In this episode of The Climb, Teko Bailey sits down with Air Force veteran, medic, recruiter, and mortgage loan officer Don “The Mortgage Medic” Hecker to talk about fear, surrender, and what it means to be a present father when life spins completely out of control. Don walks through the day he thought he was flying to Miami for a bodybuilding show and gender reveal—and instead found himself racing his pregnant wife to the ER, hearing doctors say they might lose one, if not both, of the people he loved most. The flight back to California without his wife and newborn daughter became the hardest goodbye of his life, harder than any deployment to the Middle East or Africa.
He retraces the path from almost joining the Army pre-9/11, to serving sixteen years as a medic in the Air Force, to becoming a recruiter on the streets of South Chicago. Along the way, mentors, leaders, and his church community shaped how he responds to crisis. When Sasha’s blood pressure spiked into the 220s and a placental abruption forced a 30-week emergency C-section, Don was forced to confront the illusion of control head-on and choose where to turn: into fear, or into Jesus. Posting a simple request for prayer before walking into the OR became, for him, the moment God handed him an “umbrella” in the middle of the storm.
From there, the conversation moves into fatherhood, community, and what Don calls the three Ps: patience, prayer, and presence. He talks about 58 days in the NICU, two months living apart from his wife and daughter while the Air Force pulled him back to California, and how church friends carried them with meals, prayer, and practical support. Don reframes kids not as “baggage,” but as a heavy toolbox—weight you carry because there are tools inside you will need later. He and Teko connect that vision of fatherhood with identity in Christ, everyday choices to be present, and the responsibility to teach children who they are before the world tells them who to be.



CHAPTERS(00:00) Hardest goodbye: leaving family(04:08) From Foot Locker to Air Force(06:49) Miami trip turns emergency(10:42) Preeclampsia and emergency C-section(21:14) NICU life and military support(25:05) Rooted: church as lifeline(32:27) Fatherhood after the NICU(38:44) Encouraging fathers in struggle(43:20) The three Ps: patience, prayer, presence(45:33) Helping families own a home



About Don HeckerDon Hecker is an Air Force veteran, former medic and recruiter, and now a mortgage loan officer helping families navigate the path to homeownership. Over sixteen years in the Air Force, he served across the globe and later recruited on the South Side of Chicago. His most defining season came in 2019, when his daughter Camila was born at 30 weeks after a medical emergency that nearly cost him his wife and child, followed by 58 days in the NICU. That experience, and a second high-risk pregnancy with his younger daughter Gianna, reshaped his understanding of faith, fatherhood, and presence. Today, Don uses that same calm under pressure to educate veterans, first-time buyers, and families on how to build stability and generational wealth through owning a home.
Instagram: Donald Hecker (@don_themortgagemedic)About Teko Bailey

Teko Bailey is a husband, father, coach, and guide for men walking the path of faith and purpose. Through The Climb, he’s building a brotherhood of men committed to living fully, leading boldly, and climbing with intention.

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