July 8, 2025 • 55 mins
In this episode of Mind Your Own Karma, I sit down with Dr. Maria Cronyn, a naturopathic doctor and adoptee, to explore the emotional-physical connection in healing.
With over 25 years of experience, Maria shares how suppressed emotions can manifest as chronic illness-and why healing the body requires healing the whole person.
We talk about everything from hormone health and trauma to naturopathic treatments and the importance of addressing identity, grief, and early life imprints. Whether you're an adoptee, a trauma survivor, or just someone who knows their body is holding more than it should, this one is for you.
In this episode, we cover:
- Why Maria says “Hormone health is mental health”.
- How trauma can mimic or cause chronic illness.
- The impact of early childhood trauma on the nervous system.
- The power of homeopathy, botanicals, and natural treatments.
- Her nonprofit’s mission to bring naturopathic healing to trauma survivors.
More about Maria:
Dr. Maria Cronyn is a naturopathic doctor with a specialty in Lyme disease, hormone balance, and trauma-related health issues. She is the founder of a new nonprofit (soon to be renamed) bringing natural care to survivors of adoption, foster care, trafficking, and domestic violence. Her personal story as an adoptee fuels her passion for whole-person healing.
Connect with Maria:
Website: https://thenaturopathicadvantage.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenaturopathicadvantage/
Twitter: https://x.com/mariacronyn
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Mcronynnd
Explore Somatic Healing with Melissa
Want to work through the emotional layers in your body using guided imagery and somatic tools? Learn more at:
somatichealingjourneys.com
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Email me at mailto:mindyourownkarma@gmail.comand tell me about your healing work!
Find Melissa:
-Email Melissa here: mindyourownkarma@gmail.com
-Click here for the Mind Your Own Karma Website
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey there, it's Melissa Brunetti, and welcome to the
Mind Your Own Karma Hey there, Karma crew.
Thanks for joining me for this episode of Mind Your Own Karma
Beyond the Bandage. Today's guest is someone whose
(00:23):
work lives at the intersection of science, soul, and lived
experience. Doctor Maria Cronin is a
Naturopathic Dr. with over 25 years of experience and she's
also an adoptee who's deeply understands how early trauma
impacts the body. Maria specializes in complex
(00:44):
chronic illness, think Lyme disease, hormone imbalances,
autoimmune struggles, and she also takes a whole person
approach that includes nutrition, homeopathy, even
pharmaceuticals when necessary. But what really makes her stand
out is her fierce belief that suppressed emotions and
(01:04):
unprocessed trauma often shows up as physical illness, and that
healing has to address both. She's here to talk about why
hormone health is mental health,how emotions get trapped in the
body, and how she's now bringingnaturopathic medicine to trauma
survivors through her nonprofit.This conversation is both real
(01:28):
and full of hope, and I think you just might see parts of
yourself in her story. It's time to RIP off the
bandage. Here is my interview with Doctor
Maria Cronin. We are welcoming Dr. Maria
Cronin to the show. Today, hello finally we have had
(01:48):
I. Our e-mail thread is like 30
messages long. It's like you're finally here.
Yay. Yeah.
So let's just jump right in. Tell us a little bit about
yourself. So I'm a naturopathic Dr. more
than 20 years, lots of experience.
(02:10):
I'm a late discovery adoptee. I found out I was when I was 11
and I have sought my own healingis kind of how you come to
naturopathic medicine. You know, I had, I was in my
20s. I had horrific back pain after
some military service and I found this naturopath in
(02:31):
Ontario, Canada, across the river from where I lived.
And she like fixed everything insix weeks.
I was, I just got through a divorce.
My body was aching. I didn't know what I wanted to
do and like everything, such a deep jump in how I felt overall.
(02:52):
I just felt like I take on the world and I was thinking about
getting like APHD in psychology or something and I decided to go
into this instead because I was so enamored with it.
And that's when I found homeopathy.
Wow, you're lucky you found thatat such an early age.
And it kind of, you know, I mean, I didn't find somatic
(03:12):
therapy until I was 55 S. Yeah.
I'm late, I'm late to the party,but I'm here.
Well, we keep looking for our healing and I was grateful to
have found him for sure. He was exceptional.
Yeah, that's awesome. So you bring a wealth of
knowledge as a naturopathic Dr. and as someone with lived
(03:33):
experience as an adoptee as well.
So what perspectives have you gained personally that shaped
your approach to healing? Well, I started out in hospitals
before I went to naturopathic school.
And I found regular medicine to be quite barbaric in so many
circumstances. I was an X-ray tech.
I was working with people with broken bones who are in pain,
(03:56):
you know, and people who are hospitalized.
And I just, I love medicine. And I was so turned off.
I was kind of already seeking alternative things like yoga and
meditation and stuff. So I just sort of started my own
journey. You know, I went through
(04:17):
divorce, like I said in my 20s as well.
And the adoption stuff early on just didn't really, I didn't
know what it meant. You know, I'm sure a lot of
adoptees out there know as you continue this journey, you don't
you don't know until later how it all kind of retrospectively
looks back more recently. So I'm 57 years old now.
(04:44):
When you get that kind of post menopausal perspective, if you
look back and then also in the research at the adopted
community, somebody in homeopathy in India, which is
where a lot of the greatest research comes out of narrowed
down some categories and the biggest ones are fear and grief.
(05:07):
And it was. So I treat myself at times I've
taken, I've taken almost every remedy I've ever given to
anybody else because I'm also that kind of doctor.
I'm a prover, meaning I take my own medication, I make my own
notes and I know how this shouldwork.
And it was absolutely life changing.
(05:29):
We all have an element of PTSD, of course, and sometimes life
throws you a curveball and you're quite triggered for, you
know, could be quite a long time.
And it was absolutely life changing for me.
And different ways I approached people with different grief and
trauma and adoptees and stuff that was changed.
(05:51):
So medicine is ever evolving andI evolved with it, paid more
attention to my own adoption trauma as the years went on and
through reunion and stuff like that.
Still not understanding the trauma as well as you can in
retrospect. So I've got a lot of insights on
(06:15):
where people are and their different phases of their
journey, how to help them right there, which is also an
important thing because it's notlike you could say to somebody,
look, you're going to have this problem when you're 50, so let's
deal with it. Not you can't do that.
You have to be right where they are, which is where homeopathy
is so exceptional. You literally want to hear all
(06:39):
the symptoms of what the patientis experiencing.
One person's adoption experienceis completely different from
somebody else's, but it's how they express.
And as we know, grief can look like a lot of things.
Somebody can present as extremely angry right then and
there. They're like, I'm angry all the
(06:59):
time. And that's one remedy.
Or somebody can be completely shut down, disconnected,
dissociated and out of touch with their feelings and maybe
suppressed emotions or something, and that's a
completely other remedy. Yeah.
And that's what's great, I thinkabout.
What you do? Is it's very individualized.
(07:20):
Instead of trying to squeeze somebody in a box like
traditional medicine tries to do, a lot of times, even if you
don't fit in the box, they try to squish you in there and push
a pill to you. And you know, hopefully this
works. For everybody, right?
I mean, that's how it really started for me.
I was going to be a psychologistand maybe get a SCID or a PhD
(07:41):
was what I thought because I wasso in love with psychology and I
found medicine to be a bit barbaric.
In fact, I took like neuro psychand they were doing the animal
experiments and I was so turned off, right.
And then I found homeopathy and I was like, what could be
better? What could be better than this?
(08:02):
If you go in and you have, you know, you could literally come
in with I'll just ramble off some symptoms, you know, chronic
Constipation, sleeplessness, anxiety and you bite your nails
and you're really sensitive to weather changes, plus a whole
host of other problems, right? That I'll ask different
(08:24):
questions and we'll go through different things.
And those might be the the exactsymptoms that I prescribe on in
the remedy is like Poison Ivy. It's through the filtering down
of, you know, finding the biggest priority of symptoms,
you know, what bothers you most.I mean, what that is really
(08:46):
like, you know, and you ask so many detailed questions.
Well, you say nightmares. What do you mean by nightmares?
Give me a little more detail on that, you know, and then finding
the closest fit. And the remedy could be, you
know, animal, vegetable or mineral could be any number of
remedies. Remedies are made from, there's
(09:07):
one very strong remedy that's a hallucinogen in a plant that's
very highly recommended. And and the adoptee community
from the research from the Bannergies, that was amazing to
me. Very well known remedy for fear
(09:29):
and rage. Well, yeah.
Getting in touch with those coreprioritizing what symptoms with,
you know, what's, what's the most important thing that's
through the discussion of the the symptoms.
But certainly if somebody comes in with a chronic disease or,
(09:49):
you know, even cancer, when somebody comes in and says
they're adopted, that's like at the top of the list, right?
And I don't think that's the case for other mental health and
medical practitioners. Yeah, they don't know their past
medical history. They just kind of move on.
Yep, that's for sure. And it's uncomfortable.
(10:13):
Right, It sure is. What if you had someone coming
to you? What would you?
What's your approach to someone that's new to to this kind of
modality? There's often a lot of education
in it. And I'm at times kind of
thankful for Google, right? My profession, sadly, is not a
(10:35):
household name. Like chiropractic.
I wish it was, but homeopathy inparticular, there's a lot of
confusion. So I have to sort of, you know,
point them to a little bit of reading and how it, how it
exactly works and how our time together is gonna go.
You know, I'm like usually two weeks.
(10:56):
We'll start to, you know, we'll get to know each other.
I'll start prescribing, we'll follow up within 10 days.
We'll see what changes have already taken place and then
we'll, you know, re prescribe maybe something else or maybe
we're completely on the right track.
But either way, we'll have a lotof information already 'cause
even if the remedy, the first remedy is always a very
(11:19):
important prescription, you haveto see how it unfolds.
It can unfold extremely stronglyand you, they could just feel
better, better, better, or it's like a trail of bread crumbs.
And it can absolutely show you the door that you need to go
through. Right.
(11:39):
Yeah. So it's very, very important.
And somebody paying very close attention to how they're
responding to the remedy. I'm like, keep notes.
If you have a weird dream, writeit down 'cause you'll forget.
Yeah. Pay attention to what you're
thinking about, pay attention towhat you're craving.
Pay attention to how you're sleeping after you take it.
(12:00):
And report all that back to me. Yeah, and those are all things
that people don't do on a daily basis.
They don't listen to what their body's trying to tell them at
all. And that's what gets us into
this problem in the 1st place, right?
We tune out instead of tuning in, right?
Yeah, we've become a nation. Really.
That is so overmedicated and that Oh my gosh, it's shocking
(12:25):
the speed that somebody will be given a prescription.
Oh yeah. And that's, you know, the
prescription will be doubled andeven add three other
prescriptions, not prescriptionson top of it, just for.
Yeah, I mean, I still, I still do ultrasound three days a week
and I get, you know, let's startlooking at a patient's clinical
(12:45):
notes and it's like 2 pages of alist of medications.
I'm like, how are you walking around right now?
How are you even here like? That was not the case when I
graduated. It's crazy.
We are so overmedicated at this point.
It's difficult and it's. To well, and then this doctor
over here doesn't know what thisdoctor's prescribed you and then
(13:06):
you just end up with this huge, huge list of I don't even like I
said, I don't even know how you're still here.
Taking 25 medications? Yeah, I'm starting to even think
it has to be very, very clear topeople that you're seeking my
kind of treatment because many people are so medicated and I
(13:27):
almost want to say they have a desire to be sober even.
Like if they don't even have a desire to change or get off of
certain medications, that might be very detrimental to something
like their memory or something that I don't know if it's going
to work out. How does?
How do you collaborate with what's already being prescribed
(13:52):
and what the other? You know what another doctor is
telling them carefully, right? Yeah.
I have had many cases where the prescriptions were absolutely
necessary and not going to change.
But when we're talking about mental health and I see somebody
having terrible side effects, especially something like
(14:13):
inability to concentrate and that's what's supposed they're
supposed to be getting treated for, you can't even have a
conversation. They can't hold a train of
thought and they have no forethought when they arrive.
And I'm just continually starting over and over and over
because the patient has their memory is very poor.
Their forethought is awful, and it's very hard for them to
(14:36):
maintain focus. And I have to say, the
medication you're taking isn't working.
Let's let's change it, get rid of it.
Yeah, I can re prescribe something else, but there's
dependency here too. Yeah, I look forward to a day
where. It's certainly not gonna work
out. Yeah.
(14:57):
Well, I look forward to the day that we can all collaborate
together for the sake of the patient, you know, and that they
start looking to people like youand I that do you know some
alternative or what's consideredalternative methods.
For the, for the benefit of the patient.
I mean, there's so much out there.
(15:18):
Yeah, it's, you know, every, I'ma naturopath and every patient
goes around saying my doctor doesn't listen to me.
Well, we're, we're the doctors who listen.
We're the ones who listen to your whole case.
We would love to talk to your doctors but your others often
don't have time and that may never happen.
(15:40):
And also it's a terrible position to be put in to give
contradictory information, but when you know you're right and
you have to explain it to the patient and let them decide
other doctor and you have opposing views.
Yeah. But very often when it comes to,
you know, heavier medication andstuff like that, the doctor will
(16:02):
agree. Yeah.
So like, it's, you know, I'm tied.
I have to give her this medication, a few something
better. Let's go for it.
Yeah, because maybe someday. Well, and the other thing is
patients don't realize that theydon't have to do what their
(16:23):
doctor wants them to do like. I have.
To say go against medical advice.
I'm not saying that, but you know, I, I get, I'm an
ultrasonographer. I get people all the time, like,
oh, I want to do this part of the test.
But I really, you know, is that OK?
I'm like, you're the patient. Yes, it's OK.
You can refuse. Yeah, you don't have to do it.
(16:44):
Your doctor did. Yes, they prescribed it, but
you're in charge. And a lot of people are like I
am. You know, often ask me, well,
why didn't, why did my doctor dothis to me or why didn't my
doctor say what you're saying and why train give me this
medication. And I say you went to the doctor
(17:04):
and told them you needed something for this ailment.
And that's what they have. That's all they have.
I went to a completely differentschool than they did, even
though I know most of what they do also, but I don't dapple in
the but you went in there, they have to treat you.
(17:25):
They have to treat what you camein for.
It might be kind of a crappy prescription that doesn't even
work. And but that's all they have.
There's a standard of care. You know, if you went in for,
you know, let's kind of keep it simple, Constipation, they're
going to give you some lousy Constipation, probably over the
counter thing that doesn't work.Yeah.
(17:47):
Then you come and see somebody like me and I'm gonna, like, do
all these different things and you're gonna feel so much
better. And it has nothing to do with
their kind of lousy prescriptionyou didn't get at the doctor.
Yeah. And they're not trained to dig
any deeper or, you know, half the time they won't even send
you to a, you know, a therapist,which, you know, might be
(18:09):
something like that, might be what you need.
I've heard that before too that I had a gastroenterologist on
had a patient who only eliminated once a month and it
was due to some horrific trauma that she went through in her
child and once he sent her to a psychotherapist and she worked
through that. It took her like 3 months and
she was fine, didn't need medication.
(18:32):
Yeah, there's so many. Well, we've at least gotten out
of the insurance model of you need a referral for everything.
And I, we're in such a absolute barrage of mental health
services. You can get on with the mental
health professional within the day on a telehealth basically
anywhere. Yeah, country at this point.
(18:53):
Yeah. Hopefully it's the right.
Fit. Yeah, sometimes it takes a
minute to find. Yeah, well, the right.
Adopted community, myself and probably everybody else.
We don't find the right fit. Very.
Easily, right? Yeah, it's difficult.
And I'm hoping to fill that gap because myself and other so many
(19:15):
others have had I had bad experiences with therapists
saying I was arrogant and ungrateful.
Wow, instead of meeting you where you're at, hello.
Why would you do that? I I had a therapist.
You didn't identify yourself as a Catholic nun?
I had no idea. Oh, wow.
Breaking a commandment, talking about the problems that I have
(19:38):
with my mom. Yeah, you're supposed to want
your father and your mother. Wow, she told.
Me that that I was arrogant and she wanted to slap me.
Oh my God, in in the session I. Think you're in the wrong?
You're in the wrong profession, ladies.
Wow. And that was my support, yeah,
(19:59):
Of my extreme troubles with fitting into my family and
seeking help, yeah. And there were others, you know,
you can't you all I have, I havea strong opinion about EMDR and
complex trauma. You know, it's entirely
practitioner dependent. And when you have very complex
(20:19):
trauma, you're just you're not going to get there, right?
Too much unspeakable, first of all, and it's not event by event
and you're not going to desensitize adoption.
Yeah, I find that it helps a lotof adoptees, but it doesn't get
them to where they need to be. So I, you know, like I always
(20:44):
say, everybody's healing combinations different and it
works for you great. And you know, but yeah, it's
kind of hit or miss from what I hear from my clients that come
from EMDR. Like I said, it's helped
somewhat, but it just hasn't gotten them to the actual root
of it so. People are Googling and shopping
(21:06):
and they're doing things that other people are doing.
And I would love for people to. So I was a primary care
physician taking insurance in Vermont until I moved to Arizona
less than a year ago. And, you know, I organized
people's care as a primary care.And people need to find a
(21:27):
primary care or somebody who's like the base guide them like
don't do this, do this first. And well, you've been going to a
therapist. How's it going?
I don't like it really upset allthe time.
OK, well, let's switch. And I would do that for a
physical therapist too. Let me organize your care.
(21:50):
There's some things you should do first.
There are some things you shouldn't do at certain times of
your life. Maybe you're under a you're in a
transition period and trauma work.
It's not the right time, you know?
Yeah, help me set the prioritiesfor you so that it goes
smoother. Yeah, but you don't have doctors
that do that. I thankfully had a doctor that
(22:11):
was moving and he was like, OK, your personality, I know you
like, I think you should see this doctor.
I think this would be a good fit.
And he, you know, literally likecircled the name on.
He had, like, all these doctors on a piece of paper that he was
like sending people to, but he literally, like, tried to match
you with a physician that he thought you would click with.
(22:32):
And I was like, who does that? That's so nice.
Thank you. I mean, usually you're just on
your own floating around trying to find the right person, right?
Well, so many people are and youknow, you've got to, you've got
to find, listen to what people are saying.
Who's a good doctor? Who's going to make those good
referrals for you? And they networked.
(22:52):
And can they help you with organizing your care?
Yeah, I got here. I joined doctors, networking
groups and stuff like that. And I already have a Bank of
people to refer to, but I'm alsoin a network.
Or I can ask all the doctors in that group.
Lots of them. Yeah, yeah.
That's. Perfect.
You know, we, we help each otherout.
(23:14):
Yeah. I love that.
You definitely want to do because people can be searching
and searching and not find the help that they need.
Right. You often say hormone health is
mental health, and yes, I do. And you may need antibiotics,
not antipsychotics. Can you unpack also?
Yes. Can you unpack that a little bit
(23:34):
and how it applies to people that you serve?
So I was in the Northeast for a lot of my life, and I got Lyme
disease probably more than once.And I can tell you from personal
experience, but also from the hundreds of people that I've
worked with, Lyme disease can cause terrible psychiatric
symptoms, terrible psychiatric symptoms.
(23:57):
Like what? Like anxiety, terrible mood
swings, you don't know what you're feeling.
You don't understand why you're feeling this way.
The symptoms are so severe because it's a nervous system
infection. And if you don't put two and two
together and a lot of people don't get the bull's eye rash,
(24:22):
somebody might not even know they've been bitten.
It's going to be case taking, examining and testing and get
that test out as quickly as you can, but also prophylactically.
Maybe start an antibiotic and see if it makes a dent while
you're waiting for the test to come back.
(24:43):
I've seen people go on antidepressants and anxiety
medication and they had Lyme disease and Bethesia, the effect
the nerve. And then there's for children,
PANS and PANDAS, which is just apediatric concept.
A stroke infection can cause some pretty intense behavior
(25:06):
changes in children. And if that goes untreated into
adulthood, you can have some pretty complex inflammation of
the brain that was down to an infection that really required
maybe a semi prolonged period ofantibiotics.
(25:27):
Well, and I'll meet somebody who's 26 years old and now
they're on three or four or fivepsychiatric medications and have
done several inpatient stays as a teenager in a psych facility
and they're traumatized, of course.
And then we run a test for something like and we had PANDAS
(25:47):
in the past and Lyme disease in the past, and they definitely
had. Wow and didn't even know it.
And didn't even know it. Nobody tested for it and they
were going on psychiatric medication in the blink of an
eye. That's crazy.
And it's really tragic. Yeah.
'Cause it can have very disastrous consequences for your
(26:08):
social development, your academic career.
Yeah. I have never met anybody who had
a positive experience with goinginpatient psych to date.
It's traumatic, particularly when you're young.
Yeah, have you seen unprocessed trauma contribute to a chronic
(26:28):
illness? I believe so.
I mean, it's hard to put two andtwo together.
So you have trauma. You had asked earlier about
hormones and then infections, right?
If you're we're women, you understand hormones, but people
(26:49):
don't really understand hormoneswill blind side you very often.
I'll stabilize somebody's hormones if possible 1st and
then get more into the trauma orat the same time because what am
I looking at? Are you so anxious and sleepless
and you can't sit still because it's going to be a full moon in
(27:09):
four days and you're premenstrual or trauma?
Cause the trauma will resurface and the hormones are all out of
whack, right? Yeah, it's very easy to be re
traumatized when you're extremely irritable and having
mood swings and maybe sleepless.Yeah, you're just, you're
(27:31):
fragile, right? So I wish somebody had given me
progesterone cream when I was a teenager.
Oh, wow. Because it's so helpful and so
many women will feel better, youknow, premenstrually at the very
least, because it will blind side you.
We're also an epidemic of birth control.
(27:53):
We don't know exactly. There's so many dissociated
young girls out there on birth control.
They'll give birth control at the same time, a packet of or a
bottle of antidepressant same time.
And So what are you seeing? What are the problems that come
up with that? What?
Wrong with that. So the antidepressant is for the
(28:17):
side effects of the birth control?
OK. Yeah, automatic.
There are studies not in this country on autism and the use of
progestin based birth control contributing to autism.
Oh wow. The other thing, hormones are
(28:40):
not always a great idea and theycause pretty serious side
effects. And we have.
I've met many young girls who never had a natural period.
They were put on birth control before their period even
started. They're blind to the entire
hormone picture. Their natural period is
overridden. Birth control, yeah, I see that
(29:02):
a lot at my work. They'll come in for a pelvic
ultrasound because for amenorrhea, you know, all the
time see that a lot or irregular, very irregular
menstrual cycles. There's side effects from birth
control that are treated with psychiatric medication just like
that. Yeah.
And then you're just, you're walking around with artificial
(29:24):
hormones and psychiatric medication and you're 18 years
old. Like what could go wrong?
Right. It's a high risk situation.
Well, your doctor gave it to you, so you think you're golden,
right? Are obedient, right?
They want to feel better, and this is what they're presented
with as the solution, and they think it's gonna work.
(29:48):
It often doesn't work. Yeah, well, I think a lot of
people think that. I think it's like, give me a
pill, 'cause that will help me. Like if you don't give me a
pill, that's not gonna help me. You know, like give me
something. When they go to the doctor,
they're expecting it. They're expecting to take a
prescription out of there for something.
Right. I know exactly what's going to
(30:09):
be given to somebody when they come.
When somebody does an intake form and I take a look at it
before they arrive, I know exactly before I even read the
medication list what they've already been given, the symptoms
that they have, right? And.
You're going to. I know it's.
Difficult you look at a person'sphysical body and I'm like
you're on high blood pressure medicine you're a diabetic and
(30:31):
you're you know you have hypertension, high cholesterol
yeah I know those 3 medications you're on right now my.
Initial intake is usually about 90 minutes and I'll explain
things to people about why they're feeling the way that
they're feeling, maybe because of a side effect of medication
or say trauma. I mean, I've had people look at
(30:52):
me with eyes like saucers going.I never put that together.
I go, yeah, I think, you know, Iremember one woman just off the
top of my head and she had anxiety and I can't remember
what else she came in for. But, you know, I talk at length
(31:13):
with people. How do you feel about this and
how do you feel about that? And, you know, your physical
symptoms and I have to do a physical and stuff like that.
And she was upset about her mother.
And I said, is your mother a narcissist?
And she said, I think so. I said, do you understand what
that means? And she said, no, not really.
(31:34):
And I gave her a book and I said, bring this back when you
come back in two weeks. And she came back and she's
like, I had no idea the far reaching.
And somebody wrote in a book howI felt because it was
inarticulable how I was feeling.And I think adoptees face the
same thing. It's so intense and there's no
(31:58):
words and you just, you're just dissociating when you're very
traumatized or you know, you just don't understand.
Yeah, that's why the community and telling our stories is so
huge, because it I've had so many people like, Oh my gosh, I
thought I was the only one feeling that way.
(32:18):
You know, they have no idea. Yeah, it's the you're.
Right. People need to and very, and
hopefully, you know, you come tosomebody like me or hopefully
more and more practitioners are going to put those symptoms
together and get to the root cause for you.
Because people are falling into the throes of addiction and
(32:41):
suicidality and thinking they'reall alone in this.
I said to someone once that in the adopted community
suicidality is so high, it's it's normal.
I said it's so high in this population of people, it's like
normal to feel that way. Yeah.
(33:01):
So many people do, and she's like, I feel so much better just
understanding that. Yeah, right.
Yeah, we don't. Yeah.
It's those subjects, subjects that are taboo like, you know,
like suicide and things like that, that well, let's just not
talk about them because, you know, it's not something that we
want to bring up. But that's those are the things
that we need to start talking about because people are
(33:24):
struggling and they do feel alone.
And so these taboo subjects, youknow, need to be brought out
into the light and some education for people because
they're just struggling. You know as an adopted person
and so many of us must feel the exact same way.
The truth is the most important thing I can tell them.
(33:45):
People are lying to me and they don't want to dig any deeper.
And, you know, what are you going to do?
The truth is the most important thing.
But there's such a fear I feel it's an archetypal fear.
You know what I mean by archetypal?
Practically in all of us of like, psychiatric hospitals.
(34:06):
Oh, yeah, Such a fearful thing that people don't express that
kind of a thing. And like we had said earlier,
just because somebody wants to give you a medication doesn't
mean you have to take it, but you need to express how you feel
like how bad is this? Yeah.
And you know the levels of it. Yeah, you definitely have to
(34:28):
advocate for yourself and educate yourself as much as
possible because if you don't, you are going to end up being
one of those victims of 25 listsof medications that you're
taking, and you're going to end up feeling worse instead of
feeling better. So you really have to advocate.
Yeah, Part of my advocacy for adoptees is going to be
(34:52):
educating mental health and medical professionals about
these risk factors, because the risk factors are there.
And just because an adopted adult says to you, sometimes I
feel suicidal, you need to dig deeper because this is normal in
this population. And you need to say to them, you
know, you're at very high risk of feeling that way.
(35:12):
Tell me a little more about that.
Or how about let's, you know, reinforce that you have some
understanding and say, I'm sorryyou're feeling this way.
One person, I was 56 years old, I said I was adopted to someone.
And she said, I'm sorry. How many times has somebody said
that to you? That never happened to me
(35:33):
before. Never, never supported.
The, you know, a little sensitivity and support in just
the adoption arena to begin with.
Yeah. And then a a primary care Doctor
Who may or may not be in a hurry, but literally this is a
risk factor. Somebody says they're adopted.
(35:53):
Ask a couple more questions Doing with your mental health.
Yeah. Just that simple.
Getting Are you getting the proper help around this?
When you feel, you know, dissociated or really dark
thoughts come up or you're really struggling around
something and it's gonna happen in life's milestones, you know,
(36:15):
parents having children, a very tough time in your life.
Maybe you lose your job, or yourspouse passes away, or, you
know, reunion. Yeah.
And help them find the support that they need or at least
acknowledge. Right.
That these risk factors are so high.
Yeah. That's one risk factor that we
(36:36):
don't talk about. Talk about all these other
genetic risk factors, you know that does this run in your
family? Does that run in your family?
But we don't. We don't go there.
I think it needs to be front andcenter.
Oh, I do too, yeah. So what approaches have you
found most helpful for trauma survivors in what you do?
So people can come in in a variety of states for health,
(37:02):
right, and have trauma. We know that a lot of adoptees
and people who are going to havetrauma will descend into
addiction, right? And we want to try.
You have to treat the whole person.
And if they're already going into addiction, and now we have
such a compounded pharmaceuticalproblem with addiction too, you
(37:26):
have to address the whole thing at the same time.
That's where homeopathy can be most excellent because you can
address maybe medication side effects at the same time.
You can start tapering if they're really, you know,
spacing out on a medication and you can hit the target head on
without interfering or causing some negative side effect like
(37:51):
adding a medication. You can treat somebody for, say,
rage or grief, and they can actually kind of look the same,
right? People can look hysterical from
grief, or people can be shut down from grief, or people can
be really, you know, needing to manage their anger from grief
(38:11):
'cause it's so hard to talk about.
And a homeopathic remedy will get right in there without some
toxic side effect and potentially very, very quickly.
And if you can take that off of someone and they can experience
like this lift, there's like, wow, I had no idea what you were
(38:35):
doing and what you were giving me, but wow, did that work.
And then you opened the door andthen you can start to proceed.
Yeah, for someone who maybe feels like they're drowning in
the traditional medical system and wants to maybe look at more
of a natural approach, what are some first steps for them to
(38:56):
start taking? Yeah, I mean, everybody's so
different. You know, I call it all a
singularity. Everybody's story and where they
are in their life is so singularly unique.
But start to look, you know, I'mhere, I do telehealth obviously,
but start to look for, ask your friends and ask family members
(39:18):
who they talk to, etcetera. Some people are also without
resources. Hopefully they're listening to
things like this. Find a naturopath, find a
homeopath, start getting on thatpath.
Ask your primary care Doctor Who's prescribing all of this
stuff for your nurse practitioner who's prescribing
all this stuff. Say I don't want to do this.
(39:40):
You know, how can I start to taper and get off of this?
Yeah, and if they're not willingto discuss that, then it's time
to find another. Doctor, you've got to find the
right support, and if all they have for you is more psychiatric
medication and they're resistantto helping you, even if you feel
(40:01):
terrible on it, you need to findsomebody else.
Or if your doctor gets, you know, feels personally attacked
because you're questioning the care that you're getting or you
know, then that's another red flag right there, too.
I mean, I've I've had to talk down so many patients getting so
upset by what their how gas lit they are.
(40:24):
The doctor I had a young girl with, she definitely had Lyme
disease and was treated for it but not long enough.
But there was a suspicion she had a strep infection months
before she was. She just suddenly changed and
became very aggressive, very young child.
And the mom was talking and all they were telling her to do was
(40:47):
go to psych, go to psych, go to psych.
Which is way more traumatizing. Than I gave her antibiotics and
she recovered. Yeah, that's crazy.
I knew she had that infection and they just automatically
within a couple weeks the behavior had changed so
(41:07):
drastically. The child is still sick.
Kids get upset, right? And they were just like, Oh
yeah, she had this infection. But I'm, I don't care.
She's got to go to to psych now.Yeah, and how frustrating for
her because she probably feels not listened to and feels like
something's still wrong and veryconfused as to, you know, what's
(41:30):
going on and. It's very hard to even ask
questions of your nurse practitioner or primary care
physician. Very often people, first of all,
you're not feeling well, right? So like I, I'll have too long of
an interview even out, I'm trying to extract all of that
(41:51):
information from you and encouraging getting to know you
even better. And when you go to primary care,
very often you're not listening to it all.
You forget to ask, you feel gaslit, you feel just not hurt
at all. I went to my doctor with a
laundry list of things and she like had all these bullet OK,
(42:14):
we're going to do this for her SAT and she's you know, we're
going through and about 1/4 of the way in I was like, I don't
want to do this anymore. Doesn't feel right.
I was just like, I need a break.And she's like, but we had this
whole plan and and I was like, Iknow, but I can't.
And she's like OK, you know, shewas like fine with it.
You know, for some doctors wouldhave just like blown up and you
(42:35):
know, but. Yeah.
So it could be exhausting and working.
I understand when people need totake breaks, I sometimes I have
to send them back to their primary care physician, but I'll
organize them or even reach out to the doctor to make it easier
on them because all these appointments like what you're
experiencing, it's so exhausting.
(42:55):
It's overwhelming. Yeah, it's so.
Overwhelming. And then if somebody really is
very unwell in whatever arena, they might just stop looking for
care. Yeah.
And just. True.
Well, tell us, tell us about your nonprofit, what its mission
and. Yeah.
So it's unfolding for sure. I'm trying to.
(43:18):
I have a couple board members, the world physicians who I'm
hoping will guide me to how thiswill make the biggest impact.
So it's called adoption evolution, but it's definitely
going to shift probably into ADBA 'cause I definitely feel
like foster care and traffickingvictims and but also the people
(43:42):
that love adoptees. These are, these are the numbers
that we're talking about. You know, you have one adoptive
person. Well, how many people are around
that person, right? We've got 2 biological parents,
2 adoptive parents typically. Maybe you've got a spouse, maybe
you've got children, you've got siblings, you've got friends,
you've got grandparents that could all benefit from education
(44:04):
around adoption, to support, to be a supportive family right at
any age. So the mission is to validate,
first of all, adoption trauma, educate everyone in the whole
sphere and then advocacy hopefully.
(44:25):
And that should look pretty significant, I think,
particularly the foster care system.
That's awesome. Like how are you bringing this
to adoption agencies or how are you, what are you bringing this
to? I for example, yesterday I was
at the Dustic violence shelter here in the center and they're
(44:46):
gonna let me do an hour a week and I'm, I'm going to try to,
because it's like a, you know, there's a movie called Phantom
the thread, and I love the name Phantom the thread, but adoption
is this thread going through allthese horrific circumstances
that is unacknowledged. So you can have a domestic
(45:10):
violence survivor, maybe with some addiction problems and
maybe they've maybe they themselves were adopted, maybe
they've had their children takenby CPSI, mean adoption is all in
there potentially as a core and or maybe their spouse was
adopted and that was the violentone.
(45:33):
I'm looking to start to pull through with other nonprofits
and foster care. Emphasizing the trauma needs to
be addressed and maybe even rehab facilities.
How many adoptees do you have inthere 'cause I know it's a lot.
Are you asking are you counting?Yeah, you talk about it, right?
(45:59):
Let me talk with the rehab facility, you know, raise your
hand if you're adopted like. Yeah, or been in the foster care
system or. The statistics, it's going to be
about 40%. Yeah, yeah.
Same with prison under, yeah. What have you talked about that?
How do you address that? Have you ever talked about it?
(46:20):
Third men in prison. There was a quote from a man in
prison and they said, what wouldyou, what do you think would
have helped you to not wind up here?
And, he said, grief counseling. Yeah, been heard, been.
Seen manage my emotions and dealt with my grief.
(46:42):
I wouldn't have been so hot headed, rash, impulsive, you
know, whatever. Yeah, there's so much education
that needs to happen. It's sometimes it's just
overwhelming to me. That's what I'm saying.
Like I'm gonna educate medical professionals.
Like don't ignore this giant redflag.
(47:02):
Yeah, yeah. This is a social situation that
is going to affect and at any age.
If a person is adopted, ask fouror five follow up questions
about their mental health, possibly addiction, and make the
(47:23):
appropriate referrals because consequences could be quite
disastrous. Yeah.
Most women go to the doctor and men don't.
How many women are seeking mental health care and not
getting asked? Like I'm, I'm wondering, just
right now, I'm wondering how many women are moms of adopted
(47:47):
children and their doctor doesn't know that.
Yeah. And they're struggling with
their parenting. Yeah.
I mean, have I ever been asked if I was adopted on an intake?
Never. How many I've been, I'm taking
these classes with Case in Maryland, the Center for
(48:08):
Adoption Support and Education. And how many parents are
struggling with their own mentalhealth, with their parenting?
Yeah, yeah, they don't. They don't understand the root
cause of it. It's it's so complex, we just
start asking, are you adopted? Are your children adopted or is
(48:30):
your spouse adopted? Perhaps the conversations just
kind of keep evolving. But talking about adoption and
then getting with. I'm working with friends in
foster care. They have a program where they
work with people who age out of foster care.
They work with them till they're26 is brilliant.
And I'm going to transfer two people out of that program and
(48:53):
get them to talk about their experience.
And, you know, the narrative that needs to.
Yeah. You know, these are your
identity issues, right? You could this this is the
trauma you need to grow your identity from how whatever your
origin stories are. Yeah.
You need to solidify that and tell the truth about your
(49:17):
trauma, particularly to yourselfand understand yourself.
It needs to have some compassion, yeah.
It absolutely needs to be validated as, I mean, you're
adopted. I'm adopted.
There's not a moment even probably in our sleep.
It's our identity. We are adopted.
Yeah, every minute of the day. Yeah, there's no pill to take
(49:42):
for that. It's it's our identity.
Right. And it's born of trauma.
I I got I had a blowback one time in a discussion group with
the psychiatry discussion group about adoption even being
trauma. Oh my goodness, that's crazy.
What could be more traumatic than a child who doesn't have
(50:02):
parents that has to be raised bysomebody else?
And I was just really blunt about it.
Yeah, I felt like I needed to be.
I was going to say you had to be.
I was going to. Say, yeah, I had to shut that
down. Right.
Yeah, there's a lot of education.
It's trauma, there is loss #1. Yeah.
(50:25):
That can never be forgotten. It's not, you know, and we all
know the story. You know, we have to be
grateful. And it's this.
It's the solution to all the problems that you're ever going
to have to be adopted. Well, I'm going to be talking
with some foster kids who weren't adopted.
Yeah. About what they think adoption
means. And I've also talked to people
who were adopted and then given back.
(50:49):
Yeah, rehoming. Oh my gosh, that's a whole new
episode. And I've had anything to do
about that, right? With that kind of trauma, Well,
first you got to be truthful. It hurts, right?
And then I dig deep and we hash it out and we talk about it, and
(51:11):
I'll find remedies that fit. And hopefully it will just give
your nervous system enough calming because there's nothing
other than to accept what has happened and find the strength
in your story to come to terms with that.
(51:32):
And you have to validate it all day long and educate all around
it. You're not the only one that
feels that way. Everybody feels that way.
These are the statistics. This is how you should feel.
And me saying that should make you feel better.
(51:52):
You're not alone. Right.
Yeah. And feeling that way, right?
It's like normal to feel that way.
And you're going to get through this, right?
Yeah. I mean, I do believe that what
we go through can become our superpower.
I mean, I wouldn't be doing whatI'm doing with somatic work.
(52:12):
You wouldn't be where you're at today if you know, partially
because of what we went through and then you want to help
somebody else. And I think that's the whole
purpose of even going through something is.
That is probably going to be part of the mission is because
now I've spent some time online and talked to a different people
and stuff like that, you know, as adopted adults particularly,
you know, like I was born in the60s.
(52:33):
I don't know if you're probably right after me.
People didn't talk about it and stuff.
We need to get together and be like mentors.
Yeah, exactly. Exactly what you said.
Now you have to help somebody else and in doing that you're
going to feel better. So I want to get like a legion
of helpers. Yeah, that's awesome.
I love that. Where can we find you?
(52:55):
Do you have a website? Yeah.
Doctor Maria Cronin dot. Com OK, so we will put that in
the show notes so people can find you and see what you're
doing, but I'm certainly. Available on telehealth and then
adoption evolution is, I think I'm on YouTube, Spotify, Apple,
and I'll be adding some more. Oh, I think I need those.
(53:18):
I need those links to put in theshow notes.
I don't think I have those. So send those to me so I can put
those in the show notes. So.
Many things happening at once. I need to get my podcast guy to
come back to my house and hook me up with.
My links So do you have a podcast?
Is it I do? It's my name, and then I have
another one. Adoption Evolution.
Oh my gosh. Two of them and how you do it.
(53:41):
Everything has been happening, it seems for years, but it's
only been months. Yeah, very infancy stage on all
of it. It's all happening at the same
time. So watch and yeah, grow.
Maybe you'll come on mine. And yeah, sure.
Anytime. Yeah.
So any other links that you wantpeople to find you to send those
to me, I'll have them in the show.
(54:01):
Everything just under my name. Just look for Doctor Mark
Cronin. Cronin.
What a wine, OK? Well, thanks so much for coming
on today. I really love the approach
because that's, you know, individuality and medical
approaches. It's just got to be, it's got to
become mainstream that this is what needs to happen.
(54:21):
So I love anybody that does thatand just looks at the
individual, meets them, where they're at and helps them.
So thank you so much for coming on the show and being a resource
for the listeners. Maria is such a force, isn't
she? I love how she brings both
clinical wisdom and live truth into the same space and reminds
us that the body holds everything, whether it's grief,
(54:45):
confusion, or trauma from a longtime ago.
If it's not expressed, it's stored.
If something clicked for you today, if your body's been
whispering or even yelling, it might be time to start listening
with compassion. And if you're looking for a way
to gently explore the emotional layers underneath physical
symptoms, you can always check out the somatic work that I do.
(55:08):
Just visit somatichealingjourneys.com to
learn more. And hey, if you have a unique
healing modality or a message that the Karma crew needs to
hear, I'd love to hear from you.You can reach me at
mindyourownkarma@gmail.com. Let's get you on the podcast.
I hope this one listen changed your life today.
(55:31):
And remember to take what you need and leave what you don't.
And always remember. To mind your own.
Karma. I'll see you next time.
Hey there, it's Melissa Brunetti, and welcome to the
Mind Your Own Karma Hey there, Karma crew.
Thanks for joining me for this episode of Mind Your Own Karma
Beyond the Bandage. Today's guest is someone whose
(00:23):
work lives at the intersection of science, soul, and lived
experience. Doctor Maria Cronin is a
Naturopathic Dr. with over 25 years of experience and she's
also an adoptee who's deeply understands how early trauma
impacts the body. Maria specializes in complex
(00:44):
chronic illness, think Lyme disease, hormone imbalances,
autoimmune struggles, and she also takes a whole person
approach that includes nutrition, homeopathy, even
pharmaceuticals when necessary. But what really makes her stand
out is her fierce belief that suppressed emotions and
(01:04):
unprocessed trauma often shows up as physical illness, and that
healing has to address both. She's here to talk about why
hormone health is mental health,how emotions get trapped in the
body, and how she's now bringingnaturopathic medicine to trauma
survivors through her nonprofit.This conversation is both real
(01:28):
and full of hope, and I think you just might see parts of
yourself in her story. It's time to RIP off the
bandage. Here is my interview with Doctor
Maria Cronin. We are welcoming Dr. Maria
Cronin to the show. Today, hello finally we have had
(01:48):
I. Our e-mail thread is like 30
messages long. It's like you're finally here.
Yay. Yeah.
So let's just jump right in. Tell us a little bit about
yourself. So I'm a naturopathic Dr. more
than 20 years, lots of experience.
(02:10):
I'm a late discovery adoptee. I found out I was when I was 11
and I have sought my own healingis kind of how you come to
naturopathic medicine. You know, I had, I was in my
20s. I had horrific back pain after
some military service and I found this naturopath in
(02:31):
Ontario, Canada, across the river from where I lived.
And she like fixed everything insix weeks.
I was, I just got through a divorce.
My body was aching. I didn't know what I wanted to
do and like everything, such a deep jump in how I felt overall.
(02:52):
I just felt like I take on the world and I was thinking about
getting like APHD in psychology or something and I decided to go
into this instead because I was so enamored with it.
And that's when I found homeopathy.
Wow, you're lucky you found thatat such an early age.
And it kind of, you know, I mean, I didn't find somatic
(03:12):
therapy until I was 55 S. Yeah.
I'm late, I'm late to the party,but I'm here.
Well, we keep looking for our healing and I was grateful to
have found him for sure. He was exceptional.
Yeah, that's awesome. So you bring a wealth of
knowledge as a naturopathic Dr. and as someone with lived
(03:33):
experience as an adoptee as well.
So what perspectives have you gained personally that shaped
your approach to healing? Well, I started out in hospitals
before I went to naturopathic school.
And I found regular medicine to be quite barbaric in so many
circumstances. I was an X-ray tech.
I was working with people with broken bones who are in pain,
(03:56):
you know, and people who are hospitalized.
And I just, I love medicine. And I was so turned off.
I was kind of already seeking alternative things like yoga and
meditation and stuff. So I just sort of started my own
journey. You know, I went through
(04:17):
divorce, like I said in my 20s as well.
And the adoption stuff early on just didn't really, I didn't
know what it meant. You know, I'm sure a lot of
adoptees out there know as you continue this journey, you don't
you don't know until later how it all kind of retrospectively
looks back more recently. So I'm 57 years old now.
(04:44):
When you get that kind of post menopausal perspective, if you
look back and then also in the research at the adopted
community, somebody in homeopathy in India, which is
where a lot of the greatest research comes out of narrowed
down some categories and the biggest ones are fear and grief.
(05:07):
And it was. So I treat myself at times I've
taken, I've taken almost every remedy I've ever given to
anybody else because I'm also that kind of doctor.
I'm a prover, meaning I take my own medication, I make my own
notes and I know how this shouldwork.
And it was absolutely life changing.
(05:29):
We all have an element of PTSD, of course, and sometimes life
throws you a curveball and you're quite triggered for, you
know, could be quite a long time.
And it was absolutely life changing for me.
And different ways I approached people with different grief and
trauma and adoptees and stuff that was changed.
(05:51):
So medicine is ever evolving andI evolved with it, paid more
attention to my own adoption trauma as the years went on and
through reunion and stuff like that.
Still not understanding the trauma as well as you can in
retrospect. So I've got a lot of insights on
(06:15):
where people are and their different phases of their
journey, how to help them right there, which is also an
important thing because it's notlike you could say to somebody,
look, you're going to have this problem when you're 50, so let's
deal with it. Not you can't do that.
You have to be right where they are, which is where homeopathy
is so exceptional. You literally want to hear all
(06:39):
the symptoms of what the patientis experiencing.
One person's adoption experienceis completely different from
somebody else's, but it's how they express.
And as we know, grief can look like a lot of things.
Somebody can present as extremely angry right then and
there. They're like, I'm angry all the
(06:59):
time. And that's one remedy.
Or somebody can be completely shut down, disconnected,
dissociated and out of touch with their feelings and maybe
suppressed emotions or something, and that's a
completely other remedy. Yeah.
And that's what's great, I thinkabout.
What you do? Is it's very individualized.
(07:20):
Instead of trying to squeeze somebody in a box like
traditional medicine tries to do, a lot of times, even if you
don't fit in the box, they try to squish you in there and push
a pill to you. And you know, hopefully this
works. For everybody, right?
I mean, that's how it really started for me.
I was going to be a psychologistand maybe get a SCID or a PhD
(07:41):
was what I thought because I wasso in love with psychology and I
found medicine to be a bit barbaric.
In fact, I took like neuro psychand they were doing the animal
experiments and I was so turned off, right.
And then I found homeopathy and I was like, what could be
better? What could be better than this?
(08:02):
If you go in and you have, you know, you could literally come
in with I'll just ramble off some symptoms, you know, chronic
Constipation, sleeplessness, anxiety and you bite your nails
and you're really sensitive to weather changes, plus a whole
host of other problems, right? That I'll ask different
(08:24):
questions and we'll go through different things.
And those might be the the exactsymptoms that I prescribe on in
the remedy is like Poison Ivy. It's through the filtering down
of, you know, finding the biggest priority of symptoms,
you know, what bothers you most.I mean, what that is really
(08:46):
like, you know, and you ask so many detailed questions.
Well, you say nightmares. What do you mean by nightmares?
Give me a little more detail on that, you know, and then finding
the closest fit. And the remedy could be, you
know, animal, vegetable or mineral could be any number of
remedies. Remedies are made from, there's
(09:07):
one very strong remedy that's a hallucinogen in a plant that's
very highly recommended. And and the adoptee community
from the research from the Bannergies, that was amazing to
me. Very well known remedy for fear
(09:29):
and rage. Well, yeah.
Getting in touch with those coreprioritizing what symptoms with,
you know, what's, what's the most important thing that's
through the discussion of the the symptoms.
But certainly if somebody comes in with a chronic disease or,
(09:49):
you know, even cancer, when somebody comes in and says
they're adopted, that's like at the top of the list, right?
And I don't think that's the case for other mental health and
medical practitioners. Yeah, they don't know their past
medical history. They just kind of move on.
Yep, that's for sure. And it's uncomfortable.
(10:13):
Right, It sure is. What if you had someone coming
to you? What would you?
What's your approach to someone that's new to to this kind of
modality? There's often a lot of education
in it. And I'm at times kind of
thankful for Google, right? My profession, sadly, is not a
(10:35):
household name. Like chiropractic.
I wish it was, but homeopathy inparticular, there's a lot of
confusion. So I have to sort of, you know,
point them to a little bit of reading and how it, how it
exactly works and how our time together is gonna go.
You know, I'm like usually two weeks.
(10:56):
We'll start to, you know, we'll get to know each other.
I'll start prescribing, we'll follow up within 10 days.
We'll see what changes have already taken place and then
we'll, you know, re prescribe maybe something else or maybe
we're completely on the right track.
But either way, we'll have a lotof information already 'cause
even if the remedy, the first remedy is always a very
(11:19):
important prescription, you haveto see how it unfolds.
It can unfold extremely stronglyand you, they could just feel
better, better, better, or it's like a trail of bread crumbs.
And it can absolutely show you the door that you need to go
through. Right.
(11:39):
Yeah. So it's very, very important.
And somebody paying very close attention to how they're
responding to the remedy. I'm like, keep notes.
If you have a weird dream, writeit down 'cause you'll forget.
Yeah. Pay attention to what you're
thinking about, pay attention towhat you're craving.
Pay attention to how you're sleeping after you take it.
(12:00):
And report all that back to me. Yeah, and those are all things
that people don't do on a daily basis.
They don't listen to what their body's trying to tell them at
all. And that's what gets us into
this problem in the 1st place, right?
We tune out instead of tuning in, right?
Yeah, we've become a nation. Really.
That is so overmedicated and that Oh my gosh, it's shocking
(12:25):
the speed that somebody will be given a prescription.
Oh yeah. And that's, you know, the
prescription will be doubled andeven add three other
prescriptions, not prescriptionson top of it, just for.
Yeah, I mean, I still, I still do ultrasound three days a week
and I get, you know, let's startlooking at a patient's clinical
(12:45):
notes and it's like 2 pages of alist of medications.
I'm like, how are you walking around right now?
How are you even here like? That was not the case when I
graduated. It's crazy.
We are so overmedicated at this point.
It's difficult and it's. To well, and then this doctor
over here doesn't know what thisdoctor's prescribed you and then
(13:06):
you just end up with this huge, huge list of I don't even like I
said, I don't even know how you're still here.
Taking 25 medications? Yeah, I'm starting to even think
it has to be very, very clear topeople that you're seeking my
kind of treatment because many people are so medicated and I
(13:27):
almost want to say they have a desire to be sober even.
Like if they don't even have a desire to change or get off of
certain medications, that might be very detrimental to something
like their memory or something that I don't know if it's going
to work out. How does?
How do you collaborate with what's already being prescribed
(13:52):
and what the other? You know what another doctor is
telling them carefully, right? Yeah.
I have had many cases where the prescriptions were absolutely
necessary and not going to change.
But when we're talking about mental health and I see somebody
having terrible side effects, especially something like
(14:13):
inability to concentrate and that's what's supposed they're
supposed to be getting treated for, you can't even have a
conversation. They can't hold a train of
thought and they have no forethought when they arrive.
And I'm just continually starting over and over and over
because the patient has their memory is very poor.
Their forethought is awful, and it's very hard for them to
(14:36):
maintain focus. And I have to say, the
medication you're taking isn't working.
Let's let's change it, get rid of it.
Yeah, I can re prescribe something else, but there's
dependency here too. Yeah, I look forward to a day
where. It's certainly not gonna work
out. Yeah.
(14:57):
Well, I look forward to the day that we can all collaborate
together for the sake of the patient, you know, and that they
start looking to people like youand I that do you know some
alternative or what's consideredalternative methods.
For the, for the benefit of the patient.
I mean, there's so much out there.
(15:18):
Yeah, it's, you know, every, I'ma naturopath and every patient
goes around saying my doctor doesn't listen to me.
Well, we're, we're the doctors who listen.
We're the ones who listen to your whole case.
We would love to talk to your doctors but your others often
don't have time and that may never happen.
(15:40):
And also it's a terrible position to be put in to give
contradictory information, but when you know you're right and
you have to explain it to the patient and let them decide
other doctor and you have opposing views.
Yeah. But very often when it comes to,
you know, heavier medication andstuff like that, the doctor will
(16:02):
agree. Yeah.
So like, it's, you know, I'm tied.
I have to give her this medication, a few something
better. Let's go for it.
Yeah, because maybe someday. Well, and the other thing is
patients don't realize that theydon't have to do what their
(16:23):
doctor wants them to do like. I have.
To say go against medical advice.
I'm not saying that, but you know, I, I get, I'm an
ultrasonographer. I get people all the time, like,
oh, I want to do this part of the test.
But I really, you know, is that OK?
I'm like, you're the patient. Yes, it's OK.
You can refuse. Yeah, you don't have to do it.
(16:44):
Your doctor did. Yes, they prescribed it, but
you're in charge. And a lot of people are like I
am. You know, often ask me, well,
why didn't, why did my doctor dothis to me or why didn't my
doctor say what you're saying and why train give me this
medication. And I say you went to the doctor
(17:04):
and told them you needed something for this ailment.
And that's what they have. That's all they have.
I went to a completely differentschool than they did, even
though I know most of what they do also, but I don't dapple in
the but you went in there, they have to treat you.
(17:25):
They have to treat what you camein for.
It might be kind of a crappy prescription that doesn't even
work. And but that's all they have.
There's a standard of care. You know, if you went in for,
you know, let's kind of keep it simple, Constipation, they're
going to give you some lousy Constipation, probably over the
counter thing that doesn't work.Yeah.
(17:47):
Then you come and see somebody like me and I'm gonna, like, do
all these different things and you're gonna feel so much
better. And it has nothing to do with
their kind of lousy prescriptionyou didn't get at the doctor.
Yeah. And they're not trained to dig
any deeper or, you know, half the time they won't even send
you to a, you know, a therapist,which, you know, might be
(18:09):
something like that, might be what you need.
I've heard that before too that I had a gastroenterologist on
had a patient who only eliminated once a month and it
was due to some horrific trauma that she went through in her
child and once he sent her to a psychotherapist and she worked
through that. It took her like 3 months and
she was fine, didn't need medication.
(18:32):
Yeah, there's so many. Well, we've at least gotten out
of the insurance model of you need a referral for everything.
And I, we're in such a absolute barrage of mental health
services. You can get on with the mental
health professional within the day on a telehealth basically
anywhere. Yeah, country at this point.
(18:53):
Yeah. Hopefully it's the right.
Fit. Yeah, sometimes it takes a
minute to find. Yeah, well, the right.
Adopted community, myself and probably everybody else.
We don't find the right fit. Very.
Easily, right? Yeah, it's difficult.
And I'm hoping to fill that gap because myself and other so many
(19:15):
others have had I had bad experiences with therapists
saying I was arrogant and ungrateful.
Wow, instead of meeting you where you're at, hello.
Why would you do that? I I had a therapist.
You didn't identify yourself as a Catholic nun?
I had no idea. Oh, wow.
Breaking a commandment, talking about the problems that I have
(19:38):
with my mom. Yeah, you're supposed to want
your father and your mother. Wow, she told.
Me that that I was arrogant and she wanted to slap me.
Oh my God, in in the session I. Think you're in the wrong?
You're in the wrong profession, ladies.
Wow. And that was my support, yeah,
(19:59):
Of my extreme troubles with fitting into my family and
seeking help, yeah. And there were others, you know,
you can't you all I have, I havea strong opinion about EMDR and
complex trauma. You know, it's entirely
practitioner dependent. And when you have very complex
(20:19):
trauma, you're just you're not going to get there, right?
Too much unspeakable, first of all, and it's not event by event
and you're not going to desensitize adoption.
Yeah, I find that it helps a lotof adoptees, but it doesn't get
them to where they need to be. So I, you know, like I always
(20:44):
say, everybody's healing combinations different and it
works for you great. And you know, but yeah, it's
kind of hit or miss from what I hear from my clients that come
from EMDR. Like I said, it's helped
somewhat, but it just hasn't gotten them to the actual root
of it so. People are Googling and shopping
(21:06):
and they're doing things that other people are doing.
And I would love for people to. So I was a primary care
physician taking insurance in Vermont until I moved to Arizona
less than a year ago. And, you know, I organized
people's care as a primary care.And people need to find a
(21:27):
primary care or somebody who's like the base guide them like
don't do this, do this first. And well, you've been going to a
therapist. How's it going?
I don't like it really upset allthe time.
OK, well, let's switch. And I would do that for a
physical therapist too. Let me organize your care.
(21:50):
There's some things you should do first.
There are some things you shouldn't do at certain times of
your life. Maybe you're under a you're in a
transition period and trauma work.
It's not the right time, you know?
Yeah, help me set the prioritiesfor you so that it goes
smoother. Yeah, but you don't have doctors
that do that. I thankfully had a doctor that
(22:11):
was moving and he was like, OK, your personality, I know you
like, I think you should see this doctor.
I think this would be a good fit.
And he, you know, literally likecircled the name on.
He had, like, all these doctors on a piece of paper that he was
like sending people to, but he literally, like, tried to match
you with a physician that he thought you would click with.
(22:32):
And I was like, who does that? That's so nice.
Thank you. I mean, usually you're just on
your own floating around trying to find the right person, right?
Well, so many people are and youknow, you've got to, you've got
to find, listen to what people are saying.
Who's a good doctor? Who's going to make those good
referrals for you? And they networked.
(22:52):
And can they help you with organizing your care?
Yeah, I got here. I joined doctors, networking
groups and stuff like that. And I already have a Bank of
people to refer to, but I'm alsoin a network.
Or I can ask all the doctors in that group.
Lots of them. Yeah, yeah.
That's. Perfect.
You know, we, we help each otherout.
(23:14):
Yeah. I love that.
You definitely want to do because people can be searching
and searching and not find the help that they need.
Right. You often say hormone health is
mental health, and yes, I do. And you may need antibiotics,
not antipsychotics. Can you unpack also?
Yes. Can you unpack that a little bit
(23:34):
and how it applies to people that you serve?
So I was in the Northeast for a lot of my life, and I got Lyme
disease probably more than once.And I can tell you from personal
experience, but also from the hundreds of people that I've
worked with, Lyme disease can cause terrible psychiatric
symptoms, terrible psychiatric symptoms.
(23:57):
Like what? Like anxiety, terrible mood
swings, you don't know what you're feeling.
You don't understand why you're feeling this way.
The symptoms are so severe because it's a nervous system
infection. And if you don't put two and two
together and a lot of people don't get the bull's eye rash,
(24:22):
somebody might not even know they've been bitten.
It's going to be case taking, examining and testing and get
that test out as quickly as you can, but also prophylactically.
Maybe start an antibiotic and see if it makes a dent while
you're waiting for the test to come back.
(24:43):
I've seen people go on antidepressants and anxiety
medication and they had Lyme disease and Bethesia, the effect
the nerve. And then there's for children,
PANS and PANDAS, which is just apediatric concept.
A stroke infection can cause some pretty intense behavior
(25:06):
changes in children. And if that goes untreated into
adulthood, you can have some pretty complex inflammation of
the brain that was down to an infection that really required
maybe a semi prolonged period ofantibiotics.
(25:27):
Well, and I'll meet somebody who's 26 years old and now
they're on three or four or fivepsychiatric medications and have
done several inpatient stays as a teenager in a psych facility
and they're traumatized, of course.
And then we run a test for something like and we had PANDAS
(25:47):
in the past and Lyme disease in the past, and they definitely
had. Wow and didn't even know it.
And didn't even know it. Nobody tested for it and they
were going on psychiatric medication in the blink of an
eye. That's crazy.
And it's really tragic. Yeah.
'Cause it can have very disastrous consequences for your
(26:08):
social development, your academic career.
Yeah. I have never met anybody who had
a positive experience with goinginpatient psych to date.
It's traumatic, particularly when you're young.
Yeah, have you seen unprocessed trauma contribute to a chronic
(26:28):
illness? I believe so.
I mean, it's hard to put two andtwo together.
So you have trauma. You had asked earlier about
hormones and then infections, right?
If you're we're women, you understand hormones, but people
(26:49):
don't really understand hormoneswill blind side you very often.
I'll stabilize somebody's hormones if possible 1st and
then get more into the trauma orat the same time because what am
I looking at? Are you so anxious and sleepless
and you can't sit still because it's going to be a full moon in
(27:09):
four days and you're premenstrual or trauma?
Cause the trauma will resurface and the hormones are all out of
whack, right? Yeah, it's very easy to be re
traumatized when you're extremely irritable and having
mood swings and maybe sleepless.Yeah, you're just, you're
(27:31):
fragile, right? So I wish somebody had given me
progesterone cream when I was a teenager.
Oh, wow. Because it's so helpful and so
many women will feel better, youknow, premenstrually at the very
least, because it will blind side you.
We're also an epidemic of birth control.
(27:53):
We don't know exactly. There's so many dissociated
young girls out there on birth control.
They'll give birth control at the same time, a packet of or a
bottle of antidepressant same time.
And So what are you seeing? What are the problems that come
up with that? What?
Wrong with that. So the antidepressant is for the
(28:17):
side effects of the birth control?
OK. Yeah, automatic.
There are studies not in this country on autism and the use of
progestin based birth control contributing to autism.
Oh wow. The other thing, hormones are
(28:40):
not always a great idea and theycause pretty serious side
effects. And we have.
I've met many young girls who never had a natural period.
They were put on birth control before their period even
started. They're blind to the entire
hormone picture. Their natural period is
overridden. Birth control, yeah, I see that
(29:02):
a lot at my work. They'll come in for a pelvic
ultrasound because for amenorrhea, you know, all the
time see that a lot or irregular, very irregular
menstrual cycles. There's side effects from birth
control that are treated with psychiatric medication just like
that. Yeah.
And then you're just, you're walking around with artificial
(29:24):
hormones and psychiatric medication and you're 18 years
old. Like what could go wrong?
Right. It's a high risk situation.
Well, your doctor gave it to you, so you think you're golden,
right? Are obedient, right?
They want to feel better, and this is what they're presented
with as the solution, and they think it's gonna work.
(29:48):
It often doesn't work. Yeah, well, I think a lot of
people think that. I think it's like, give me a
pill, 'cause that will help me. Like if you don't give me a
pill, that's not gonna help me. You know, like give me
something. When they go to the doctor,
they're expecting it. They're expecting to take a
prescription out of there for something.
Right. I know exactly what's going to
(30:09):
be given to somebody when they come.
When somebody does an intake form and I take a look at it
before they arrive, I know exactly before I even read the
medication list what they've already been given, the symptoms
that they have, right? And.
You're going to. I know it's.
Difficult you look at a person'sphysical body and I'm like
you're on high blood pressure medicine you're a diabetic and
(30:31):
you're you know you have hypertension, high cholesterol
yeah I know those 3 medications you're on right now my.
Initial intake is usually about 90 minutes and I'll explain
things to people about why they're feeling the way that
they're feeling, maybe because of a side effect of medication
or say trauma. I mean, I've had people look at
(30:52):
me with eyes like saucers going.I never put that together.
I go, yeah, I think, you know, Iremember one woman just off the
top of my head and she had anxiety and I can't remember
what else she came in for. But, you know, I talk at length
(31:13):
with people. How do you feel about this and
how do you feel about that? And, you know, your physical
symptoms and I have to do a physical and stuff like that.
And she was upset about her mother.
And I said, is your mother a narcissist?
And she said, I think so. I said, do you understand what
that means? And she said, no, not really.
(31:34):
And I gave her a book and I said, bring this back when you
come back in two weeks. And she came back and she's
like, I had no idea the far reaching.
And somebody wrote in a book howI felt because it was
inarticulable how I was feeling.And I think adoptees face the
same thing. It's so intense and there's no
(31:58):
words and you just, you're just dissociating when you're very
traumatized or you know, you just don't understand.
Yeah, that's why the community and telling our stories is so
huge, because it I've had so many people like, Oh my gosh, I
thought I was the only one feeling that way.
(32:18):
You know, they have no idea. Yeah, it's the you're.
Right. People need to and very, and
hopefully, you know, you come tosomebody like me or hopefully
more and more practitioners are going to put those symptoms
together and get to the root cause for you.
Because people are falling into the throes of addiction and
(32:41):
suicidality and thinking they'reall alone in this.
I said to someone once that in the adopted community
suicidality is so high, it's it's normal.
I said it's so high in this population of people, it's like
normal to feel that way. Yeah.
(33:01):
So many people do, and she's like, I feel so much better just
understanding that. Yeah, right.
Yeah, we don't. Yeah.
It's those subjects, subjects that are taboo like, you know,
like suicide and things like that, that well, let's just not
talk about them because, you know, it's not something that we
want to bring up. But that's those are the things
that we need to start talking about because people are
(33:24):
struggling and they do feel alone.
And so these taboo subjects, youknow, need to be brought out
into the light and some education for people because
they're just struggling. You know as an adopted person
and so many of us must feel the exact same way.
The truth is the most important thing I can tell them.
(33:45):
People are lying to me and they don't want to dig any deeper.
And, you know, what are you going to do?
The truth is the most important thing.
But there's such a fear I feel it's an archetypal fear.
You know what I mean by archetypal?
Practically in all of us of like, psychiatric hospitals.
(34:06):
Oh, yeah, Such a fearful thing that people don't express that
kind of a thing. And like we had said earlier,
just because somebody wants to give you a medication doesn't
mean you have to take it, but you need to express how you feel
like how bad is this? Yeah.
And you know the levels of it. Yeah, you definitely have to
(34:28):
advocate for yourself and educate yourself as much as
possible because if you don't, you are going to end up being
one of those victims of 25 listsof medications that you're
taking, and you're going to end up feeling worse instead of
feeling better. So you really have to advocate.
Yeah, Part of my advocacy for adoptees is going to be
(34:52):
educating mental health and medical professionals about
these risk factors, because the risk factors are there.
And just because an adopted adult says to you, sometimes I
feel suicidal, you need to dig deeper because this is normal in
this population. And you need to say to them, you
know, you're at very high risk of feeling that way.
(35:12):
Tell me a little more about that.
Or how about let's, you know, reinforce that you have some
understanding and say, I'm sorryyou're feeling this way.
One person, I was 56 years old, I said I was adopted to someone.
And she said, I'm sorry. How many times has somebody said
that to you? That never happened to me
(35:33):
before. Never, never supported.
The, you know, a little sensitivity and support in just
the adoption arena to begin with.
Yeah. And then a a primary care Doctor
Who may or may not be in a hurry, but literally this is a
risk factor. Somebody says they're adopted.
(35:53):
Ask a couple more questions Doing with your mental health.
Yeah. Just that simple.
Getting Are you getting the proper help around this?
When you feel, you know, dissociated or really dark
thoughts come up or you're really struggling around
something and it's gonna happen in life's milestones, you know,
(36:15):
parents having children, a very tough time in your life.
Maybe you lose your job, or yourspouse passes away, or, you
know, reunion. Yeah.
And help them find the support that they need or at least
acknowledge. Right.
That these risk factors are so high.
Yeah. That's one risk factor that we
(36:36):
don't talk about. Talk about all these other
genetic risk factors, you know that does this run in your
family? Does that run in your family?
But we don't. We don't go there.
I think it needs to be front andcenter.
Oh, I do too, yeah. So what approaches have you
found most helpful for trauma survivors in what you do?
So people can come in in a variety of states for health,
(37:02):
right, and have trauma. We know that a lot of adoptees
and people who are going to havetrauma will descend into
addiction, right? And we want to try.
You have to treat the whole person.
And if they're already going into addiction, and now we have
such a compounded pharmaceuticalproblem with addiction too, you
(37:26):
have to address the whole thing at the same time.
That's where homeopathy can be most excellent because you can
address maybe medication side effects at the same time.
You can start tapering if they're really, you know,
spacing out on a medication and you can hit the target head on
without interfering or causing some negative side effect like
(37:51):
adding a medication. You can treat somebody for, say,
rage or grief, and they can actually kind of look the same,
right? People can look hysterical from
grief, or people can be shut down from grief, or people can
be really, you know, needing to manage their anger from grief
(38:11):
'cause it's so hard to talk about.
And a homeopathic remedy will get right in there without some
toxic side effect and potentially very, very quickly.
And if you can take that off of someone and they can experience
like this lift, there's like, wow, I had no idea what you were
(38:35):
doing and what you were giving me, but wow, did that work.
And then you opened the door andthen you can start to proceed.
Yeah, for someone who maybe feels like they're drowning in
the traditional medical system and wants to maybe look at more
of a natural approach, what are some first steps for them to
(38:56):
start taking? Yeah, I mean, everybody's so
different. You know, I call it all a
singularity. Everybody's story and where they
are in their life is so singularly unique.
But start to look, you know, I'mhere, I do telehealth obviously,
but start to look for, ask your friends and ask family members
(39:18):
who they talk to, etcetera. Some people are also without
resources. Hopefully they're listening to
things like this. Find a naturopath, find a
homeopath, start getting on thatpath.
Ask your primary care Doctor Who's prescribing all of this
stuff for your nurse practitioner who's prescribing
all this stuff. Say I don't want to do this.
(39:40):
You know, how can I start to taper and get off of this?
Yeah, and if they're not willingto discuss that, then it's time
to find another. Doctor, you've got to find the
right support, and if all they have for you is more psychiatric
medication and they're resistantto helping you, even if you feel
(40:01):
terrible on it, you need to findsomebody else.
Or if your doctor gets, you know, feels personally attacked
because you're questioning the care that you're getting or you
know, then that's another red flag right there, too.
I mean, I've I've had to talk down so many patients getting so
upset by what their how gas lit they are.
(40:24):
The doctor I had a young girl with, she definitely had Lyme
disease and was treated for it but not long enough.
But there was a suspicion she had a strep infection months
before she was. She just suddenly changed and
became very aggressive, very young child.
And the mom was talking and all they were telling her to do was
(40:47):
go to psych, go to psych, go to psych.
Which is way more traumatizing. Than I gave her antibiotics and
she recovered. Yeah, that's crazy.
I knew she had that infection and they just automatically
within a couple weeks the behavior had changed so
(41:07):
drastically. The child is still sick.
Kids get upset, right? And they were just like, Oh
yeah, she had this infection. But I'm, I don't care.
She's got to go to to psych now.Yeah, and how frustrating for
her because she probably feels not listened to and feels like
something's still wrong and veryconfused as to, you know, what's
(41:30):
going on and. It's very hard to even ask
questions of your nurse practitioner or primary care
physician. Very often people, first of all,
you're not feeling well, right? So like I, I'll have too long of
an interview even out, I'm trying to extract all of that
(41:51):
information from you and encouraging getting to know you
even better. And when you go to primary care,
very often you're not listening to it all.
You forget to ask, you feel gaslit, you feel just not hurt
at all. I went to my doctor with a
laundry list of things and she like had all these bullet OK,
(42:14):
we're going to do this for her SAT and she's you know, we're
going through and about 1/4 of the way in I was like, I don't
want to do this anymore. Doesn't feel right.
I was just like, I need a break.And she's like, but we had this
whole plan and and I was like, Iknow, but I can't.
And she's like OK, you know, shewas like fine with it.
You know, for some doctors wouldhave just like blown up and you
(42:35):
know, but. Yeah.
So it could be exhausting and working.
I understand when people need totake breaks, I sometimes I have
to send them back to their primary care physician, but I'll
organize them or even reach out to the doctor to make it easier
on them because all these appointments like what you're
experiencing, it's so exhausting.
(42:55):
It's overwhelming. Yeah, it's so.
Overwhelming. And then if somebody really is
very unwell in whatever arena, they might just stop looking for
care. Yeah.
And just. True.
Well, tell us, tell us about your nonprofit, what its mission
and. Yeah.
So it's unfolding for sure. I'm trying to.
(43:18):
I have a couple board members, the world physicians who I'm
hoping will guide me to how thiswill make the biggest impact.
So it's called adoption evolution, but it's definitely
going to shift probably into ADBA 'cause I definitely feel
like foster care and traffickingvictims and but also the people
(43:42):
that love adoptees. These are, these are the numbers
that we're talking about. You know, you have one adoptive
person. Well, how many people are around
that person, right? We've got 2 biological parents,
2 adoptive parents typically. Maybe you've got a spouse, maybe
you've got children, you've got siblings, you've got friends,
you've got grandparents that could all benefit from education
(44:04):
around adoption, to support, to be a supportive family right at
any age. So the mission is to validate,
first of all, adoption trauma, educate everyone in the whole
sphere and then advocacy hopefully.
(44:25):
And that should look pretty significant, I think,
particularly the foster care system.
That's awesome. Like how are you bringing this
to adoption agencies or how are you, what are you bringing this
to? I for example, yesterday I was
at the Dustic violence shelter here in the center and they're
(44:46):
gonna let me do an hour a week and I'm, I'm going to try to,
because it's like a, you know, there's a movie called Phantom
the thread, and I love the name Phantom the thread, but adoption
is this thread going through allthese horrific circumstances
that is unacknowledged. So you can have a domestic
(45:10):
violence survivor, maybe with some addiction problems and
maybe they've maybe they themselves were adopted, maybe
they've had their children takenby CPSI, mean adoption is all in
there potentially as a core and or maybe their spouse was
adopted and that was the violentone.
(45:33):
I'm looking to start to pull through with other nonprofits
and foster care. Emphasizing the trauma needs to
be addressed and maybe even rehab facilities.
How many adoptees do you have inthere 'cause I know it's a lot.
Are you asking are you counting?Yeah, you talk about it, right?
(45:59):
Let me talk with the rehab facility, you know, raise your
hand if you're adopted like. Yeah, or been in the foster care
system or. The statistics, it's going to be
about 40%. Yeah, yeah.
Same with prison under, yeah. What have you talked about that?
How do you address that? Have you ever talked about it?
(46:20):
Third men in prison. There was a quote from a man in
prison and they said, what wouldyou, what do you think would
have helped you to not wind up here?
And, he said, grief counseling. Yeah, been heard, been.
Seen manage my emotions and dealt with my grief.
(46:42):
I wouldn't have been so hot headed, rash, impulsive, you
know, whatever. Yeah, there's so much education
that needs to happen. It's sometimes it's just
overwhelming to me. That's what I'm saying.
Like I'm gonna educate medical professionals.
Like don't ignore this giant redflag.
(47:02):
Yeah, yeah. This is a social situation that
is going to affect and at any age.
If a person is adopted, ask fouror five follow up questions
about their mental health, possibly addiction, and make the
(47:23):
appropriate referrals because consequences could be quite
disastrous. Yeah.
Most women go to the doctor and men don't.
How many women are seeking mental health care and not
getting asked? Like I'm, I'm wondering, just
right now, I'm wondering how many women are moms of adopted
(47:47):
children and their doctor doesn't know that.
Yeah. And they're struggling with
their parenting. Yeah.
I mean, have I ever been asked if I was adopted on an intake?
Never. How many I've been, I'm taking
these classes with Case in Maryland, the Center for
(48:08):
Adoption Support and Education. And how many parents are
struggling with their own mentalhealth, with their parenting?
Yeah, yeah, they don't. They don't understand the root
cause of it. It's it's so complex, we just
start asking, are you adopted? Are your children adopted or is
(48:30):
your spouse adopted? Perhaps the conversations just
kind of keep evolving. But talking about adoption and
then getting with. I'm working with friends in
foster care. They have a program where they
work with people who age out of foster care.
They work with them till they're26 is brilliant.
And I'm going to transfer two people out of that program and
(48:53):
get them to talk about their experience.
And, you know, the narrative that needs to.
Yeah. You know, these are your
identity issues, right? You could this this is the
trauma you need to grow your identity from how whatever your
origin stories are. Yeah.
You need to solidify that and tell the truth about your
(49:17):
trauma, particularly to yourselfand understand yourself.
It needs to have some compassion, yeah.
It absolutely needs to be validated as, I mean, you're
adopted. I'm adopted.
There's not a moment even probably in our sleep.
It's our identity. We are adopted.
Yeah, every minute of the day. Yeah, there's no pill to take
(49:42):
for that. It's it's our identity.
Right. And it's born of trauma.
I I got I had a blowback one time in a discussion group with
the psychiatry discussion group about adoption even being
trauma. Oh my goodness, that's crazy.
What could be more traumatic than a child who doesn't have
(50:02):
parents that has to be raised bysomebody else?
And I was just really blunt about it.
Yeah, I felt like I needed to be.
I was going to say you had to be.
I was going to. Say, yeah, I had to shut that
down. Right.
Yeah, there's a lot of education.
It's trauma, there is loss #1. Yeah.
(50:25):
That can never be forgotten. It's not, you know, and we all
know the story. You know, we have to be
grateful. And it's this.
It's the solution to all the problems that you're ever going
to have to be adopted. Well, I'm going to be talking
with some foster kids who weren't adopted.
Yeah. About what they think adoption
means. And I've also talked to people
who were adopted and then given back.
(50:49):
Yeah, rehoming. Oh my gosh, that's a whole new
episode. And I've had anything to do
about that, right? With that kind of trauma, Well,
first you got to be truthful. It hurts, right?
And then I dig deep and we hash it out and we talk about it, and
(51:11):
I'll find remedies that fit. And hopefully it will just give
your nervous system enough calming because there's nothing
other than to accept what has happened and find the strength
in your story to come to terms with that.
(51:32):
And you have to validate it all day long and educate all around
it. You're not the only one that
feels that way. Everybody feels that way.
These are the statistics. This is how you should feel.
And me saying that should make you feel better.
(51:52):
You're not alone. Right.
Yeah. And feeling that way, right?
It's like normal to feel that way.
And you're going to get through this, right?
Yeah. I mean, I do believe that what
we go through can become our superpower.
I mean, I wouldn't be doing whatI'm doing with somatic work.
(52:12):
You wouldn't be where you're at today if you know, partially
because of what we went through and then you want to help
somebody else. And I think that's the whole
purpose of even going through something is.
That is probably going to be part of the mission is because
now I've spent some time online and talked to a different people
and stuff like that, you know, as adopted adults particularly,
you know, like I was born in the60s.
(52:33):
I don't know if you're probably right after me.
People didn't talk about it and stuff.
We need to get together and be like mentors.
Yeah, exactly. Exactly what you said.
Now you have to help somebody else and in doing that you're
going to feel better. So I want to get like a legion
of helpers. Yeah, that's awesome.
I love that. Where can we find you?
(52:55):
Do you have a website? Yeah.
Doctor Maria Cronin dot. Com OK, so we will put that in
the show notes so people can find you and see what you're
doing, but I'm certainly. Available on telehealth and then
adoption evolution is, I think I'm on YouTube, Spotify, Apple,
and I'll be adding some more. Oh, I think I need those.
(53:18):
I need those links to put in theshow notes.
I don't think I have those. So send those to me so I can put
those in the show notes. So.
Many things happening at once. I need to get my podcast guy to
come back to my house and hook me up with.
My links So do you have a podcast?
Is it I do? It's my name, and then I have
another one. Adoption Evolution.
Oh my gosh. Two of them and how you do it.
(53:41):
Everything has been happening, it seems for years, but it's
only been months. Yeah, very infancy stage on all
of it. It's all happening at the same
time. So watch and yeah, grow.
Maybe you'll come on mine. And yeah, sure.
Anytime. Yeah.
So any other links that you wantpeople to find you to send those
to me, I'll have them in the show.
(54:01):
Everything just under my name. Just look for Doctor Mark
Cronin. Cronin.
What a wine, OK? Well, thanks so much for coming
on today. I really love the approach
because that's, you know, individuality and medical
approaches. It's just got to be, it's got to
become mainstream that this is what needs to happen.
(54:21):
So I love anybody that does thatand just looks at the
individual, meets them, where they're at and helps them.
So thank you so much for coming on the show and being a resource
for the listeners. Maria is such a force, isn't
she? I love how she brings both
clinical wisdom and live truth into the same space and reminds
us that the body holds everything, whether it's grief,
(54:45):
confusion, or trauma from a longtime ago.
If it's not expressed, it's stored.
If something clicked for you today, if your body's been
whispering or even yelling, it might be time to start listening
with compassion. And if you're looking for a way
to gently explore the emotional layers underneath physical
symptoms, you can always check out the somatic work that I do.
(55:08):
Just visit somatichealingjourneys.com to
learn more. And hey, if you have a unique
healing modality or a message that the Karma crew needs to
hear, I'd love to hear from you.You can reach me at
mindyourownkarma@gmail.com. Let's get you on the podcast.
I hope this one listen changed your life today.
(55:31):
And remember to take what you need and leave what you don't.
And always remember. To mind your own.
Karma. I'll see you next time.
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