Anne: Hi everybody. It's Anne Duffy and welcome to Dental Entrepreneur, the future of dentistry's podcast. I'm so happy to have you here today. I've got a very special friend. She's a special guest. We've known each other for a couple of years. She's a dynamic DeW and helps us out. But before we get started, let me tell you a little bit about her.
Caitlin Parsons is seasoned industry. Dental hygienist and chronic pain survivor is a certified yoga therapist and ergonomic consultant. She empowers dental professionals to thrive through her wellness programs and the Aligned Hygienist podcast. Caitlin Parsons, welcome to the podcast today.
Thank you. I am so excited to be here with you. I'm so glad you're here. And so it's so funny because every time I get on before we start hit record, I am a little bit stressed out. My heart rate goes up and I get a little bit tongue tied. And,and so I know that you have the gift of giving us a few seconds, to get some breath work in.
And so if you're listening to this and you feel a little stressed, hang tight right now because Caitlin's going to walk us through a little breath work to get started. Just a little, what, 10 seconds, 30 seconds, something like that.
Caitlin: Yeah, just a moment. Awesome. Perfect. So if you can, and you're in a safe place to close your eyes, you can close your eyes.
If not keep them open and just take a moment to first become aware of your breath, either through the nose or gently parted lips. You might notice if it feels fast. Or rigid, or maybe it feels easeful. And then just start to slow the breath down. So allow each inhale to become longer and slower as you fill all the way up.
And each exhale, long and slow, exhaling all the way to the bottom. And again, full breath in, maybe even sitting up a little bit taller, opening across the chest. Then a long exhale all the way out. And then one more time, long breath in, sitting again, even a little bit taller, or standing a little bit taller, and a long exhale, letting the shoulders drop, the arms relax.
And then if you closed your eyes, you might open them. And welcome to the podcast, . Welcome to the podcast. Ah,thank you so much. Just Anne and I are addicted to breath work.
Anne: I know. I never knew I was addicted to breath work until I met you. And now I am. I need you to be with me every day though.
That's the problem. I'm gonna remind myself. Now you had mentioned that you can do this anytime. of the day because we're all stressed. those of you that are listening today are most probably a true dental entrepreneur. And we know that's a rollercoaster. You got to hang on tight, either owning your practice or owning your business or, wanting to do either of those.
So, You know, I appreciate that, Caitlin, you've seen a lot of stressful dental professionals out there in your career of coaching and aligning people. So tell us a little bit about, what you see in the dental industry how stressful is the dental industry and the people in it?
Caitlin: Oh, that's a good question.
Dentistry, from like a clinical perspective, is physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting, or it can be, I should say. Physically, we are, first of all, just sitting in general for long periods of time is not easy on our bodies. And then we add a patient and a mouth and instruments and equipment. it can be physically exhausting.
And then when we look at a day to day of a patient. entrepreneur too, because we sit a lot for being an entrepreneur and running our business. And that affects our physical health too. But then when we look at a dental office or running your businesses constantly go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, we're thinking about our last patient. We're thinking about the next thinking about our co worker. There is. Constantly things going on and it adds up in our body and our patients can feel that as a business owner.
Our clients can feel it. It's a big difference from if we walk into an op or a client meeting and we're stressed out. We're overwhelmed. We're discombobulated. We're all over the place. First, if we feel Good. We feel balanced, centered, grounded, right? That's a big difference. But dentistry is challenging and there's a lot of burnout because it's, that physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion of caring for patients, of sometimes not being treated the best either by our coworkers, our boss, or even by our patients.
And that adds up.
Anne: you're in the parking lot, you're going into the office, you see the schedule and as a clinical hygienist, I would zero in on the very difficult patients, not just from a clinical standpoint, but just from personality standpoint, right?
You know, they hate being there. they're going to be complaining the whole time. that's happened to every single dental professional when they walk in the morning in the office and they see the schedule, or if you're the dentist and you're the owner and the schedule is empty.
I mean, Talk about stress. So what I love about what you do and you teach is that you can not just do that. As we were talking in the morning, in the cars, those what we just did. Now, put your hands on the steering wheel if you want, and then do the deep breathing. Go in, give us some tricks and tips on how to get through day, a day, an eight hour day.
In the dental office. To get grounded.
Caitlin: I'd say how you start the day is the most importantthe literally the most simple and effective, tricks that I have is when in doubt I do yoga in bed in the morning like a minute of just stretching while I'm in bed.
Would I love to do more? Yeah, but just that moment of slowing down of paying attention to our breath and being in the body releasing any of The aches and ickies from sleeping or whatever the day before that helps for me. And for so many people just get centered.
And again, starting your day instead of like how most people started is getting in the parking lot, you're thinking about your schedule and, Oh my God, are there going to be any people that don't show up? And of course the dentist is hoping it for the opposite way, but, There's a big difference of coming in grounded.
We're going to be a little more excited to take care of our patients and to show up for each one of them. But so I'd say how you start your day is important. And it doesn't mean you have to take 15, 20 minutes or go on this big walk or go to yoga or do a half hour of this. It's like a couple of minutes of being in your body of breathing, maybe setting just a really simple intention or affirmation for the day.
But then when we get to work. As early as looking at our notes, we can be again, breathing, paying attention to our posture. Sometimes when I'm reading my notes for the day or like looking at my patients, I even just, I'm doing it now, bringing my hands behind the back of my head. So my elbows are out wide and even just like stretching the elbows back.
I can clearly easily read my notes, but then you can kind of lift one elbow and get a side bend. So there's things that we can do throughout our day That I think is one of the most important things because obviously it's those moments where we get to be centered. We're stretching our body. We're releasing tension.
But I think when we're doing that again throughout our day in between each patient when we're cleaning the room or whatever it is, there's less accumulation of gunk, whatever it is, like physical stress or mental stress at the end of the day. So there's less recovery time required when again, we're just getting those little bits of.
nourishment for ourselves throughout the day.
Wow. What strikes me is that all those years I worked in clinical hygiene, I never thought about taking care of myself. When I hit the office, This is like a definitely a newer thing in general, I'd say, but I only came to this conclusion because I spent so long in pain and realized that I had to take care of myself in order to actually feel good and do well.
Be a great hygienist, but we're not taught these things we're taught like, Oh, if we want to, you know, go on a diet, it has to be this diet or this day and we have to choose. And what if throughout the day, we could just have little moments of what would feel good right now?
OK, I'm going to get up, I'm going to stretch against this wall and then I'm going to go get my patient or whatever it is.
Anne: but the other thing that strikes me is that you were saying earlier too, before we got on the podcast, that you actually can show up and be present to that person in the chair to be able to serve with your highest self to that patient, instead of just, patient after patient, cause we're all on a timeline, there's somebody out there waiting and, we just don't ever, you know, Take a second to just really settle in
Caitlin: and I think that's when we start to experience burnout right when there's day after day after day of we're like chasing the next thing without having caught up with what happened before so we're just piling things up and continuing forward.
Yeah, I think. One of the most important things we can do is the small moments of just taking care of ourselves. And for me, it only happened because I had to.
Anne: you get into being the aligned hygienist?
Caitlin: Because if I'm being really honest, I was so out of alignment for so long.
That's a big part of my story. So I started as a dental hygienist. I was 22 years old when I got my hygiene license. so I was a baby. I started working five to six days a week, living at home, but paying off my loans heavily, like work ethic. Gone too much. And I started experiencing multiple areas of pain and it didn't go away and I ignored it for a while until I finally couldn't.
I was looking into other career opportunities. I was looking into getting my bachelors to see if I could do something else with hygiene. I was,really worried because I was feeling stressed. I was anxious. I was not showing up as the best hygienist that I probably could be. And then later saw.
I had a moment I went to yoga, hot yoga, out of all things, which is the opposite of what I teach now, but I remember going to a few classes and thinking, if this class can help me feel a little bit better, there has to be something that's specific to the work we do, because I had been in pain for a while and finally started to realize, I wasn't the only one in pain.
There's actually a lot of other people that are struggling with welcome to the group.Welcome to the group. Yeah. And then I started researching. There really wasn't anyone doing anything therapeutic. And so I just had this realization. I need to learn and understand how to heal my own body in pain so I can help other dental professionals.
And so I became a yoga teacher and then I moved from Boston to San Diego. For my second teacher training, which was an advanced yoga teacher training, more focused on therapeutics, which was where I was going on posture, gait, the way that we move our body, our nervous system. Yeah, exactly. And really throughout it, it was a personal discovery.
I was learning how to bend. be in my body. I spent so many years just a people pleaser and anxious and, in pain that I really hadn't been connected to myself. after that I did a thousand hour yoga therapy program and got into more of ergonomics, always knowing my goal was to help dental professionals, but I didn't know how.
And so I healed from neck and shoulder pain. I had low back pain. I had carpal tunnel syndrome. I've had tennis elbow. I've had a ton of stuff. And I feel like that's how I've learned to understand the body and pain and I mean, unless there's like a clear injury where I fell or I was playing baseball and whatever, unless there's something like that, it's typically multiple things like, what is our posture like?
How are we taking care of ourselves? What instruments are we using? Like, there's multiple things when it comes to pain. But, Fast forward a few years, I've been teaching yoga classes and working privately with people on programs for pain management, injury recovery. And now I'm an ergonomics consultant and yoga therapist and really the aligned hygienist was because body, mind and energy.
I went through massive transformation of therapy. Physical misalignment to getting aligned. mentally I was stressed. I was anxious. I was worried and that affected the way that I showed up. And then obviously our energy is what it is and how we show up. So that's my story and a big part of it and why I feel so passionate is, The hygienist I was when I was in pain, stressed out, really disconnected, is a completely different hygienist, and I would not recommend that hygienist for the same job that I would recommend the hygienist that I really am now, which is present and care, not that I wasn't before, but there's this next level of care because I care for myself and I can, Support my patients differently.
Anne: That is so beautiful. So I mean,it makes me so happy that there's a solution is actually like baby steps. You know, You said something about, the diet. So a lot of times people say well, I'm not going to eat for four days or something like you know, or fast or, Drink liquids, but it's baby steps that really get you the result that you're really looking for. And this is possible if you're in pain and you're stressed out and you're burnt out, take a look at this. And, do you go into offices Caitlin and coach, or do you coach on zoom?
How does that work? Because I could see that it would just be a great lunch and learn if you will, or just a day take care of ourselves because we don't do that.
Caitlin: Yeah, absolutely. So I coach and have online programs for dental practitioners, individual clinicians. We can do virtual coaching or I have a yoga membership and a ergonomics and yoga program for dental hygienist.
And then I also do team consulting. Sometimes it's just a CE on all of this. Sometimes it's a full day of ergonomic consulting and analyzing for everyone on the team, which is super fun. And sometimes we do yoga. It's all customized on what the office, what the practice needs and wants.
Anne: I think in this day and age, especially with the lack of,professionals that we can hire, they're all looking for hygienists and they're looking for assistance. and assistants, especially they arebent over from the waist over half the time
And then the doctors, you know, get the elbows up and I mean, just so many things, would be so fun to care for your team that way to say, Hey, listen, let's do this today because, you know, it's always CE.
Okay. Let's learn more about teeth, which is wonderful. But there is a trend now, you know, you can't take care of anybody if you don't take care of yourself. And if you're not doing well, so thatwould be such a neat thing for, the leader of the office to be able to bring in to just say, Hey, listen, you could have a little, bell in the office.
Okay. Time to breathe. Everybody 10 seconds to breathe and we start again or just even start the morning huddle that way.
Caitlin: There are so many things that I would love to see for the future of dentistry.
And I see.I see it now, and I admire and love the dentists and the practices that are investing in their team, and it doesn't have to be this big, everyone gets saddle stools, everyone gets all of this, but these small ways of investing in their team and truly showing they care, I think that's honestly what, makes dental offices stand out.
And I think especially when we're looking at the younger generation of hygienists of assistance, I feel like it's going to become a non negotiable. Like to stand out. If you want to keep your team and keep them long, you have to take care of them. hmm. And what does that look like?
Again, that can be different for every office. I'm not suggesting for a small, tiny practice incorporate, you know, this huge program, but what are some small things that you can do to take care of your team yourself on the team?
Anne: Yeah. And like I was telling you, I didn't even know those small things were really available or doable I've been doing yoga for three or four years and I just never have.
think about doing some of that breath work during my day, that would help me show up and be present to my next call or my next conversation, which is really valuable. I know there's some technology out there. Like I've seen the loops, they've got some stuff.
I know you probably are all, clued into all this. What kind of technology is out there that can help us, have better posture not set ourselves up for chronic pain?
Caitlin: First, when you were talking about the little breaks and the little things we could do, I call them yoga snacks.
So now you can take that wherever you go. Your yoga snacks are always with you. Love that. Your little breath or your stretches. Where is technology going? I'm really excited to continue to see advancements in ergonomics. love ergonomic loops. a big fan of them. They're the only tool that allows practitioners to see their patients while being in a proper alignment and position.
That's, I think, a game changer, but I would just love to see a generalization of more ergonomics. Even,I'm excited about a lot of technology. I'm curious to see what AI comes in. I think when we look at guided biofilm therapy, that's a really cool technology and advancement. And I'm curious to see how that goes, because that takes so much less strain on the body doing it.
I've never practiced it, but that's one really cool thing.
Anne: That's really neat because also, you know, so many women are coming in to dentistry. heard a number the other day was 69percent the graduating dentists are women. I know that seems very high to me. I know 60 percent has been floating around for a year or so.
Women have so many other stressors on them and man, we love you guys. but you're so laser focused and women are getting off of work, conducting the childcare, the sports, the dinner. We get help, but we really have the stress of making those decisions all day long.
So, I mean, I can't even imagine as a practicing dentist and an owner, especially all the decisions that they have to make throughout the day. And that can add up to a big load of stress right at the end of the day. So I think being able to do these yoga snacks. throughout the day, gosh, you'd be so much better off, arriving in your home.
I used to get so upset when I would come home and it was like a total disaster. I'm like, Oh my God. Yeah. But that's life. That's living with the family, the dogs and,and the kids and your husbandyour partners, But I do think that actually being able to take ownership.
Of making ourselves feel better. And it'snot hard to do, but we need to learn how to do it right. And, And may have a coach. I love that you come on our coffeesand Wednesdays and Tuesday afternoons, because you set us all on a very calm, even lane, because we all show up stressed out.
Cause we've all run around and, you know, it's, it's, 3 Tuesday afternoons like, okay, get her, sit down, get in the zoom. And here we are. And there's like, okay, Caitlin's going to lead us through a, 10 second breathing exercise. And the whole, zoom, picture looks totally different after we go through little, yoga snack, if you will, like we did before this started today.
So, kudos to you. I
Caitlin: love when you see that in teams, by the way, I go in and people are like anxious or not knowing when to anticipate, or there's like stuff going on. And we do like a breathing exercise and a quick stretch. And there is a palpable shift in the energy in the room. And it's like, yes, this is awesome.
Yeah, we need that. And, We need to find those ways like you were talking about the load that moms especially and women in general can hold. remember leaving work one day specifically and I felt like I wanted to cry. I was like a puddle but then I was annoyed and I remember my partner being like, you know, asking me or talking to me and I was annoyed at him.
And it was a moment that I was like, I don't think this is mine. I think I'm sad. And I thought about my day and some of the patients and one of them was going through. I don't even remember what it was at that time, but something really intense. And that was the first moment that I thought, Oh, It's not just me. I saw eight patients today and I am bringing to some extent it might be the stress. It might be the physical stress of the work, but sometimes it's like the emotional impact from our day and we don't realize it. So I love to finish my day, especially when I'm in the car or driving home.
And maybe it's just silence in the car when I'm driving home or sometimes I imagine if whether I can actually get in the shower or not, but like, imagine what water like rinsing off whatever is not mine and doesn't need to be here. And it's just a really simple way to shift so we can keep showing up as our best.
Anne: Oh my gosh, I just love that. I am going to take that with me and use that on a regular basis. So how can our listeners get in touch with you because they may want to bring you into the office, get your guidance. What I love is, getting your likeyoga snacks on a regular basis, because I forgetyou forget because you get busy I just remember talking to a hygienist that she's younger than I am, but she's just started back after she had a reprieve.
she says, just do it in a whole day. you get in the car and you feel like you have to crawl into the driver's seat. But I think if we did these little yoga snacks throughout the day and at the end of the day, the shower brush that, blush that off because we have to show up and be present to our families.
so anyway,
I digress, me, talk
Caitlin: about this all day. I know. I'm
Anne: so excited to just even learn more every time I talk to you. So how do we get in touch with you and get some help from you?
Caitlin: Yeah. I anyone listening right now, whether you are going through something or you just want to connect, I love talking and connecting so you can find me pretty much everywhere.
The aligned hygienist. So Instagram, I'm the aligned hygienist. My website is the aligned hygienist. com and then you can send me an email if you want. Hello at the aligned hygienist. com.
Anne: Hello, Caitlin Parsons. And Thank you so much for being with us today and sharing your expertise. I think it's going to make our days much better, much calmer and all the people around us are going to be happier.
So you just take care and I'll see you at the do coffee. And then don't forget everybody that Caitlin will also be at our, dental entrepreneur woman's retreat in November. She and Lori Bullock are going to be doing some yoga snacks. And maybe a yoga lunch. know, It's going to be wonderful.
We'll have some yoga in the morning and then throughout our day. So November 14 through 16, all women are invited. You have to be a woman, guys. The dudes, we love our dudes. that support women in dentistry. But for this retreat it's only women and women just like you. So take care, everybody.
Most importantly, if you're listening, keep doing you. And thanks again, Caitlin, for being with us. Thank you.
