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 There are a lot of terrific small businesses creating products to help with diabetes management. We've seen families with 3-D printers making insulin vial cases, people who've come up with better ways to make your CGM stick to your body, and  creative clothing with places for pumps. What if you could search through those products in one place? That's the question Adam & Celeste Litt decided to answer when they started their online marketplace, The Useless Pancreas. Adam was diagnosed with LADA a few years ago. He and Celeste share what that diagnosis was like (he was initially misdiagnosed with type 2), how they teach their two boys about dad's diabetes, and what they hope to accomplish with the Useless Pancreas. In Tell Me Something Good lots of teens and young adults with new jobs and a bunch of sports milestones to brag about. This podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Check out Stacey's book: The World's Worst Diabetes Mom! Join the Diabetes Connections Facebook Group! Sign up for our newsletter here ----- Use this link to get one free download and one free month of Audible, available to Diabetes Connections listeners! ----- Get the App and listen to Diabetes Connections wherever you go! Click here for iPhone      Click here for Android Episode Transcription (rough transcription, has not yet been edited)  Stacey Simms  0:00 Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Daria health manage your blood glucose levels increase your possibiLitties by g evoke hypo pin, the first premixed auto injector for very low blood sugar, and by Dexcom take control of your diabetes and live life to the fullest with Dexcom.   Announcer  0:22 This is Diabetes Connections with Stacey Simms.   Stacey Simms  0:28 This week, lots of people get a diabetes diagnosis themselves or in their family and they create a product or write a book or invent something to help others. Adam and Celeste Litt took a   Adam Littt  0:40 broader view. I just see all kinds of different really cool stuff out there. And I think that's part of the magic as well. Stacy is there's so many questions out there. What is the solution for this? How can I help this and you get shipped to all these different places and sites. It's not really in one place and people don't always really know where to go.   Stacey Simms  1:01 Adam was diagnosed with LADA a few years ago, he and Celeste join me to talk about their marketplace for T1D products and services called the useless pancreas. In tell me something good. Lots of teens and young adults with new jobs and a bunch of sports milestones to brag about this podcast is not intended as medical advice. If you have those kinds of questions, please contact your health care provider. Welcome to another week of the show. Are we so glad to have you along. We aim to educate and inspire about diabetes with a focus on people who use insulin. My son Benny was diagnosed with type one right before he turned to more than 14 years ago. My husband that's with type two diabetes. I don't have any kind of diabetes, but I have a background in broadcasting and that is how you get the podcast and Adam Litt who I'm talking to this week. We connected many, many years ago. Well it was a one way connection because Adam used to listen to me on the radio. And it was just funny to think about how you know things like that kind of come full circle. As I always say for the start of every show. You know I have a background in broadcasting here. I live in Charlotte, North Carolina. I worked in radio here for 10 years. I hosted a radio morning show Charlottes Morning News, the city's top rated morning news show, basically, I got up in the middle of the night and got to work by four o'clock in the morning to go on at five for four hours a day trapped in a box with a couple other guys. And we had a great time. But I love that. But after 10 years of getting up at 233 o'clock in the morning, I definitely had had enough. But talking to Adam just reminded me about that connection that you have with your listeners when you do a job like that, you know, he commuted into Charlotte and listened every day. And my son Benny was born in 2004. And I was on the radio at that time. So my listeners went through all of that with me. And then they went through his diagnosis with me. So he knew the story. Well before the podcast, it just took me back because I was very lucky to have the career that I really always dreamed about having when I was a kid. I worked in radio first part time. And then I worked in television for more than 10 years as a local reporter and anchor then came that decade in Charlotte doing radio. And then you know, it's funny, I've really I've spent almost the last 10 years and I hadn't realized it, I left the radio station at the very end of 2012. And I did some freelance work. I worked as a multimedia journalist, it's really a one man band, you know, you're shooting your own stuff for about a year after that just for health insurance. But I've been on my own running my own business for a long time. And I hadn't realized how long until I talked to Adam and we figured out when he must have listened to me. I don't miss getting up in the middle of the night and I don't miss some of the nonsense of working at a radio station like the one I was at and that's another long story. I do feel extremely grateful to have been able to kind of create this radio job for myself and to be able to serve you and do this and have listeners all this time. We're coming up on six years this summer and every time I get a Litttle radio reminder like that I just want to take a moment be thankful so I really appreciate having you here we will talk to Adam in just a moment and his wife Celeste but first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Gvoke HypoPen and you know almost everyone who takes insulin has experienced a low blood sugar and that can be scary. A very low blood sugar is really scary and that's where Gvoke HypoPen comes in. Do you focus the first auto injector to treat very low blood sugar? Gvoke HypoPen is pre mixed and ready to go with no visible needle. That means it's easy to use. How easy is it you pull off the red cap and push the yellow end onto bare skin and hold it for five seconds. That's it. Find out more go to Diabetes connections.com and click on the Gvoke logo. Gvoke shouldn't be used in patients with pheochromocytoma or insulinoma visit Gvoke glucagon.com slash risk. My guest this week saw a gap in the diabetes community and like many of us, they jumped into filling. Adam Littt was diagnosed with LADA A few years after being initially mis diagnosed with Type two if you're not familiar with LADA 80 is latent autoimmune diabetes in adults it's also called type 1.5 it presents a lot like type two but it's really type one it's just slower moving is a really good kind of basic definition of it and i link up more information we've done lots of episodes on LADA but i like to explain it you just you know you never know if this is somebody's first time hearing about it adam and his wife celeste have started a new website it's a marketplace for diabetes products called the useless pancreas and i will link that up as well in the episode homepage it is useless pancreas all one word full disclosure my book is listed as one of the products on that website but they don't pay me any extra to list it there and no money exchanged hands for this interview adam and celeste thank you so much for joining me it's great to talk to you today   Adam Littt  5:48 thanks so much for having us yes thank   Unknown Speaker  5:50 you   Stacey Simms  5:51 yeah this is gonna be fun i have so much to ask you about our charlotte connection and your website and the uselessness of everything that you're doing but let's start at the beginning here if we could adam tell me about your diagnosis   Adam Littt  6:06 sure yeah be happy to go into that stacy so i was a ladder diagnosis the you know late onset type and at first and probably probably very similar to a lot of people's stories out there i was diagnosed as a type two and this was around my mid 30s and you know what stacy after that they diagnosed me type two that was a Litttle pudgy and i said yeah i'm just gonna go ahead i'm going to lose weight i'm going to work out i'm gonna get really fit and when i lost weight when i started losing weight i started losing weight at a pretty rapid rates where people started making some comments like well you're you're getting reasonably thin probably a Litttle you know fitter than where you ought to be and i blew this off i completely disregarded it you know i had my a one c's checked for a couple of years and they were maintaining in the mid sixes and you know everything was fine and but i kept getting healthier and healthier as far as weight control and diet and everything else and it wouldn't budge and then i went off to las vegas with some friends we partied a Litttle bit out there and after that i came back i was feeling really bad the day after i came back as you can imagine from las vegas and it went down in my workplace they're sort of infirmary set up and they took my sugar because i was again a type two in their eyes and it's 250 and they said you know let's go ahead and check you out and they they look they found ketones like you're off to the hospital right now and then you know after that it was the typical story you know you go see the end oh you do the tests you get the diagnosis my a one c somehow went from six and a half to it was 10.5 i think for that three month period so it was some rapid acceleration maybe you know it was just time i guess so anyway and it just gave out and was it las vegas probably not   Unknown Speaker  8:03 well it was also partly your birthday cuz your birthday was my birthday yes   Unknown Speaker  8:07 that was my my diversity is that what they call them   Celeste Littt  8:10 diversity is the day after his birthday   Unknown Speaker  8:14 yes yes there you go   Stacey Simms  8:15 so what during this time kind of what were you thinking you know 30s is young for type two to begin with but it's not extraordinary i mean were you kind of thinking things were funky   Celeste Littt  8:26 you know looking back on it i i think we saw signs and didn't recognize them up until that point so it was a Litttle scary i mean here i am with two young boys and you know thinking oh my goodness now i have one more thing on my plate adam sometimes put refers to the diabetes as his third child   Stacey Simms  8:48 adam had you ever heard of LADA   Adam Littt  8:50 no i had no idea as a matter of fact when my doctor first throughout the term lot i said i don't know what you're talking about she said well it's type one and a half so what do you mean type one and a half so i started looking all this up and stacy you know during this period where they do all the blood work you know you just pop every night and you're looking what is lot and i'm like i hope it's not tied to my biggest fear at that time was again a type two i was pretty well control they'd never had prick myself at all to take my pleasure my biggest fear was oh my gosh are they going to come back and start telling me i have to test my blood sugar once or twice a day well different story now but yeah we went through all that   Stacey Simms  9:31 it is funny what your initial thoughts are when you get that diagnosis because we don't really have any idea right unless you're in it and so let's say i ask you because as you know in many families mom has a lot going on i'm sure adam is very responsible with his as he calls it his child that's their child there but i'm curious too when you heard he had a lot of what first went through your mind   Celeste Littt  9:53 oh wow like i said before i feel like i was overwhelmed it was a change in our lifestyle we actually had to take some time off to really figure out how to manage the type 1 diabetes and how to carry things around and how to deal with all the lows and the highs and there was this learning curve at the very beginning that was just very overwhelming for me especially trying to manage and make sure that he was okay he obviously wasn't on any Dexcom or any pump at this point he would test his blood sugar and it would be really low there were a couple of really scary moments at the very beginning where he had some 30s blood sugar levels and just thinking also just about having to raise these kids by myself there's always that thought in the back of your mind and and or am i gonna wake up and find you know that he didn't make it to the night i was constantly worried about him all night long and just during the day when he was away at work things like that   Stacey Simms  10:52 and did you know that   Adam Littt  10:53 did i know she was worried about me stacy well to that extent no i at all it's nice to to hear she's always been a wonderful caretaker and she carries around two Litters for me stacy wherever we go you can always see the concern obviously it did make me think stacey have you know when i was first diagnosed though i remember i was sitting downstairs with one of these lows that she was talking about and my older son who was still very young at the time she may be honey he was what like seven or eight at that time something like that he was looking down as i was experiencing this this low and shaking and trembling and not knowing what was going on i remember this this vividly and he didn't really know how to help me either and that was actually a reasonably scary moment it was all just brand new so glad we're you know we've learned since then   Stacey Simms  11:45 yeah are the kids kind of on board now i mean they're they're tweens i guess we could call them at this point do they kind of i'm sure they understand more and they they're you know they can help out if needed   Adam Littt  11:55 or though when we when we go out to the golf course they you know they pack smarties in the bag and stuff like that and you know if daddy ever has a severe low whatever it might be they'll go and run and get the two Litter they'll pour it for me and they'll stand by and make sure i'm alright so they're they're good kids   Celeste Littt  12:12 i feel like we've been proactive about that and we've tried to prepare them a lot for how to handle an emergency situation it's really important for me to continue getting them trained in first aid cpr and things like that on a regular basis so as they get older they're just they feel competent enough to deal with a such situation if it were to arise what's the two Litter the lemon lime soda   Unknown Speaker  12:37 hey it's probably sitting on my desk over there dc   Unknown Speaker  12:41 what does it like storebrand   Unknown Speaker  12:42 sprite is from lead oh yeah yeah it works it does a job it's quick   Stacey Simms  12:50 it's funny though because i really feel like i should mention before we go any further that while you and i don't know each other you have known kind of me since benny was diagnosed because and this feels really weird to say like you listen to me on the radio i mean i don't say that to weirdly brag or anything but it is funny how you have these connections with the diabetes community that when you are diagnosed or when your child is diagnosed it's so nice to kind of i know from my experience i knew people before benny was diagnosed is why i'm bringing it up and i was able to say oh my gosh i remember and i remember this kid evan that i had met several years prior and he was this nice normal funny kid i was like okay my kid's gonna be alright because i remember evan is all right and i'm curious do you listen to wb t and we didn't talk about benny all that much but you do remember him having diabetes   Adam Littt  13:37 i do and i remember i remember driving to the same company i still work for every morning and listening to you in the crew on wb t and i remember these sort of snippets and you would talk about benny and what i really heard come through i didn't fully understand even though we do have a connection to family stacey right i have a half brother that was diagnosed in 12 but you know he's you know he lives in new york and we talk whenever but i never flew him sandy but but hearing what at what i heard is i heard the amount of emotion that came through when you talked about it right and that's what i remember from those you know those discussions that you were having and things like that and you know also you know the the passion for what you were doing in the community so that that really did resonate and then you know so many years later i'm diagnosed i run across you again i'm like stacy and she's in the type one community and here it is i'm like i have to go ahead and shoot an email right now and that's that's what i did and now we get to do this really cool talk so   Celeste Littt  14:38 yeah we appreciate it   Stacey Simms  14:40 oh of course of course unless it's funny to think about that vinnie was so young you know i had him while i was working at wb t so it's really funny to think about when did you well i'll ask celeste i'll start with you here when did you all get the idea for the useless pancreas   Unknown Speaker  14:55 how did that come about   Stacey Simms  15:01 Back to Celeste answering my question in just a moment. But first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dario Health. bottom line, you need a plan of action with diabetes. We've been lucky that Benny's endo has helped us with that and that he understands the plan has to change. As Benny gets older, you want that kind of support. So take your diabetes management to the next level with Dario health. Their published Studies demonstrate high impact results for active users like improved in range percentage within three months reduction of a one c within three months and a 58% decrease in occurrences of severe hypoglycemic events. Try Dario’s diabetes success plan and make a difference in your diabetes management. Go to my Dario comm forward slash diabetes dash connections for more proven results and for information about the plan. Now back to Celeste and how they got the idea for the useless pancreas.   Unknown Speaker  15:54 Well,   Celeste Littt  15:55 it was actually Adams idea. I was visiting some relatives in Florida, and I left him at home that that visit I brought the kids down, we visit the grandparents, I guess we've kind of talked about doing something for the type one community for some time, but we weren't quite sure where we fit in yet. And while I was gone in Florida, he was up here and it just kind of hit him. He was always on a lot of Facebook boards and things regarding diabetes to find the answers to his questions and to see what other people are going through. And a lot of times people always were wondering, well, where can I get this? And what is the solution for this issue that I'm having? And so he came up with that idea? Well, you know what, let's solve these problems. That's pretty much where we started from. And I don't know if you have anything to add to that.   Stacey Simms  16:46 Adam, was there like a item that you will have an aha moment where you thought, Oh, my God, I need to do this.   Adam Littt  16:51 Yeah, there was there actually was Stacey, it's interesting. So yes, less left, I had quiet time. And I guess this is what I do. In my quiet time, I just start thinking of things to keep myself busy. And so yeah, it was, you know, it's amazing, because the type one community, I always in, not in a negative way, Stacy, but I always feel it's just a massive population of just really good people just looking for solutions. But the community is underserved in various ways. And on some of these big boards, like the Dexcom boards, a lot of people would go out there and they would post, you know, whatever they were selling, whether it would be as a hobby as a business just to support their type one child, whatever it may be. And I think this one board had maybe 30,000 people on it massive, you know, creating   Unknown Speaker  17:35 a Facebook group,   Adam Littt  17:37 a Facebook group. Yep, I'm sorry. Yep. Yep. And, you know, the moderator said, No, look, I'm really sorry, but we can't have these solicitations or posts anymore. And somebody else posted up there, you know, that's fine. You know, you put a comment on his post saying, Well, look, you know, we started this Litttle other community. And, you know, you could go ahead and buy and sell on Facebook right here. And I went to that community as well, anyway, you know, and you saw people just trying to go ahead and solution and sell their goods, you saw people looking for them. And I said, you know, this is great, but there's got to be a better way that we can bring this community together and make the transactions easier. And that's how sort of the whole concept came to be Stacy.   Stacey Simms  18:15 So tell me what it is. This is like a flea market almost. For all the diabetes goods and services. Maybe flea market isn't the best word.   Adam Littt  18:23 No, it's it's okay. I mean, that's, that's actually exactly how we started. And we started. And so we started, you know, talking to some of these people on these boards, we said, you know, look, you, you if you want to take it a step further, you know, we'll handle the transactions for you and just go ahead and post it up. And people started started doing that. And we started getting a Litttle bit of traction, the first site we rolled out was really, really terrible. And eventually, it was terrible. It was awful. It really did look like a flea market actually is less right.   Celeste Littt  18:53 But if you think about it at a flea market has multiple vendors all trying to sell products. And so yeah, actually, flea market is not a bad term for what we have at the very beginning.   Stacey Simms  19:01 I like a good flea market. Maybe that's not the best term. We need a better phrase for it. marketplace. marketplace marketplace.   Adam Littt  19:09 Yes. I mean, even eBay, they call it fleabay. Right. You ever heard that term, but anyway. But yeah, it started out pretty awful, Stacy. And you know, as we started going, at least the design, the concept was always there. People loved it. And we had some really early adopters despite the design and the look and feel of the site. And we started talking to some of the larger companies and the larger companies said, you know, we're excited about the idea. We love the concept of bringing everything together in one place, almost like a you know, an Amazon and everything store for type one diabetics, which is really how we started to head but we don't, you know, want to, you know, we want you to just put up everything for us. We want you to sort of host it for us and take care of the business and we just want to be sort of a we want you to be a marketing outlet for us and that that's how we've trained And now states that we handle, we handle everything we handle the really small guys that are selling, you know, like these decorated vials or patches or they have these seat belt Oh, girths. Yes, stickers, a ton of people stickers on Etsy for their kids. And then you know, we move all the way up to the, to the bigger guys that have, you know, these really high end diabetic bags, accessories for supplies, you know, the the insulin cases, the, you know, cases for the various pumps, things like that. So, you know, the idea is, is to get everything under the sun, type 1 diabetes, so all of us all the community can go to one place and find sort of the solutions that they need.   Celeste Littt  20:41 The main goal, I think, is to have people be able to share their solutions with others in the type one community and provide a place to do that someplace, even if you don't have your own website, you can get your own storefront on our website. So you could start out with that, and then move on to a more, you know, larger company setup where we have a drop ship option. It's really for all not just for large companies.   Stacey Simms  21:03 And I'm I won't ask you to play favorites, and everything on the website is fabulous. But have you found anything that you're using? I mean, I'm not I'm not seeing any gLitttery stickers on you.   Adam Littt  21:16 I'm really simple guy, right? So I don't use much in the way of anything, I actually just I keep the basics. Although I you know, I will say I really tend to favor some of the patches out there because you know, I have constant like everybody does with the I wear Omni pod, the word Dexcom. That does tend to peel away. And some of the, you know, some of the CGM patches and the Omni pod patches are really great solutions when you've tried everything else like skin tack and stuff like that. Yeah, those those patches seem to really help beyond that, as Celeste mentioned, I want to say Stacy, the creativity of some of these people on 3d printers, engineers making cases, as less said somebody came up with a design to prevent compression modes where you, you know, put basically a almost like a case around your Dexcom. And you sleep with that. And that seems to help. We've got people out there, we just on boarded a new business the other day that that actually, if the adhesives, if the patches don't work well for you, he's actually got a Litttle Litttle belt to go around and secured or if you're really active. So that seems to help as well. So you just see all kinds of different really cool stuff out there. And I think that's part of the magic as well, Stacy, is there's so many questions out there. What is the solution for this? How can I help this and you get shipped to all these different places, and cites it's not really in one place, and people don't always really know where to go. And now we can present all these options to the type one world,   Celeste Littt  22:51 I wanted to just throw something in there as well. We are worldwide, we have a global type one community. And a lot of times when I'm looking at products, I'm finding different products over in Europe and in Australia and some other countries that I have not seen here in the US yet. And if people aren't searching for something in particular, they are never, they never know what's out there to be able to solve their problem,   Stacey Simms  23:16 you'll ship like if I see something I live in Australia,   Celeste Littt  23:18 well, the cool thing is, is we actually don't carry any inventory, we're only dropshippers. So the companies choose where they will offer their products to where they will ship them to. And a lot of companies will ship to the US or we'll ship to Australia, Europe, UK is very big on our on our community as well. So the more countries that they're able to ship to that the more obviously the more sales they'll get, and the more they'll be able to share their products with other people who can use them around the world. And I want to say as well, Stacy, it's clearly listed on on each of the listings, where where the shipping is, but we will always go ahead and reach out for somebody, if somebody asks us if, you know if they can ship to that particular country, we'll certainly go ahead and contact the vendor and ask them, you know, we want to try to do what we can where we can for both parties. And to be clear, this is a business for you all.   Stacey Simms  24:08 So you are making money on this. We are   Celeste Littt  24:11 okay. Very Litttle. But   Unknown Speaker  24:15 that's the amount of work we're making less 510 cents an hour. Oh,   Celeste Littt  24:19 my goodness, not even not even but it's okay. Right. But I   Stacey Simms  24:23 just wanted to be clear that the way it's set up is that you know, the you are going to make money on the transactions and that kind of thing.   Adam Littt  24:31 We are Yeah, we're a mission driven organization in the sense that we want to serve the type one community but admit it's a for profit business for sure. I mean, as with any startup, Stacey, I mean, most of that gets most of it all of it gets dumped right back into getting the word out advertising listing, you know, and basically soliciting right back out to the community.   Stacey Simms  24:50 Yeah, well, you've heard the podcast I have sponsors, I have no issue with ethically making money, as long as everybody's upfront and clear, as you all are.   Adam Littt  24:59 So yeah. As part of the community aspects of all of this, Stacey is we want, as you know, you just asked, you know, we're making money. Of course, there's markups between, you know, what we, you know, what it sold for, you know, what we pay, and we're trying to give a lot of that right back to the community. So we started an affiliate program where if affiliates want to go ahead and sell for us, they can easily sign up on the website, and they'll get a piece of whatever is sold out there. So, you know, that's one of many ways that we're trying to get the word out and keep the money in the community. And maybe, you know, one of the things to mention as well here, Stacy, is we don't want to limits the marketplace in any way to products. We're already talking with diabetic coaches out there. We talked with somebody just the other day that does lessons, or rather gets together kids groups,   Celeste Littt  25:56 right social groups for diabetic children.   Adam Littt  26:00 Yeah, and we've already talked with people that work with type one, diabetic groups for travel as well, you know, after the whole COVID thing is over, we like to get into all of these things. So you know, people can come to one side and say, you know, hey, I could travel, I could send my kids who grew up or maybe I need nutrition counseling or fitness coaching. And I could buy a set of CGM patches at the same time if I need those.   Stacey Simms  26:22 And Adam, how are you doing? You mentioned you're using an Omnipod, you've got a Dexcom. So it sounds like you're, you've come quite a long way from worrying about checking your blood sugar once or twice a day.   Adam Littt  26:32 Well, I've got a handy two Litter there, right, just in case No, I, I don't know. I was born with a very obsessive personaLitty, Stacy. So   Celeste Littt  26:40 I have to admit he does do well. That's nice to hear.   Adam Littt  26:43 I tend to keep pretty good control. I want to say that part of my retirement for my workplace is probably going to have to be annuitized turned into lifetime income Stacy, I intend to live till 150 just to get all of my money right out of that workplace.   Stacey Simms  26:58 Very nice.   Adam Littt  26:59 You got it to God, it's so I tend to do okay, I'm pretty regimented. I know you know what I eat and what it does to my blood sugar is I live pretty boring lifestyle as far as food, I put my energy into business and and the kids who run me relatively ragged. Thanks for asking. Sure.   Celeste Littt  27:17 I actually I have to say he, he has simplified my life because he does eat almost the same meals for breakfast. And for dinner. And lunch is our main meal with his protein at lunch. So I can't complain so much. He actually does keep things very simple. For me.   Stacey Simms  27:34 That's the difference of having perhaps a husband with type one and a son. As we were saying, for the interview started, I'm not exactly sure what my son is eating what hour of the day, especially with virtual school. Chinese who to two o'clock in the morning.   Unknown Speaker  27:48 That sounds like our tweets, actually. Yeah. That's what they went through last night.   Stacey Simms  27:53 Adam and Celeste, thank you so much for joining me, it's great to talk to you and learn more about this. I'll link everything up so that people can learn more and start snooping around the website and maybe contacting you if they have products. We have some very creative people in the audience as well. But thanks for sharing your stories.   Celeste Littt  28:08 Thank you so much for having us.   Adam Littt  28:10 Thanks so much for your time today. We really appreciate it.   Unknown Speaker  28:18 You're listening to Diabetes Connections with Stacey Simms.   Stacey Simms  28:24 Lots more information. As always, at the episode homepage, just go to Diabetes, Connections COMM And I like to say every so often, if you are looking for a previous show, or a topic that we covered, if you go to the website, I have a search box on the upper right hand side, it's a really robust search, we have 365 episodes. There's a lot of stuff out there. If you'd like to hear something, many of the newer episodes have transcripts, not the older ones yet we're working on that. But it's just a really easy way to go through what I hope is a good source of information and sort of what I kind of call it a snapshot of the history of the diabetes community for the past five, almost six years. I'm certainly not exhaustive, but really good snapshot of what's been going on in our community since 2015. So definitely check that out at the homepage. Tell me something good is coming up. We have a teen and young adult edition this week. But first Diabetes Connections is brought to you by Dexcom. And I just want to take a moment to talk about control IQ. This is the Dexcom G6 Tandem pump software program. When it comes to Benny's numbers. You know, I hardly expect perfection. I just want him happy and healthy. I have to say control IQ the software from Dexcom and Tandem has exceeded my expectations. Then he is able to do less checking and bolusing and spending more time in range. His last three A1Cs were his lowest ever they keep going down. This isn't a teenager, the time when I was really prepared for him to be struggling. His sleep is better to with basil adjustments possible every five minutes, the system is working hard to keep them in range. And that means we hear far fewer Dexcom alerts, which means everybody's sleeping better. I'm so grateful for this. Of course individual results may vary. To learn more, just go to Diabetes, Connections comm and click on the Dexcom logo.   I went looking for good news stories in a Facebook group that is frequented by parents of teens and young adults. And I've got some really fun stories to share with you. Catherine says Noah is my type one spectrummy 16 year old he had his best report card since third grade three A's and a B plus. He's on new meds new therapist, a new school also doing remote school. So it's quick with reduced social anxiety, fewer distractions and no papers to lose. He actually likes school this way. I gotta say, I know this year has been very difficult, but remote school has been a boon for many kids. I don't know what we're going to do when things go back. It's not for me to say but it would be really nice to figure out a compromise here for some kids like this that it's really working well for. Tammy says my son Cole is a sophomore in college. He was diagnosed at age three and a half. He's now 20 he serves he rock climbs he traveled to Cabo. He's MDI and uses a Dexcom he ran on club teams. He was a varsity runner in track and cross country. Tracy posted about her daughter Sophie, who was diagnosed at age nine. All she posted first was a really cute picture of her daughter saying she finally got her job at Starbucks. So I had to say, Is there more to this story? I do not get it. So Tracy wrote back and said she is a junior in high school and enjoyed bagging groceries at Publix. But her main parents made her quit due to the pandemic. She has attended virtual school since last year. But missed working. She discovered Starbucks was safer, because they only have a few people working there at a time and it's mostly drive thru. It took weeks of email and calling and follow up work to make it happen. She just turned 17 on Sunday. So that's the story. And then Jessica writes in my 17 year old Trenton played in all three games at their state basketball tournament. He's their ninth guy, he even scored a basket. And she posted a really cute picture of Trenton with his parents, I'm going to grab these photos with permission and put them into the Facebook group because they're really fun, especially this one, I have two more good news stories for you. They're very different from one another. But this one is from Alex. And she writes, I was born and raised in Oregon. But I've lived in Argentina since the 90s. Our daughter was diagnosed a Litttle over two years ago. And I learned that in Argentina, they have a diabetes law that guarantees access to insulin strips and all necessary technology for diabetes care as a human right. This love is achieved by a group of moms in 2013. While there are gaps in the system, there is a framework within which you claim access to what you need at a public hospital. The psychological relief she writes, this law provides brings me no end of comfort. And I love that it was achieved by a group of moms. This is the photo of when Congress approved the law. And this is a great photo of moms cheering and hugging and crying. And there's one gentleman in the photo as well. I will put that in the group. What a great story. I mean, wherever you come down on the side of access and insulin for all I know there are different poLittical views. That's fine. You've got to really believe that the psychological stress of trying to afford this stuff is heavy on many, many, if not most people's minds. And I will leave you with a really fun one. And I don't know if she knows that this is kind of an anniversary. So here's the story. Leslie, who I have known for years, you may have heard me tell the story about when Benny was very Litttle another Litttle boy was diagnosed right at the end of Gosh, I'm getting old now was at first or second grade, I want to say was the end of first grade. And Michael and Benny talked it over and everybody felt better about it. But Michael and Benny had also played baseball together and Leslie posted a photo of Michael Vinny no longer plays baseball. He played lacrosse and then he's into then football and now he's he's really into wrestling. But Michael stayed with it and it's done really well. And she posted a photo of Michael as an umpire. He is working as an umpire and the picture is partial gear. This kid you can't even see him. He's like buried in the equipment here. And she says he really enjoyed it. calling home plate is more fun than the basis I have a new appreciation for the discomfort ups must be at games after the many layers required to put on and I said it was an anniversary of sorts because it was this week. It's last week as you're listening. But this week when Leslie sent me the photo that Michael and Benny and another Litttle boy Parker, all played in a baseball game together two teams. This was our Litttle town baseball league for elementary school. So a couple of towns I guess, but two teams and three boys with type 1 diabetes on the same game, and it showed up in my Facebook memories, which is how I know so let's Thanks for sending that in. Thank you all for these great good news stories. This is always my favorite part of the show, send him in, you can email me Stacey at Diabetes, Connections, comm or post them in the Facebook group.   Before I let you go big thank you to jdrf Desert West, which includes chapters in Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada. I participated in their type one talk last week, and I really appreciate you have me out to talk with the world's worst diabetes Mom, I am looking forward to an event with my local chapter, which I don't even know how big my local chapter is anymore. Maybe it's North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia, I think. But at the end of April, well, April 23, I will be hosting trivia, I'm very excited about this, we're gonna have a big online zoom, but play along trivia. And if you'd like to do something like that, I am more than happy to host it for your chapter, your diabetes group. If you've ever seen my silly game shows or listen to my game shows that I put out here it's not dry trivia. We're not quizzing people, we're not going to do math problems on bolusing. It's lots of fun diabetes news. But you know, in a, I'll give myself credit in a comedic, It's lots of fun diabetes news, but in a fun, interesting, family friendly kind of way. So I would love to do that get in touch. Let me know if that's something you're interested in. You can play over zoom. Everybody needs a separate app on their phone. It's a Kahoot app that lots and lots of schools use. So your child probably already has that and can set you up if you don't have it yourself. Alright, lots of stuff coming up classic episode in a couple of days and we are back to our interview shows on Tuesdays. So please join me then. Thanks as always to my editor john Kenneth from audio editing solutions. thank you as always for listening. I'm Stacey Simms. I'll see you back here soon until then, be kind to yourself.   Benny  36:51 Diabetes Connections is a production of Stacey Simms Media. All rights reserved. All rounds avenged

Tego (05:01): So Tracy just a couple of headlines real quick. Let's just run through in the real estate world. This is more national real estate news-- interest rates. If you're paying attention, you know rates have pushed up a little bit, you know, three ish. You know, we were at 2.75%-2.875%. People were getting 2.5%, But they're closer to 3%now maybe a little over 3%, you know, that always just depends on your credit, your down payment, all that stuff, right? But interest rates pushed up, which is funny, you know, interest rates are up there at 3% now, which is kind of funny. And I found this chart, Tracy, that I shows interest rates by decade. And it's pretty interesting. And you know, if you go back to the seventies average interest rate was right around 9%. And then if you go to the eighties, it around 12, almost 13 Tracy (05:59): Is the average, but it piqued some thing like 19%, 20% than. So the average was not that high those years. Tego (06:05): And then in the nineties it was about 8%. It was about 6% during the two thousands. Tracy (06:21): The 2000 to 2010. Yeah. Tego (06:24): Right, right. And then in 2010 to 2019, around 4% to 5%, remember that we were like, wow, this is amazing. We'll never see this low interest rates again, well here we are, you know, and so far this decade, it's only two years, two years and three months we're right around 3%. Right. So if you look at it from a historical perspective, I mean, it's still amazing. Tracy (06:47): And what that does is it makes homes more affordable, even though prices are up right. The monthly payment, because interest rates are so low is keeping affordability exceptionally low. Tego (06:59): Yeah. One other big headline. I want to bring up Tracy and you know, you're absolutely right. And we've talked about that. The affordability is a big deal. One other headline here is FHFA, which is a kind of the group that is over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which handle all the government back mortgages. Hey've now extended the eviction moratorium for foreclosures through June 30th. Tracy (07:25): And that's for loans through Fannie and Freddie. Correct. That's not conventional loans, not all loans. Right. So they've extended it through June 30th. Yeah.  people that haven't been able to make their payments since last year. And it seems like we're just kicking the can down the road. And I don't think that's in a bad way. I'm saying that in a sense that we're going to have time to get that work through and get those homes into the market. Somebody told me the other day, or a statistician that works in the housing world. He put some data together, if all of those homes that were in forbearance right now came on the market immediately, which of course would never happen in the US, we'd still only be at five months supply, which is still considered kind of a balanced, almost leaning toward a sellers market. So it's interesting. Tracy (08:29): Yeah."  

Tracy Venturi: Let's talk about forebearance. I want to get to that topic. So that's been a big topic. Tego Venturi: It's a hard topic. Okay. It's funny. I've, I've gone to the chiropractor. I went to the eye doctor in every time I end up just in the last few weeks and every time I end up talking about real estate, right. Oh, tell me about this and tell me once they hear my name. Tracy Venturi: I think it's going to be this big deal. So if somebody is coming out of forbearance Tego, Tego Venturi: I wanna just talk about some stats, if I may I find me well, yeah. Picking up on your sarcasm. Tracy Venturi: No, no, I love it. That you would know stats. Tego Venturi: Well, one of the things that's, that's been, um, going on is, yeah. I mean, back at the beginning of the pandemic, there were over 5 million people that took a forbearance plan. And so what that means is they, they went to their lender and said, Hey, can't make my payment because of COVID. And I need to just put a pause on my mortgage payment. So there was over 5 million. Well now we're down to about 2.7 million. Again, we're talking nationwide obviously. And that's good. The thing is interesting is of those people that have come off of that program over 3 million, 52% of them just basically they're paid up, right? They either started making payments or they refinanced, or they sold their home. Tracy Venturi: Or they continue to make payments while they filed for forbearance, because they weren't sure if they were going to be able to keep paying their payment, but they were able to. Tego Venturi: You know, a lot of those people were probably people that took the forbearance plan thinking, eh, you know, we'll just do it just in case, you know, it's kind of, there was obviously, there was a lot of, um, a lot of mystery back in March and April of last year. And so people just did it. So, and the rest of those, not the rest, but a third of those, um, they basically just said, well, we're going to work something out. So they're actually working out something with the bank, a repayment plan. Yep. Tracy Venturi: That could be that whatever they didn't pay, if they actually did skip some payments that they tacked it onto the end of their loan, or they've done sort of some sort of repayment plan that they can afford temporarily or, you know. So that's upon exiting the forbearance plan. Another 33% have a repayment plan. 52% of them are paid in full. What about the other 15%? Tego Venturi: The other 15% are in, are in trouble. Right. They're in some sort of loss mitigation plan. So either they're basically not making their payments so they could either just sell their home if they got the equity or if they don't have the equity, then you know, the very last thing would be, it would go into foreclosure. Tracy Venturi: Well, they could go to short sale first and sell their home. Right? So we, we negotiate with lenders on behalf of sellers that, ask them if they can't afford to sell their home, because it's not worth enough to pay off the underlying mortgage. We work with the sellers to negotiate, to have the lender take short, what they're owed so that we can get the home sold versus going into foreclosure. Tego Venturi: I kind of erased short-sale from my mind, because back in 2009, 2010, we did a fair amount of them. And they were really difficult back then because the bank, there were so many of those properties, the banks weren't geared up for it. Now it's actually a, it's a much easier process. So that's, again, that's one of those options for people that do find themselves, you know, in that, that group of people. I want to just one more comment I want to make, I think it's important. The narrative out there has been that if you're in all those people, the 2.7 million people that are still in forbearance, those are automatically going to be foreclosures and get dumped on the market. And we're going to have this mass flow of homes coming on the market. And that is just not, what's going to happen. Come March, April we'll know because a lot of those plans will expire. And again, so people could, you know, they could just, if they're financially able, they'll just start making their payments and just move on. They'll work it out with the bank. Tracy Venturi: Can I just add in there that, you know, New Mexico is behind the curve on people getting back to work because our restaurants just opened indoors at 25%. Right. But a lot of the country have gotten back to work compared to New Mexico. So we kind of think about New Mexico and how many people are still out of work because of our climate here. But you know, much of the country is back to work so that 15% will change. But go ahead. Tego Venturi: Well, and I just wanted to bring you into this conversation, but let me just, just follow up on that. So these people that are still going to be coming out, or if you're one of them coming out of this forbearance plan, you're not sure what to do. There's, you know, there's options. And so again, just assuming that just because somebody is in forebearance, it's going to end up in foreclosure and be a bank sale, that's just not true. There's going to be people that have equity and can just sell or take the short sale option or you know, whatever it is. And so Tracy Venturi: I would say really have a private conversation with us to talk about the options, right? Tego Venturi: That's exactly what I was getting to. So Tracy, you know, if somebody is in a forbearance situation, they want to know what their options are outside of what the bank is offering them, Tracy Venturi: Call us, let's sit down, let's have a private conversation, look at your situation and see how we can best help you with whatever direction you need to go.  

Hey Guys! You’re listening to #GrowGetters – the future skills podcast for smart women in business. We exist for one simple reason: we are here to help you GROW! Each week, we drop a brand new ep that covers the latest trends, tools, tips to make sure your business or career is future-ready!Today we are hosting a brilliant Masterclass - with Tracy Harris - Founder and CEO of Mums With Hustle!Mums With Hustle is THE place for Mamas in business to learn how to confidently turn up on social media online and live their own unique version of success that, as Tracy says, “makes them light up from the inside.”In 2015, Tracy began maternity leave after 10 years of working as an executive teacher. With teaching as Tracy’s core purpose, she knew she wanted to continue to pursue a career, but didn’t want to have to make the choice between work or motherhood.Rather than step back onto the path of conventional work, Tracy simply wanted more.With no startup slush fund. No investors. No business loan. No email list, or backup plan, or advocates. Tracy backed herself up and knew her ‘thing’. With her skills, her genuine passion for business, for teaching, and a love of tech - Tracy saw the need that so many working mothers face - the need to carve out a career on their own terms.So Tracy built a profitable, scalable, enviable business that started while she was breastfeeding and typing with one hand. Now, she teaches other Mums in biz how to do the same.Fast forward to today, and Mums with Hustle has attracted a global tribe of empowered, connected women. Over 50,000 beloved business mums getting noticed and building powerful online brands.Mums with Hustle offers teaching, mentoring, industry experts, and business-building opportunities to Mums powering through to create empires of their dreams.One of the key features of Mums with Hustle is its exceptional membership club: The Social Method Society. This is a premium Instagram Marketing Academy and monthly membership for female business owners.In this #GrowGetters Masterclass, Tracy takes you through everything you need to know about building a membership business model, and achieving sustainable success.Plus…If you want to stay in contact with Tracy, you can follow Tracy Harris on Instagram at @mumswithhustle, as well as the Social Method Society at @socialmethodsociety. You can also stay up to date with Tracy via her website at www.mumswithhustle.comAlso if you want some more sweet, sweet inspo, check out our Insta page, and please follow us at @growgetterspodcast !! :)And if you’re still hungry for more, our #GrowGetters GROWTH HACKS NEWSLETTER is designed to keep you up-skilled and up-to-date on all the latest tips, models, and trends - so sign up at www.growgetterspodcast.com/newsletterYour hosts are:Award-winning brand strategist and writer, Tanya Garma (@tanyagarma)Forbes-listed startup founder and entrepreneur, Tiffany Hart (@tiffanyclairehart)

On this episode of the Healthy, Wealthy and Smart Podcast, I welcome Tracy Blake on the show to discuss the evolving role of physical therapy in sport. Tracy’s desire to contribute to sport beyond the field of play motivated her clinical work with athletes from over 25 sports at the local, provincial, national, and international levels, as well as doctoral research focusing on pediatric sport-related concussion and physical activity. It remains the driving force behind her current work as a clinician, researcher, educator, editor, and author. In this episode, we discuss: -The preventative and reactionary roles of physical therapists in sport -How to optimize the healthcare team’s strengths to amplify the organizational mission -Equity and shifting power dynamics between the athlete and clinician -COVID-19 and ethical considerations in sport -And so much more!   Resources: WCPT statement of diversity and inclusion WCPT symposium on diversity and inclusion 2016 consensus on return to sport Introducing patient voices Coin model of privilege and critical allyship Tracy Blake Twitter   For more information on Tracy: The only daughter of Trinidadian immigrants, Tracy Blake and her youngest brother were raised in the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-faith, working class Toronto (Canada) neighbourhood of Rexdale on the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, as well as the Anishinabeg, Chippewa, Haudenosaunee, and Wendat peoples. Sport was a power source of connection and vehicle for connection throughout Tracy’s upbringing. Tracy’s desire to contribute to sport beyond the field of play motivated her clinical work with athletes from over 25 sports at the local, provincial, national, and international levels, as well as doctoral research focusing on pediatric sport-related concussion and physical activity. It remains the driving force behind her current work as a clinician, researcher, educator, editor, and author.   Read the full transcript below: Karen Litzy (00:01): Hi Tracy, welcome to the podcast. I am happy to have you on. And I'm so excited to get to speak with you one on one. I heard you speak at WCPT in Geneva last year and I think I've told you this. It was one of my favorite sessions and we can talk a little bit about that session later. We'll probably sort of weave it in as we go along here, but it was a great session at WCPT and I'm really excited to have you on the podcast today to talk about the evolving role of physical therapy or physiotherapy in sport. So I'm just going to hand it off to you and if you can kind of let us know what that role kind of maybe where we were and how you see it evolving and how it has evolved up to this point. Tracy Blake (00:53): Yeah, so I think historically, physiotherapy or physical therapy, I'm Canadian, so I tend to use both. Historically in sport was seen as reactionary. So injury happens, enter physiotherapist from stage 1 right. And I think over time what has happened is that both from a clinician standpoint and an organization standpoint in sport there has been a change in perspective with an increasing level of focus on primary injury prevention. And so what that has meant is physiotherapists are not only responsible for there reactionary role, the rehabilitation, the remediation of injury, but also there has been a serious investment both in their time and an organization's resources around preventing injuries from occurring at all. I think the other part of this is that part of the evolution has been in the team around the team. So historically speaking, there may have been a physical therapist and athletic trainer, a doc, and that would sort of be the primary set of your team. Tracy Blake (02:14): Now, more and more organizations are having maybe multiple therapists, strength and conditioning, nutrition, dietician, sports psychology, other disciplines are involved in the team, which both alters the way in which we gather information, gather experience, the way we develop as practitioners, and also the way in which we engage in our role and in our competencies. Within a sport context. And I think that there's sort of three arcs in which I see physiotherapy in sport, which is consultant. So in a consultant role, you may not be actually involved with front-facing athlete care at all. You might be making recommendations or talking to ownership or be brought in special cases for example. As a concept, then you have external service providers. They might have more regular athlete contacts, but they're not embedded in the daily training environment, which is the third aspect. Each one of those rules has a role to play in today's modern sport, particularly as you get into more resource abundance levels, your high performance or Olympic level or professional level. But the arc of change for each of them is going to be different. The arc of evolution is different. And what that means for the practitioner and the profession will also be different. Karen Litzy (03:47): And so when we talk about those tiers, so let's say you sort of outlined consultant the external service provider and those people who are really embedded with the team on a day to day basis. And before we went on, you sort of use the example of the NBA example. So can you talk about that just to make that a little bit clearer? Tracy Blake (04:10): Yeah. So there was a time where like if you were, the internet still existed, but maybe like online rosters and Google's worth weren't quite as prevalent, I know, usage, but you wouldn't have been able to just go on and find a physical therapist listed on an NBA team. There might've been one a decade ago, maybe two. And now in today's days and times, every NBA team has at least one and sometimes multiple that are working in various specialties within physical therapy. And so I think that that is also something to consider it, right? So what exactly is your contribution to the team in the context of both your profession, which is a healthcare paradigm and your occupation, which is in a performance paradigm in your sector. And so how do you reconcile those two in a way that allows you to contribute and to be of service? Tracy Blake (05:11): And I think we were, I mentioned this to you as well, that I think that the only way to reconcile that in a way that is grounded and sustainable is to be really clear about what your specific mission is as a physical therapist. And then making sure that whatever role you're in, whatever tier you're in, in the incredibly fast paced moving world of physio and in the fast, fast moving world of sport that you're grounded to that regardless, it makes you more responsive and adoptive, particularly in these days and times where on top of the unpredictability of sports and the fast paced moving to sports, we now overlay a global pandemic into that. And so you lose your footing. It's real easy to lose your footing in sport these days. And so if you are not grounded in something that is separate from your job professionally, it is very easy to lose your way. Karen Litzy (06:10): And especially now that there is no sport happening. Correct. While we're in the midst of this global pandemic, there is no sport happening. And so I guess being very clear on what your mission is, does that then allow you to find other ways you can contribute to the team aside from direct we'll say patient care, athlete care or direct overview of strength and conditioning programs and things like that. Tracy Blake (06:41): Yeah. So, then the question becomes is how is a team still a team when they're not playing? So when the technical has been removed from you, what makes you a team? And then in that context, what is your role in maintaining that team in contributing to that team? So I think when we were at WCPT when I had mentioned the idea of what is your mission, I had told people to think about it and you're not allowed to use the words rehabilitation, remediation, illness or injury in whatever your mission statement is. The purpose of that at the time was that you were having conversations with people in sport who do not come from your health care background. So if you only use language that relates to health care remediatory way or inaction reactionary way, you're undervaluing what you do. And you also run the risk if that's not understood in the same way you intended. Tracy Blake (07:52): It turns out that that actually works out in this case as well because now we've taken all of the trappings or all of the preconceptions that come with our role have now been wiped away. Right. So what are you contributing to the team in this context? Are you, for example, as it's somebody who is usually in the daily training environment? Having a team that is sometimes centralized and sometimes decentralized. I made sure that I continue to talk to my team and do check-ins even when they're decentralized. So now we're decentralized longer than we would have been because the Olympics aren't happening. Right. But their communication with me isn't somehow new. Karen Litzy (08:42): Smart. Tracy Blake (08:44): So that's not everybody's option. But that is for me, a way in which the relationships we've had, we're not based on strictly what was on court in the team context. So therefore the relationships are able to be sustainable when an earth shifting history shifting thing is occurring.   Karen Litzy: And, I have a question for you. What is your mission statement? Without using remediation, rehab, et cetera, et cetera.   Tracy Blake: So my mission in sports specifically is the optimization of health function and performance, whatever your age, stage or field of play.   Karen Litzy: Excellent. I love it when people are prepared. That was great. And I think it's very clear. I think that's very clear. It's short and sweet and to the point and people get an idea of what your mission is and what your function is within that team setting. And now let's talk about the team, but not so much the team that's on the court or on the field. But let's talk about the team around the team. So you had mentioned you've got maybe a couple of physical therapists the MD, the ATC, a sports psychologist, nutritionist, but let's talk about how the team around the team functions for the good of the team that's performing on the field, on the slope, on the court, et cetera. Tracy Blake (10:15): Yeah, I think that there is, so my circumstances were particularly interesting in my current situation with volleyball Canada in that I was brought in with the strength and conditioning coach halfway through a quad. Like going into Olympic qualifiers, which is highly unusual. Well we were very lucky was that we had our conversation right out of the gate and we were of a mind so to speak philosophically in this way. So we had our first conversation, I say lucky, I think our director of sports science, sports medicine and innovation would say that he planted this way cause he hired both of us. But we were lucky that we were philosophically aligned in both what we thought our jobs could be for the team in this setting and in this circumstance. And then turns out how we work together also worked quite well that way. So that becomes, I think one of the first things is what's your mission? Does it align with the people who you work with? That's the first thing. And then from that spot, how do you use your strengths of each of those team members to amplify what that organizational or team goal is. Tracy Blake (11:33): And then how can you also identify gaps in each other and fill those in. Because that's the thing, like people love to talk about their strengths. To a team and what they can contribute with their strengths. They're less comfortable, particularly in sports, particularly an environment that is bred on competition and winning. And there can only be one. It is much harder to feel comfortable with vulnerability and opening up something that feels like a gap or a weakness or an area that you're not as confident in and trust that somebody else will fill it without exploiting it. So I think both parts of those need to happen for a team to be both functional and that function to be sustainable for anyone for time. Karen Litzy (12:20): Yeah. And I think that's also where the learning happens, right? When you have that team of professionals around the team, I would think me as a physiotherapist or as a physical therapist can learn so much from those other partners. Tracy Blake (12:38): Yeah, I agree. And I'm a nerd. There's no getting around it. I love a learning moment. I love them all the time. I want to know everything. And so for me, I feed on that, but that is not everyone's experience. And so what I've had to learn is timing and approach and repetition. Frankly, being not just clear on my mission once, but clear on it over and over and over again. How do I express my mission in the big and small things that I do in a day so that I'm consistent and I'm transparent so that at no point somebody can be like, well you said that at the beginning but you did this and this and this. That was inconsistent with that. And so I want my own way. And so in those kinds of circumstances I'll be like, look, this is where I was coming from with this. Tracy Blake (13:30): This is why I thought it made sense. I went to a school where when I say school, like entry level physio training, was that a school where we didn't have traditional lectures? Very much. Almost everything was small group learning. And so I feel like that environment really fostered the way that I work in the team environment, in sport where everybody had the same questions. We all went off and found the information and key information, excuse me, and came back to it with our own whatever that information is plus our own experience and perspective layered in on it. And then you figured it out together what was useful, what was not. Karen Litzy (14:13): Nice. Well that's definitely set you up for being part of a team, that's for sure. And now let's talk about, so let me go back here. So we spoke about kind of the different tiers that may be a physiotherapist might be in how being part of the team is so important to understanding your mission, staying true to that. And I think being self aware enough to know that you're being true to that mission and that you can stand by it and back it up. And now let's talk about how does all of this that we just spoke about, what are the implications of that for athlete health and for support in sport? Tracy Blake (14:52): So for me, the cornerstone of every relationship but particularly in the context of sport is trust. I work in sport obviously, but I also work in acute inpatient healthcare. And I also worked in private practice for a long time and people often assume that my private practice life, my private practice, orthopedics and my sport life are the two that are most closely aligned. Okay. Particularly in recent years, I've corrected that. And then I actually think it's my hospital life in acute care and my sport life, particularly in high performance that are the most aligned and the reason why is the relationship building and the communication that they require. So when I'm working with an athlete, the way in which I can get the best out of that athlete is if they trust, but I'm working to the same goal they're working to. Tracy Blake (15:58): Now that does not mean that I don't care about health, right? Because sport is inherently a risky situation, right? There's a level of risk acceptance that you have to participate in them, particularly when the levels get higher. And I believe there was an article by Caroline bowling, it's a couple of years old now that actually talked about injury definition and asked high performance athletes, coaches and sport physios. And in that article, all injury was negative effect on performance. There's no mention of it risk, there's actually no mention of illness or injury. So if I can't have a conversation with you about what I think the injury is doing to affect your performance negatively, I'm only filling in half the picture. So I need you to trust me. And the way in which I garner that trust. The way in which I build that trust is making sure that you always know that I have your goal, which has performance in mind. And so I think that that component of the relationship is the cornerstone. What cannot be left out of it, however, is the role of equity and the power dynamics. Tracy Blake (17:23): Physio is a health profession. Health professions historically are in a position of power or a position of privilege in the context of your practitioner patient relationship, right? If that's the situation already to start, how can you know that the person is giving you the accurate information if they're already in a position where the power is shifted out of their favor? So knowing that and understanding that concept, I've tried to be really intentional and again, really consistent in actively working to even the scales. I do that. Yeah. So I regularly consistently ask athletes, not just what they think, but I start with the part that they know the most about because as it turns out, I've never played professional volleyball, I've never played any sports at a high level, right? So if I start with the part that they know the most about the technical components of that, the way that training happens, the way practices are organized. If I start with what they know and ask questions about that, and then I work the way in which I build a program back from that, what I often say to people, not just athletes, but obviously this applies to athletes as well, is that I say I know bodies, you know your body and what we're trying to do is take what we know about those two things and put them together in a place that gets you to where you want to go. Tracy Blake (19:02): And anything that you think I'm doing that either doesn't make sense for that for you or that you think is working against that you need to tell me early and often. And so that's the framework. That's a conversation that's happening like right away. First day. Karen Litzy (19:19): Hmm. Tracy Blake (19:19): And then I give them opportunities to come back to that over and over. And not everyone communicates the same way. So you can't expect somebody to like just be like, you spit out five minutes of like clinical decision making information at them and they're going to be like, yeah, aha, Oh by the way, this, this, that and the third. Right. That's not going to be how it happens all the time. So making sure that people have time to think about it. Give time to reflect how the place to come back to you. Some athletes want to break it down into small bite size pieces. Some athletes want to be like, just fix it. I don't want to talk about it. And that's also my responsibility to make sure all of those different types of personalities, those people with different relationships with their bodies. How the power of the emboldened to be able to say what they need to say to meet their goal. And so that's what for me, that communication and relationship building part has to be the cornerstone because it's the only way we can get anything done with the kind of both the speed in which we need to get it done in the context of sport, but also in a sustained way. Because if someone keeps getting hurt, that is also not going to help anybody’s situation both from my job security or theirs. Karen Litzy (20:34): Right, right. Absolutely not. And so again, this kind of goes back to being part of the team. And so what I'm sensing is, and again, I feel like as therapists, we should all know this, but the team around the team also includes the team. You can't just have the team around the team making the discussions and these return to play decisions without involving the members of the team without involving that athlete. Tracy Blake (20:48): Correct. And one of the things that I found, like I'm saying a lot of these things to be clear, I'm saying them now and it sounds Zen, but I found out most of these things through failure to be clear of course a million times over. It has brought me to where I am having this conversation today, but I just wanted to be clear that I did not like walk out of entry-level physio with this knowledge on a smorgasbord. No, I know. Shocking. Shocking. What kind of program was this? You went to again, that didn't prepare you for high level sport athletes shawty is what it was. But the idea that the idea that an athlete, an essential part to their healthcare team still is radical for many and they see it, they see it. Tracy Blake (22:03): But what happens is when there actually requires an actual power shifts to make happen. Yeah. It's hard for people when it actually requires them to let go of some of their power if it requires them to acknowledge. There was a moment in the process of programming, in the process of delivery, in the process of recovery that they are not the expert in the room. It can be a blow, particularly people who've spent in our cases years getting to that point.   Karen Litzy: Oh absolutely. And I think in several presentations I've seen in writings of Claire ardor and I feel like she goes through this which with such specificity and simplicity that it makes you think, well of course, kind of what you just said. Like for some people it's a radical view that the athlete should take this big part in their recovery and their return to sport or in their health. But when you listen to folks like you or like Claire, it's like, well yeah, it all of a sudden turns into a no brainer. So where do you think that disconnect is with those people who still considered a radical idea and the people who are on the other end who are like, well, of course they should be part of it. Tracy Blake (23:09): Some of it is experience. And so what I mean by that is not just like length of time experience, but I found that when everything's going well, it's going well, right? There is no impetus to change. There is no disruptor that actually acts to give you a moment to or recalibrate as you need. And so when I say experience, I mean I've had instances where, to be honest, I wasn't sure if it was going well. I wasn't sure I was doing what I thought needed to be done and I was doing what felt right. Again, I was aligning with the mission that I had because I didn't have any real world context in this specific sport or circumstance that I might've been in. And then something goes wrong. And you realize in the aftermath of that, whether it's an illness, whether it's an injury, whether it's something off court altogether, right? Whether it's an abuse and harassment situation, whether it's a boundary situation, whether it's a patient confidentiality situation, right? You realize when those things go sideways, but that's whereyour power and your metal is tested professionally. Tracy Blake (24:46): And so I think that's one part of it. I think another part is there's ability to what they call it mission creep, right? Where over time you sort of like, this is what you think your mission is, but then you did a little of this and you do a little of this and the next thing you know, you're far away from where you started. And I think that a lot of people, I think they're in service to the mission one in sometimes they actually end up in service to the business model. And particularly in sport where the jobs or when I say sport, like high performance sport professional sport, where the jobs are few, where the jobs are highly competitive. I don't think I've ever applied for a sport job that had less than 75 applicants and upwards of several hundred in some cases. Tracy Blake (25:43): Wow. Everybody wants that gig. And so people can sometimes get led by the, or creeped away from their mission by the instinct to do what is necessary to stay in the position rather than what is necessary to optimize the health function and performance of their athlete. So having a situation where you've been tested and sometimes don't, aren't successful and mission creep. Those two things I think are maybe the biggest ways that aren't just related to like personality. Like those are that things can be trained or modify. Those are like the modifiable things I think. Karen Litzy (26:44): Great. And then, you know, we had said as we are recording this, we are in the middle of the global covid-19 pandemic. And so there is no sport going on. And so to the best of your ability, and we're not asking you to be a future teller here, but what do you think will happen to the role of physiotherapy in sport and the medical teams in sport? Tracy Blake (27:28): I don't know necessarily what will happen. What I hope happens is that all healthcare practitioners, but particularly physical therapists in our case because I'm biased in that direction that they recognize their role in contribution to population health in the context of sport. So public health in the context of sport, we often think of sports as a bubble and it is to a certain extent, but that bubble is manufactured. That means all parts of an athlete's existence are manufactured, right? All parts of what the athlete is provided with from a health perspective are manufactured. So have gaps are left in that it's up to you as the person who is actually in the sport context to identify and try to remedy and resolve. Right? It's deeply problematic for athletes to not have the same information that somebody who works in the public house. It's deeply problematic for athletes too, not have access to labor rights. It's deeply problematic for athletes to not have be informed and be given informed consent to participate in mass gatherings during a time of pandemic. Tracy Blake (29:02): And I also think there is a strong ethical quandary that comes with providing services, two events that fly in the face of public health recommendations during times like this. And I've been on record with this, I said this a couple of weeks ago, I posted about it on Twitter where there was a massive wrestling tournament happening and I thought to myself, it's wrestling, it's a combat sport. It can't happen. Like they literally would have no insurance if there was no medical covenant medical coverage provided. So if you didn't have medical coverage, the event couldn't happen. So how does medical coverage or physio coverage or what have you happen against public health recommendations? We can't continue to act in separation with each other. We need to view sports as part of population health. And then we need to make sure athletes and those in the sporting community are acting in accordance with the public health. Tracy Blake (30:11): At the times demand as well. And I think the Rudy go bear situation was truly, genuinely shocking for a lot of people. They were unprepared at every level, not just sports medicine and sport physical therapy. And so what I hope lingers for people is that we think about emergency action plans a lot, right? We think about how we're going to get somebody off the court in the case of an emergent issue, Encore, how are we preparing them for life in that same context? How are we in preparing ourselves as professionals in that context? And I hope that those conversations, because it turns out you don't need to be in person for that. Tracy Blake (31:01): That people are reflecting on that now and that steps are being taken to improve both the gaps that are specific to the city, the situation with the pandemic now, but also how do we identify these things going forward. And I think some of that had already started to show its colors around issues of food insecurity, issues of education, issues of like the younger your players are coming in. Are you providing appropriate development? I went to you as a, you know, I went to the United nations last year for the sporting chance for him, which is around sport and human rights. And last year, 2019 was the year of the child. And so there had been a special rapport to report on the rights of the child and child exploitation and snails. There is an entire section dedicated to sport and how sport has been used as a vehicle for the exploitation of the child. Tracy Blake (32:08): And I think of things like that, like those are the kinds of gaps. But now that you know that these kinds of gaps exist now you know, you understand in a very real way and it's kind of, it's telling in some kind of ways that it needs to strike so personally close to people's wallets and they'll help. But now that we've had that touch, now that we've been exposed in this kind of way, can we continue to be proactive in the way we address other things going forward? That would be what I would hope to see. Karen Litzy (32:40): Well, and I think that's I feel like very doable hope. I don't think it's like a pie in the sky. Hope. I think all of those conversations can be had and hopefully can be had by everyone surrounding sports, not just the physiotherapist or just the medical team, but straight up to owners and players and everyone else in between. So Tracy, thank you so much for such a great conversation. Tracy Blake (33:13): Yeah, it's been great. And I think again, like physios are really well situated because you have physiotherapists who have really like have access to the player and have access to the coaching, the ownership, the administrative stakeholders. They're well situated to be able to bring these things to light on both sides and be involved in those conversations even if they don't have out right decision making power. Karen Litzy (33:38): Right. Absolutely. Tracy Blake (33:39): Yeah. Thanks for letting me out of the shadow. Karen Litzy (33:42): Oh, it was great. Thank you so much. And then before we sign off here, I have one more question that I ask everyone. And knowing what you know now and where you are in your life and in your career, what advice would you give to yourself as that fresh graduate, straight out of physiotherapy school? Tracy Blake (34:04): I would say that you need a mission early and you need to speak it into existence. It's not good enough to keep it in your head. You need to say it out loud to people and you need to get feedback from people and whether it's clear or not. And I also think that one of the things that I learned I was 36 almost 37 when I took my first dedicated health equity class and aye, it was a workshop. And in the beginning she said for some of you this will be new information and it was specifically targeted at health professionals, not just physio. And some of you would have learned this in, you know, your first year equity studies, first year gender studies kind of course. And after the weekend where I slept for basically three days because of all the information floating in my head, I was like, there are 18 year olds walking around with this in there. And so I think that if I could go back now, I'd be like, you need to start taking those courses early. You need to start embedding it into your thinking early. Maybe you'll be better at being intentional about how you use it earlier. Karen Litzy (35:11): Excellent, excellent advice. Now, where can people find you if they want to shoot you a question or they just want to say how great this episode was? Tracy Blake (35:22): So I'm active on the Twitter, so my Twitter handle is @TracyABlake. I am not as active on the on Instagram. My Instagram still private, but if you shoot me a message I usually find it anyway. So that also works. Same handle @TracyaBlake. Karen Litzy (35:38): Perfect. And just so everyone knows, we will have links to certainly to your Twitter at the show notes over at podcast.Healthywealthysmart.com. So Tracy, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. This is a great conversation. Thank you so much. This is quite the podcast debut. I appreciate it anytime and everyone, thanks so much for tuning in and listening. Have a great couple of days and stay healthy, wealthy, and smart.   Thanks for listening and subscribing to the podcast! Make sure to connect with me on twitter, instagram  and facebook to stay updated on all of the latest!  Show your support for the show by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts!

Ade and Zach reply to more listener letters! Remember, if you have a question you'd like for us to answer and read on the show, feel free to email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com! You can also DM us on all platforms - they're open! Check them out: Twitter, Facebook, InstagramConnect with us! http://bit.ly/livingcorporateTRANSCRIPTAde: Hey, y'all. It's Ade.Zach: And it's Zach. Hey, look, we did it the other way. How does that feel?Ade: Yuck. I can't stand it.Zach: [laughs] It's also alphabetical, and we're going from A to Z with these listener letters. Yo. Bars. [laughs]Ade: All right. [?]. I'm just gonna let you have it.Zach: Man. Y'all, I might be--yo, I might--I need to take these talents, like, to NBC, man. Like, I need to write for somebody. Like, these are good jokes.Ade: Hm.Zach: Or maybe I'd be, like, a ghostwriter, 'cause, like, this is crazy. I have bars. Like, this is great. Did you hear that? I said alphabetical 'cause you--Ade: No, I got the point.Zach: You know what I'm saying? Come on, man. Don't hate. Okay, so look, we're doing these listener letters today. Now, look, we kind of said it last week. The names y'all put in these letters, we're going to say those names unless it seems a little too specific, then we might, like, just call it something else, right? But, like, just know we're gonna read these letters as you send 'em, right? So, you know, sign your name with what you want to be addressed as, and we'll make sure that we respect that, but, you know, we don't want to, like, go into our fake bag name and then, like, give you a fake name, but that might mess around and be your real name, you know what I mean? So just help us out. Help us help y'all. Yeah? Okay. So look, we got these listener letters. We're gonna go ahead and get going. I'ma read this first one. The subject line is "Too Friendly." Uh-oh. What's that mean?Ade: It sounds like a call to HR.Zach: I'm saying. Like, what you mean too friendly? Relax. Okay. "What's up, Ade and Zach?" Look, they kept it alphabetical. What'd I tell you?Ade: [scoffs]Zach: "I feel--" [laughs] "I feel like everyone else is super close at my job and I'm always on the outside of whatever inside jokes they're telling. It makes me question who I can trust, since everyone is friends with everyone but me. They're always going out after work and will come back from the weekend with their stories of what they did. I just want to come to work, do my thing, and go home. I don't want to give up that much time, but I'm also feeling like the odd woman out. What should I do to feel more comfortable at my job? Thanks." She wrote her name as Tracy. Okay, so what should Tracy do?Ade: Well, Tracy, you can't have your cake and eat it too, friend. I don't know what to tell you. It sounds like you're saying that you don't want to do the things that make--that have made everyone else become closer and, you know, more vulnerable with each other, right? So I understand wanting to come to work and go home and have that be the extent of your responsibilities at work. That being said, it means that you're not going to have a relationship with the depth that you are admiring and coveting. I mean, you can certainly do the things that we encourage. You can ask your coworkers to go get coffee with you, maybe bring donuts, but you can't have the conversations with people, you can't--honestly, if they're having, like, inside jokes because they went to Happy Hour three times and you went zero times, you're not gonna get any of those contexts. Am I missing something?Zach: No, you're not, and I think ultimately to make friends you have to be friendly. That's what my mom always tells me. Right? Like, you have to actually put yourself out there. So looking at your letter, I'm not really sure--I'm imagining, because of our platform, that you're a person of--a woman of color, and if you are--and even if you aren't, like, it can be hard to put yourself out there and--'cause to show vulnerability with, like, a group of people that you don't really--you don't know, to, like, really try to make friends, and it's tough because, you know, like, the cliqueiness and stuff, like, those things don't just stop after high school. Like, there are definitely, like, work cliques.Ade: Correct.Zach: And so I can understand and empathize with you, you know, feeling a certain kind of way, but, like, if you [?] these insecurities, one way to combat those insecurities is to one, just, like, maybe go out every now and then. It doesn't have to be all the time, but just take the time. Like, if you know they go out somewhere every weekend, maybe you go one time with them on a weekend, or just start maybe with baby steps of if you know they're going out to Happy Hour every single week, you know, maybe choose one or two times a month that you're gonna go with them, right? Like, and then that way you can start kind of easing into it, and that way you will feel more comfortable, and then they'll feel more comfortable, and then, like, it'll--barriers will just kind of come down, I think. But I'm not a woman though, and, like, my wife always tells me that, like, women are different. Like, I'll be kind of talking to her about something and she'll be like, "Look, Zach, women are just different." So help me understand, Ade, what I might be missing in this.Ade: I do not want to project things that aren't there. I don't want to project off of my own personal experiences, simply because I don't think that it does Tracy any good to hypothesize about what could be happening. I mean, her letter doesn't say that she's ever been invited. So that to me might be the issue in that it's one thing that they're having all of these, like, Happy Hours or they're going or whatever it is that they're doing outside of work. It also doesn't say how long that Tracy has been there. It doesn't say that she's ever been extended a formal invitation. It doesn't say that they're including her in other ways that don't include these extracurricular activities, so I--there are many, many different things that could be going on, but what I do know to be true is that Tracy herself says that she only wants to come to work, do her thing, and go home. There are ways to develop friendly relationships that don't also require you to be more vulnerable than you want to be at work. So I would say to Tracy kind of what we said last week with I think it was Jamal. Grab a drink with them. Not, like, alcohol, but grab some coffee or grab some tea, or come in in the morning and ask them about the weekend and share a little bit of what you did on your weekend, or "Oh, hey. Did you guys catch Homecoming on Netflix? Really great. You guys should see it." There's so many--yeah, there's so many different ways that you can share cultural contexts that don't require you to be more revealing than necessary. Also, once you start relying on greater cultural contexts, I mean, you don't have to get their inside jokes, because Beyonce, like, crosses all cultural barriers, right? Like, come on. Come on.Zach: "Come on. Come on." [laughs] No, I super agree, and that's a really good point, like, that culture is a big deal. People talk about culture in, like, these really, like, high-brow, generic, 30,000-foot ways, but I think, like, just really practically speaking, like, for people of color, at least I'll speak for black folks, like, if I'm going out for drinks with you after work, like, that means that I'm really cool with you. So, like, it's hard for us--I'll speak for me anyway. It was hard for me to, like, really be like, "Yeah, I'ma go out to drinks with you," after I've already worked 8 hours or 9 or 10 hours with you and I've seen you, you know what I'm saying, all day, and I don't even know if I really like or trust you. So, like, you haven't really shown me, like, any type of trust-worthy characteristics while we work together, but now I'm about to spend extra time and my money with you? Right? Like, those are the things that have gone through my mind. Like, "Okay, I'ma go break these barriers down," but, like--and we talked about this with Deborah Owens, who's CEO of the Corporate Alley Cat. We spoke with her--we spoke with her about this, I believe that was in season 1, but we were just talking about that's part of the job. Like, doing that, extending yourself is part of your job, and getting to know those people is part of--is part of your whole work life. Like, those are working hours for you. Like, that's how you should think about it. If you genuinely just don't do want to do it, it's important for you to make some of that time. Again, it doesn't have to be all the time, but you should not be like, "No, I don't go to anything." Like, you should go to something from time to time, but I also think it's a really good point that, like, you shouldn't have to extend yourself super far. There are small things you can do at work, you know what I'm saying? There are things you can do at work to make sure that people at least know a little bit about you. Maybe there's some more humor you can insert at work. Again, I'm not asking you to be, like, a comedian. I'm just saying, like, there's things that you can do. So I think that's really good feedback.Ade: I think the final comment that I would want to make is that--have you ever seen that graphic of the cultural context? Like, the cultural iceberg?Zach: Nah, what is that?Ade: Okay, so it's this image that shows--like, you know how an iceberg, you really can only ever see the tip of it, and there's so much more depth or so much more that's underneath the waters? At the top, it shows things like food and holidays and language as the things that are easy to see, but underneath the surface there are things like rules of conduct, child-rearing practices, family values, body language, expectations, aesthetics, personal space. There are all of these different things that are a part of your culture that are so much more difficult to articulate. I think there is such a thing as work culture, a similar iceberg in that it's easy to see, like, your dress code, turn-around time for client deliverables, or just all of these different things that are easy to see once you enter the work space, but they're things that are--that are underneath the surface, right? How often you should be going to Happy Hour being one of them, which could be really alienating for people who don't drink for whatever reason, right, or that you have to make your rounds every day to have conversations with people, which is something that I didn't know when I first started working in a lot of corporate spaces. Like, you have to make rounds. You have to go around to people and make conversations in certain--in certain work environments because you're so scattered, and so in order to maintain your working relationships, it's this unspoken rule that you get up at 10:00 a.m. or at 2:00 p.m. and you kind of go talk to other coworkers. These are all things that are a part of that work culture iceberg that might be difficult to see, and once you have fallen on the wrong side of that iceberg, it's very difficult to repair those relationships. Because they're unspoken, people assume that you know that this is the appropriate thing to do, and so they feel as though you've slapped their hand one too many times when they extended it out and tried to be friendly by inviting you out or by asking you to do whatever, whereas your understanding is "I'm just here to work and go home," and so in order to bridge the gap of those two work cultures, I would say that there is no better time than now to start reaching out. And people love talking about themselves. It's not, like, a moral failing. It's simply just human nature. Like, when people start taking interest in the things that you enjoy and the things that you feel proud of, it makes you feel closer to the person asking. So Tracy, I would advise you to--not us asking you to, like, do any social engineering, but getting to know people by asking them about the things that they love and the things that they enjoy, and also with the understanding that we are not saying that that means that you need to go attending Happy Hours or that you need to extend yourself any further than necessary, simply that it is a mark of a good professional to be able to maintain good working relationships, regardless of the depth of those relationships. Does that make sense?Zach: It does make sense, and that's just a really good reminder, even for me. Not even for me, like I'm somebody. For me, because--Ade: [laughs] You are somebody, Zachary.Zach: [laughs] Aw, thank you, Ade. But no, it's important, like, to make time and to, like, do the rounds. 99% of the time--99% of the businesses that we work in are people businesses. There's some type of people element to it, and even if they're not, like, external clients, if they're just, like, your own colleagues, there's relationships that you need to be continually thinking about in how you manage them. So that makes sense to me. I think it's super spot on.Ade: Cool. Cool, cool. Thank you for writing in, Tracy. We hope that you get a resolution to this soon, and we'd love to hear from you, see how you dealt with this, how you handled--how you handled this conversation.Zach: For sure, for sure. Okay, I see this next one. This one is called--the subject line is "Micromanager." Here we go. I'ma go ahead and read it. Actually, no, do you want to read this one? 'Cause I read the first one. Why don't you read this one?Ade: Sure, okay. All right. "Hey, Living Corporate. So I've been at my job for about two years now and recently got a new manager. They're nice enough, but are nonstop with the feedback," ooh, "as if they have something to say about every little thing to do, from checking my work, how I present and lead meetings and my body language. They're also asking me for their feedback, like, every other week to the point where I don't know what to say. I just am feeling overwhelmed. A part of me wants to tell them to back off, but I'm not trying to cause any trouble. What do you think I should do? Thanks. Courtney."Zach: Hm.Ade: Go ahead, Zach.Zach: So they're nonstop with the feedback. "I feel like they have something to say about every little thing I do, from checking my work, how I present, lead meetings, to my body language." So when I read this, and maybe I'm reading this from, like, a manager lens, right, so I could be wrong, it sounds to me like you have someone who's really engaged and they're trying to help you, right? And then when you say "They're also always asking me [?], like, every other week." So every two weeks they're asking you to give them feedback, so they're looking for you to help them, just like they're trying to help you. Are you just not--maybe you're just not used to being managed. Like, this is kind of weird. This is kind of weird to me. How do you feel? You're making all of these noises, and you were making noise when you read the letter, so, like, what am I missing here?Ade: Okay. I wouldn't necessarily say that Courtney is not used to being managed. I think that there are two conflicting styles here of working relationships. I think that Courtney's new manager is used to, to borrow PwC's phrase, "real-time feedback," and Courtney might be a little bit more used to a more hands-off style type of management, and that will--that will create conflict, but I don't know that it's necessarily a bad thing. I don't know that anybody is wrong here so much as miscommunicating, because it can be overwhelming to go from a very, very hands-off managerial style to someone who is seemingly in your face all of the time. That can be a very difficult experience. I know that I would be frazzled. I was frazzled when it happened to me, and I certainly think that--and I'm not saying that the manager is wrong either in saying that, "Oh, hey. I noticed that you do things this way. Maybe you should try this way instead," because ultimately most managers who are worth their salt are trying to help you develop your career and help you grow as an individual. They are not being malicious in their feedback, but nobody likes to be micromanaged, and that's likely what that feels like to Courtney. All that to say that I think that there are ways in which you can communicate that you feel overwhelmed with the deluge of information. Maybe you could schedule checkpoints every two weeks with your manager. Like, "Hey, let's go grab some coffee every two weeks for 30 minutes. We can have a conversation about my progress so far. We can talk about what you think I should be doing differently, but the constant check-ins are distracting, they're demoralizing, and I don't feel that they are actually helpful to me."Zach: That's real. You know, so, I'm looking at this email. Like, every other week the manager's asking them for feedback. 'Cause I don't know Courtney. I don't know if Courtney--Courtney might be a man or a woman, I'm not sure--asking them for feedback, right? So, like, asking them for feedback. Like, maybe that's where they can propose this. Like, that's where they can propose like, "Hey, look." Like, being really transparent, right? Like, "Hey, this is how this is making me feel. We have this time already." Unless it's something that's, like, a serious problem, like, "Unless it's something that's, like, gonna break--make something break, like, could we wait to kind of give me feedback during these points?" Typically, I'll say for me anyway, sometimes when I know that I'm micromanaging somebody, I realize that, like, I'm giving them feedback every little step of the way as opposed to, like, backing up and letting them, like, drive something, and then I can be like, "Oh, wait. I was gonna say this, but you ended up doing this anyway." "I was gonna say this, but you ended up--okay, so I don't even have to say anything about this," right? Like, I think that that makes sense. I think there is definitely opportunity, and if they really are being serious about this 360 feedback, I think that's the perfect place to give it to them then, but that's gonna take some vulnerability and, like, courage on your part, right? And you say in here, "Part of me wants me to tell them to back off, but I'm not really trying to cause any trouble." I don't feel like you're causing any trouble, right? I think it's about just being respectful, and nothing in here, what you've said, is that they've been disrespectful to you, so I'm gonna assume that everything has been above the board so far, that it's been, like, work. But that's what I would suggest, and yeah, I'm not trying to be unfair and say that you're not used to being managed. I guess what I'm saying is because of my work history, I've been in so many situations where, like, my lead does not care. They won't communicate with me. And I'm on a project now where I have a very engaged manager, and they really, really are plugged in, and they care about, like, my growth and my progress, and they give me, like, really poignant feedback, and it has felt at certain times overwhelming, but I had to ask myself, like, "Okay, how much of this is overwhelming because of I'm just getting too much feedback? How much is overwhelming because it's like, 'Wow, maybe I haven't really ever gotten, like, on-the-spot coaching about my performance before and, like, I'm just not used to how this feels.'" Like, maybe it's just a new feeling as opposed to me putting it on somebody else, you know what I'm saying? So that's what I mean when Courtney's like, "Okay, well, is this like--" How much is this just a new feeling for you that you need to navigate and, like, work through? That might take you time, and how much of this are you really feeling like they're micromanaging you? That's my take, but I feel like--I feel like we're still saying something--are we saying something different? Like, what do you think about what I'm saying?Ade: I think that it's entirely possible that it's both in that--I think we're actually saying the same thing actually, that the truth is somewhere in the middle, that Courtney might not be used to this person's managerial style, they might not be used to this instantaneous feedback, and that this manager's feedback might be--managerial style might be a little overwhelming, particularly for someone who has been in their position for two years and is switching contexts between two managers, and so I think that as a manager you do have to be mindful of the context and the role in which you step--like, the people who you're managing have had different contexts over time, and I think that it's only fair that you ramp up not coming with guns blazing. And it might not feel that way to you because you're simply doing what you've always done, which is "Oh, hey, I saw this. We should work on that," or "Oh, hey, I think you'd be a much more effective presenter if you did things this way." Which, fair, that's absolutely what you're supposed to be doing, but to manage up, Courtney, I would say that you should definitely take some time to sit down and figure out truly what are the things that make you the most uncomfortable, and then figure out how to make those things work for you, because if the feedback is meant for you to grow as a professional, there's no way that it can be a terrible thing to hear it. However, it's entirely true that it might be overwhelming for you when you're in the middle of deliverables and also trying to incorporate the last six things that were said to you in the last two days. So I would say that for me it would be much more effective to manage up in putting time on your manager's calendar, like, "Hey, every two weeks, let's go out, get some coffee or grab some lunch, and we can talk through my progress over the last two weeks and some areas you would like to see me improve, and we can iterate over my behavior in that way or my progress in that way as opposed to you sending me a note every, you know, three hours, because that's jarring."Zach: [laughs] Every three hours? No way. No way.Ade: Right, it's a little bit much, and not that I don't appreciate you paying close attention to me and my activities, but it does make me feel a little bit monitored and micromanaged, and I can't succeed in that way.Zach: No, that's real, and I mean, like--I'm agreeing with you, right? I agree with that. I think--and I think what's really cool is that two--every two weeks, that can just be the two weeks I already have set up, and yeah, so that's great. I think that's really good feedback. So Courtney, hope that helps. Let us know how it goes. Keep us updated on the progress. I definitely think the term "managing up" is important, 'cause this is part of it, this is a huge part of it, is you having this discussion with your boss, and it seems as--your lead, your manager, and it seems as if--I don't know. Maybe I'm looking at it through--I'm being biased 'cause I'm looking at it through, like, a manager lens, but it seems as if this person at least--I mean, the communication is there, right? It's not like you're having to create a lane of communication, so hopefully it should work out. We'll see though. Hm. Okay. All right. All right, y'all. Well, that does it for us on the listener letters. Let's see here. So I have one Favorite Thing, and I recognize that we did not talk about this in pre-production, so if you don't have one it's no big deal. But it's been a couple of weeks, right? So I just want to, like, really quickly--so, like, I feel like I can now talk about Avengers: Endgame. Very good, right?Ade: No spoilers.Zach: No, no. Definitely spoilers. It's been two weeks. It's been, like, two or three weeks.Ade: No spoilers. What? No. Don't be a terrible person.Zach: How am I being a terrible person? It's been mad weeks!Ade: No spoilers! None.Zach: Oh, my goodness. Man, I was about to say--I was about to be like, "And when So-and-so did the such-and-such!" I was just--Ade: I require more of you than you are giving me right now, Zachary.Zach: Man, that's real, that's real. Okay, so I'm not gonna get into spoilers. However, great, great movie. In fact, let me tell y'all what happened. So opening weekend, right?Ade: Oh. I was about to be like, "Didn't I just say?"Zach: Nah, nah, nah. So opening weekend, right? I planned on going Thursday night, but then I had a really busy day on Friday, and I was like, "You know what? Let me be wise and just, like, let me be mature, and I will wait," so I waited. I did not go Thursday night. I ended up going Friday night instead, and man, when I tell you that I was so emotionally overwhelmed. Like, I cried. I cheered. I cried again. I cheered again. I gasped, like, multiple times. I was like, "Man." And so I had already, like, proactively got tickets for Saturday AND Sunday, and I was like--'cause I just know I'm gonna want to see it again, and the theaters are sold out, but I was so tired--like, I was so drained by that movie and the multiple conversations I had--again, I'm not gonna get into spoilers. I was so drained. I was just like, "You know what? Let me just not." I've only gone to see it once. Like, that's how drained I was, 'cause I was just--I cried. Like, it was just so good. I've never seen a movie--like, it's just the culmination of more than 20 films, man. Like, come on, dogg. Like, that's a lot of work. It was so good. Like, you saw it, Ade. Am I tripping? Was it not great?Ade: It was amazing. Amazing.Zach: It was so--like, my gosh. It was so good.Ade: Amazing.Zach: Ugh, so good. So anyway, that's my favorite thing. I hope that y'all go see it if you haven't already, and then also, you need to go ahead and just cut the cable and go ahead and get that Disney+, 'cause y'all know all these shows about to come up. And again, I can't get into the spoilers 'cause Ade told me not to, but there's gonna be a bunch of other stuff coming, and--Ade: I'm just gonna--I need your login information, Zach. Thanks in advance.Zach: You are wrong. [both laugh] You know, it's so funny. Like, everybody has Candice and I's login. Like, I go on my little Netflix and my Hulu, I see, like, 17 accounts. I'm like, "Who are these little profiles?" Like, what is this? Come on.Ade: You're the grown up. I don't know what to tell you.Zach: Clearly. My goodness though, and some of them--some of them created profiles when they were, like, you know, in college, but, like, come on, man. Like, we all got money now. Y'all need to go ahead and help. Get your own, you know what I mean? Anyways.Ade: Chip in.Zach: Chip in, exactly. Put in on this, you know what I'm saying? You know, put 5 on it. That's all I'm trying to say. So okay, with that being said, I feel like we're at the end. So Ade, is there anything else?Ade: Nope, that's it. I actually was gonna use Endgame as my favorite thing as well. I've seen that movie several times at this point, and yeah, y'all watch it so we can talk about it in two months.Zach: Straight up. Okay, well, I guess that's that. Thank you for listening to us and joining us on the Living Corporate podcast. We are on all of Al Gore's internet.Ade: Everywhere.Zach: Everywhere. Just type in Living Corporate. Check us out. You type in Living Corporate on Google, we will pop up on every major player. You can check us out on Twitter @LivingCorp_Pod, on Instagram @LivingCorporatePodcast. You can email us at livingcorporatepodcast@gmail.com. And actually, on Instagram it's not @LivingCorporatePodcast, it's @LivingCorporate. Boom. Thank you. If you have any questions, any letters you'd like to send in on the show for us to read them like we did on this episode today, again, just email us, or you can DM us on Twitter and Instagram, 'cause our DMs are wide open. That's right. You don't even have to follow us. You can just DM us, but come on, be polite, 'cause some of y'all be out here wildin', okay? You know who y'all are. I'm not even gonna give you the air time, but you know. Let's see here. What else? What else? What else? Nah, I feel like that's it, you know what I'm saying? Grace and peace, afro grease or whatever else you use to keep your skin and hair lathered. You know, do what you do.Ade: [sighs] So much is happening. Um...Zach: This has been Zach.Ade: ...Yeah. This has been Ade. Y'all pray for Zach. He's going through some things.Zach: [laughs] Not at all, not at all! Listen, okay? Moisturization is important, and we're talking to people of color here. Come on. Like, you gotta--come on, let's go. Carol's Daughter or something. You gotta use something.Ade: [sighs] Goodbye, y'all.Both: Peace.

In this episode Tracy Chalmers shares 4 tips for getting through summer time as a work from home parent. If you're a work-from-home parent you know exactly how crazy it can be. It can affect your focus, your daily mode of operation and even your results. So Tracy is sharing a few tips to help get you through those periods when things are not running as normal as you will like it. ***********************************************

This week, we're trying something a little different: we team up with our friends at WNYC's Only Human podcast to find Tracy's roots. Growing up in Louisville, Kentucky, she always heard that her ancestors were, in her mother's words, "black, white and American Indian." But, like many black Americans, she's found it hard to trace her family heritage with ancestors forced into the American slave trade. So Tracy turns to DNA ancestry tests, and experts on DNA and race, to find out where she comes from. Follow Only Human: @OnlyHuman Follow us: @HeavenRants and @brokeymcpovertyEmail us: anotherround@buzzfeed.comSubscribe to the Another Round newsletter at buzzfeed.com/anotherround/newsletter. Merch is back! Tees! Totes! They're so cute: shop.buzzfeed.comLearn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices