction when Tetiana shared what we are doing with Bad Women with you? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (03:02) Well, first of all, my initial reaction of Tetiana was, oh my God, that's Olivia Pope. I gotta go meet her. It's got to be like the actual person. And lo and behold, she is like everything amazing. So when she asked me to do this, it was like such a Olivia Pope kind of question. It's great. I'm here. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (03:22) And I know part of your first initial private conversation kind of circled around dating what we started with on the show. when Tetiana was telling me about it, it really resonated with me as well, because I think all of us, we always wonder how much of your own story do you actually share online in a profile when you want to meet someone when You know, like, yeah, what, what are these steps for you? Like how much do you actually share of yourself before you are meeting a person? Like what are you putting out there about yourself? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (04:04) I think I'm pretty vulnerable on my social media channels. So it's got a pretty good pretty good history of everything that's happened and everything that I've been working on the last nine years really since my accident and kind of life a little bit before that too, right? I will say I don't I don't fancy myself an influencer. So I'm not like trying to make content to appease the influencer algorithm as much as like I put out stuff that I think I want people to know about me. And that's, ⁓ that's a control that I like to keep. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (04:45) It comes from the heart. Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (04:46) Yeah, it's genuine, you know, it's not I'm not chasing followers with this like half the time I'm second-guessing whether I want to post it at all and you know, so that's probably half the posts that are up there But it's interesting definitely and to your question about how that influences people I engage with especially of the of the opposite sex I am very, I'm charming, but shy. Right? Like I'm guarded, I'm protected. I like being alone. like things a certain way. So I don't know, don't do as much chasing as I did in my younger years. Tetiana Anderson, Bad Women Host (05:35) Okay, okay, okay. I like that. You know, you're talking about how you're not an influencer, or you don't see yourself that way. But you know, I have to disagree. Especially, you know, if you look at Mark, he's been on like every major talk show. His Instagram following, you know, puts my 12 followers to total shame. And it's his mission that's important. And if you haven't been able to gauge this from Mark, or you haven't been able to see this, he is joining us from a wheelchair. he is partially paralyzed. But before we get to how that happened, I want to share with our viewers sort of what your life was like before that. So I want to play this clip of you on Jennifer Hudson's show. Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (06:19) Can you tell us what life was like before you? Life was amazing. I was 27 years old, so I was really coming into my own. I was like the prince of New Orleans, the way I moved and enjoyed life. But I was also a broadcast engineer, so I was traveling the country. Literally would fly out on Thursday to work a show Friday, fly back home Saturday. And that was my work week. It was fun. Ooh, that was fun. So much fun. Like I miss that. UFC was here in New Orleans actually this past weekend and I got to see some of the guys I worked with frequently. yeah, life, life pre-accident was pretty, pretty fun. Tetiana Anderson, Bad Women Host (07:00) Well, so can you tell us about what happened? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (07:05) Yeah, so I went out. Let me back up a little bit. Going back, I traveled and worked every Thursday, did a show Friday, flew home Saturday. This particular weekend was Essence Week in New Orleans, so I didn't have to work. Flew home, partied the whole weekend. Monday landed on the 4th of July. So me and a bunch of friends decided we were gonna go out on a boat, hang out, and kind of take it easy, because we had just finished partying all weekend. And, um... Around five o'clock, I wasn't paying attention to the depth of the water or the tide and took three steps off the back of the boat, dove in, hit my forehead on the sandy bottom and it didn't knock me out. So I opened my eyes and I was looking at the ground like, and I couldn't move. it was a very, there's a lot of strange emotions that runs through your mind when you are face down in water and can't move. ⁓ So I pretty much immediately went into the panic mode and started praying, started thinking about mom and just asking God to save me somehow. And that was the last thing I remember and I woke up three weeks later in the hospital room with everything beeping. Yeah, not exactly the right turn I was trying to make in life, but I'll take it. Sonia Kennebeck, Bad Women Host (08:31) Sounds a lot in the way that you talk that there's kind of the before and after. So how would you describe, like you've shared a little bit and we heard it on a show, sort of the before life. So what was the after like? Mark Raymond Jr., Split Second Foundation (08:50) After has been a journey. After was like a reset, right? Like you start as an infant in this process and there's a lot of crying, kicking and screaming and negotiating. After things kind of settle in, you get comfortable and you start
