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Choosing gratitude ft. Adriana Santos
4 Plays1 year ago
When facing the unthinkable, one's mental battle is just as important as their physical battle. It's Women's History Month, and April and Alicia are joined by Adriana Santos, a dear friend, former colleague, and cancer survivor. After a tumor was discovered on her pancreas, Adriana's life was turned upside-down with intense treatments and surgeries. In this episode, she shares her patient journey, detailing how her attitude - and gratitude - carried her through some of the most difficult times in her life.
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Transcript
A Rough Day with Kids
00:00:00
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And I was like, because you don't want to wait six minutes?
00:00:01
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Are you kidding?
00:00:02
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Do you know the day I've had?
00:00:03
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You're so spoiled.
00:00:06
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She was like, God.
00:00:08
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Today's not the day to mess with mom.
00:00:10
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I was like, wrong day.
00:00:11
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I was like, I'm going to bed when we got in the house.
Introducing 'On Call' with Adriana
00:00:16
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The only thing that could have made it worse is if I was watching my Roomba throw itself down a flight of steps.
00:00:22
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This is On Call.
00:00:24
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This would be really cool to just wear scrubs all the time.
00:00:26
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Then you don't have to think about what you're going to wear to work.
00:00:28
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That is awesome.
00:00:29
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We're here to answer your questions.
00:00:31
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We can sit down and discuss them.
00:00:33
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Wait, I gotta go.
00:00:34
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I'm on call.
00:00:35
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Wait, you're on call?
00:00:35
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I thought I was on call.
00:00:40
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Welcome back to another episode of On Call with April and Alicia.
00:00:42
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I'm April.
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I'm Alicia.
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And I'm Adriana.
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We have a guest.
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Adriana.
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Adriana's talking real quiet.
00:00:51
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That's Adriana, everybody.
00:00:53
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Hi, Adriana.
00:00:54
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Hello.
00:00:55
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Hello.
00:00:56
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Oh, we're so excited to have Adriana.
00:00:58
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So Adriana is a friend of Alicia and I, but also she used to work with us at Sound.
00:01:02
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So we'll talk all about her story with Sound and stuff like that.
00:01:06
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But we are so excited to have you here today, Adriana.
00:01:10
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Welcome to the call room.
00:01:12
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And fun fact, April, you shared something with me.
00:01:15
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Was it last week?
00:01:16
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Yeah.
00:01:17
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The week before?
00:01:18
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Last week, I think.
00:01:19
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Why is Adriana?
00:01:20
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Adriana's Cupid.
00:01:21
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She's a podcast Cupid.
00:01:23
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She is.
00:01:24
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She is actually the one that connected the two of us.
00:01:26
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So I had been approached about doing a podcast and was kind of brainstorming in my head of ways to do it.
00:01:35
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And Adriana was one of my thought partners there.
00:01:37
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And so I said, Dina, and she said, why don't you have somebody like a partner do it with you?
00:01:41
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And you and Alicia should do it together because you guys have a great dynamic.
00:01:44
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So she is part of the reason that we're here today.
00:01:47
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She noticed that I was harassing you from day one.
00:01:50
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She did.
00:01:52
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And the world would love it.
00:01:53
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Yes.
00:01:54
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Right.
00:01:55
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She picked up on it.
00:01:57
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Seriously.
00:01:57
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Thank you, Adriana.
00:01:58
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Thanks for inviting me.
00:02:00
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Well, having making April making April do it.
00:02:02
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Thank you.
00:02:03
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Thank you.
00:02:05
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We're amazing leaders and, you know, two people that I truly admire and so grateful that I was able to work with both of you.
00:02:14
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We'll see if you still feel that way after this episode.
00:02:19
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April, I know we've got a lot on our plate today, but I do have to tell you guys a story.
Electric Car Troubles
00:02:26
Speaker
So April, you sent me a text last night.
00:02:28
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Yes, I did.
00:02:29
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And you're like, hey, are you alive?
00:02:31
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And I was a little bit reactive because I was like, what do you mean?
00:02:35
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You just sent me a text Thursday for the queen of not responding to texts, by the way.
00:02:39
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But that being said, I had...
00:02:43
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the worst Friday I've had in the longest time.
00:02:47
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I went to provider orientation at one of our sites.
00:02:52
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That's about an hour, hour and 20 minutes from my house.
00:02:55
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And as I've shared on the podcast, I have an electric car.
00:02:59
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So what I've noticed is in the wintertime, it doesn't charge like as high for some reason, or, you know, it takes like a lot more energy to charge it.
00:03:09
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But it doesn't charge
00:03:10
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as high and I'm always doing like math and arithmetic, like, like aeronautical engineering and all these kinds of things to figure out like how the heck I'm going to make it from point A to point B. It sounds very stressful by the way.
00:03:24
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It is, but it was an impulse buy.
00:03:26
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So here I am stuck with my decision.
00:03:30
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So, so anyway, I go to this orientation and I've got this thing like, except orientation drags a little bit.
00:03:35
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It's like one of those days where it's domino effect day.
00:03:38
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Everything is kind of falling behind.
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And all I keep thinking is this orientation is now an hour behind.
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I have to get on a specific call at noon.
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And then I have got to get my kids at two o'clock and at three o'clock.
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So by the time I bust out of orientation, get in the car, plug like my home address in, and it routes me to this charging station.
00:03:59
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So I sit there for my first call, recharge, get on the road, and I just start driving.
Lost and Frustrated
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And about an hour in, I'm like, I don't recognize any of this.
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I am an hour plus in it going east away from my house.
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So I am now like close to three hours away from home.
00:04:21
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Oh my God.
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Where I started.
00:04:22
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How did you not realize that?
00:04:23
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Because the car was routing me to another charging station for some reason.
00:04:28
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30, I want to see 30, 40 miles in addition to like where I kind of checked myself on the highway.
00:04:36
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I have no idea.
00:04:37
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And somehow there's like, you can click how they want the map to be created.
00:04:42
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So I picked this option, which I didn't pick the option, but allegedly this option was selected to like either go off highways or avoid major highways.
00:04:53
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So I was like on these backgrounds.
00:04:56
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I had no idea where I ended up.
00:04:59
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I, I was,
00:05:01
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When I say livid, I can't tell you.
00:05:03
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I don't know if you've ever had a screaming session in your car, but everything started crashing down on me at that point.
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It was like I was going to be late to get my daughter, late to get my son.
00:05:13
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I'm trying to focus on these work calls, but I don't even know where I am, and I'm going to have to stop and charge my car again.
00:05:20
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And I say something like on a call in the car, it's like my Mercedes, and
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But it'll like her, she responds to Mercedes or anything similar to like how Siri responds.
00:05:31
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If it's, I must've said something that sounded like Mercedes.
00:05:34
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She was like, what can I help you with?
00:05:35
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And I was like, you can help me by giving me the right GD directions and not sending me in.
00:05:41
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Like going off.
00:05:43
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I can just imagine how many not podcast appropriate words were said.
00:05:48
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Lots of expletives.
00:05:51
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And I, I mean, when I say rage, I was like, I'm, if you see me right now, my face is so red in embarrassment because I don't, I cannot tell you in time I ever did that.
00:06:00
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But like, I had a couple of people call was like, Hey, I've been trying to get ahold of you.
00:06:05
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I was like, don't get me started right now.
00:06:10
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So did you get the kid?
00:06:11
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Yeah.
00:06:12
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No, I had to call Matt to get the kids.
00:06:15
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And then I got to them and they had lacrosse and volleyball respectively at the same time.
00:06:23
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And I was just like, right.
00:06:24
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And then what the privileged kids, they are like.
00:06:28
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Wait, so like if we both get picked up like at the same time, like which one of us is going to have to wait?
00:06:33
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And I was like, you guys are six minutes apart.
00:06:36
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It doesn't really matter.
00:06:37
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Somebody's just going to wait six minutes.
00:06:39
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And Julianne was like, well, can I just call my dad?
00:06:41
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Come pick me up then.
00:06:42
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And I was like, because you don't want to wait six minutes?
00:06:44
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Are you kidding?
00:06:45
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Do you know the day I've had?
00:06:48
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You're so spoiled.
00:06:49
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She was like, God.
00:06:50
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Today's not the day to mess with mom.
00:06:52
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I was like, wrong day.
00:06:54
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I was like, I'm going to bed when we got in the house.
00:06:58
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The only thing that could have made it worse is if I was watching my Roomba throw itself down a flight of steps.
00:07:04
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So that was my story.
00:07:06
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That's why I didn't write you back, April.
00:07:08
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I was decompressing and it was probably a good thing I didn't talk to you on Friday.
00:07:12
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Oh my gosh, that sounds horrible and scary at the same time.
00:07:15
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It is really.
00:07:16
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Well, it's scary.
00:07:18
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I didn't like who I was.
00:07:19
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That was the scariest part.
00:07:21
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It's just one of those days.
00:07:22
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And I kind of laughed.
00:07:23
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I was like, I know we talk about these days, but
00:07:25
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In hindsight, you don't feel like they're funny.
00:07:27
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Or I mean, like in the moment, you don't.
00:07:28
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But in hindsight, it's really, it was funny to me.
00:07:33
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Like to look at myself and I was like, I would just love to have been one of the cars passing me.
00:07:38
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And been like, yeah, she's yelling at somebody, but not realizing it was just at an AI person inside.
00:07:47
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I'm like, did you hear that?
00:07:49
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Did you hear what I just said?
00:07:52
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These are moments where I'm thankful that I have like my really old minivan that has no technology in it at all.
00:07:58
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And I just have to like figure it out myself and drive.
00:08:02
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So, yeah, yeah, I need I need to be present is what I'm learning.
00:08:06
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And so,
Meet Adriana: Podcast Cupid
00:08:08
Speaker
okay, okay.
00:08:09
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Adriana, sorry to take all of that time.
00:08:11
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We do have a guest.
00:08:13
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Great story.
00:08:14
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Is it great, Adriana?
00:08:15
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I don't know.
00:08:19
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It's one of those things that you never think is going to happen to you until it happens, right?
00:08:22
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And then you're like, Oh,
00:08:24
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Well, and that's like one of those things you can't make it up, right?
00:08:26
Speaker
Like it sounds like a ridiculous story, but it's like you can't make that up.
00:08:29
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That's the trigger.
00:08:30
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Like when I say to somebody, even like, okay, let's take this into a positive, right?
00:08:36
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The way we approach our patients, we are meeting patients on some of their worst days.
00:08:41
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If you had met me on Friday, I would not be the person you know me as.
00:08:47
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You would have been like,
00:08:49
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she's really angry.
00:08:52
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I don't really like her right now.
00:08:55
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Like she might need out all.
00:08:57
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There's something that you might've said about me in that moment, but we're meeting patients this way.
00:09:02
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This some, for some of these people, this is the worst day of their life.
00:09:05
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Friday wasn't the worst day of my life, but it was a, it was a challenging snowball avalanche effect type of a day, but okay.
00:09:12
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So let's make it positive and say, yeah, let's, what it taught me was,
00:09:18
Speaker
I shouldn't be so judgmental people sometimes because maybe I'm meeting them on a bad day.
00:09:23
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That's true.
00:09:23
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You never know, really.
00:09:24
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And I'm making it about me.
00:09:25
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It's going in other people's minds.
00:09:26
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Yep.
00:09:27
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Yep.
00:09:27
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So, okay.
00:09:28
Speaker
That being said, we're in March.
00:09:29
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Happy March, everybody.
00:09:31
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And as we did last year, we did Herstory Month because it's Women's History Month.
00:09:37
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And what we decided was to invite Adriana, who April just introduced, on to talk a little bit about her journey and what she's been going through.
00:09:46
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And I'm not going to spoil that part.
00:09:49
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I'm going to let her introduce that.
00:09:51
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But I'd like to do, let's break the ice, April.
00:09:54
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Yes, of course.
00:09:56
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Adriana, we're going to ask you a couple just questions.
00:10:01
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And I want you to give us the first answer that comes to mind.
00:10:04
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Okay.
00:10:06
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April.
00:10:06
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All right.
00:10:07
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Am I going first?
00:10:08
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You go.
00:10:09
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All right.
00:10:09
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So Adriana, I always ask something about food.
00:10:12
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I don't know why, but it's always like my thing.
00:10:15
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So if you could have any sandwich, what would your ideal sandwich be to eat?
00:10:28
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That's a good one.
00:10:29
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Probably a
00:10:31
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If I could have turkey with bacon, but now that I'm diabetic, just remove the bacon.
00:10:37
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Yeah.
00:10:38
Speaker
All right.
00:10:39
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No cheese?
00:10:40
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Turkey with bacon?
00:10:41
Speaker
Yeah, cheese, lettuce, tomato, you name it, throw it in there.
00:10:45
Speaker
All right.
00:10:46
Speaker
I'm a turkey girl, too.
00:10:48
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My kids are turkey, too.
00:10:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:51
Speaker
All right.
00:10:51
Speaker
Well, I was going to ask a similar question, but I'll ask it in a different way.
00:10:57
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It's still going to be about food.
00:10:58
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So you're Adriana, you're on a deserted island and you can only eat one type of junk food for the rest of your life.
00:11:07
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And it's not going to affect your health.
00:11:08
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It's calorie free, everything, nothing counts.
00:11:14
Speaker
What is your go to junk food for the rest of your life?
00:11:18
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That's a good one.
00:11:19
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I forgot about junk food nowadays.
00:11:24
Speaker
Probably some chips.
00:11:27
Speaker
What kind of chips?
00:11:29
Speaker
I would say potato chips, you know, anything that has garlic or vinegar.
00:11:36
Speaker
Yes.
00:11:37
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Yes.
00:11:38
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April, we have another vinegar.
00:11:40
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I know.
00:11:40
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I was just thinking another vinegar person.
00:11:43
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I hate vinegar, Adriana.
00:11:44
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I don't eat it.
00:11:45
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Like I hate it.
00:11:45
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I love it.
00:11:47
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Yeah.
00:11:48
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I love it.
00:11:48
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I love it.
00:11:49
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I knew I liked you, Adriana.
00:11:52
Speaker
All right, April, you go.
00:11:54
Speaker
All right.
00:11:55
Speaker
Adriana, if you could take a trip to anywhere in the world, where would you go?
00:12:02
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I would either go to Alaska or to, I did a cruise around the Horn in South America.
00:12:13
Speaker
Okay.
00:12:15
Speaker
Yeah, that was breathtaking.
00:12:17
Speaker
Those are probably my two favorite places just because of the connection with nature and was able to spend some time in a penguin reserved and do a lot of those
00:12:29
Speaker
and see the whales and things like that.
00:12:31
Speaker
Yeah, that's cool.
00:12:33
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:12:33
Speaker
Aww, penguins.
00:12:35
Speaker
Yeah, they're so cute.
00:12:37
Speaker
I've only seen them in the aquarium.
00:12:39
Speaker
Hmm.
00:12:39
Speaker
That'd be interesting.
00:12:41
Speaker
We saw them at SeaWorld and they stunk so bad.
00:12:43
Speaker
Did they really?
00:12:45
Speaker
Yeah, they were in this like contained area because they have to keep it cold for them, right?
00:12:50
Speaker
And it's in Florida.
00:12:51
Speaker
So you have to go in and they can't open both doors at the same time because it'll throw off the temperature.
00:12:57
Speaker
And so I think just all of them confined in that small area.
00:13:00
Speaker
It was very smelly.
00:13:02
Speaker
Penguin poop.
00:13:04
Speaker
Yeah.
00:13:04
Speaker
Sounds lovely.
00:13:05
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Well,
00:13:06
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I kept telling my husband, take a picture.
00:13:10
Speaker
Oh, he's so cute.
00:13:10
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Come on, take a picture.
00:13:12
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He finally said to me, they all look alike.
00:13:15
Speaker
How many pictures do you take?
00:13:18
Speaker
That's true.
00:13:19
Speaker
Really, who's going to challenge you that's really not a picture you took even though?
00:13:23
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You could just get it off the internet, Adrienne.
00:13:25
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I get a really good one and be like, yeah, we saw this one.
00:13:28
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That's true.
00:13:29
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I'm just saving you time.
00:13:30
Speaker
I know, but I was in an area that it was like
00:13:34
Speaker
500 penguins, you know, and they were scattered and it was just, you know, very pretty.
00:13:42
Speaker
I mean, with nature and things like that.
00:13:44
Speaker
So they come, they actually migrate to this island during their mating season.
00:13:52
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So it was really a wonderful experience.
00:13:57
Speaker
I love that.
00:13:58
Speaker
I'm going to go a little quirky on my final question.
00:14:00
Speaker
And that is, there are a lot of things
00:14:04
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that I believed growing up as a kid that as an adult, I look back and I'm like, that's what's funny that that's what I believed monsters under your bed, you know, all of those like type of things that our parents tell us, or that maybe we just pick up as, as kids.
00:14:17
Speaker
But what is the weirdest thing that you were absolutely convinced was real when you were a child?
00:14:26
Speaker
I probably had, you know, those funny that you mentioned that because I was afraid of sleeping alone.
00:14:32
Speaker
It was like,
00:14:33
Speaker
I thought it was a monster or something underneath my bath bed.
00:14:37
Speaker
And my mom refused.
00:14:39
Speaker
She's like, you're going to have to get over that.
00:14:41
Speaker
And she was a school teacher and she was firm about that.
00:14:45
Speaker
And I was like, I used to dread when it came back time to sleep.
00:14:50
Speaker
I used to dread it.
00:14:52
Speaker
We would worry because we had bunk beds.
00:14:54
Speaker
And so I'd always want to be like on the top bed because I'd worry like if my leg went over, um,
00:15:01
Speaker
like the monster can only get you if you're hanging off your bed if you're right it stays in place but i like had tricked myself and like well i can't get up to use the bathroom i can't get up to do and i can't let if my covers fall off the bed they just fall off the bed r.i.p i'm not getting i'm not moving and getting pulled under the bed but
00:15:20
Speaker
I just wondered if you guys had kind of weird twerk.
00:15:23
Speaker
Do you know what I had?
00:15:23
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Yeah.
00:15:24
Speaker
I don't know if you've ever seen the movie Candyman.
00:15:27
Speaker
But we watched it as a kid.
00:15:29
Speaker
And I like I am just not a horror movie person.
00:15:32
Speaker
I can't do it.
00:15:32
Speaker
I like think about them forever.
00:15:34
Speaker
And I watched that with my friends one day.
00:15:35
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And I for years like if I got up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and looked in the mirror like I would freak out like I wouldn't.
00:15:42
Speaker
I'd be like, oh my God, I can't.
00:15:43
Speaker
So I would like try to get up and go to the bathroom and not look at the mirror.
00:15:46
Speaker
And you can't say, isn't it Candyman three times?
00:15:49
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:49
Speaker
So we're not going to say it anymore.
00:15:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:15:52
Speaker
You still believe it.
00:15:53
Speaker
I don't know.
00:15:55
Speaker
It like really struck me as a kid.
00:15:56
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Like I was like, I can't.
00:15:58
Speaker
And then there's, but there's just certain things like that.
00:16:00
Speaker
Like there was a CSI episode one time of a guy who hid under people's beds and I, that freaked me out for a long time.
00:16:08
Speaker
Like, well, you know what freaks me out before I go to bed?
00:16:12
Speaker
Do you know that there's, okay, this is going to turn into a true crime podcast in just a second, but do you know that there are people called froggers?
00:16:19
Speaker
Have you ever heard this?
00:16:20
Speaker
Adriana, have you heard this term, froggers?
00:16:22
Speaker
No.
00:16:23
Speaker
Okay.
00:16:24
Speaker
Froggers are people that basically, like, they squat in your house, but they hide in certain places of your home.
00:16:33
Speaker
They'll, like, I don't even want to scare anybody, but it is, it's like a real thing.
00:16:37
Speaker
People find out there are, like, people living in areas of their homes or, like,
00:16:42
Speaker
in their attics or in other places.
00:16:44
Speaker
And like, there's a whole Dateline episode about it.
00:16:49
Speaker
Okay.
00:16:50
Speaker
We're done talking about that because that's like a big sphere.
00:16:52
Speaker
Moving on to the weather.
00:16:53
Speaker
Today it's sunny and it actually is sunny.
00:16:56
Speaker
Okay.
00:16:57
Speaker
On to our episode and really the highlight of our episode, Adriana.
00:17:03
Speaker
We are happy to have you here.
00:17:05
Speaker
And we're really, really, I think April, you recently were on a call with Adriana that you were pretty inspired by her reflection.
00:17:10
Speaker
Why don't you tell us about that?
00:17:11
Speaker
And let's get started with Adriana.
00:17:15
Speaker
Adriana, so she was, she worked with us at Sound as our senior director of clinical recruitment.
00:17:21
Speaker
And then, you know, as she'll get into in a little bit, she had a medical diagnosis that pulled her away from work and has an incredible story to share about that.
00:17:28
Speaker
But she was on a recruiting call with our team,
00:17:33
Speaker
It was probably a few weeks ago, maybe even a month ago, and was just sort of sharing her story and some inspiration for the group.
00:17:40
Speaker
And it really kind of inspired me.
00:17:42
Speaker
And I thought, you know what?
00:17:43
Speaker
We should get her on to share her story on our podcast.
00:17:45
Speaker
So here she is today.
00:17:47
Speaker
So we're super excited to have you.
00:17:48
Speaker
Thank you, Diana.
00:17:49
Speaker
Thank you.
Adriana's Cancer Diagnosis Journey
00:17:50
Speaker
So let's start about and have you tell us a little bit about your career story and just your life story in general.
00:17:57
Speaker
Sure.
00:18:03
Speaker
I was born in Cuba and came to this country many, many, many years ago and have 30 years of health care total.
00:18:19
Speaker
Partially part of my first 14 years where I teach in hospital, I'm really involved with graduate medical education and health information management.
00:18:34
Speaker
And then I saw an ad about work with doctors.
00:18:38
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, I can do that.
00:18:39
Speaker
This is happening all this time.
00:18:43
Speaker
But it didn't say anything about a recruiting position.
00:18:46
Speaker
Because I probably would have declined it.
00:18:49
Speaker
Because at that time, my office was constantly being flooded with recruiters trying to poach our physicians and our residents.
00:19:01
Speaker
So I went to the interview and it sounded exciting, sounded something totally different.
00:19:06
Speaker
And I started recording emergency medicine and obviously through my lifetime, I have recorded many specialties and worked at Sound for 13 years.
00:19:18
Speaker
Love the organization and the people.
00:19:23
Speaker
And my plan was to retire from Sound.
00:19:28
Speaker
Circumstances change because of my diagnosis, but I can't imagine working with the finest group of people and amazing leaders and mentors and they're part of my family.
00:19:44
Speaker
Yeah, I love that.
00:19:45
Speaker
Tell us what changed, Adriana.
00:19:49
Speaker
In November of 2023, I started having some mild symptoms of itching and heartburn.
00:20:00
Speaker
went to the urgent care obviously you know what kind of itching sorry I'm just curious what kind of itching it was strange it was it's not a regular itching that you have a rash it was something that I felt like my skin inside was burning so went to the urgent care the doctor obviously you know makes sense you know said you know change your soap take some omeprazole see you know
00:20:26
Speaker
let me come back if you didn't feel better.
00:20:28
Speaker
And a week or two went by and I didn't see any improvements.
00:20:35
Speaker
So something, you know, I was, something felt wrong.
00:20:40
Speaker
So my primary care doctor who had done a physical in August said, we're going to repeat your labs in November, in December, just because your glucose and your
00:20:53
Speaker
The liver enzymes are slightly elevated.
00:20:56
Speaker
And I decided to go to Quest and had my labs done and they all came back abnormal.
00:21:05
Speaker
And consequently from that, I went to the emergency department as soon as I had my lab results and told them what was going on and they admitted me to the hospital.
00:21:18
Speaker
I was admitted for...
00:21:20
Speaker
almost a week.
00:21:21
Speaker
It was the week of Thanksgiving.
00:21:22
Speaker
They did a full workup.
00:21:24
Speaker
Did they have any idea, Adriana, at the time?
00:21:26
Speaker
No.
00:21:28
Speaker
So they were just like, something's abnormal, but we're not sure what.
00:21:31
Speaker
They thought it was that, you know, my gallbladder.
00:21:34
Speaker
Okay.
00:21:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:37
Speaker
And they went through that.
00:21:39
Speaker
They did.
00:21:40
Speaker
It was awful.
00:21:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:42
Speaker
They thought it was my gallbladder, but as the more testing they did, obviously,
00:21:48
Speaker
They found that I had a tumor in the head of the pancreas and a small lesion in my liver.
00:21:58
Speaker
Yeah, obviously.
00:22:00
Speaker
And that was November or you had to wait some time for that?
00:22:03
Speaker
No, that was November.
00:22:04
Speaker
By the time I was I was discharged from the hospital, I had a diagnosis.
00:22:11
Speaker
I obviously.
00:22:14
Speaker
You know, when you hear cancer and you pancreatic cancer, you immediately, I don't even know if you ask me, I look back retrospectively and I don't recall a lot of things because of the amount of stress that we were under and, you know, not the uncertainty, right?
00:22:38
Speaker
So, and I started immediately, you know,
00:22:43
Speaker
I had an appointment, of course, with a multidisciplinary team here locally, but I immediately decided that I was going to go to either MD Anderson or MSK, whatever, you know, those institutions that are well known and well respected for cancer.
00:23:04
Speaker
And I wanted to start, you know, if I qualify for treatment as quickly as possible.
00:23:12
Speaker
I recall vividly one of my doctors telling me, do yourself a favor and don't look up anything.
00:23:22
Speaker
You're too much.
00:23:25
Speaker
And, you know, whatever, you're going to read a lot of horror stories.
00:23:31
Speaker
You're going to read and it's not in your best interest right now.
00:23:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:37
Speaker
I feel like you can go down quite a rabbit hole on the internet with this stuff and really
00:23:41
Speaker
Well, you can find what you're looking for.
00:23:44
Speaker
Just the way you put it in.
00:23:46
Speaker
Did you, did you, did you actually listen to him, Adriana?
00:23:49
Speaker
Or did you, did you look it up?
00:23:51
Speaker
I had already done all of that.
00:23:55
Speaker
And yeah.
00:23:56
Speaker
And I certainly appreciate it when he said that, because, you know, now that I've learned a lot about precision medicine and genetics and all of this, and obviously there's, there's a lot more to,
00:24:09
Speaker
to learn and to understand and to do research on cancer.
00:24:14
Speaker
Now look back, I listen to my friends sometimes and they're like, yeah, I don't feel I have this thing.
00:24:19
Speaker
And I, I Google it and I'm like, why are you going to Dr. Google?
00:24:23
Speaker
I mean, you need to go see a doctor or, you know, your provider, you know, just don't, don't everything that is online is not true.
00:24:34
Speaker
And I also, and by the way, Alicia, I went through
00:24:38
Speaker
The second time when I was, so I went through six courses of treatment of chemo, and then I had Whipple.
00:24:47
Speaker
And when I was preparing for Whipple, I joined several Facebook groups and I started doing a lot of research on Whipple.
00:25:00
Speaker
And I realized that I needed, I just went ahead and said,
00:25:08
Speaker
and remove myself from those groups because, yeah, because first of all, you know, my experience in 2024 was totally different than 17 years ago.
00:25:22
Speaker
And two is that there's a lot of misinformation and probably really some horrific stories and some really sad stories.
00:25:32
Speaker
Mm-hmm.
00:25:34
Speaker
I didn't experience that going through Whipple.
00:25:36
Speaker
So that's something that looking back retrospectively, you know, it was great that I had a network of people that had gone through Whipple in the past that I can go to, that none of them had those, you know, horror stories.
00:25:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:51
Speaker
You know, obviously it's a major surgery, but, but it was five days in the hospital and I recovered well.
00:26:00
Speaker
Well, Adriana, let me walk this back just a little bit because I think you skipped over something that is important as well.
00:26:07
Speaker
So you were diagnosed in November and then you said I had chemo, then you had Whipple.
Challenges of Chemotherapy
00:26:12
Speaker
Tell us about the chemo.
00:26:13
Speaker
What was the chemo like?
00:26:15
Speaker
I mean, you don't have to tell us day by day, but what was that experience?
00:26:19
Speaker
And then what is Whipple for those people who don't know what that procedure is?
00:26:25
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:26
Speaker
Well, chemo is, you know...
00:26:28
Speaker
it's tough.
00:26:29
Speaker
I don't think there's any patient who's been diagnosed with cancer, regardless of, you know, what the diagnosis is, who's going to tell you that they went to, they love chemotherapy.
00:26:42
Speaker
I mean, obviously I embrace my cancer.
00:26:45
Speaker
This is my tumor.
00:26:47
Speaker
I qualify for chemotherapy.
00:26:50
Speaker
I am going to go and take this one day at a time and go to treatment and say, thank God I qualified for chemo.
00:26:57
Speaker
And
00:26:58
Speaker
Here we go.
00:26:59
Speaker
And chemo is tough.
00:27:02
Speaker
The six courses of treatment for chemotherapy take a toll on you and then you go through, you know, then we'll talk about Whipple, but it's tough.
00:27:13
Speaker
It's by the time you, my chemo was practically the full day.
00:27:20
Speaker
And then I would have a pump that I would take home for a day and a half.
00:27:25
Speaker
And by the time
00:27:27
Speaker
You go through chemo and your body starts recovering and obviously you have to drink a lot of water.
00:27:34
Speaker
There's a lot of commitment to your well-being during this time from a nutritional perspective, from a dehydration perspective, from all the side effects for chemo and how do you manage that?
00:27:49
Speaker
By the time you start recovering, then you have the next cycle.
00:27:55
Speaker
So...
00:27:56
Speaker
It is tough.
00:27:57
Speaker
I mean, I tell everyone that, you know, take care of yourself because I wouldn't want anyone to have to go through chemotherapy.
00:28:07
Speaker
But I also recognize that chemotherapy is the reason why I'm, you know, part of the reason why I'm here today.
00:28:14
Speaker
So, and then after the surgery, which I'll talk a little bit about, after the surgery, I went through six more rounds of chemo.
00:28:25
Speaker
And I thought before surgery was bad, post-surgery that you're recovering from this large, this is a very lengthy procedure, a major surgery was even tougher.
00:28:42
Speaker
There were days that I was like, how am I gonna make it through this?
00:28:46
Speaker
I never said anything to my doctors or my family and my husband because,
00:28:52
Speaker
You know, I'm a strong person and I'm like, I'm gonna make it through this.
00:28:56
Speaker
There's no point of either being the victim or feeling sorry for myself or, you know, and this shall pass.
00:29:03
Speaker
But it was tough, very tough.
00:29:06
Speaker
But Whipple is, you guys probably know more about Whipple than I do, but it's basically what happens through the Whipple surgery is they remove your gallbladder
00:29:20
Speaker
They reconnect, they cut the head of the pancreas, which part of the reason why a lot of patients end up with diabetes is because of that.
00:29:29
Speaker
And then they reconnect the pancreas to your liver and to your small intestine.
00:29:38
Speaker
And post-Whipoli, obviously I depend for any time I eat, I have to take digestive enzymes because my body,
00:29:50
Speaker
my pancreas does not produce it anymore.
00:29:53
Speaker
So it's a major surgery.
00:29:55
Speaker
It's a surgery that, you know, my surgeon shared with me that because of my health, because it was in pretty good shape and pretty health-wise, it was, you know, that I, and because of my cancer and, you know, the fact that
00:30:18
Speaker
Although I had a lesion in my liver, it had not spread completely to my liver.
00:30:25
Speaker
I qualify for Whipple, but not everyone is fortunate to qualify.
00:30:35
Speaker
So here I am qualifying for chemotherapy and having the, you know, being fortunate or
00:30:44
Speaker
to qualify for Whipple.
00:30:47
Speaker
And then obviously post Whipple is chemo again for six more treatments.
00:30:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:55
Speaker
Which is every other week.
00:30:57
Speaker
So it's, it's tough.
00:30:58
Speaker
I can't, I can't not share in words how, how this journey has been.
00:31:06
Speaker
I can only share what I have learned through the journey because it is, um,
00:31:13
Speaker
I am so empathetic to anyone who has a chronic disease or yeah, that there are no, it's, it breaks my heart and I wouldn't want anyone to go through it.
00:31:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:29
Speaker
Well, you've been through a lot, um, in such a short time, it feels like, and, um, and you had good news on Friday at your, at your post, uh, treatment imaging, right?
00:31:39
Speaker
So that's great news.
00:31:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:41
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:41
Speaker
I, um, it was six month checkup, obviously.
00:31:44
Speaker
Um, you know, every three months they do scans and, um, no evidence of cancer.
00:31:50
Speaker
So awesome.
00:31:51
Speaker
That's great news.
00:31:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:54
Speaker
And that's, that's been, I mean, so your, your diagnosis was 23, right?
00:31:58
Speaker
November 23.
00:32:00
Speaker
Correct.
00:32:01
Speaker
Then a full, full year, 24 treatment, surgery treatment.
00:32:06
Speaker
And here we are.
00:32:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:08
Speaker
It's pretty awesome.
00:32:09
Speaker
April 3rd is going to be my first Whipple anniversary.
00:32:14
Speaker
Oh, it's two days after my birthday.
00:32:18
Speaker
Well, happy birthday.
00:32:22
Speaker
I need, I would love good news.
00:32:24
Speaker
More good news for you.
00:32:27
Speaker
That's wonderful.
00:32:28
Speaker
I have an appointment with my surgeon that day and, um,
00:32:33
Speaker
And I was telling my oncologist, she's like, you have an appointment on the same day of your surgery.
00:32:38
Speaker
I'm like, yeah, we're going to celebrate.
00:32:41
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:32:42
Speaker
I mean, you have to, right?
00:32:43
Speaker
Like, that's awesome.
00:32:46
Speaker
Well, I mean, as we said, you've been through a lot and, you know, a lot of exposure to the healthcare system and all that kind of stuff.
00:32:51
Speaker
So how has this impacted your outlook on life?
00:32:55
Speaker
Would you say this journey that you've had?
00:32:58
Speaker
It certainly has impacted me in many ways.
Gratitude and Reflection
00:33:02
Speaker
Certainly has my faith has grown.
00:33:03
Speaker
And I cherish my family and friends even more.
00:33:12
Speaker
They not only are amazing people, but through this journey of realize what a gift, you know, to have.
00:33:23
Speaker
a wonderful family and be surrounded by with friends who they're supported me, their love and compassion and throughout this journey is so was so palpable that I have no way no words to express my gratitude.
00:33:44
Speaker
It certainly has
00:33:48
Speaker
You know, I thought I lived a life practicing gratitude, but it's taking it elevated to another level where, you know, I realized I wake up every day just being grateful and thankful that I am alive, the gift of life, that I really focus and strived every day
00:34:16
Speaker
on things that are really important.
00:34:19
Speaker
And it is so easy, especially when you're working and you have kids and family and responsibilities and demands to get so caught up in all of that, that sometimes we often forget to take care of ourselves, to be grateful for what we have, to, you know, we,
00:34:44
Speaker
our nutrition, you know, and sadly enough in this country, you know, we have to do something about that.
00:34:52
Speaker
I mean, even I remember days when I was working that I would eat at 2 or 3 p.m.
00:34:57
Speaker
and I would, you know, grab a salad from whatever place, you know, it wasn't probably the, I don't even know if they had organic vegetables or what they did, it was just whatever, it's just a salad, right?
00:35:14
Speaker
I spend a lot of time, you know, meditating and prayer.
00:35:18
Speaker
I think that that's how I start my day every day.
00:35:23
Speaker
And then obviously more of enjoying life and, you know, don't sweat the small stuff.
00:35:29
Speaker
Things that we all know life, you know, keep it simple, right?
00:35:35
Speaker
Don't complicate yourself with accumulating stuff and, and,
00:35:40
Speaker
focusing on things that are not important or relevant because at the end of the day, you know, it's like, we're all here and we don't, we don't know when, you know, that moment is going to come.
00:35:52
Speaker
And obviously when you're, when you have a diagnosis of cancer, then you start thinking about your legacy and your life and all those things.
00:36:02
Speaker
And you realize that, you know, my legacy is, is probably, you know,
00:36:10
Speaker
making sure that I stay true to myself by saying, you know, I'm, I'm strong.
00:36:16
Speaker
I'm a fighter.
00:36:16
Speaker
I'm not going to let this, um, diagnosis overcome, you know, diagnosis be, I'm not going to be the victim.
00:36:27
Speaker
This is for whatever reason is in my life.
00:36:31
Speaker
And I'm, I'm going to fight until the end.
00:36:36
Speaker
That's all I can do.
00:36:37
Speaker
So I strive to live my life with that same passion that every day is a gift and I'm going to live it to the fullest and enjoy life.
00:36:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:51
Speaker
I love that.
00:36:52
Speaker
I mean, I do think, I mean, obviously having cancer is a physical battle, right?
00:36:56
Speaker
Like you're, you know, going through chemo and surgeries and all the things, but a lot of it is also mental, right?
00:37:01
Speaker
Like if you don't have that positive outlook of, you know, I can fight this, I can beat this, you know, and like you said, not kind of getting in that zone of where you're kind of feeling sorry for yourself.
00:37:12
Speaker
And instead of having that positive outlook is, is so important.
00:37:16
Speaker
But I want to also add like,
00:37:19
Speaker
anybody is hearing this it is okay when we say feel sorry for yourself it's it's more of like a persistent constant mind state right i i i think it like reasonably as humans that we all are going to respond in a way like why me like what did i do you know and those are the questions that you may ask yourself and adriana i'm sure you had your own um i've not talked to many people in in this profession um that the patients were just like well
00:37:47
Speaker
well, okay, I have breast cancer, pancreatic cancer.
00:37:50
Speaker
So let's just take it on.
00:37:51
Speaker
It's like all in a day's work.
00:37:53
Speaker
It doesn't happen like that.
00:37:55
Speaker
But it is like the persistent mindset.
00:37:58
Speaker
If that sounds to me like what you're saying is if that's where you stay, then you kind of will some of that negativity into your attempt to recover.
00:38:09
Speaker
One thing you said, Adriana, when we did a call with Adriana last week, just to kind of touch base with her and
00:38:16
Speaker
April heard this great story.
00:38:17
Speaker
We really wanted to share it with all of you guys.
00:38:19
Speaker
And you really touched me with the lessons learned piece.
00:38:25
Speaker
And what you took from your life is what you've started to respond to, but also your perception of healthcare.
00:38:32
Speaker
And you're on one side of the bed is what we... Sometimes we say, I'm not used to being on this side of the bed.
00:38:39
Speaker
You're in the healthcare system that you know.
00:38:43
Speaker
and have navigated for so long, part of your career, just be part of who you are.
00:38:47
Speaker
Now you are the patient.
00:38:49
Speaker
How has this shaped your view of healthcare in general or specific, whichever part you want to tackle?
Insights on Healthcare System
00:38:56
Speaker
Yeah, no, and I, thank you.
00:38:58
Speaker
Thank you, Alicia.
00:39:01
Speaker
I mean, you're absolutely right about the victim piece.
00:39:04
Speaker
And I want to, I want to actually add to that and answer your question.
00:39:10
Speaker
What I realized through this journey is that when I would go to get my infusions in the waiting room, at times I found patients that their insurance will not qualify, they would not pay for their chemo, that they were alone, that somehow they didn't tolerate the treatments.
00:39:41
Speaker
Along the way, you know, I realized that, heck, I can't be, I cannot be a victim because I have a family that cares about me.
00:39:52
Speaker
I have, I am going to fight this.
00:39:56
Speaker
I have insurance.
00:40:00
Speaker
My neoprogen injections, which is to your blood counts, your white cells that you need post chemo were never denied.
00:40:12
Speaker
So I had so many things to be thankful for that that's the reason why I didn't go into this feeling sorry for myself.
00:40:22
Speaker
But what I realized in health care, I mean, I'm going to give you two different perspectives.
00:40:27
Speaker
My perspective as a patient and also as a recruiter.
00:40:33
Speaker
I personally think the health care system is broken, but, you know, it's no news.
00:40:37
Speaker
We all know that.
00:40:39
Speaker
If you think about the shortages of healthcare providers across the country, and we as recruiters, it's very palpable.
00:40:51
Speaker
You as clinicians certainly have felt that.
00:40:59
Speaker
And so recruiters, I often would go to a hospital, perhaps meet with the administration, meet with the medical director.
00:41:07
Speaker
turnover and things like that, you can hear and feel the stress.
00:41:13
Speaker
But as a patient, I experience what it is to be short of staff, whether it's a shortage of nurses, shortage of doctors, whether it's a doctor who recently resigned and then, you know, the other physician has to pick up all those patients.
00:41:34
Speaker
That, you know,
00:41:35
Speaker
the high cost of healthcare.
00:41:39
Speaker
I mean, I would look at, you know, I'm going through all this experience of chemo and Whipple and all of that.
00:41:45
Speaker
And I would see the unsurmountable amount of bills.
00:41:49
Speaker
You know, and luckily that I had, you know, good insurance and that we were prepared for this, but financially this can be devastating for a family.
00:42:01
Speaker
The lack of access, I mean, how many patients
00:42:06
Speaker
in that same infusion room, we're told your insurance will not cover, I'm sorry, you have to go somewhere else.
00:42:12
Speaker
And now they have to make an appointment and start all over again.
00:42:16
Speaker
Or a community hospital where, you know, I live in an area that there's a lot of resources, but I can't imagine in a community setting where, you know, there's, they don't even have perhaps oncologists, you know.
00:42:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:31
Speaker
or highly specialized nutritionist to really support you through this journey, which is, you know, it's so important or, you know, even a psychologist to really help understand and navigate for your own mental health.
00:42:48
Speaker
And then I, you know, the whole inequalities, you know, I've talked to patients in the waiting room where they were there.
00:42:58
Speaker
They obviously knew they had a,
00:43:00
Speaker
you know, cancer, they needed to get their chemo, but they had very minimal awareness of clinical trials, genetic testing, what resources are available.
00:43:15
Speaker
A lot of these community hospitals don't have a, you know, maybe the titles are different, but basically an ambassador to walk you through where, you know, this healthcare provider can,
00:43:30
Speaker
actually help you get those resources.
00:43:35
Speaker
You know, so it was really eye opening to me.
00:43:40
Speaker
And then, you know, obviously, from a physician perspective, you know, I often talk to the nurses and, you know, to regardless of where I went, you know, since I'm a recruiter, and I love people, you know, that was part of our conversation.
00:43:55
Speaker
And we would talk about how many times you spend your full day seeing patients and obviously doing paperwork and then have to have appointments with the insurance company to talk about denials and write letters and regulations.
00:44:10
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, my God, how stressful can it be a health care provider to navigate through that, to have all the student loans, you know,
00:44:23
Speaker
to be able to spend time with your family and to navigate through all of this and then also to help your patients along the way.
00:44:33
Speaker
Because if they don't have the resources and they don't know how to obtain them, you know, how then it becomes, you know, there's more for you to do.
00:44:46
Speaker
I mean, one of the things that I was talking to my oncologist the last
00:44:51
Speaker
our last visit is sometimes medications.
00:44:53
Speaker
You can get medications, lower costs or lower co-payments if you call the pharmaceutical company.
00:45:01
Speaker
A lot of patients don't know this.
00:45:03
Speaker
So I can only, that's why I'm so empathetic to cancer patients when they're going through this journey because if you are a minority and you don't have anyone in your family who can advocate or you know how to advocate to some extent,
00:45:21
Speaker
Can you imagine going through this journey, having a diagnosed with cancer, a lot of uncertainties through this journey, especially if you don't, you know, depending on your stage and all of that, and then having to advocate for yourself.
00:45:40
Speaker
And if you don't know how to advocate for yourself, probably you're not, you know, something is going to happen.
00:45:48
Speaker
Something's going to happen.
00:45:50
Speaker
Either you're going to give up
00:45:52
Speaker
um you don't know that you can ask for you know i'm dehydrated i need an iv iv infusion post-chemo or you don't know that you can obtain um genetic testing through a network that is available you know for free but the majority of patients don't have
00:46:14
Speaker
don't know about these things and they don't know how to navigate through the system and they don't have, sometimes they don't even have access to this.
00:46:21
Speaker
If you live in a small community, you know, you have to drive four hours to go see a doctor.
00:46:27
Speaker
I mean, you know, that's, I don't know if I would, you know, if I would do that.
00:46:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:34
Speaker
That would be hard.
00:46:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:46:37
Speaker
I think we take a lot for granted.
00:46:38
Speaker
Is there anything in particular, Adriana, one thing you had mentioned, um,
00:46:44
Speaker
I'm trying to think on our call last week, you said something about providers that really stuck with me and maybe it was.
00:46:52
Speaker
Yes.
00:46:55
Speaker
Say that again.
00:46:57
Speaker
Well, I, I think that, you know, because I saw, I was constantly going for treatment, right.
00:47:06
Speaker
I would see probably more than just one visit as a recruiter.
00:47:12
Speaker
Through this journey, I don't, I made it a point to thank everyone along the way.
00:47:24
Speaker
I listened to some, so many stories of nurses who decided to go into medicine with, you know, during COVID.
00:47:34
Speaker
And they, and now they're like, did I make the right decision?
00:47:40
Speaker
I think it's so important that, you know, we often talk about, you know, during COVID we talked about our heroes, right?
00:47:49
Speaker
Our heroes are every, are still doing the work.
00:47:55
Speaker
Our heroes are constantly giving every, giving themselves to these, to patients like me, who at times we know they would hold my hand and say,
00:48:10
Speaker
Don't worry, honey, you're going to be okay.
00:48:13
Speaker
They would come and check on me.
00:48:15
Speaker
Our heroes are the ones that would, you will walk into the infusion room and they're there with a smile.
00:48:22
Speaker
And, you know, sometimes, you know, when you think about working in an infusion room with all those drugs and all those chemos and all of that, there's all of these things that they have to do for safety.
00:48:32
Speaker
But I think that we don't,
00:48:36
Speaker
we often forget about this.
00:48:39
Speaker
Our heroes are the ones that are short of staff and they're still taking the load.
00:48:45
Speaker
That at 7 p.m., you know, one time my chemo started late for whatever reasons.
00:48:54
Speaker
And at 7 p.m., my nurse was there with me and she's like, don't worry, I'm going to stay with you until, you know, until we're done.
00:49:01
Speaker
Obviously, but those are my heroes.
00:49:04
Speaker
I mean, to me,
00:49:06
Speaker
these nurses that took care of me were angels and my multidisciplinary team that was surrounded me, they're amazing.
00:49:15
Speaker
And I would be grateful every single day of my life for the care they have provided me.
00:49:22
Speaker
We as patients need to be sometimes, you know, we say thank you, but we need to say thank you all the time.
00:49:31
Speaker
We need to be grateful for those people who have made a commitment
00:49:35
Speaker
and that are passionate about medicine and made a commitment to provide service.
00:49:41
Speaker
And, you know, there's, to me, there's not more of a rewarding career than being in medicine.
00:49:49
Speaker
But sometimes along the way, you know, what happens is, you know, patients think that, oh, this is just a job.
00:49:57
Speaker
Well, no, I mean, you can actually, heck, you can choose any career that you want.
00:50:02
Speaker
But medicine requires a lot of dedication and passion.
00:50:07
Speaker
And I saw this every day that I went to the hospital, every day that I got care.
00:50:12
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:14
Speaker
I remember you saying that and thinking, we don't hear it enough.
Appreciation for Healthcare Workers
00:50:21
Speaker
So to hear it, I guess, also from the inside-outside perspective is nice.
00:50:27
Speaker
And I'm really grateful that...
00:50:31
Speaker
that you took time to recognize that because like, I think we even talked about those providers that are putting on their scrubs and heading into work every morning, usually don't, don't hear those things and they don't know the impact that they've had.
00:50:45
Speaker
And they've been kind of a blip on the radar in your treatment or, and maybe people you'll always remember, but they won't, they'll never know that that's how you thought.
00:50:53
Speaker
And for all of our, you know, all patients, that's,
00:50:56
Speaker
I don't know, that's very touching for me.
00:50:58
Speaker
So thank you again for sharing.
00:51:00
Speaker
You know, I also think that, you know, we were talking about burnout, you know, either because of shortage or for whatever reasons, you know, as when you're burnout, you could have easily have a bad day, right?
00:51:13
Speaker
But wouldn't it be nice to in return, you know, the same smile that I got when I got to the infusion room and, you know, for me to in return to say,
00:51:23
Speaker
Thank you for taking care of me.
00:51:25
Speaker
I really appreciate everything that you did.
00:51:27
Speaker
You went above and beyond.
00:51:31
Speaker
To me, it would mean so much for us to do that.
00:51:40
Speaker
I would say my sense of empathy and compassion has definitely elevated to a level above and beyond what I thought I was capable of.
00:51:52
Speaker
But that's my motto.
00:51:54
Speaker
I mean, I think you can take this motto along to anywhere you go, right?
00:51:59
Speaker
Whether it's to a restaurant or supermarket or whatever.
00:52:02
Speaker
But these are people that are, you know, when I think about healthcare professionals, and that's why I love so much recruiting, is because there has to be a passion to really spend so many years going to school.
00:52:18
Speaker
And we all know this is not easy.
00:52:20
Speaker
We all know getting into
00:52:22
Speaker
in all these school and learning and practicing and internships and preceptor ships and things like that.
00:52:31
Speaker
And now you finally arrived, right?
00:52:35
Speaker
You're either a physician or APP and you're delivering care and you're just going along every day trying to do your job.
00:52:46
Speaker
And it would be nice, you know, along the way for someone to acknowledge all the hard work and all the sacrifice you made.
00:52:53
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:52:56
Speaker
I love that.
00:52:57
Speaker
Well, I know that we could talk about this all day.
00:53:00
Speaker
And Adrienne, I think you have officially broken a record in one of our longest recordings.
00:53:05
Speaker
So thank you.
00:53:07
Speaker
And I actually think that's a great thing.
00:53:08
Speaker
I just looked at the clock and I was like, holy smokes, we've been talking for a really long time.
00:53:13
Speaker
And I could talk to you for like another hour, but for purposes of this episode, I think we'll wrap it up here.
00:53:19
Speaker
Any last thoughts, Adriana, that you have or any, I don't know, we say clinical pearls in our world, but just life pearls.
00:53:26
Speaker
Any closing thoughts, remarks, comments that you have on your end that you'd like to share with the audience?
Closing Thoughts on Gratitude
00:53:32
Speaker
I think we cover most of them.
00:53:35
Speaker
Basically, you know, just take care of yourself and listen to your body, share with your family and friends, you know,
00:53:42
Speaker
nourish your soul and um good nutrition um and mostly be grateful and be kind and be thankful yeah yeah i love that i love that well if you guys have questions for adriana or feedback for this episode obviously we'll have the episode launched
00:54:06
Speaker
on all of our platforms, Spotify, Apple, SoundCloud, anywhere where you can find your podcast.
00:54:13
Speaker
So please make sure that you follow us there, download, subscribe to our podcast.
00:54:18
Speaker
If you'd like to interact with us, you can email us at oncallpodcast at soundphysicians.com or on Instagram, follow us on call with April and Alicia.
00:54:27
Speaker
And Adriana, we'll
00:54:29
Speaker
probably going to post some photos and get some family photos or just timeline photos of your treatment that we'd like to share with the audience.
00:54:35
Speaker
So we'll talk to you about that.
00:54:37
Speaker
But yeah, I think we'll, we'll leave it there and share, you know, let our listeners share their feedback and see what happens.
00:54:45
Speaker
So thank you.
00:54:47
Speaker
Thank you so much.
00:54:48
Speaker
And until next time you guys stay well and we'll stay on call.
00:54:51
Speaker
Bye everyone.
00:54:52
Speaker
Thanks guys.