Transforming Lives Through Lifestyle Medicine with Dr. Maria Colon-Gonzalez

Welcome to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast with Dr. Kerry Reller! This week, I am joined by Dr. Maria Colon Gonzalez to talk about her holistic approach to healthcare through her practice "Salud Revisited." We discussed the integration of lifestyle and integrative medicine, particularly for professional women in Texas, and Maria's personal journey and development of the Type 2 Diabetes Transformation Method.

Dr. María founded saludRevisited, an Integrative and Lifestyle Medicine practice in Texas. She is the creator of the Type Diabetes Transformation Method, a 12-week group medical appointment program for professional women with Type 2 who are eager to get off their pills. While in residency, Dr. María realized the many missing links in the care she provided to her patients. She noticed patients would visit the office for medication refills but not necessarily live healthier. 

After four years in practice, she completed her training in Lifestyle Medicine; then she
retrained as a yoga instructor. She is also trained in culinary medicine and plant-based nutrition. In 2021, she started her Integrative Medicine fellowship since she believes patients deserve holistic care. She is a trauma-informed physician, recognizing that the events of harm to one's life have affected the body, mind, and spirit. Her approach to care is "your body tells a story, and you can rewrite the narrative." She is the author of Healing the Wounds of Medicine: Stories and Journaling for Physicians.

00:29 - Introduction of Dr. Maria Colon Gonzalez
01:03 - Dr. Maria discusses her background and the focus of her practice
02:08 - Dr. Maria's transition from health education to medicine
06:39 - The evolution and importance of lifestyle medicine
07:36 - Dr. Maria's personal health challenges from childhood
14:50 - The impact of environment and diet on health
20:29 - Detailed exploration of Dr. Maria’s health philosophy
24:30 - Incorporating parasympathetic activities like yoga into her routine
28:23 - How Dr. Maria translates her experiences into patient care
37:16 - Closing thoughts and where to find Dr. Maria online

Connect with Dr. Maria 
Find her writings at shineMD: www.shineMD.net
Follow FB and IG: @MDwrite2heal.
Her gift to our listeners below: https://pages.diabetessaludrevisited.com/free-guide-1
Sugar-Balance Simplify: Lower Blood Sugar Levels for Busy Professional Women
with Type 2 Diabetes

Connect with Dr. Reller
My linktree: linktr.ee/kerryrellermd
Podcast website: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprout.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClearwaterFamily
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clearwaterfamilymedicine/
Clearwater Family Medicine and Allergy Website: https://sites.google.com/view/clearwaterallergy/home

Subscribe to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, iheartradio, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Pandora.

Transcript

Kerry: 0:29

Hi, everybody. Welcome back to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kerry Reller And today we have a very special guest, Dr. Maria Colon Gonzalez, who likes to go by Dr. Maria and welcome to the podcast.

Maria: 0:43

Thank you for having me here. I'm very honored to be part of your guests

Kerry: 0:51

yes. We're super excited to have you on and to talk about you and your journey and your expertise today. So why don't you tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do, and then we can dive into our, Actual discussion.

Maria: 1:03

Yeah. So I am a lifestyle and integrative medicine physician based out of Texas, where I see patients virtually. I founded salud revisited, where is my private practice and my goal is to help successful professional women here in Texas heal naturally and come off their medications. And I'm also the creator of the type two diabetes transformation method. And this is a passion of my heart because it's related to my own story and my own journey of health, and I know the challenges that can be faced when you have This type of diagnosis and chronic medical conditions.

Kerry: 1:48

Awesome. Yes. I didn't know you had the type two diabetes method. So I'm excited to hear about that as well, but I did read about your practice is called salud revisited. Right.

Maria: 1:58

Yes. Yes.

Kerry: 2:00

I love the name.

Maria: 2:01

Yeah.

Kerry: 2:02

Cool. So why don't you tell us a little bit about, how you got to where you are then?

Maria: 2:08

Yeah. So I went into medical school thinking, that I could help people live healthier. Originally, when I was in school, I was studying health education. And I really thought, right, that what people needed was education. And then when I was like in school, I realized Oh, I think actually I can be of greater impact on people's life is if I'm a physician and I come from a family of physicians and Puerto Rico. And then I said, you know what, I really do have the brains to do this. And I decided to in a way shift my journey a little bit. I have been on the health and wellness industry since I have been 18. I was a group fitness instructor. I worked at spa. So I have always been in health and wellness industry. Once I started to see a lot of patients during residency, I really started to notice like a pattern, which is patients come quick appointments. You really don't have time to go into the issues. You're just a lot of the times refilling medications at time, maybe adjusting doses. Rarely are you taking them off medications and noticing at least in primary care, right? People come with all of these issues that they're trying to solve and very difficult to address everything. I started to become a little bit frustrated with what I was doing as a physician. And in 2018, I have a colleague that she is preventive medicine, and she was actually one of the first to sit down for the American lifestyle medicine board exams. And she introduced that to me and taking into consideration again, my background in health and wellness, where I already, you know, you don't learn about a lot of related to nutrition or sleep or stress or breathing or yoga. You don't learn about a lot of these other healing modalities in medical school, but it's a lot of what I believe in that we really should be emphasizing with our patient. So when she told me about it, I really felt in love with it And it is one of the trainings that I completed, and I did a lot more. I find that people struggle a lot with food for multiple issues that we could go into. So I did some additional training related to how to help people right? Eat healthier and change those habits, which sometimes can be very complex. And then Again, coming with that background of health and wellness and having a very holistic perspective of who people are for me, it's very important to go beyond the symptoms. So I train in integrative medicine with the Academy of Health And medicine and integrative medicine out of California and I completed this past October and really what I try to do with my practice is integrate these different modalities, but that at the same time have a lot of other healing and powerful components that go beyond writing a prescription. Because I think of that as physicians, we can do a lot more to help patients. And if we go beyond that prescription, not that that might not be indicated at some points, right? And not that that is bad. And then what I realized Even though I had completed my training and I had the knowledge, it was very challenging to integrate certain things in the normal healthcare system. So then I realized that it was not only about my knowledge, my training, but I was still in a system that was limiting me for what I wanted to do and how I wanted to practice. So then that's when I decided that I really needed to just explore and branch out and see and that's why the name of the practice is salud, which is health in Spanish and revisited, right? We're going back to see really what health means and how we can get you help get healthy beyond symptom control.

Kerry: 6:39

I love that. And I love that the lifestyle medicine board certification has come in like the recent years too. It's not that old. I think obesity medicine is a little bit older, but the lifestyle medicine has really, I guess, given us physicians that didn't get that training or nutritional training in med school and everything that we really should have to prevent disease to give us another chance and learn more about how to do that appropriately. And like you had mentioned, take people off of medicines rather than always treating with medications. So I think we are moving in the right direction, but it's just getting more people to be aware about it, to be able to help more patients. So there's a lot of people like you are creating these wonderful practices that I really, I think the future of healthcare, hopefully. So tell us about your journey where you told us, what is it? The five things that you learned growing up as a kid or right. Yeah. Tell me about that.

Maria: 7:36

Yeah. So, you know, I was actually a sick kid, one of those sick kids. I had asthma and I was like in the hospital, especially, you know, in those first couple of probably like the first decade of life because of my asthma exacerbations. I then developed when I was in elementary school. Preschool, right? Type two diabetes. And then when I was a teenager, I started to develop chronic back pain that was not getting better, right? I know what it is to do MRIs as a teenager. and that's why this personal journey that I had with my own health and my own healing, I think that is part of a lot of what has. brought me into shifting how I want to help my patients, So I'm going to specifically be talking about what I learned in my sugar or insulin resistance journey, And I have said a couple of times this story and a lot of people go like what? Because a lot of the times we think of type 2 diabetes as something that adults are going to get, a lot of the times we also think that it's only because people are obese. And the added weight. But I was a child and I was not an obese person either. I was not of a large body habitus. Yet I remember a day that I came out of the shower and my mom was in the room. Again, I was in elementary school and she noticed this rash that I had on my butt. And she asked me and I was like, I have no idea. It's not bothering me. I'm not itching or anything, right? She was very concerned. So she took me to my pediatrician and They were not exactly sure what it was. So they refer me to a dermatologist. So again, a sick child. So I know what it is to go to like multiple doctor visits and specialists and having all of these invasive procedures, even thought I have never had a surgery, thank God. And the dermatologist was like, We need to do a biopsy. And I remember, again, I was laying on my belly, so I didn't know what was going on because the biopsy was on my butt. But I can remember the dermatologist and my mom talking. I mean, not understanding what they were talking about, right? You know, and I can remember being in that table. And it was like cold, right? And I was not like cover. Again, I'm a child. I don't understand what they're doing, what's happening to my body and I got sent home, you know, to maintain the wound and when the biopsy was back, they called us in, right? And I can remember again, the physician speaking to the adult, not necessarily to me, And all of a sudden after that conversation, I got sent to get another doctor, my pediatric endocrinologist. And she was actually, I remember her older lady, she already had kind of like white hair, sitting in the very typical long, big, desk with all of the diplomas and all of this stuff. And again, this conversation with an adult, and As a child, I think one of the things that happened that maybe somebody could spoken to my level was, this is like adults having this conversation about my health, my body was going on to me. And I had no idea what it meant, what was exactly that they were talking about. I do remember that she took a prescription pad. It was those days that we have prescription pack. She wrote something. She gave it to my mom and my mom took it to school. And the only thing that happened at school was that I went from having fruits in heavy syrup, like fresh, and then from a whole fat milk to nonfat milk. So really, for me as a child, when I was diagnosed with diabetes, what I understood was there's something wrong with my body that I cannot eat the same thing. And you need to think about it, right? As a kid, all of a sudden I'm being told not to eat sweets. Not to eat candies, And I am being told to use like the artificial sweeteners and in my family, there is history of type one. I have a cousin that has type one and then I have an aunt growing up that I cannot remember if she was type one or type two, but she has actually lost her sight because of her diabetes. And I remember my grandmother, every time that she would see me eating something that was not right the fear that she would put of like, you're going to stay blind like your aunt. So, I think that the other thing that I learned, if you are a patient and you have people talking about your health, Yes, as a child is hard, but once you start to grow up and understand, hey, ask questions because you do want to be able to understand the disease process, the diagnosis, what is it that just happened? Been here in your body because sometimes that can help you understand how to fix it you know, the other thing that I learned was Fear doesn't help We can try to scare people into if you do not do x this can happen But the reality is that does not help me Right, and I remember because there were certain sweets that I really like, there were times that I would hide to eat them, because again, I was a child, and growing up, I then felt that I was different. There was this sense of like, I am different than everybody else. And so how do I deal with that? And I think that also in that journey, I learned How important it is that if you do not understand if they're giving you messages and still your body's not feeling good Because trust me my body wouldn't feel good when I would have the candies that at that time had artificial Sweeteners that then will give you bloating and diarrhea. Diarrhea if you ate too much of them. So my body was not feeling good, I was like, okay, I can't eat sweets. But then if I do it this way My belly is still like uh uh So when those things happen, getting this empowerment or motivation to yourself, then look outside. And I remember one of the things that I had growing up. I would go with my mom to do grocery store to go grocery shopping with a magazine. And I can't remember the name of the magazine, but I can remember that it was a special edition about the rainbow. Oh, and the food colors and the rainbow of the foods. And if you know anything about the typical Puerto Rican diet, it really does not include a lot of like rainbows and vegetables specifically, we're very good at doing like the rice and the beans, and breads and we have our own Kind of like bamboozle like the Mexicans do, right? Do those sweet treats. So one of the things was that I kind of like, okay, I was already different from my family. So then I was like even more different and here I am eating mushrooms, and me myself, I started to do that, and it was in that process of me kind of like taking action and experimenting that I started to then learn. Oh, wait a second my body now feels better than with the artificial sweeteners and the candy that have artificial sweeteners. So I would say that's number three of something that I learned, you know, growing up in my own health journey. The other thing that I learned and I think, you know, this was not so much as a child I think that this was more in retrospect with the knowledge that now I already have. Stress is real. And even if you are taking your medications, you're eating right, you're trying to do all of these other things, yet you live in a stressful environment. There is you know, the, we talk about the adverse childhood events, When there is a lot of that, when in your family there is a lot of I'm going to say the word conflict, not necessarily dysfunction, but a lot of conflict, right? When you are not sleeping well for certain reasons, right? And you're going from this, to this, to this, to this. One of the things that I learned was I grew up living more in sympathetic and I didn't know what that was or how that actually even felt in the body. But what I really understand is that that was affecting me as a child. And a lot of the times, again, we really focus on changing food. We really focus on, Hey, get to the movement. But I think that especially in the American culture or the Western society. We focus less on this component of what I like to say, sympathetic versus parasympathetic, where are you living? And I think that part of the reason is because that means that you will have to, in a way, say no to a lot of the things that society says that you need to do or be able to do. In order to achieve. And yes, some of the things that were going on when I was growing up, I was, they were not under my control, right? But those things, that now as an adult, now that I understand I do have control over, I really try to be very jealous about those. And then finally, you know, the last lesson that I learned. And not only specifically with my diagnosis of diabetes, but also with my chronic back pain. And then my asthma is that not because you have a medical condition today, and perhaps you will be going to the doctors or you're getting admitted to the hospital or the MRIs. That absolutely does not mean that 10 years from now was how you're going to live. And I think that that's a lot of patients Go into that fear I don't want to take medications. How long is it going to be? And the reality is, look, you don't have to live sick. There's a lot of things that you as an individual, you can do to live healthy, to live whole, to regain your energy, your mobility, to not live in pain. And to enjoy certain foods without, you know, fear without control. And that's the journey that takes time. And sometimes what happens is that we continue to approach our bodies and health as the microwave culture, The quick, the fast, the But if you really want to be healthy and not have all of that, those medical conditions, the one thing that I would say, Hey, give your body grace, time, compassion and patience. And just know that if each day you're doing things. each those little like days and all of those little pieces will take you slowly to where you want to be and how you want to live. And in that journey, you will discover things that if you continue to do them long term, because a lot of people say, Oh, but then it comes back. My experience has been, if you stop doing the things that got you healthy the first time. And yes, we cannot control everything about our bodies or about our health. Things can happen. But my invitation is to embrace that your body was not designed like this machine, like a microwave. Give your body time and it will start to heal from the inside out.

Kerry: 20:29

That was amazing. Let's unpack it a little bit. That's it was a lot of, a lot of, a lot of good stuff. Random question is I have to know what was the rash. Do you remember? Cause what rash is associated with that?

Maria: 20:42

Yeah, so what I can remember is that it was like this circular marks that the biggest concern that my pediatrician had was that somebody was burning me at home or in school with cigarettes. So they really look like cigarette marks. So think of the ringworm type of rash that has like the, I say like the donut, right? The two circles, so it had kind of like that double circle and then again, like the scale is on top, but it was not itchy. And you know that ringworm can get like very, very big. These were smaller, kind of like cigarette marks all over my butt and my back and that's where the rash came out. So again, I'm, you know, I didn't even know that the rash was there.

Kerry: 21:30

And that led to them sending you to an endocrinologist and diagnosing diabetes?

Maria: 21:35

so that led to a dermatologist. Who did a biopsy and then the biopsy showed that it was due to my blood sugar level and then that led to the pediatric and acronologists

Kerry: 21:49

Yeah, I guess I was asking, how did that lead to the blood sugar level? I don't know what it would have been. What rash? For knowledge, for knowledge.

Maria: 21:58

Right, and one of the things that I say is there's still a lot that we do not understand specifically about type 2 diabetes Because when you think about the symptoms that people present with, you know, in terms of type 2 diabetes, a rash is not something that you say, oh, well, let me check your blood sugar level. Let me, let me do an autopsy, right? You don't. And I, I cannot remember what the biopsy read, and I'll be very honest. I haven't even looked to see if there are case reports about it. But what I can tell you was whatever they saw microscopically, there was something in the results of the biopsy that what was provoking the rash was my high blood sugar level.

Kerry: 22:41

Okay. It's very interesting. So you came from like a physician household, right? And not a very strong family history of diabetes. It sounds like it's not really like the immediate family. Correct.

Maria: 22:54

so my mom, yeah, my mom has type two diabetes

Kerry: 22:58

did she at that time, though?

Maria: 23:00

I don't think so. I think that probably when she was older, yeah, I know that she has suffered from hypothyroidism, which, you know, is autoimmune for like all of her life, but I don't think that the type two was at that time.

Kerry: 23:15

Yeah, so you kind of being the first to navigate it, really, in your immediate family, but all these other relatives know, and you're, you know, a child, and they're trying to help direct you to what you should or shouldn't eat, and I can see how that can obviously create that fear of You know, goodness, what's going to happen when you eat these things, and wanting them anyway, as kids would and then having to hide to eat it is not, it's not good. And then what's wonderful is that you realize it doesn't make you feel good. So I'm always telling people, you know, we don't eat, but doesn't make us feel good. Right? Yeah.

Maria: 23:50

hmm.

Kerry: 23:51

it was a fairly good you know, approach. Obviously that's important to teach people that what you're eating can make you feel good or bad. And you're really to learn and figure out what that is.

Maria: 24:04

Yeah. Pay attention to the signals that your own body sent to you,

Kerry: 24:08

yes. Yes. And then one thing you didn't mention, but you were talking about always living in this sympathetic state and not this parasympathetic state is you eventually got into yoga and things like that. And that probably took some time, but how did you start incorporating the parasympathetic state as you're going through this journey.

Maria: 24:30

that's a very good question. So I started to do yoga when I was a teenager because of my back pain, And there was not a lot of things that were helping my back pain and then I remember this time. It was my dad that went to my PMR doctor and she was like, well, we need to do surgery. You know, she's not getting any better. She's in a lot of pain. Look how she is. And my dad asked a couple of questions about the surgery. And I'm, you know, I'm talking more than 20 years ago and my dad was like, Ooh, no, you're telling me that she might not be better. She might actually be worse. We're not going to be going to do surgery. And yes, I practice yoga. My back pain would get better and I would feel more mellow and this, this is what I can, you know, tell you without going into a lot of the history, but I was still living with all the aces. It was actually not until COVID that I started to do, again, trauma therapy, but trauma therapy that is in the body. There's different modalities. So this is more in the body. And then, you know, when it was like at the worst of COVID, when we were at the worst of COVID, I would just come home from work and I would just literally lay in the hammock the rest of the evening. when that happened that I started to notice, oh my god, this feels different. And as I started to notice how my body just feels more calm. There's less what I say like tension in my muscles, I'm more, it's beyond being relaxed, right? Is this, I don't have weight in my body already. I can take a deep breath. People do not even know what taking a deep breath a lot of the times are. And then I started to learn things that helped me because we will always have stressors in life. But then what is it that I can do to manage that right from yoga, breath, journaling, meditation. To even creating, you know, in my schedule, a lot of what I do nowadays is that I create a lot of margin, a lot, a lot of a lot of margin and anything that asked somebody that train as a physician, right? I know what it is to work. How many hours a day, I see all these patients then come home sitting at the top of your computer. Do more AMR kind of like work and that's why I say that I feel that this coming out of sympathetic, of stress, of tension, of demanding of your body to do more than what your body can really do of living, you know, in systems where there is conflict, pain, abuse, right? How to move out of that and how to become guarded of your relationships because we do need healthy relationships. I think that that's a longer journey and So there are some things that as a person and as an individual you might be able to do by yourself, but I think that that's something that really requires other people in your life because again, growing up, even though I was doing yoga, I still did not feel like that. And then I have started to realize what it is, and especially when I forget my margin, I automatically start to feel the anxiety and the stress. And when my body starts to become like tension, and I'm holding it in, and I'm throwing and, Clenching at nighttime. I'm like, oops, not good. Reverse, reverse, reverse.

Kerry: 28:23

Wow. Yeah. So how do you take all of these experiences and everything that you've learned and translate it into helping your patients?

Maria: 28:31

Yeah. So one, I think this more holistic perspective, where, yes, I think that diet and nourishment and the type of foods that we eat and choose are extremely important and Yes, I want my patients to like move and sleep well, but then I incorporate a lot of the being, who you are, what's going on in your environment, what stressors do you have? Because it doesn't matter what I try to do or what I prescribe. You if you're still in an environment that does not help you to achieve health, you still have challenges, And these can be related to not only environment in terms of the people, right, and conflicts, but this can be as something as simple as you live in a place that the train passes and there's all of this contamination, right? We have to take those things into consideration. The other thing is I tend to give my patients a lot of options. And this, for some patients is challenging because some patients, you want a little bit more prescriptive approach, but what I do is that I tell him, Hey, you know, we can either do this and order these tests do this treatment. We can either do this and I try to allow patients to have a say on their treatment to have a say on where they want their health to go to. Because I believe, again, I remember that child where the adults were always having conversations, right? Even as a teenager, you know, the PMR doctor with my dad deciding about surgery or not, right? It was always. Like I was like this third party, so I try as much as possible to give my patients the opportunity to be kind of like a little bit more in control, providing them with like the knowledge and the expertise that I have. The other thing is that there are some more gentle healing modalities, that are available for people to heal, feel well. I'm a strong believer for issues related a little bit more to mental health, depending on the diagnosis. You've seen herbs, you've seen acupuncture, you've seen aromatherapy can be very, very effective because a lot of patients don't have a good experiences with the side effects of some of those mental health medications, So I try to offer, you know, to patients more dental modalities of healing first before we Go into things that can be a little bit more aggressive or invasive Knowing that if that's needed I let them know also. Hey, I think that that's needed at this time.

Kerry: 31:27

Yeah, no, that's a great approach. And I think that brings in your integrative part of your training, right. In addition to obviously the lifestyle part. So that's, that's really a great way to practice. Awesome. I did have one funny question cause I was perusing your website. And so obviously in Tampa we have like, you know, the Cuban population and pasteles are a big thing here. And I think I think my grandpa used to always bring them to us and it's filled with not what is it? Guava, guava. And you had mentioned that one of your favorite things is a pasteles. And then it was, what is it? guayabana or what was it? Yeah.

Maria: 32:07

Yeah,

Kerry: 32:07

It is the guava. Okay. So there's, well, there's another guayabana. I don't know how to say it because I don't know if it's actually in Portuguese or Spanish, but I can never find it. And I think it's delicious. We don't have it here, but so I thought it might be guayabana, but it's guava. So it's g u a y a b a n a, right? Is the

Maria: 32:28

Guajaba. Yeah, guajaba. Yes! That is

Kerry: 32:33

you've learned to incorporate those things, your journey of having diabetes, but you still are able to enjoy them and eat them in, you know, a certain way that they aren't affecting your blood sugar, I'm assuming. Yeah.

Maria: 32:45

Yes, and that is, you know, like in a blue moon, right? I eat pizza from time to time. But that's not the way that I nourish my body every day. And then, yes for example, I wouldn't, I usually have the best ideas when I travel to Puerto Rico, like here in Houston, even thought there is a big Hispanic community where I am, and everybody that sells them is like an hour. So I just don't drive. I hate driving. But if I'm going to have something like that, I am cautious of like not have it after I have been fasting for like a very long time, because I'm going to get the palpitations and kind of like dizzy foggy mind, right? I tried to do it with a meal or after I have had a meal. I wouldn't mix it with like alcohol that at the same time will have that effect on your blood sugar level. So the, you know, those tricks, let's just put it that way, of how can you enjoy certain things from time to time, even that I use the word tricks, it's not of like, oh well let me learn how I can cheat and do certain things for my body. I think is more a way of giving yourself the grace and the space that hey, you know, if I'm traveling to Puerto Rico, which is I don't do it not even every year at this point. There are certain foods that I grew up with that I super enjoy. Well, I'm going to, while I'm there, give myself that opportunity, knowing that I cannot super overindulge. Or, you know, give myself the grace of, if today was a very hectic day, and I haven't cooked, and I'm super tired, It's okay if I, you know, eat out right. If I do certain things, and I, I think that that also comes after you have done some work. In terms of, I think that this is really important in terms of what people call, like the cravings and indulging and giving in. I think that there is a mindset component and relationship with food that as somebody that lives not only with type two diabetes, but there are certain medical conditions that are really affected by what you eat, you first have to heal that relationship. And because a lot of patients tell me, Oh my God, it's the cravings, the cravings, the cravings, or is that everybody else at home is eating this. And then I am not, which I never recommend. I always recommend that the changes are done for everybody in the family. at the end of the day, if it's good for one person is probably good for the other people at home. so, yeah, I enjoy them when I go to Puerto Rico. I usually have at least one or two. Sometimes if my mom is traveling, she will bring them to me because of yeah, all like the desserts out there. That's like my favorite. Favorite one. Like, I love. Yeah, I love it.

Kerry: 35:59

Yeah. You, it's worth it. You plan for it. You're aware that you're going to be planning to have it when you go there if your mom brings it back. I think that's, that's a really great way to put it. And, you know, being, it's important to know that those things can be included in your life and give yourself grace. I think that's a great, great way to put it. So do you have anything else to tell our listeners?

Maria: 36:22

You know, my I think my message for everybody is so I talk about the liminal space, right? The space in your health journey where you're not completely like healthier out of your medications, but you're there. And in that space, the liminal space, you will need help. You will need support, you will need guidance, and not only of health professionals, there's people that have only also told me they even have to start changing their friends because of the influence. So in that liminal space, there is hope. Do not give up on yourself and your health journey, but then know that for that, there is hope. You do need people, and you do need the right community, the right support, the right accountability, and it's out there. There is good help and there is hope for your help.

Kerry: 37:16

That's a very important message to, yeah, support and accountability are definitely helpful. Great. Well, how can people find you if they want to, you know, find more about you or whatever you're putting out there, social media, what, how can they find you?

Maria: 37:30

Yeah, so website, www salud revisited, that's S-A-L-U-D. R. E. V. I. S. I. T. E. D. dot com. And then you can follow me also on social media, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube at salud revisted

Kerry: 37:52

perfect. Well, thank you. We'll put all that in the show notes. And thank you so much for being on the podcast today, Dr. Maria, and everybody tune in next week to see what we have for you.

Maria: 38:02

Thank you.

Kerry: 38:03

You're welcome.