Aaron Broverman, 37, has been writing How We Roll since 2019. For the final entry, he’s pulling back the curtain on his 17 years as a journalist and his recent foray into fatherhood.
The Man Behind How We Roll
I’ve been writing How We Roll for four years, and I’ve enjoyed every second of it, but as my life gets busier and busier juggling parenthood and being the Lead Editor at Forbes Advisor Canada, it’s time to end this column and look back on how I got here.
When I graduated from Toronto Metropolitan University in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree in journalism, I didn’t get the big, flashy newspaper internships at the Toronto Star or The Globe and Mail, and no editors were waiting with an entertainment reporter job or taking my pitches about Canada’s comic book community. Sure, I got to interview celebrities like Dog the Bounty Hunter, Criss Angel and Stan Lee every so often, but it wasn’t enough to make a comfortable living.
So, I made a conscious decision to write what I knew and exploit my status as a guy with cerebral palsy by writing about disability. Even then, it still took bumping into the editor at a book fair before I was regularly featured in Abilities Magazine, Canada’s only national lifestyle magazine for people with disabilities. But after a few years, I grew tired of its tendency to comfort the afflicted without afflicting the comfortable. In my university’s journalism review, I wrote about the fact that Canada’s disability media had no teeth. In 2009, I started freelancing for NEW MOBILITY. I was excited to cover disability issues with a little more depth and without the inspiration porn.
Meanwhile, my handling editor on that disability media feature, Bruce Gillespie — remember the name — was also the editor of Bankrate Canada and invited me to contribute. At the time, I saw it as consistent freelance work until I could make those entertainment-reporter dreams work, but that one job led to more personal finance freelancing with AOL, Yahoo and creditcards.com, since the editors who syndicated my Bankrate articles on those websites took notice.
I still wasn’t sure personal finance journalism should be my career until I sat down for coffee with my former teacher at TMU — the late, great Stephen Trumper — who had a huge influence on me as the only wheelchair-using teacher and journalism professor I ever had. He gave me some great advice:
“Everyone is going to always need personal finance help and investment advice. Entertainment lives and dies by its funding model, and [entertainment is] the first thing to go when budgets get slashed. Don’t struggle along with that boom-and-bust cycle — go where the money is.”
So, even though I passed high school math with just over 50%, I leaned in. I got better the more I worked at it and realized personal finance journalism isn’t just about the numbers, but also the human stories behind them. Eventually, I built up a freelance resume that featured almost every prominent personal finance outlet on the web, from NerdWallet to Money Under 30.
It was a great 15-year freelance career, but by 2021, with a 1-year-old in tow, I needed a steadier paycheck, and who should come back with a recommendation at just the right time but Bruce Gillespie, the man who gave me my first opportunity at Bankrate. Turns out, the chief copy editor from back when we worked there, Katie Doyle, was now the senior vice president of content at Forbes Marketplace, and after successfully launching Forbes Advisor in the U.S., she was looking for someone to lead an editorial team that would launch the same personal finance brand in Canada. Bruce recommended me.
Thankfully, she remembered me, and I haven’t looked back since. I finally get to pass on my knowledge and experience, while getting the opportunity to build something significant from the ground up.
Parenting: A War of Attrition
Broverman details his successes and struggles as a new father of a son with dwarfism, along with his hopes for the future.
“During World War I, the front shifted no more than 80 kilometers until 18 months before the war’s end. That’s what parenting can feel like a lot of the time to me. I’m killing myself every day only to see a little bit of progress. Not to mention, raising a 3-year-old in particular is like someone just threw a grenade into a crowded room — you are just going about your day and then suddenly, chaos.
So why did I make this decision? Why did I go in with an inadequate support system, knowing that as a person with a disability, taking care of your own needs can already be taxing?
Because the little moments of success are worth it. When my son was first born, I wondered how this thing that sleeps, eats and needs to be carried everywhere would ever become a full-fledged human being. I can tell you that watching that evolution take place before your eyes is nothing short of magical.
Besides, even though I’m not the preferred parent now, and he doesn’t listen to any instruction I give him, my day will come. After all, I’m the one with the comic book and action figure collection. “
Why did you join United Spinal?
I didn’t so much join as I was sucked in. It keeps my ear to the ground in the SCI community I cover.
Can’t live without:
Right now, my highly detailed and articulated collection of Hot Toys figures.
Greatest accomplishment:
Making it through the fiery gauntlet of the Season 21 Hot Ones chicken wing challenge on Father’s Day 2023.
One thing people wouldn’t know about you:
I am a purple belt in Brazilian jiujitsu.
