WEBVTT - Living With Endometriosis (w/ Sarah Michal Hamid) 0:00:00.920 --> 0:00:04.680 Good morning, good afternoon, good evening. You are tuned into 0:00:04.680 --> 0:00:07.040 the Vitamin D with dwn Day podcast and I am 0:00:07.080 --> 0:00:09.640 your host, Dawn Day, here to get you excited about 0:00:09.680 --> 0:00:11.640 your life so that you can live life on purpose 0:00:11.640 --> 0:00:13.720 and for a purpose. And this is your first time 0:00:13.760 --> 0:00:17.040 tuning in and welcome Vitamin D. It's upon of my name. 0:00:17.320 --> 0:00:19.280 My name is Dawn and you get Vitamin D from 0:00:19.280 --> 0:00:21.440 the sun. So I'm here to shed light into your life. 0:00:21.640 --> 0:00:25.000 And I do this with inspirational insights and conversations with 0:00:25.040 --> 0:00:28.040 celebrities and everyday people like you and me, Because if 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:30.000 you want to be better and you want to do better, 0:00:30.520 --> 0:00:32.760 then you're going to have to be able to see better. 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:35.760 So join me on this journey of living our best 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:39.760 lives and understanding and realizing how you are your greatest 0:00:39.760 --> 0:00:44.000 ass act. Let me tell you something, going after your 0:00:44.080 --> 0:00:48.280 dreams isn't easy. They say dreams don't work unless you 0:00:48.400 --> 0:00:54.400 do so what you're doing? Mm hmm. Have you ever 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:57.320 heard the quote that, um, it's not about the size 0:00:57.400 --> 0:01:00.160 of the dog in the fight, it's about the as 0:01:00.160 --> 0:01:03.040 of the fight and the dog. Well, I gotta ask 0:01:03.080 --> 0:01:07.399 you something. How big is your fighting your dog? M hm? 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:10.679 You know, we have these dreams and aspirations and a 0:01:10.720 --> 0:01:14.000 lot of the things that we want, uh, But sometimes 0:01:14.040 --> 0:01:18.200 I wonder how bad do we really want it? Because 0:01:19.120 --> 0:01:23.759 oftentimes we come into a situation we make these things 0:01:23.840 --> 0:01:29.199 called excuses as to why we couldn't do something while 0:01:29.200 --> 0:01:31.839 we can't show up, why aren't we there on time? 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:36.520 Not wanting to be uncomfortable? But then I gotta ask you, 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:41.000 how big is your fighting your dog? Now? Usually we 0:01:41.000 --> 0:01:42.680 look at the size of the dog of as far 0:01:42.720 --> 0:01:46.360 as people have access, uh, people who have notoriety, people 0:01:46.360 --> 0:01:49.520 who have a social media following, people that come with 0:01:49.720 --> 0:01:53.480 a wholesome family, some people that may not have any 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:58.400 mental disorders or physical disabilities, but they ain't got nothing 0:01:58.400 --> 0:02:01.800 to do with the fighting the dog. Let me just 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.720 tell you, even with myself, you can't allow people to 0:02:05.760 --> 0:02:11.040 tell you know, when I first applied to Howard, I 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:15.640 didn't get accepted. Now easily that could affect in my ego, 0:02:15.880 --> 0:02:20.240 right and me showing up in my ego the biggest dog, like, 0:02:20.240 --> 0:02:23.079 oh my god, I didn't get in. And I had 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:25.080 to say, wait a minute, Dawn, this ain't about whether 0:02:25.160 --> 0:02:28.480 or not you're smart enough. Because you're an honor roll 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:31.520 you're you're honor student, you're active on campus, you are 0:02:31.600 --> 0:02:37.000 president of student council. This had to come with the 0:02:37.120 --> 0:02:40.840 moment of how bad are you willing to fight? And see, 0:02:40.840 --> 0:02:43.440 that's when you got a mother lying in Janice Hill. Hey, 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:46.760 she gonna remind you that there is nothing that you 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:51.239 cannot do. She's gonna fuel she has she still does 0:02:51.560 --> 0:02:55.320 fuel the fight in my dog. So down, what did 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:57.119 you do? Oh well, let me tell you what I did. 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:01.400 I wrote Howard. Now I did say president. I was 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.680 at the secretary student council in high school. That's neither 0:03:04.680 --> 0:03:08.280 here nor there. I wrote Howard and told them my 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:11.720 qualifications because perhaps it's just the fact that I didn't 0:03:11.800 --> 0:03:17.120 test well, huh. But my fight persuaded me, gave me 0:03:17.160 --> 0:03:23.040 the ammunition to rebuke their verdict. And guess what, the 0:03:23.160 --> 0:03:26.760 verdict was changed. Not only did I graduate from Howard, 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:31.880 I graduated with honors and I hosted my graduation. So 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:35.080 don't sit here and tell me what you cannot do, 0:03:36.400 --> 0:03:38.600 because it's not about the size of the dog in 0:03:38.680 --> 0:03:42.360 the fight. It's about the size of the fight and 0:03:42.480 --> 0:03:50.080 the dog. Let's go right with me and get excited 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:56.160 about Hello. Let me tell you I got somebody's special 0:03:56.160 --> 0:03:59.400 in the studio with me. Now, I was asking Jeremiah, 0:03:59.480 --> 0:04:04.200 I should know this is it Michael or McCall, you're 0:04:04.400 --> 0:04:09.400 super super close. It's me Hall. It's like a you know, 0:04:10.360 --> 0:04:19.520 cuse yes, yes. So it's complicated. But my mom's Jewish, 0:04:19.520 --> 0:04:24.960 she's Ashkenazi, so she's like Eastern European basically, but like 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:29.200 they have very unique like culture from like Russians and 0:04:29.279 --> 0:04:33.039 Ukrainians and stuff. And then my dad was born in Pakistan. 0:04:33.520 --> 0:04:37.640 But we're from two different ethnic groups, both of which 0:04:37.680 --> 0:04:41.520 are like indigenous groups basically, So I'm Punjabi and Kashmidi, 0:04:41.640 --> 0:04:44.240 and then I'm from like two patrilineal tribes. So it's 0:04:44.360 --> 0:04:51.839 very confusing. So, like we understand ancestry to descend from 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:55.919 the father, so patrilineal means it comes from your father's side. 0:04:56.120 --> 0:04:59.560 But then on my mom's side, everything is matrilineal, so 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:02.440 it's with the mother. So it's very interesting. So you say, start, 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:06.599 what do you mean by that, Like like you know 0:05:06.640 --> 0:05:09.159 those stories like in the Bible, like Sarah, you know 0:05:09.200 --> 0:05:11.800 how she was like the mother of nations, so it's 0:05:11.880 --> 0:05:15.320 like the matriarch of the family. Also, you're the way 0:05:15.320 --> 0:05:21.120 you grew up. Christianity is not something that that's so interesting. 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:24.480 It's so interesting that you say that because I had 0:05:24.720 --> 0:05:26.800 first I had never been in a church until I 0:05:26.880 --> 0:05:29.840 was like eighteen years old, like an actual religious church. 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:33.520 I had been to like old churches or like food 0:05:33.520 --> 0:05:35.280 donations stuff like that, but I had never been to 0:05:35.360 --> 0:05:39.200 a church service. And I think that once I went, 0:05:39.440 --> 0:05:41.560 everyone was doing all these different things that it was 0:05:41.600 --> 0:05:45.200 foreign to me. So it felt like the first time 0:05:45.279 --> 0:05:48.120 I was learning so much about Christianity. I didn't know 0:05:48.160 --> 0:05:50.320 that when people put their hands up it's like to God. 0:05:50.560 --> 0:05:53.520 I did not know that. How was I supposed to know? Like? 0:05:53.600 --> 0:05:56.960 How would I know? When I was in Kenya, I 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.760 was talking to the Homeida. I should know his name 0:05:59.839 --> 0:06:01.800 right out of my phone, is right, it don't matter. 0:06:02.480 --> 0:06:04.320 I was asking him. I was like, you know, what's 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:06.640 what's your background like with faith or religion? He was 0:06:06.680 --> 0:06:08.839 talking about, you know, something of God and Jesus. I 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:11.160 was like, how do you How does your people know 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:14.599 about Jesus, like just geographically speaking, and how the messages 0:06:14.640 --> 0:06:17.520 like oh, you mean my grandfather's religion, let's talk about 0:06:17.560 --> 0:06:22.560 that um And basically grandfather, grandmother, but just before there 0:06:22.640 --> 0:06:25.760 was a thing of Christianity, So you had never heard 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:28.279 of God or Jesus. Well, I mean, obviously I knew 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:30.880 what God and Jesus was, but like, okay, so like 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:33.360 Jesus is the son of God, but then Jesus died 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:36.240 for everyone's sins and then Jesus is God but also 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:40.640 the son and marries a virgin, like and I'm a 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:44.279 birth worker, so I'm like, that's how you make a baby. 0:06:44.600 --> 0:06:48.919 Like something was up in her like come on? How else? 0:06:49.440 --> 0:06:54.240 Was like like what? What? Really? Do we really like, 0:06:54.320 --> 0:06:56.240 come on with all the sperm that was in the 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.680 world and really like, let's think about that rack sleep 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:04.279 because we want to Wow, you're ready for a real conversation. 0:07:04.320 --> 0:07:06.960 And here, oh yeah, you know. I think it's important 0:07:06.960 --> 0:07:08.520 because I was just talking to a home girl of 0:07:08.520 --> 0:07:10.840 mine and she was telling me her daughter is twelve 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:13.560 years old and thinks that a baby comes from a swan. 0:07:14.280 --> 0:07:17.200 She probably mean a steward, she said swan, And I 0:07:17.240 --> 0:07:20.200 said really, And I didn't mean to judge, but I 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:22.160 feel like I don't know about in your background, but 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.840 I want to say African American communities. I don't know 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:27.280 if we talk about sex enough and talking about where 0:07:27.360 --> 0:07:30.920 children come from and your genitalia in general, of what 0:07:31.000 --> 0:07:34.080 it even looks like. It's don't say anything. And you know, 0:07:34.120 --> 0:07:36.760 I've had an individual, Kiana, she was on the show 0:07:36.800 --> 0:07:38.560 and she was just talking talking about how she had 0:07:38.560 --> 0:07:41.800 been involved in um sex trafficking, how she had been raped, 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:44.360 she had been molested, and that whole hush hush, And 0:07:44.360 --> 0:07:46.960 it's like, we need to be more open with this dialogue, 0:07:47.000 --> 0:07:49.720 in this conversation and not acting like some fairy dust 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:53.280 just came out of nowhere. And I think it's hard 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:57.120 to because people I want to do what's best for 0:07:57.160 --> 0:08:00.680 their kids, and they think that keeping information on them 0:08:00.840 --> 0:08:04.520 is protecting them in some way. But ultimately what that 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:08.200 does is it drives people to the Internet, which is 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:11.480 like you so you don't want your kid to know 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:15.800 about how they became a person, which one I think 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:17.760 is a problem because I think it's normal to talk 0:08:17.800 --> 0:08:20.680 about how we enter the world. That's something that is 0:08:21.400 --> 0:08:24.720 common to every human. You know, we were made like, 0:08:24.840 --> 0:08:29.320 that's not an uncommon experience. But to then have that 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:32.520 and then kids going to the Internet, it's just they're 0:08:32.520 --> 0:08:39.920 primed for exploitation and for misinformation about their own bodies. 0:08:40.080 --> 0:08:43.880 You know, it's really weird. It's really weird. I love 0:08:43.880 --> 0:08:47.000 how you described yourself. You said, I'm a birthworker. Yes, 0:08:47.800 --> 0:08:51.760 does that mean? Okay, so a birthworker is someone that 0:08:52.120 --> 0:08:54.520 works in birth or with birth. I think of it 0:08:54.800 --> 0:09:00.120 so like yourself. You know, you're creative. You have this 0:09:00.559 --> 0:09:03.800 calling in some way that keeps you going despite how 0:09:03.840 --> 0:09:08.800 difficult it is. You know how frustrating it can be 0:09:09.080 --> 0:09:13.640 to navigate the field or you know, partnerships or whatever, 0:09:14.600 --> 0:09:17.800 just the same way that I get tired of standing up, 0:09:18.040 --> 0:09:21.720 and you know, I am often up for long hours 0:09:21.760 --> 0:09:24.600 at late hours, almost always covered in baby vomit of 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:28.959 some sorts. But we have this calling, you know. For me, 0:09:29.440 --> 0:09:33.319 I feel like it definitely was something that came from 0:09:33.400 --> 0:09:36.640 my ancestors, and for that I was just like, whoa, 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:38.880 what's happening? Like it was the first time I had 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:44.599 felt that kind of reconnection to ancestry, which was gray. 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:48.040 But once I realized that, I was like, Okay, basically, 0:09:48.120 --> 0:09:52.040 this means for me that I'm going to have my 0:09:52.120 --> 0:09:55.320 hands and arms wrapped around like families and mothers and 0:09:55.360 --> 0:09:58.160 birthing people for probably like the rest of my life, 0:09:58.200 --> 0:10:02.560 you know. Yeah, And and it just came to you 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:04.440 one day to be like I'm going to be dealing 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:08.440 with yeah, So it didn't just come to me one day. 0:10:08.559 --> 0:10:15.240 So throughout my life, I've always appreciated kids because they 0:10:15.520 --> 0:10:20.040 don't know boundaries really that well. So everything that they're 0:10:20.120 --> 0:10:23.520 learning is typically for the first time or the first 0:10:23.600 --> 0:10:27.640 few times. And so with a baby, you see that rapidly, 0:10:27.760 --> 0:10:30.880 Like babies developed so quickly, you know, they learned how 0:10:30.880 --> 0:10:35.960 to move, walk, talk, like within six months, Like what 0:10:36.000 --> 0:10:38.120 do we do in six months? Like we're in our 0:10:38.160 --> 0:10:40.320 adult lives, and what do we do in six months? 0:10:40.320 --> 0:10:41.760 Like I could not tell you what I did this 0:10:41.840 --> 0:10:45.000 last six months, but you can see the observations in 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:48.760 a new human And so I've always loved kids. And 0:10:48.800 --> 0:10:53.120 then I was working at this government commission in Hawaii 0:10:53.160 --> 0:10:56.480 about women, and we were working on this feminists like 0:10:56.640 --> 0:11:00.760 recovery plan for COVID because all of a COVID like 0:11:00.920 --> 0:11:05.160 funding was like police, you know, sending it out to 0:11:05.320 --> 0:11:08.680 like places that did not need money. You know, the 0:11:08.760 --> 0:11:14.640 police don't need more money or anything, but that's that, 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:19.280 that's that. But um, we were basically advocating for money 0:11:19.320 --> 0:11:22.880 to be put into like community Healthcare Midwiffree Services, and 0:11:22.920 --> 0:11:27.160 that's where I met my mentor, um Tanya Smith Johnson. 0:11:27.320 --> 0:11:31.320 She's the current president of the National College of Midwiffrey. 0:11:31.400 --> 0:11:35.079 She's the first black president of the National College of Midwiffrey. 0:11:35.280 --> 0:11:39.839 So she's always she's always rooting me on, and I 0:11:39.880 --> 0:11:42.720 always like to give her shout outs because if I 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:44.840 didn't meet her, I think it would have been really 0:11:44.920 --> 0:11:49.160 really hard for me to figure out like what to do, 0:11:49.320 --> 0:11:52.640 because it's not easy, you know, like what happens when 0:11:52.679 --> 0:11:54.800 you make wake up one day and you're like, I 0:11:54.800 --> 0:11:56.640 want to be a midway, Like what do you do? 0:11:56.840 --> 0:11:59.880 Where do you go? You look towards like schools and stuff, 0:12:00.480 --> 0:12:03.360 and the schools that we have here are not the best. 0:12:03.679 --> 0:12:07.120 Necessarily we have like two three midwid free programs just 0:12:07.160 --> 0:12:13.000 in California, two and three. It's like like this is 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:16.280 a whole new world in my brain, like, of course 0:12:16.280 --> 0:12:19.040 this is something or a position or a field of 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:24.640 career that is definitely a needed valued But I never 0:12:24.720 --> 0:12:28.840 thought to think like what this person does, like how 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:32.120 important they are in the process. And so just hearing 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:35.320 you're talking about like how you kind of dived in 0:12:35.360 --> 0:12:37.560 there was interesting and then as I was looking at 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:41.680 you further, it's interesting that you did choose this career 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:46.480 path and you yourself have challenges with your how do 0:12:46.559 --> 0:12:51.920 we um with endometriosis? And that was another big thing 0:12:52.160 --> 0:12:58.079 was my experience like basically being forced to navigate the O. 0:12:58.200 --> 0:13:01.160 B G. I. N's office since I was is thirteen 0:13:01.240 --> 0:13:04.360 years old? What's going on a third day? For some 0:13:04.400 --> 0:13:07.120 of them may don't know what's endometriosis? So, yeah, So 0:13:07.360 --> 0:13:12.520 endometriosis is a disease that basically happens when the uterine 0:13:12.559 --> 0:13:18.199 lining doesn't fully well. It sheds, but it makes adhesions 0:13:18.240 --> 0:13:20.640 on other parts of the pelvic area. But it can 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:23.840 also be found like in your brain. So it's kind 0:13:23.880 --> 0:13:27.439 of like the worst thing ever. Yeah, but so it's 0:13:27.440 --> 0:13:31.720 like attaching skin. Yeah, So it makes adhesions, It layers 0:13:31.760 --> 0:13:35.040 these cells that over time caused these kind of like 0:13:35.160 --> 0:13:42.440 exactly like fibrous almost at times, but ultimately like binding materials. 0:13:42.559 --> 0:13:46.480 So I had to have a surgery called excuse me, 0:13:46.840 --> 0:13:51.440 bilateral laparoscopic Ablatian surgery for endometriosis. And they basically just 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:53.320 put a camera in your belly button and then in 0:13:53.400 --> 0:13:56.319 other parts of your stomach. They fill it with gas 0:13:56.360 --> 0:13:59.680 and they like burn and kind of cauterize out the 0:14:00.280 --> 0:14:05.839 you know, diseased parts. And I had like adhesions basically 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:08.959 like fusing part of the back of my uterus to 0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:12.520 my bladder. It's just like, how did you find out 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:17.360 about this? Okay, so at Thursday. So this surgery happened 0:14:17.360 --> 0:14:22.080 when I was eighteen, But fast forward. I've always struggled 0:14:22.080 --> 0:14:26.040 with my menstrual cycle. It was something that the first 0:14:26.080 --> 0:14:29.680 time I got it, I was so shocked because I 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:34.880 genuinely was surprised that I was just losing that much blood. 0:14:35.160 --> 0:14:38.400 I was I had just turned twelve, I remember, and 0:14:38.400 --> 0:14:40.400 I remember like I was walking home from school and 0:14:40.400 --> 0:14:44.680 I was like, uh uh, something's not right. Like I 0:14:44.680 --> 0:14:46.280 could just feel and I was like, oh my gosh, 0:14:46.280 --> 0:14:48.600 I'm bleeding. I was like, this is my period. But 0:14:48.680 --> 0:14:51.520 it was a lot. And that first year that I 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:53.880 had my menstrual cycle, it was just like I would 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:57.840 bleed and bleed and bleed, like it was like it 0:14:57.920 --> 0:15:01.040 was NonStop, and it was very be painful, Like I 0:15:01.120 --> 0:15:06.760 was like so much pain that I like I wouldn't 0:15:06.760 --> 0:15:08.080 want to do the things I wanted to do. When 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:13.480 I was their teens, like, you know, that's typically not 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:16.520 something necessarily that thirteen year old struggle with. So I 0:15:16.560 --> 0:15:19.960 felt isolated too because I was like growing up in 0:15:20.040 --> 0:15:24.200 also like a South Asian household. Like you know, the 0:15:24.240 --> 0:15:29.280 way menstruation is treated is very like interesting. Um, I 0:15:29.320 --> 0:15:32.280 don't say bad or wrong, but you know, there's this 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:35.920 assumption that like you really shouldn't do much when you're menstruating, right, 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:38.560 like you should really rest, which I actually like find 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:41.920 value in. But that also kind of comes from the 0:15:41.960 --> 0:15:46.000 idea that you could potentially be like contagious and leave 0:15:46.000 --> 0:15:50.560 her alone and buy her even to today. Yeah, I 0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:52.840 think I've heard I don't know what culture is in 0:15:52.920 --> 0:15:56.360 my brain. I could be messed up. Uh, Like I 0:15:56.360 --> 0:15:58.800 imagine I've seen something read something where there in the 0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:01.960 tent and nobody can go in there, and I don't 0:16:01.960 --> 0:16:05.680 know if there's Washington, but I just imagine very disgusting 0:16:07.080 --> 0:16:10.480 and it's it's really weird because I don't think that 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:13.080 it has to be negative, but I definitely think that 0:16:13.160 --> 0:16:16.760 the way that like a lot of our communities engage 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:20.440 with it is stigmatizing. You know, it's just sad because 0:16:20.480 --> 0:16:23.800 like life comes from this passage exactly and it's the 0:16:24.240 --> 0:16:27.200 it's it's a uniting experience, you know, like we we'll 0:16:27.240 --> 0:16:31.480 all have it, you know, we can we can know that. 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:34.760 I mean some people don't, but there's a lot of 0:16:34.760 --> 0:16:39.440 people you can rely on. Despite this, you know, I 0:16:39.480 --> 0:16:42.080 still was like, Okay, I'm so young. I was one 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:43.760 of the first of my friends to have my period. 0:16:43.840 --> 0:16:47.200 Like it was just very strange. And I didn't end 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:50.360 up going to see my pediatrician until I was like thirteen, 0:16:50.400 --> 0:16:52.280 about like a year after I had initially gone in 0:16:52.360 --> 0:16:55.240 my menstrual cycle. And he's like this very sweet, like 0:16:55.360 --> 0:16:58.800 Filipino doctor. He's been my family doctor forever. You know. 0:16:58.840 --> 0:17:01.400 My dad's with me in the room, like it's like, 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:03.880 you know, I'm thirteen, man, like, what are you gonna 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:10.240 do with me? And he's like, oh, yeah, take um aspirin. Yeah. 0:17:10.440 --> 0:17:12.480 So you are you closer to your dad and your mom? No, 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:15.720 I'm closer to both of them equally. I love them both. There, 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:21.280 you know, there's such they're such good parents. No, I 0:17:21.320 --> 0:17:23.880 do love them. I think it's interesting because my parents 0:17:23.920 --> 0:17:28.560 are older, so seeing them progress has always happened in 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:30.560 a different way than I saw my friend's parents. You know, 0:17:30.800 --> 0:17:36.520 how my mom was forty. Okay. She was like, I'm not. 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:39.720 I'm not doing the whole young thing with these kids. 0:17:39.800 --> 0:17:45.280 You you were her first, she had more. Okay, so 0:17:45.359 --> 0:17:48.199 it's hope. Okay, I'm not I'm not forty yet, but 0:17:48.240 --> 0:17:50.919 I'm okay. So this is this is another thing we 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:55.840 can talk about. Oh my god, the myths around geriatric pregnancy. Okay, 0:17:55.840 --> 0:17:59.040 wait because hold on wait okay, so okay, okay, go ahead. Wait, 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:07.080 let's because then we got to go into okay, so 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:13.040 I went to He eventually was like okay, yeah, there're 0:18:13.040 --> 0:18:15.760 he We told him. You know, I've been taking ibprof 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:19.520 and I've been taking ivent, taking aspirin. It's not helping me. 0:18:19.760 --> 0:18:25.440 And it's like one they weren't helping me. Like they're 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:30.400 called nd sades non steroid anti inflammatory drugs. They basically 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:33.080 just try and reduce the body's response to inflammation, right, 0:18:33.600 --> 0:18:36.239 But if you're just treating the body for inflammation over 0:18:36.320 --> 0:18:39.600 and over again, not adjusting the root cause it. Yeah, 0:18:39.760 --> 0:18:42.520 and it's also really bad for your stomach. There's all 0:18:42.560 --> 0:18:45.840 sorts of issues with like continuous like over the counter 0:18:45.880 --> 0:18:49.960 pain medication, you know, consumption stuff. But I get sent 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.800 to this O b G I N. And you know coincidence, 0:18:54.040 --> 0:18:55.879 it's my mom's O B G I N. You know, 0:18:55.880 --> 0:18:58.560 because we're all I'm I'm thirteen, we're all in a family, 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:03.280 you know, healthcare plan. My dad's with me, and you know, 0:19:03.359 --> 0:19:06.439 she says to me, like, you know, most teen girls 0:19:06.440 --> 0:19:09.359 just have irregular periods, and all that we do is 0:19:09.400 --> 0:19:12.160 just recommend that you go on birth control. So basically, 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:16.680 from age thirteen, I started taking hormonal birth control and 0:19:16.800 --> 0:19:23.120 it like regulates your cycle basically, so it is essentially 0:19:23.280 --> 0:19:29.480 your ovaries and your uterus that usually communicate with your 0:19:29.480 --> 0:19:32.560 brain are being kind of controlled by like a synthetic 0:19:32.640 --> 0:19:36.359 hormone um. And it's not like I'm not I'm not 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:38.920 a birth control hater, you know what I mean. I'm 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:43.000 just this is my experience, and it isn't something we 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:47.600 should probably readily over prescribe teenage girls, especially teenage girls 0:19:47.880 --> 0:19:52.240 who are in the clinical environment for reproductive health issues already, 0:19:52.320 --> 0:19:54.560 you know what I'm saying, Like it was looking back 0:19:54.600 --> 0:19:56.760 on it now as someone that is one day going 0:19:56.760 --> 0:19:59.400 to be a provider, like I think about that situation critically, 0:20:00.280 --> 0:20:04.600 so that basically the harm is that it's thrown off 0:20:04.640 --> 0:20:06.360 the body, Like, what are some of the negative side 0:20:06.400 --> 0:20:10.240 effects of like the hormonal control. Well, one, it didn't 0:20:10.240 --> 0:20:13.240 actually address my symptoms, so I was still experiencing painful 0:20:13.320 --> 0:20:16.080 menstrual cycles, and they didn't really provide me any relief 0:20:16.160 --> 0:20:20.120 other than they gave me like an increase like a milligram, 0:20:20.119 --> 0:20:23.199 you know, like advill or something like that, which is 0:20:23.240 --> 0:20:27.320 like cool, I could just take two of these from CBS, 0:20:27.440 --> 0:20:31.160 like really like what's going on here? But it did 0:20:31.280 --> 0:20:36.840 kind of tied me over until I started experiencing my 0:20:36.960 --> 0:20:39.880 endometrio systptoms really badly, which is when I started college, 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:45.600 and I was like passing out, Like I was in 0:20:45.720 --> 0:20:48.920 so much pain. I would black out, like or sitting 0:20:48.920 --> 0:20:52.119 in class and fallout. Yeah, and so that's actually what happened. 0:20:53.320 --> 0:20:57.760 So once this situation happened, my roommate was there, you know, 0:20:58.000 --> 0:21:00.960 ended up going to the emergency room and m m 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:08.720 m yeah. And unfortunately, you know, there's so much that 0:21:08.800 --> 0:21:10.800 needs to change. There's so much that needs to change. 0:21:11.040 --> 0:21:17.000 Talk about So when you're admitted to like an e ER, right, 0:21:17.200 --> 0:21:20.119 they are immediately trying to perform as many tests as 0:21:20.200 --> 0:21:25.000 they can to figure out, Okay, what is this story 0:21:25.320 --> 0:21:28.520 we have the symptoms, right, the patients here, you know, 0:21:28.600 --> 0:21:31.240 reporting these symptoms, but we don't know the cause. So 0:21:31.280 --> 0:21:33.920 they're going to use tests and things. They're going to 0:21:34.000 --> 0:21:37.080 run exams, and they're going to use their education and 0:21:37.080 --> 0:21:41.240 their expertise to make a conclusion. But the conclusions that 0:21:41.520 --> 0:21:46.480 doctors often make are not disentangled from systems of power. 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:50.560 So the decisions doctors make, you know, about certain things, 0:21:50.920 --> 0:21:54.840 it's impacted by racism, it's impacted by sexism because we 0:21:54.920 --> 0:21:58.040 live in a racist and sexist country, you know, So 0:21:58.080 --> 0:22:00.920 how is it that and we have all this research 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:06.479 proving you know, that there is different outcomes health outcomes 0:22:06.480 --> 0:22:09.199 from people of color during COVID even why is it 0:22:09.240 --> 0:22:12.200 that people of color were dying of COVID more, you know, 0:22:12.359 --> 0:22:16.000 the white people when we're all in the same country, 0:22:16.040 --> 0:22:19.000 and a lot was just even people that experience I 0:22:19.040 --> 0:22:22.960 don't know what the term is, but difficult pregnancies and 0:22:23.240 --> 0:22:28.480 women of color dying more exactly. So it shows It 0:22:28.600 --> 0:22:32.119 showed me that moment that wow, things really need to change. 0:22:32.520 --> 0:22:34.320 So you feel like a minority when you step through, 0:22:34.359 --> 0:22:37.440 nobody is thinking like you might be. I mean, they 0:22:37.920 --> 0:22:44.000 maybe have questions. They have questions because I don't, you know, 0:22:44.040 --> 0:22:45.760 I can check in Asian box and then they look 0:22:45.800 --> 0:22:49.399 at me and they're like, and I'm like, I know, 0:22:50.119 --> 0:22:56.119 but it's not my choice. There's no Southwest Asian category 0:22:56.160 --> 0:22:59.679 that I can choose. So take what you take, you 0:22:59.680 --> 0:23:03.320 know what saying? Um, When I go into the e R, 0:23:03.520 --> 0:23:07.000 the questions they will immediately ask are, especially with reproductive healthcare, 0:23:07.040 --> 0:23:11.959 are about your sexual activity. So I was seventeen, I 0:23:12.000 --> 0:23:15.400 was in college. I was a person having sex right 0:23:16.720 --> 0:23:21.080 and because of that, they immediately thought, well, you probably 0:23:21.119 --> 0:23:24.120 have honorrhea or chlamydia. You have an STI and that's 0:23:24.160 --> 0:23:28.840 why you're in pain. Because I was experiencing extreme pelvic cramping, 0:23:28.920 --> 0:23:38.600 like extreme pelvic pain, and you know, I'm thinking to myself, 0:23:38.600 --> 0:23:44.399 you're not really a hell like that side side. Like 0:23:44.640 --> 0:23:48.400 I mean, I seventeen years old. I was not as 0:23:48.600 --> 0:23:51.160 conscious and aware of like taking care of your sexual 0:23:51.160 --> 0:23:54.960 health as I am now. But it wasn't like that. 0:23:55.160 --> 0:23:59.199 Like I was getting tested. There was no way I 0:23:59.200 --> 0:24:02.320 had an STI. And you know, they took a sample, 0:24:02.600 --> 0:24:05.960 but they said, this is really really bad. If an 0:24:06.119 --> 0:24:09.960 STI develops into something called pelvic inflammatory disease and it 0:24:10.000 --> 0:24:15.200 can cause infertility. It's so dangerous, traumatic, traumatized. So they're 0:24:15.200 --> 0:24:17.600 telling me all these things and they're like, the thing 0:24:17.640 --> 0:24:20.239 that's going to help you is an antibiotic shot in 0:24:20.280 --> 0:24:24.600 your butt. So I get this antibiotic shot on my 0:24:24.640 --> 0:24:27.240 butt and I pick up my antibiotics and they send 0:24:27.240 --> 0:24:29.359 me home with the referral to an O B G 0:24:29.520 --> 0:24:33.800 I N and UM. I end up having to go 0:24:33.880 --> 0:24:39.720 in early because I'm experiencing so much pain. And basically 0:24:40.920 --> 0:24:42.479 I go to this O B G I N and 0:24:42.640 --> 0:24:45.280 I can just tell she's like overworked. You know, you 0:24:45.280 --> 0:24:50.800 can see when people are just like to sneeze, thank you, 0:24:51.600 --> 0:24:55.400 there you go. So you can just tell when you're 0:24:55.440 --> 0:24:58.040