Ironcast: Providing Under Pressure with Journeyman Electrician & Cancer Survivor, Mitchell Shepherd

When you grow up in a blue-collar world, the word provider isn’t just a title—it’s an identity. It’s not glamorous, and it’s rarely celebrated. It means showing up when you’re bone-tired. It means swallowing stress, smiling at your kids, and telling your wife “we’ll figure it out” even when the bills are stacked like a wall in front of you.

In Episode 2 of Ironcast, we sat down with Mitchell Shepherd—Ironhide co-founder, journeyman electrician, husband, father, and cancer survivor. His story cuts to the heart of what it means to be a man who carries weight, both on the job site and at home.

This isn’t a feel-good chat. It’s a conversation about the dangerous work electricians face daily, about fighting cancer when the system stacks the odds against you, and about how men tie their identity to providing for their families—even when it breaks them down.

The Provider’s Burden

The episode kicks off with a story from the 1968 Farmington Mine Disaster. Ninety-nine men went underground that morning in West Virginia. Seventy-eight never came back. These were husbands and fathers who knew the risk and took it anyway—for one reason: to put food on the table.

That story hit Mitch hard. As a journeyman electrician, he knows the sting of danger. He’s been locked up by live wires, left with burns, and sat alone afterward wondering how close he came to not making it home. For him, the mine story wasn’t just history—it was a mirror.

“I’ve had moments where the fear made me sit down and just breathe,” Mitch admits. “Not because I thought I’d quit, but because I realized the stakes. The people waiting for me at home.”

This is the quiet reality for countless tradesmen. Every drive to the job site, every climb up a ladder, every switch flipped—it’s risk. Not all of it is as dramatic as a mine explosion, but it’s there. And men shoulder it because someone has to.

Cancer at 30: Fighting with Half a Lung

Two years ago, Mitch’s life changed overnight. He went from pulling wire to coughing up blood, from chasing side jobs to sitting across from doctors telling him he had adenoid cystic carcinoma—a rare cancer lodged in his lung.

Most guys would crumble. Mitch’s first thoughts weren’t about himself. They were about his kids.

“It doesn’t matter if I die to me,” he said, “but it matters to my kids. They need bread. They need a dad.”

Within months, he was on the operating table, losing an entire lung. Half a million dollars in surgery and hospital bills later, he woke up alive—but changed.

He recalls the darkest days in the ICU: “My wife said I didn’t smile once. I dropped 40 pounds in eight days. I didn’t eat. I didn’t want to move. That was the lowest I’ve ever been.”

Yet even then, the provider instinct never left. “I was never not going to fight,” he says. “Because you have to.”

The Cost of Survival

It’s one thing to fight cancer. It’s another to fight cancer with a broken health insurance system.

Before surgery, Mitch’s out-of-pocket was manageable. A year later, after picking the wrong plan, the bills stacked high and fast. A PET scan that once cost him $100 was now $900. Doctor visits were $90 each—just to walk through the door. Even medication, inhalers, and routine checkups ballooned in cost.

“There are things I need to do for my health, like a sleep study, but my insurance doesn’t cover it. That’s two or three grand out of pocket. I’ll have to wait.”

This is the silent war providers fight. It’s not just about surviving surgery. It’s about surviving financially while doing it. Credit card debt, side jobs, payment plans. The burden stacks, but the answer is always the same: “We’ll figure it out.”

Balancing Work, Family, and Mental Health

Providing isn’t just money. It’s time. It’s presence. It’s memories.

Mitch talks about the battle of balancing the grind with being a father. He wants his wife at home with their kids. He wants his boys to play sports, go hunting, and have the kind of childhood that builds resilience. That means long hours and side work, but also creative ways to give his kids fun without breaking the bank—front-room camping, splash pads, and looking for deer in the mountains.

“They don’t care if it’s Disneyland or a splash pad. What they care about is time with me.”

At the same time, he’s learning to take care of himself. Whether that’s turning off the phone and playing Pokémon with his boys or hiking into the mountains with half a lung, Mitch knows that resilience requires more than work. It requires small moments of recovery.

Brotherhood and Community

One of the most powerful themes of the episode is community. Mitch admits he hates asking for help, but when cancer hit, he had no choice. His dad chipped in. His brother handed him $4,000 cash. A GoFundMe raised $11,000. His company kept him on payroll, even if it meant making him the most expensive parts runner they’d ever had.

“It’s embarrassing asking for help,” Mitch says, “but I learned that people want to step up when you let them. Sometimes providing for your family means letting your community provide for you.”

That’s a lesson men in the trades need to hear. Brotherhood isn’t weakness. It’s survival.

The Takeaway

Ironcast E2 isn’t about glory. It’s about grit. It’s about a journeyman electrician who fought through the fear of live wires, the weight of medical debt, the crushing blow of cancer—and still came out standing. Not because it was easy. Not because he had all the answers. But because his kids needed him, and because that’s what men do.

For blue-collar men, being a provider isn’t optional. It’s a burden, a blessing, and an identity. Mitch’s story is proof that even when the system fails, when your body fails, when everything seems stacked against you—you can fight, you can endure, and you can still provide.

Because at the end of the day, that’s what men were built to do.

Listen to the full episode here: [Ironcast Podcast – E2 with Mitchell Shepherd]
More stories of blue-collar resilience at: IronhideUSA.com