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 Radically Resilient Health Podcast

Why Supplements Are Necessary
and How They Make The Difference

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Dr. Carolyn Dolan shares her deeply personal “WHY” about developing Vitakinetics. Dr. Dolan actually wrote a thesis setting out to disprove the need for supplements and came to a dramatically different conclusion. On her own journey to be Radically Resilient, Vitakinetics became more than just a supplement – but a mission. 

Transcript:

Connie Wray: (00:00)
Welcome back to radically resilient health with Dr. Carolyn Dolan and in today’s podcast, we’re going to talk to Dr. Dolan about her. Why, why did she create Vitakinetics? We’ve talked a lot throughout these podcasts about her thesis. She was really on a mission to disprove the importance of supplements, but in that process, what she learned was the value. Once she learned this, why was it so important for Dr. Dolan to go out and create Vitakinetics? Dr. Dolan? It’s so wonderful to have you here today to talk more about radically resilient health, but really to dive into your why you’ve shared with us many times that this was a really a thesis you wanted to disprove the value in supplements. And yet here we are today. You are the founder and creator of Vida kinetics. So we thought today we would take a moment to kind of dive into your why.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (00:59)
Thank you. And this was really prompted to do this episode also after giving that talk to the, at 1 million cups here locally where I realized maybe I have, we haven’t shared this part of the story, but yeah, when I went back to school to get my master’s degree in holistic nutrition, I was very working specifically on my thesis related to lifestyle interventions, focusing in on nutrition, sleep movement and stress management in this connection piece. The supplements were sort of the last thing on my list. And I thought, let me just, I think supplements can be very complicated. They can be ineffective for a variety of reasons. It can be full of things that you don’t want to be putting into your body, but let me just do some research and see, I tended to really want to not use them. They were the last things I would consider in, in clinical practice.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (02:02)
And as I started researching the data and that inflammation and pain and healing, I really found components where there was enough data to support that they can have a therapeutic value. And so I started gathering that even though I was very resistant. I, like you said, I was trying to disprove that there was any effectiveness to them and that really all we needed was the right nutrition, sleep movement and stress management techniques. And then I found that, well, wait a minute, there, you know, a certain dose of vitamin C will reduce your risk of developing a chronic pain state following an injury, or that a certain amount of vitamin D three seems to promote pain reduction in back pain, or it promotes gut integrity, you know, that lining. And so then I started putting all those pieces to the puzzle and developing a recipe and choosing dosages that were therapeutic, but also choosing supplements that really had a really good safety profile.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (03:13)
You know, where there wasn’t going to be all the same problems that you have with other pharmaceutical medications potentially with addiction and or that they were safe enough to be taken with other things, or there wasn’t gonna be withdrawal problems. But as I was explaining this in our presentation, one of the attendees asked the question, but really what is your why? And, and I stopped a moment and hesitated, cause I hadn’t thought about this story in a while, but I really realized that part of my, why has to do with, a story of when my husband had to go through a surgical procedure. This was probably about 15 years ago now. Oh yeah. Close about 14 because, um, my oldest is 15 now. And so I had two young boys at the time and I was still working in the hospital system.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (04:12)
I was actually working in a worker’s comp outpatient. We were in a new area temporarily and I could not find in the bay area, I could not find daycare facilities that had availability for my boys. So I could work my two to three days a week in this worker’s comp outpatient facility. And so we ended up hiring a nanny. We tried an in-home a daycare facility that didn’t pan out. So we ended up with a nanny and I’d done all the background checks and references and all this kind of stuff. And then my husband had to have surgery and he had to have a surgery that he was prescribed a post-op pain medications. He was prescribed opiates. And even at that time, we knew we didn’t want to get involved in taking them because of the addiction. And we needed to keep them safe from the kids, but we figured they were prescribed.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (05:08)
We needed to have them, you know, just in case. And he, I think, I can’t remember for sure, for certain maybe took one if that – but he really didn’t have much pain following the procedure. He really struggled with like nausea and stuff, but we had our medications up that he had to take. He probably had to take an antibiotic. We had them out of the way. And one day I came home and the nanny was sitting on the couch, watching TV with, with the boys. And we had specifically asked her, you know, she could use TV periodically, but that was not going to, I mean, I was paying her to take care of the kids. I wasn’t paying for her to sit and turn the TV babysitter on. And the look in her eyes, like I knew immediately that she wasn’t, wasn’t all there.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (05:58)
And then when my husband got home from work, he looked and he said, someone’s been taking are the opiates that we had there and it wasn’t our kids. And so for obvious reasons, she was fired immediately. I had to put my two weeks in for my job because I remember I couldn’t find any daycare. And now I also didn’t trust anybody to come into my home anymore. And she was fired immediately, but I didn’t really realize how much that impacted me. But as I was researching on this pain and recovery piece, I did go into the dangers of opiates and their addictive Dick addictiveness. And that it only takes for a naive person or somebody who has never had opiates before. It takes three days potentially to become addicted only three days. And that the other thing that was really, and I cover this in talk sometimes where I kind of dive deeper into that, but the number one way, someone becomes addicted to opiates or narcotics where they gain access is from their friends and family.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (07:14)
I thought for sure it was, you know, the dark web or they would be seeking, you know, jumped around from doctor to doctor seeking drugs, but it was from friends and family. And so that was sort of an alarm bell that went off or a light bulb moment where I connected maybe part of the reason why I was so passionate about continuing forward, despite challenges with running a business or changing kind of changing my career path was that at that time, if I go back in time, we didn’t even use the opiates. And man, I wish we would have had some, something like Vitakinetics available to us even then. And maybe just simply not having that present now, she shouldn’t have stolen it from us obviously. I mean, that’s not okay, but just how complicated the problem is. She struggled with back pain, our nanny struggled with back pain, apparently that I had not known about.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (08:13)
And so she had also been taking some other medications from, from us during that time as well, that we’ve sort of realized later, but that, you know, something, having something safe around that isn’t going to be quite as addictive or have, you know, dangerous attached to it is probably really where my, why comes from. You know, my family uses Vita kinetics. We’ve had surgeries or injuries or events happen where I appreciate having this available to us as, um, an alternative means or a supportive process, even though we’ve used, you know, over the counter, nonsteroidal anti-inflammatories or Tylenol and, and even opiates. But, you know, we, we approach it very differently now, you know, whatever we’re not using is hidden for a period of time to make sure we’re, you know, my husband had to have another surgery and we made sure. And then I said, okay, now it’s time to get rid of this. We, we just don’t, we’re not going to have this in our home anymore, because if we’re really in that much pain again, at some point it’s like, well, we need to go back to see a doctor.

Connie Wray: (09:27)
So I find it interesting too, that, you know, you’re talking about this, you know, 15 years ago that you were recognizing that this was a problem. And is it hard for you now to look at where we are in society? I mean, obviously we have a huge mental health problem, which a lot of it leads, you know, addiction, mental health go hand in hand. Is it interesting for you to see that we have an opioid crisis now, and here you were 15 years ago, excuse me, 15 years ago already recognizing, Hey, this woman is in my home and stealing opioids too. You know, this is a problem. Is it shocking to you to see where we are today? And as, as a physical therapist and a doctor yourself, I mean, obviously, you know, within your practice, you know, you have patients that are coming that are on opioids, they’re having surgeries and you know, they, they have an injury where they may have been prescribed an opioid. How are you handling that today? And how are you starting those conversations with your patients about, okay, I know the doctor has given you an opioid. These are the risks that I see. Here’s an alternative. Well,

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (10:45)
Sir, I, I think the testimonials that we get from clients who have been using both well, both people that I know and people that I don’t know are using our product. And then somehow we get the feedback where, you know, a mom got their son off the opiates after the major surgery quickly, you know, at a, at a time or an age where they’re most at risk, or we have somebody who got off another pain medication started to decrease their pain medication. And since they started using that, those little, you know, snippets really do keep me going as far as gosh, you know, it’s really nice to hear. And, and while that may not have been their intention initially, even right at that, all of a sudden that’s sort of a measurement, well, are you reducing all your other pharmaceutical needs? Are you able to sort of graduate?

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (11:46)
So I, I think it keeps me going in that sense and I still have young, you know, I have young adult kids now and teenagers where, you know, they’re have to have their wisdom teeth out. You know, I like to know that I’m going to have a tool that I can use when I look back at where we were then and where we are now, as far as this prices, I try not to get too frustrated, too frustrated, about it. Cause it does seem like there’s some very simple things that we could be doing to, to change how we recover from injuries and treat things. I mean, I think people still really like the idea of a magic pill. and I think it can be a useful tool in some aspects, but as, as a society, we just need to refocus in on new things.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (12:51)
Like we talked about with our last couple podcasts, nutrition, just the fundamentals. People need to learn how to cook there’s people who don’t even know how to cook or are paying attention or making sure that food insecurities aren’t as much of a problem, educate kids early on about those choices and give people better choices in schools. And so we’re starting to make some transitions as far as that goes, but really educating people on how those components, those fundamental components cause impact your most sense of wellbeing, but your pain perception and your, ability to recover. So I get frustrated about it. What did we talk about with Dr. Brown last time too? Like the time it takes from the research sexually hits a clinical practice. It’s, it’s a pretty huge, don’t quote me on it, but it’s something like 15 to 20 years. So we’re still like kind of in that window now, where now when you go to the doctor, they’re starting to talk to you about your nutrition and your vitamin D three. It’s not across the board yet. And we still need to continue to make improvements with that. But I mean, I’m noticing it when I’ve gone back to even new doctors I’ve never met before, are spending time on these concepts. So it’s patients, it’s patients,

Connie Wray: (14:20)
You know, it’s interesting that before you and I met, we really met based on the fact that I had had an injury. I ended up going in and, and was working with your husband. Who’s an orthopedic surgeon and that’s how we became friends. That’s how I learned about Vitakinetics. But I can remember prior to meeting with your husband, I had gone through many, many doctors trying to figure out what was going on with my hip injury and the pain that I was going through. And it was shocking to me, how many doctors were wanting to just hand me opioids, pain meds. And I remember at one point coming home – my routine was that I would come home and literally sit in a bath after the end of my day because I was in so much pain. And I remember sitting in the bath and I was crying and my husband came in and I said, I can’t do this.

Connie Wray: (15:16)
Like I can’t raise my daughter at the time was, you know, a year and a half when I was still dealing with all of this and trying to figure out what was going on. And I said, I cannot believe that I’m, I’m, you know, barely 40 years old. And what they’re prescribing to me is opioids. And I have a, I have a baby. I’m like, how am I, I just, and I refused, I would not take the opioids for me. It was just, I just couldn’t do it. I was terrified of exactly what you were talking about that addiction. I do feel like we are starting to see a shift. You know, here we are, my daughter’s 11 now, and I have gone through a hip surgery and a hip replacement now, and I was able to get through all of this. we’ve we’ve talked about this before, you know, after my hip replacement, I think I was on the pain meds for a day, maybe a day and a half.

Connie Wray: (16:05)
And then I was right over to the Vitakinetics, but that there has been a shift in conversation of to where we are today, which I’m very happy for. But it’s frustrating to me because I think there are a lot of people that are like, like me that, you know, I know people that are dealing with chronic pain issues or trying to get to the bottom of what is going on. And for me, it was when I finally walked in and met your husband, I felt like I had a, like, someone was hearing me, he, and he was able to pinpoint what was wrong and we found a solution. so I guess that the reason I bring that up is I would encourage people if you feel like something isn’t right. And for me, it was really I’m 38 and you’re handing me a full bottle of Oxycontin as the solution to a problem.

Connie Wray: (16:59)
I think that we need to start looking at our own health and taking responsibility for our own health and not looking for the magic pill that you, that you’re talking about right there. The magic pill is, you know, for me, I remember saying to your husband, like, I’ll change my diet I’ll do anything. And for me it was an actual injury. I needed to have surgery, but that we got to think outside the box. I get so frustrated when I see pharmaceutical, I ask your doctor, well, what do you really feel? Listen to your body, listen to what is going wrong. And, and you’re right. There was no need for me at 38 years old to be on Oxycontin there, I had an injury that needed surgery. So I would encourage people to, you know, get that second opinion. If you don’t feel like this is a right diagnosis, trust your gut. Like, I feel like so so many times, and, and by no means, Dr. Dolan do, I mean to be disrespectful to the medical field, I value your education. I value what you bring to the table, but I think there’s something to be said for, we know when something isn’t right.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (18:13)
Well, and I think that’s kind of what we talked about at one, a few episodes ago. Just you have to be including in your life health care providers that you can trust. And part of that trust is knowing that they’re going to listen and that you are also going to be able to have conversations with them. and if, and if it’s really not a part of your not being heard or feeling like you’re a part of the conversation or the health care plan, then you know, you get to say, Hey, I need to find somebody else that’s going to fit my needs. And that’s, and it’s, and it’s also okay for the doctor or the healthcare provider to say, I can’t give you what you’re asking for – or whatever. I, if it’s not a good match, it’s not a good match. And doctors need to be able to say, if all you want is opiates or those other management, then that’s not something I’m going to offer you because I know it’s not the best option.

Dr. Carolyn Dolan: (19:15)
So I think it’s important to be able to find a place and that you finally found physicians in your life and healthcare providers that you felt like you could be a part of the healthcare plan.and there was a mutual respect. And I personally find that healthcare providers that I’ve continued to have in my life are ones that also trust my gut. Like, Hey, I’m telling you something’s not right. Or even with my kids, something’s not right. It just I want healthcare providers that will sort of trust that instinct and work with it, but also be able to be willing to say, this is not going to be a good plan. That’s not, but like help direct and help, advocate for, for what’s best for, for the patient, both with their clinical expertise and sort of meeting the demands of my personality. I think it’s about, it’s a dance, right? And I always tell people if your healthcare provider is not making you feel confident, or you’re not satisfied with the plan, then you can always look for somebody else, but we do need to take personal responsibility, like you said, and personal responsibility in the sense that making the best choices that you can make and that some of these choices are as simple as the breakfast you’re eating or how much sleep you’re getting can really impact our overall health wellness and even our pain state.

Connie Wray: (20:54)
So, well, I just appreciate you so much just opening up this conversation because I think it’s important. I mean, and for me, Vitakinetics, is it, I feel healthy grabbing Vitakinetics. If I have a sports injury or I’m feeling stressed, or I, I feel like I’m putting something healthy in my body, which is helping my body heal faster naturally. And I think that we really need to start looking and understanding that number one, you know, as you’ve explained many times, you know, inflammation, isn’t all bad. It is good. We do need to have a certain balance of inflammation in our body. And as we get older, we are going to have aches and pains. We are going to experience changes in our body. I mean, if we’re an active person and w you know, we’re a cyclist, I would think it’s odd if you didn’t have your legs were tired or you’re exhausted from a long like that is you utilizing your body.

Connie Wray: (21:59)
That’s the joy of what we have. We have this body that is going to go through those changes. Don’t expect that life is supposed to be where you never experienced pain. You never experienced, I mean, yeah, excruciating pain, different than muscle soreness. This to me, I almost think of my muscle soreness as a badge of honor. Right. You know, I had a great workout today. I’ll be honest with you. As you know, Thursday’s leg day. I could barely sit in this chair today, but I’m proud of myself that I’m at leg day and I’ve got up this morning. I took my Vitakinetics. I’m ready to get out and kill the rest of my day. And I have a tool. I have an option that’s, that’s healthy. And, and that’s what I encourage people to do is, you know, take a moment. If you want to learn more about Vitakinetics, you can visit Vitakinetics.com.

Connie Wray: (22:48)
You can learn about the ingredients. You can hear more incredible testimonials from individuals. If you are someone like, I think most people are concerned about becoming addicted to opioids. There’s nothing wrong with finding something as an alternative. And this is what Vitakinetics is. It’s an alternative. And it is something that is now a part of my lifestyle. And I’m happy that I have something that is good for my body, that I can reach for at those times of high stress or muscle soreness, or I’ve experienced an injury. I don’t feel as though my only option is an opioid. And again, you you’ve mentioned this many times, they have their place, right. We all know that they have their place, but we also need to look at how it’s affecting our community, how it’s affecting our world, our, our global health. And I’m happy to see these changes more and more in, in the medical field.

Connie Wray: (23:50)
And I think you are a part of, of making sure that people see that there is an alternative out there. So I just appreciate you sharing your why with us. I think it’s important. I’m just happy that on my counter, I have Vitakinetics as an option to keep my family healthy. So I thank you for that. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to radically resilient health with Dr. Carolyn Dolan. And again, please visit Vitakinetics.com to learn more about Vida kinetics and how you too can eat well live well, sleep well, connect well and move well. And thank you for listening to radically resilient health with Dr. Carolyn Dolan.

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