Latest / Your Body Knows / Hair as Embodiment: Caring for Our Hair, Caring for Ourselves w/Trichologist Bridgette Hill

Transcript

Hair as Embodiment: Caring for Our Hair, Caring for Ourselves w/Trichologist Bridgette Hill · Your Body Knows

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to Your Body Knows, a podcast for women ready to return to their bodies and reclaim their power, their truth, and their way forward.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_02: I'm your host, Shanetta McDonald, a somatic life coach and writer.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: Each episode will explore the messy, beautiful work of healing, self-trust, and learning to feel at home in your own skin.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: Whether you're in a season of transition or simply longing to feel more like yourself, this space is for you.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_02: Let's listen in.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_02: Today's guest is certified tricologist and scalp therapist, Bridget Hill.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_02: We'll have a conversation about the surprising ways our hair can reflect what's happening beneath the surface.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_02: Drawing from more than two decades in the beauty industry and our specialized work in tricology, Bridget shares why the scalp deserves the same attention as the rest of our body, and how stress, hormones, inflammation, nutrition, and emotional well-being can all influence the health of our hair.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: Together we'll also explore the relationship between identity and hair, why so many of us carry shame around our hair loss or changes in our appearance, the connection between beauty and healing, and what our bodies may be trying to communicate through our scalp.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: This combo offers a refreshing perspective on self-care, one that I believe moves beyond products and aesthetics to reveal health caring for ourselves from the inside out, but it can transform the way we experience confidence, health, and our relationship with our bodies.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome, Bridget.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you, Sanetta.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_02: I'm so happy to be here.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_02: Very curious to know what season of life you're in right now.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Ah, wow, this is um vulnerable.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm in a whole new body.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a recent widow after 25 years of being with from a young girl growing up with someone.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that's a whole new person that I've kind of tried to become.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And along with that, being in a body of a mother watching her daughter become fatherless in terms of a human connection.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um I have a that's the only thing I had to, I had to learn how to trust.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: The only thing that is real is the body.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's that connection.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I knew it or believed it instinctively, just innate, like just my innate being was very much connected to movement, nature, feeling, and being such a sensitive, like, like energy.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: But when life takes you in a way where you physically have to learn every your there's nothing else but what your body is.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that's like the first thing, you know, just through my therapeutic process was like my only job is to learn to learn to trust my body.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: And that was so such a freeing, profound moment.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know, hello, here she is.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm learning a body in a way that is um of so much reverence.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: I the gift of it all, though, is to be the wisdom of living at the time, like in my late 40s, now at 52, is the reverence that I have for such just the body is such a magnificent um thing.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: I don't even know what to call it.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: It's a machine, it's a feeler, it's such a magnificent being.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: And the cellular structure, the emotions, what we put into it, we put on it.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: I have such an appreciation, and I think learning how to have a radical love affair with the body in all weird kinds of ways.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, I'm a student right now of this body.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: I'm so sorry for your loss.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: And thank you for sharing that.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: I I also notice on your Instagram profile you have human first, and so that lends well to just the navigating all the things that come with being human, you know, and it's such a nonlinear life, and uh there's just as much sorrow as there is joy and good.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_02: And so to hold space for all of it is is really just so much.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely, it's the balance.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: Period.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, that's what we're here.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we're here for, right?
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I believe we're in these vessels that can feel and experience so much.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: And I think even in the sorrow of just life, I mean, we everyone experiences it, right?
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: Varying degrees, but we none of us escape this human experience without knowing deep sorrow.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Is that that means that the space of like the adverse of that is just so big too.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: So you can experience so much love and so much beauty.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and again, that appreciation is so real in my body and a very um, I feel privileged to be able to be in the body physically and know that that kind of goal and aspiration is something as long as I'm in this body.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: I want to sustain, I want my cells to feel like privileged, you know, every day because it it really is a gift.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_02: I want to get into how you got into this work, but before that, I want to go back.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_02: I want to learn about so many things about your upbringing, particularly how was your relationship with hair, with beauty, with wellness growing up.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's so interesting.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I probably, with my most honest self, never felt, I think growing up in the South, being of a darker complexion, like no, those colorisms were real.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: It was all about texture, labeling good hair, bad hair.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so granted, I have, and I grew up just beautiful, and my my family were beautiful women, very diverse in terms of color, hair types, textures, all those things.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: However, I think innately, when I'm being honest, there was always a little bit of an inferior aspect of being like on a darker side of complexion.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I think I always had that kind of um complex relationship with color that's just honest.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: I was I was fortunate enough in the sense that my hair texture, what kind of could go in these directions that weren't, when I look back now at some of the people that I work with and clients and just young girls, and just your hair being able to have more eluser, or you put water on it and it could like stretch, or you put conditioner on it.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: Those, those very early memories of not necessarily feeling like, oh, I love my hair, oh I love my skin, or I love my body.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Those are very new things for me.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm really being completely honest.
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, um, but I've always just had an aesthetic for beauty.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: And in my eye, I could see the differences of just the uniqueness of skin and hair that was always just so gorgeous to me in a very externally in a very honest way.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I just like pretty things, you know, I like to make things pretty, and I just always like pretty things.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: And pretty girls are fun and to look at, pretty women in their clothes.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: I just I was always in a people watcher like that with beautiful women.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: So I would say that was my initial connection to just um beauty.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: And then from there it led me to magazines and being obsessed, of course, at that time with like vogues and ebony's and essence and um, you know, just images.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: So that was shaped pretty images, is what kind of turned me on to be.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_02: What messages were you receiving from your family or parents?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_02: I kind of understand societal messages, but any familiar messages?
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Things I got so much love, and they were not like as they weren't as aesthetic.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like I was just such a visual kid.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Like my mom, I was doing my mom's makeup when she was like, you know, the she was very, she was an educator, so she was like the class president sponsor.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: So when she had to do all these things, I was picking out her clothes.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: I was doing makeup.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: I was doing that stuff like at 9, 10.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: It was just, I was naturally, it was so natural for me.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Um, again, in the terms of colorism, her mother was like so light, and then they're so dark.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: So they never made, it was nothing that was consciously projected.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, they just love chocolate little babies, even though they just never, but I picked up the way the world perceived it.
• 8:37
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I was more sensitive to that.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't, there was nothing negative that reinforced me and my family except for hair blank.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I shaved my hair very long, and I got a lot of pushback.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: I was very, I did it very young.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_00: I was very much a rebel that way.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that was my first, where like uncles would come up to me and be like, you need to grow your hair back.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the first, like, really, you know, and I was like, oh, what does all this mean?
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: Why does that make them feel so?
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_00: It really impacted people a lot of different ways.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: So that was my first, like, oh, they have an opinion.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: And like, now it's like a they were really concerned that I was walking around with like really short hair in the 90s.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: That was wild to me.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my gosh, cutting your hair in a black family is like a thing.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: It might as well be a sin.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when I went natural, I had a bad haircut haircut in college, and I went natural and uh I just did the big chop and I had like maybe two inches of curly hair.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, I think I went to uh around my family for a holiday, and one of the women said to me, What did you do to your hair?
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, it was just blasphemy.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_02: It was I was like, I just cut it, it'll grow back.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: It will grow back.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_00: It was absolutely and I wasn't even, I was still like kind of relaxing it.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: So it wasn't even like short like this.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_00: It was still like, you know, cute trying to be like pixie girl.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was like that really affected.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: That was a lot of there was so much projection onto me.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, again, it's unconscious, not to the I'm not gonna quite like a negative from their perspective, but it's their own reflection of themselves.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: But that's a lot, that's heavy to carry, like as a 14-year-old, and you're like, I kind of like what I look like, you know?
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: So that goes back to that body of what is your body feeling versus what are people telling you your body should be feeling?
• 10:35
  SPEAKER_00: And being able to really understand the two of those, that's that's that's provocative right there.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_02: And then where did your career path go early on?
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_02: And then how did you evolve into the work you do now?
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: So um, I moved to New York in 1999.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: I went to beauty school after college at the Aveda Institute of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I went to Clark Atlanta University for undergraduate.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I, I mean, at that point I was um, you know, I was always just the beauty girl and then fashion girl.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: My friends were like the models.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: I did the hair.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was just always in that circle and did a little bit of my own commercial print, small local modeling, but like in hair books, some beauty was always a part of my world in some way, shape, some fashion.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: So I was around dancers, creatives.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: And then after college, I just knew that I wanted to, I wanted to kind of work with my hands, and I'd been motivated by the whole Aveda emergence, which was this whole mind, body, spirit, and beauty.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: They were having these phenomenal visuals, and I was like really into crystals and oils, and I just had this natural draw to be like, I feel like I want to explore this kind of world.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Inside of that, I was also a big fashion, high fashion, like, you know, fashion files.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm aging myself for sure.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: But like I loved, you know, the supermodel world.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: I love high fashion, I love aesthetics.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: So those things were just naturally what I gravitated to.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, let me just kind of try, you know, let's see what happens.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: And that took me to Minnesota, to the Beta Institute, and I got the bug, like, okay, I've I'm gonna do this.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: I want to be with the best, and I wanted to work with Garrett of New York, and I wanted to do Fashion Week.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how my career started.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: I was definitely older because I had spent, you know, those years in university.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I was this 20, I was a married woman.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: My husband and I were like these two little college, we was like, we were just free spirits and gonna make our lives doing things that we truly were motivated to do.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And that is where my path began as an assistant in Garen, where I was uh build a career and editorial colorist and editorial stylist.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that got you into the world where I had to think about hair care as a colorist because my clients were a lot of models and actors and just industry that had to do a lot of manipulation to hair.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: So caring for hair, um, thinking and considering all the factors that impact hair really were at the prime was very, very prime, you know, very first thought in my career, other than just like making pretty hair.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: And I got fascinated with kind of the behind the scenes of how do you care for hair?
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: How do you make it look shiny?
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: How do you let it withstand these things?
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: So that is how my brain started developing into like what's really going on beneath the surface.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: And then I ended up managing my own, and then I ended up managing my own hair loss condition.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: So then it was like, here we are, you know, this is why this is so personal.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that was gonna be my next question is what was going on with your hair at the time?
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, yes.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: I was, I had just so I shaved my head completely.
• 13:59
  SPEAKER_00: I wore like probably like a relaxer.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: I won't get it relaxed every three, four months.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: My daughter, um, who had this beautiful little fine afro.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: And when I got, came back from getting like a relaxer, she was so fascinated with like this straight hair that was blowing out.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it, I was in beauty school.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember like just in my gut, I were like being conscious as a mother of certain things that I wanted, I didn't want her to feel or do I didn't want to project onto her.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that next day, I literally went in the bathroom and shaved my head.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: Like I had a fresh relaxer, I shaved my head bowl and went through this entire experience of like, oh my gosh, like really making a connection to what my hair felt like coming out of my scalp.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Once I went through like this whole, then I fell in love with like my natural hair, wore it big when I moved to New York, just the stress factors, I've now looking back, I was getting massive alopecia areyata.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: So I was going to the dermatologist and getting um cortisone shots.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: And like I could hide it because I had so much hair at the time.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: But by that fourth shot, I was like, this can't be normal.
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_00: What's happening?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so my own understanding of managing as a colorist in hair care, managing what's happening on my body started my journey for making those true connections.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, interesting.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't even know cortisone could be a treatment for alopecia.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Most things are steroces.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: What they do is they reduce that inflammation and they're kind of it's just an anti-inflammatory things, right?
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then you're doing things to kind of encourage blood flow.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're doing with stress-induced alopecia area, it's not where the follicle is like being impacted for a moment and it typically goes back into a cycle.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't necessarily shut the follicle all the way down.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: Most of us, when we're managing alopecias, and we get we have different types of them and more than one type of them that then create massive inflammation.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: It can have some fungus or some bacterial component to it.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: And those are the things, along with other underlying root causes and factors, begin to destroy the whole follicle in itself.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: So it's multifactorial, but in those early stages, like anything dealing with the skin, everything is some type of topical steroid to begin with.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, when you're just getting those initial alopecia area, and that's how they would treat it, steer steroids.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um, what are some of the common types of alopecia?
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_02: I I know of traction alopecia.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_02: I know, I guess, of the, I don't know if it's a medical term, educate me girl.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, some androgenic, yeah, androgenic.
• 16:42
  unknown: Okay.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: I would say, so you're dealing with androgenic alopecia, um, alopecia areata, which is like kind of stress-induced.
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_00: And those can be emotional, those can be um uh sometimes this medicate medication thing, shifts in the body, um, allergic reactions.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: Then you can be managing, I see a lot of, firstly, women of color, what we call central centrifugal, cicatricial alopecias and circular patterns, which are due to massive, again, it's something in the DNA of the cells.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um, our hair structures come out of an elliptical hair follicle, which makes the hair curling even before it comes out of that follicle, which can ingrown, think of ingrown hairs.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, it's against the scalp.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: So you can retain moisture and certain oils and bacteria that can disrupt a lot of the microbiome and the scalp, the scalp barrier.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: So those things on top of the traction and the tension are what creates the most is the most amounts of alopecias that can then turn into scarring alopecias, right?
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where you have the this multifactorial of environmental things going on, and the follicle just is not being able to thrive a lot, thrive at all, the blood flow completely shuts down, and then you're left with scarring alopecia.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: Which inflammate and any type of inflammatory alopecia can create that if you don't, if you're not in front of it, or you can be um you know aware of the conditions that we're creating in the environment when we're talking about alopecia.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_02: Got it.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_02: And is tell me the difference of working with someone like you who is a tricologist versus a dermatologist.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_02: So anytime I've had any skin or scalp issues, I've always gone to the dermatologist.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, number one, I'd love to know what inspired you to lean into that specialty.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_02: And then, yeah, what's the difference?
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: So, great question.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: Dermatology is just the skin all over.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_00: So most dermatologists are not necessarily hair scalp specific.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: A tricologist and tricology is designed to be paramedical, meaning we're not a one-stop solution.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_00: We are working in relationships with your dermatologists, your medical practitioners, your hairdressers.
• 19:03
  SPEAKER_00: Most importantly, in this era, is the tricologist and the hairdresser, and the hairstylist and hairdresser that have that very deep working relationship, and then your dermatologist that specializes in scalp and hair.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: Because most dermatologists, if they don't have that as a specialty, it is not a, it's not a one-step answer.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: It requires the skin to go through a plethora of different uh cycles.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: It allows you to you have to think about that hair texture, hair type.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: What is it doing?
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: How is it being maintained?
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of the initial damage that I see and that manages tracology is a mechanical breakage, a mechanical damage, which is done by lack of proper hair care, not understanding hair as a fiber, unnecessary traction tension, um, and proper cleansing and hydrating.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of those initial steps that people say, oh, my hair is falling out or breakage.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of it is mechanical traction.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_00: When you really are dealing with a hair loss and the hair shedding, you're seeing like massive shedding coming out of the scalp.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you get more of these conditions that are preempted a lot by just the lack of care and the lack of understanding, both from the professional side and the personal side of how am I managing my hair as a biological fabric.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like you have to really tear that, break that down.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's how do you take care of like your silk and your cotton?
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's the contrast and the lack of the specification of how we approach our hair care before we get into scalp care that I think renders a lot of the initial damage that people think, oh, my hair is falling out, or am I experiencing hair loss?
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that you have color, like it's just your coloring extensions.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_00: And nowadays there's so we can do so many creative, amazing things with our hair.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: But there is an, you know, there's a cost benefit, but there's a cost for that.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so when we're doing that, there's a responsibility of having to adjust hair care to meet some of the demands and some of the fun things that we are doing to our hair fabric.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: I've never thought of it as a biological freaking sound so important.
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it is well, because it's it's a fabric, but you think about like what how do you treat if you have a dog that has to be groomed, if you can like think about fur coats, think about pets.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: You just don't put olive oil all over a pet.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the same way that you would treat the coat of a certain it's biological, but it's still like your satin, it's your Gucci bag.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's you know how do you care for the things?
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_00: Like, oh my gosh, how do you care for those things?
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's the first line of action when we're talking about just making that hair connection because we really make the connection first with how our hair looks and performs versus what our hair really is.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: And did you have a personal experience or moment when you realized you wanted to really dive into that level of detail and that specialty?
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because I I'm nosy when it comes to stuff like I want to know more.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I have and I just believed, yeah, I feel like there are ways to offer solutions.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_00: And you just have to keep asking deeper questions.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: And the thing about tracology was like there was not a lot out.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: There's it's so new in terms of not as the practice, but for the science and the study and the clinical.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_00: I feel very um fortunate to kind of have been coming along and be curious when it was just starting to get the funding because no one cared.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_00: Like hair is a non-essential tissue, right?
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: We it's not a vital organ.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: We need hair like psychologically and we appreciate it, but we don't need hair to like thrive.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: So when it comes to all the science based regarding hair, there were just like flukes of studies that they were trying to deal with basically managing uh diseases um with white men that they were fully as, oh, these things grow back hair, or this, you know, all the side effects were hair growth.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: And that's how you kind of got the on uh the beginning of the the pharmaceutical of monoxidil and all of those um yeah, just pharmaceutical approaches to hair loss or hair shedding.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, it was like who the hair follicle is so complex.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, everyone had this own DNA makeup, like there's a hundred thousand of them.
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_00: Who cares about a hair follicle until now we do?
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right, right.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_02: Now we do.
• 23:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and I have to acknowledge there's so many, there's so much more acknowledgement around the scalp these days.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_02: I I don't, I mean, 10 years ago, 20 years ago, no one talked about it.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I'm curious, are there any myths that you have heard or your clients seem to have as it relates to hair, scalp, anything up there?
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that we could go on and on and on and go ahead and make a little series.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: I think the first thing we have to recognize like hair, you can't hair is not a living thing.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_00: So when we talk about healthy hair, hair has no feeling, it's not alive, it's a fabric.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: If you think about every time you combed your hair, every time you cut your hair, you would physically like be in pain.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: So let's recognize that hair can't have a health quality, hair can have a healthy looking quality, and hair can have a gorgeous, sustainable tit style.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: It can have strength, it can have shine, it can have bounce, depending on the type of genetic hair that we are born with.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, I think the other thing is that the scalp itself, people don't recognize that it's a structure and the literally the hair follicle is a microorgan.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's not a little hole, it's a literally an organ.
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_00: It has all these component parts, lots of connective tissue, lots of these um, lots of cells and like uh blood cells.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's like it's it's a very complex structure.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_00: So it's a living host with and within itself.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um trying to say, oh my gosh, I I uh there's so many fallacies out there.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the more you like cut your hair, crim crim your ends, the longer it's gonna grow.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_00: No, your hair is predestined to grow genetically, however, that you can maintain uh the quality of the ends of the hair, which allow you to experience more growth.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, just like any fraying um jean, or you think about a silk dress or a lace dress, when it's pulled, our hair has that same type of uh ability to be fragile.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_00: So, from a styling or supportive standpoint, the more we keep those ends, you know, trimmed and keep a nice barrier and support system that's gonna allow you to experience more growth.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's not the cutting.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um so yeah, so that's the biggest misconception that I've heard is that the more you cut your hair, or that basically the more you keep up with trimming your ends, that will make your hair grow longer or it will, you know.
• 26:18
  SPEAKER_02: Does it make you grow longer?
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: The more you keep those ends of providing this the perimeter for that hair to benefit, the more you hydrate and the more you moisturize.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: That's really the key to like if you want length and you want to optimize it's hydration, hydration, hydration, hydration, along with making sure you are then reinforcing that hair with uh, I mean, my gosh, you didn't go on and on about just depending on hair type and texture.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_00: How are you treating and restoring that fiber so that it has tensile strength, it has elasticity, and it needs moisture?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: Those are gonna be the key to maximizing length.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: Interesting.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_02: And then how does hair products, specific products play into that?
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_02: There's so many products these days.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_02: I I feel like I just keep it simple.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I don't veer a lot into too many different things, but are there products that women are using that are harmful?
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_02: Are there some that we should be using more of?
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_00: So this is a very great, unique individu uh conversation.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm grateful that there's so many products and tools because the hair they're we're all so unique.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think that you have to we we we fall into categories of every you don't need every product, depending on your hair type and texture.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: You find the family that you live in, and I'm just gonna give like maybe a quake kind of analogy.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: For example, um, I know that I'm a foam, a foam gel kind of girl, a water-based product.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna do so much for me.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: So when I'm looking for categories of products that are gonna work the way I like to perform, I know I'm gonna gear towards certain types of gel-e, certain types of mousses, certain types of foams.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: Or there are clients who I want them to be strictly water-based.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: They want water, water, water, a little bit of cream.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it's finding out what your silo is or what your mixture is, and then keeping your mind based in there.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody's hair type and texture needs a variation of things.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: Some people benefit more from an oil base based on their result.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the key to any type of product or moisturizing is ensuring that the type of oil that's being used does not create a barrier that can also prevent hydration and moisture.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that's when you go into the quality and the efficacy of certain products and the ingredients in them.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I say that where certain oils are designed where the molecular structures are so small that they're able to penetrate the hair when they don't sit on top of the hair.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes oils sit on top of the hair, and yes, you in your mind you're feeling like, oh, it feels soft or it feels moisturized.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_00: But if that uh is that oil can also act as a barrier and it's locking things in and it's also preventing things from getting in.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: So that's when if you're using products that are heavy and have those kinds of uh components in their formulation, knowing how to clarify, when to clarify.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: So it's more about being cognizant of what your little silo is.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: Are you a mousse girl, a gel girl, a water girl, ignoring everything else?
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_00: And then also being aware of what your ingredients are and knowing that depending if you're using a high or a low quality product that may have some filler in it or oils that sit on top, you're gonna have to clarify different.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it's knowing your ingredients and then knowing the product lines that work best for your tight hairtight texture and the performance that you want to see individually.
• 29:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_02: And then we've talked about uh specific conditions like alopecia a little bit, but some can be stress-induced.
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_02: But how else does stress life, um, illness, I mean, I know pregnancy, we both have children, have impact our hair very differently.
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, what are some ways that just the changes of life, a woman's body in particular impact hair and scalp?
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: So hair is such like it literally is like a magic, it is your your magic, your crown and glory because your hair growth function only thrives when your body is like at like it's homosexual, everything is balanced, right?
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: So there's hair is my multifactorial.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: So diet, stress, medications, genetics, you name it, it affects hair growth production.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: And anytime there's shifts in the body, the last, it's the the hair if follicle is the last organ to receive all the nutrients.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: So that hair follicle has to work just as hard.
• 31:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it requires so much energy to make one hair, even more than it requires to even heal our vital organs.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: So hair is very much like we are the last people on the boat, you know, to get any type of help.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: So it's our job to really first and foremost be more mindful of like what is really going on in our bodies.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_00: Any disruption we know from for certain minerals and the um minerals, vitamins in the body are going to deplete and take away from the quality of our hair fiber, because the body is always going to win.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we want that to happen.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_00: We want our vital organs to be thriving.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: However, it's so important for us, and science is catching up to let us know.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_00: And when we look at like where our vitamin levels are or are the recommended, what's a normal range of certain deficient, certain vitamins, certain minerals in the body, we now know that it requires higher levels of certain vitamins to be in the body for the hair growth function to really receive what it needs.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: So as science is catching up with that, it's allowing us as humans to really pay attention to like if we're not getting it through our diets, if we're not getting it through, you know, juicing or however we choose to and put it in our through foods, supplementation and other aspects have to be considered because the hair, the body is always gonna win.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: And as we're going through any type of change, be through pregnancy, uh, menopause, just stressors, even during our cycles, certain minerals are our iron levels, our ferritin levels, all of these important components that make up just the cells in our bodies to function and work, have to work overtime to make hair.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: So that kind of balance of recognize the body's gonna win first.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: So we want our hair to have the best optimum opportunity to be at its best to get growth.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: The body has to be balanced first, and we have to overcompensate to let the hair work.
• 33:05
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where working with your healthcare providers and tricologists, we can through different supplementation, uh, get the body to a place where it's not depleting and fighting with the hair follicle and the hair follicle getting just not enough to even keep that hair fiber alive or wanting to grow out of that follicle.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_02: What would you say are three things someone, women in particular, can do to take care of their hair better these days?
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: I know there are a lot.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_02: There's like the what are we taking in and vitamins and blood, you know, our our health and topical products.
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_02: But if there are three things everyone can do today, what would those be?
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: Three things immediately, which are so simple.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I believe for every hair type and texture, different variations.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: Pre-shampoo oil treatments that are really designed to be pre-shampoo oil treatments.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the main things that could go on this, first of all, the scalp, cleansing the scalp is not just a shampooing component.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's how we get into more of the skinification.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: We want the scalp to be cleansed, and there are gentle ways of cleanse.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_00: Like we want on antibacterial, antifungal, and you get a lot of those components and those activists and oils.
• 34:24
  SPEAKER_00: Also, when we are cleansing or shampooing the hair, the design of shampooing is this to remove product and to move surface debris.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: Our hair fiber, again, depending on how unique we are with our hair type and texture, does not need to be cleansed and shampooed the same way like our bodies do, if that makes sense.
• 34:44
  SPEAKER_00: Our scalps also need to be cleansed regularly, but think about how we employ skincare.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_00: The scalp needs kind of more of that thought style.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, what a pre-shampoo oil, a high-quality one, does is it protects those hair fibers because we want to retain moisture, moisture, moisture for the optimum hair care.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it also has ingredients formulated that are going to be antimicrobial, antibacterial.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: They're going to protect that scalp microbiome.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: So you put this on dry, dirty hair before you shampoo.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_00: And what it does, it gives the scalp able to penetrate, get the benefit of all of that antimicrobial, microcirculation, all of those ingredients in the hair fiber to be protected internally through oils that go through.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_00: You shampoo, so you're getting all the dirt, the debris out, and you also having a layer of protection.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: Game changer, because it keeps the inflammation down on the scalp.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: It allows the scalp to receive any type of active you're putting on, and it's helping that hair fiber retain its tensile strength and the intensity.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_00: The second thing I would be is so important is understand how your hair fiber themselves, like how do they thrive when not to be manipulated?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like, are you an air dry type of person?
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have to make twists or braids?
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone needs to have some kind of system if you're wearing or growing hair, how to allow it to be in a less manipulated state with some type of leave-in and some type of like be left alone and feel good about it.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: I think everyone needs that in the regimen because the hair needs to rest.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then when it comes to just that overall wellness of your body, it is so essential to like know your vitamin D levels, to know your folate levels.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_00: You cannot think about anything beautiful with the hair if we're not taking care of the body.
• 36:40
  SPEAKER_00: So I think understanding like a general, like getting annual workup, blood workup is extremely important to see where those efficiencies are, medications that we may be taking, because it can be just changes in the diet.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: It could be simple adjustments that could give the body the overall um benefit that it's needing.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: And it's also always gonna be awareness of keeping inflammation down in the body.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_00: We can keep inflammation down in the body, give this scalp in the hair some protection and its maintenance, and then allowing our hair ways and styles that fit us to let it just exist in its authentic state occasionally.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna, those are just three strong, simple things that we can control.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, there because there's so much that we just can't control and don't know, but those things that are controllable will make a difference.
• 37:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I had no idea.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_02: I've heard of pre-shampoo products, but a pre-shampoo oil product, I had never heard of it.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_02: I'm using that immediately.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_02: And uh they're there.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_02: They're there.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_02: Oh my gosh.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_02: You'll have to tell me some brand recommendations after this.
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes, yes, yes.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_02: And then a lot of my listeners are busy women.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_02: We are mothers, we are working mothers.
• 37:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the idea of taking care of our hair because we have to um is probably something that's pretty common, and my hair is braided up.
• 38:09
  SPEAKER_02: I worked with a new girl to braid my hair, and when I tell you, she braided my hair so tight, it's a whole other story.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: Too tight.
• 38:14
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no, we need to.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: I know, I know, I know.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_02: And I told her, I was like, I'm really tenderheaded, and I don't think it made one difference at all.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_00: Anti-inflammatory, you can just, yeah, you gotta, we gotta talk about some topicals that you can be doing, just reduce some of that inflammation that's gonna be happening for sure.
• 38:33
  SPEAKER_02: And here's the thing, it looks, it's been four weeks.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_02: This is four weeks, it looks good.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, what would you say to us, or what would you say our hair is saying to us for the women who uh prioritize convenience and looks over the health of our hair, the care of our hair and our scalp.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's just such a it's such a uh an example or a reality of what it means just to care for how caring for ourselves seems to be like such a secondary, it's not even a priority.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I say that hair care is ritualistic.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_00: Hair, hair care is not hygienic, getting in the shower kind of situation.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_00: It is time, it is a practice that does require scheduled time.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_00: There's no way to defend that.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: Whether you're going to someone or you're doing it at home, it's a making time.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I will say it's about like belief systems.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_00: I think belief systems impact cells just as equally as all the other external things.
• 39:36
  SPEAKER_00: So if your belief system is, I don't can't prioritize, I don't have time, what you're telling yourselves and the way that you approach your hair care is very secondary.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_00: The first thing is making that belief system that the hair is literally the communicator of what's happening in your body.
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think if you just sit down and really absorb that, really our hair, yes, is really a communicator of what's happening in our body when it's not performing in ways that we feel good about.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_00: So the belief system has to then make you be like, okay, this is I have to make a change or change a belief to prioritize.
• 40:14
  SPEAKER_00: Until we make that shift, that belief, there's no magic anything.
• 40:19
  SPEAKER_00: Even if you have a great product, if your belief system doesn't allow you to make time to use that product as you're supposed to use it, it don't matter.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: If your belief system doesn't allow you to make time to go see that hairdresser on a regular basis, it doesn't matter.
• 40:34
  SPEAKER_00: So the belief system is where I want to uh and it doesn't can be little things.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_00: And making it be like it's a you have to carve out time.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_00: There's just no way around that.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: And yep.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_00: If you believe you don't have time, you don't.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_02: You are speaking my language.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_02: I've been uh standing on a soapbox talking about belief and possibility for the longest, um, especially this year, and what we believe is possible for ourselves.
• 41:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I I started this year despite me working with a new hair braider to get this style done.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I made the decision coming into this year to just dedicate the time to my hair.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: Like I dedicate, and I still have a four-year-old.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_02: I have a busy life, but uh I spend time on other things that aren't as important.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_02: And so, and I work with clients in the same way of seeing where we're putting our time and energy and putting that towards the things that we want to spend our time and energy in.
• 41:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um, my hair will, you know, I don't know how my hair will be in 10 years, 20 years, but to really hold it with gratitude now and to express that.
• 41:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so what would for me it look like to express gratitude for my hair?
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like, well, to take care of it, to spend the I mean, it's only extra 20 minutes in washing it, you know, weekly or bi-weekly, and to just make that like this is the time we're doing our hair, this is what we're doing.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_02: We're gonna watch a show, yeah, we're gonna maybe put on an audiobook or a podcast, and this is what we're doing.
• 42:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I noticed a difference in the quality of uh my hair and the texture.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_02: Last year I was wetting it, slapping gel on it, and just throwing it in a bun.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, for years actually, for a very long time.
• 42:22
  SPEAKER_02: And it was hard and crunchy, and I was like, okay, we have to do something different.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_02: We have to.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_02: This is not going to work.
• 42:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I also breastfed my daughter for a very long time.
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_02: So I stopped breastfeeding her at the end of last year.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm assuming a combination of my hormones probably regulating and me choosing to care for it differently really made an impact.
• 42:49
  SPEAKER_00: No, and even in the moments where you do, like for working busy moms, you do have to throw.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I get it.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_00: You do have to, but there, that's when you know you have to do a leave-in spray.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: You want to use scrunchies that are not that you know that are silk lined.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_00: There's still a solution to be to use your do what you gotta do.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_00: There's that's what I love having so many tools around.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: There's so many products.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: A leave-in, a this, get the brush, sew it up.
• 43:16
  SPEAKER_00: And also we don't have to be redefining what presentable looks like.
• 43:20
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, our you know, you don't have to be slicked.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_00: It can be sleek and it can be still fluffy and frowy and still be very like, you know, ready, ready-to-wear sheet.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_00: We can't, we don't need to be so refined.
• 43:33
  SPEAKER_00: Our hair, curly hair is not, that's not its thing.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it isn't very whimsical and airy.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: So changing what is approachable is seeing ourselves with hydrated, glossy, you know, moisturized hair that's not always controlled.
• 43:49
  SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, that's where I think also the exciting is I'm loving seeing women with different hair textures truly embrace that texture.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not always in a way that's we deem is what it's supposed to be, like polished and perfect and pretty.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_00: All textures are not like that.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: Some textures woolly and cotton, again, just like a fabric, just like flowers.
• 44:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think we're we we are opening our minds to see texture in more beautiful global ways.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: And that should also be encouraging us to embrace uh the what we see is beauty and like healthy looking hair.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I am I'm excited about watching that continue to explode, which is so nice to see nowadays.
• 44:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_02: We've talked so much about other women and women in general, but I'm curious what what are you calling for and hoping for in this next chapter of your life?
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh, that's um it's so day by day presence.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I think for me is my everyday is to be present.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um and what does that mean in being present?
• 44:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like literally as much as we always have to be, you know, we're here moving forward, planning forward to truly wake into my days is finding the beauty of the presence.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I that's challenging.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, when we're we're I think I'm you're more, you know, we're born in kind of everything in our schooling is about achieving and preparing and testing and improving and to be like just presence.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think that as humans, as women especially, we have not learned or haven't had the, I just say generationally, I haven't my bloodline as as a black American woman, that was something they can't even think like that, right?
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 45:40
  SPEAKER_00: I hope to shift the energy for all humans, but more importantly, give myself permission to be present.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that you don't have to be in any form of achievement.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_00: The presence is the achievement.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the joy that I'm learning how to uh give that self to me is very um freeing.
• 46:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm excited to learn.
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I have a 29-year-old daughter, so I feel like I'm a student again and watching and learning other young women take up space in a world.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm kind of like curious and excited.
• 46:16
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like I'm learning from them, you know.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_00: Teach me something.
• 46:20
  SPEAKER_00: Save.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm like here for like, okay, this is let me learn, you know.
• 46:26
  SPEAKER_02: I love it.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_02: Bridget, thank you so much for your time today.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_02: How can people find you, work with you, learn more about all of your knowledge?
• 46:37
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, you can find me on Instagram at the Scout Therapist, and you can go to my website at bridgethill.com.
• 46:45
  SPEAKER_02: Amazing.
• 46:46
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you again, Bridget.
• 46:47
  SPEAKER_02: Appreciate your time.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having me.
• 46:50
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for the lovely conversation and space you're making for us.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_00: This is very necessary.