Hustle Grind Shine & Reignite with Jessica Hartley
Hustle Grind Shine & Reignite with Jessica Hartley
Hustle Grind Shine & Reignite: Episode 7 with Dr. Joia Crear-Perry
Even as a child, Dr. Joia Crear-Perry was an activist and advocate for those that could not champion for themselves. As the founder and president of the National Birth Equity Collaborative (NBEC), Dr. Crear-Perry identifies and challenges racism as a root cause of health inequities, including Black maternal mortality. In this episode, we explore how she took all the curveballs that life could throw at her, and turned them into triumphs for herself, for her family, for her patients and for Black and Brown birthing people everywhere.
- How preparation meeting opportunity allows you to forge your own path, even when others doubt what you are capable of
- What it means to shift career focus from being a practitioner in the craft to evolving your entire industry as an activist and policy expert
- What women and people of color can do to support their overall health and wellbeing, in a system not built for us or by us
Learn more about Black maternal mortality and how you can support the National Birth Equity Collaborative (NBEC)
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry is a physician, policy expert, thought leader, and advocate for transformational justice. As the founder and president of the National Birth Equity Collaborative (NBEC), she identifies and challenges racism as a root cause of health inequities. She is a highly sought-after trainer and speaker who has been featured in national and international publications including Essence and Ms. Magazine. In 2020, Dr. Crear-Perry was honored by USA Today in its “Women of the Century” series and featured on ABC Nightline’s “Hear Her Voice.”
Dr. Crear-Perry has twice addressed the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to elevate the cause of gender diversity and urge a human rights framework toward addressing maternal mortality. A proud recipient of both the Congressional Black Caucus Healthcare Heroes award and the Maternal Health Task Force at Harvard University Global Visionary Award for Commitment to Advancing Women’s Health, Dr. Crear-Perry’s most notable efforts include the removal of race as a risk factor for illnesses, including premature birth. Dr. Crear-Perry currently serves as a Principal at Health Equity Cypher and on the Board of Trustees for Black Mamas Matter Alliance, Community Catalyst, National Clinical Training Center for Family Planning, and the UCSF PTBi. She is an Adjunct Professor at Tulane School of Public Health. She was also recognized as a Fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Welcome to the hustle grind shine and reignite podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Hartley. Join me on another journey with amazing and talented professionals of color. We laugh and cry and take notes. But most of all be inspired all of this and more on our next episode of hustle, grind, shine. And let's go Hello, and welcome to another episode of hustle grind, shine and reignite. I am your host, Jessica Hartley, and it is my pleasure to welcome you to another episode of our show. My guest today I am so very excited is Dr. Joy career Perry. She is the founder and president of the National Birth equity collaborative. She's a physician, a policy expert, a thought leader and advocate, and just an amazing, amazing woman. Join us. Welcome to the show.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Thank you so much. It's been too long. Thank you for having me. Just,
Jessica Hartley:it is been way too long. So I am so excited. There are so many pieces of your story in career that just for me personally are inspiring, and I hope will be inspiring to our listeners today. But Doctor career period, I would like to start first I'd like to go back a little bit and just talk about your childhood and growing up. And my first question that all is always, you know, what did you want to be? What was that sort of thing that as a child or as you moved into middle school in high school that you wanted to be? And how did that influence? You know, how you made the decision about what you decided to study when you went to college and all of those things. But let's just start there. And talk to me a little bit about growing up in life as a little joy back in the day.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Well, you know, it's already my my sister always tells me although I'm a physician, that because I do policy work. Now it's a continuation of what I always wanted to do. So growing up the joke was always I was Switzerland. sides of every argument if people are hating something I could, I would be the neutral arbiter. And I would say no, no, no, no, I could see your side and I could see that side. And I always I want to travel and I knew that this ability to see both sides was the thing that people always talked about that I was good at, like just listening and figuring it out. And then when I applied to college, my mother had picked Grambling for us to live in as a single black woman when I was eight years old. She left New Orleans left my dad and was like I want my children to grow up in a place where they see black people with jobs and education. No two, I teach her that she's one of the original black mamas who was like, Okay, go take my kids going. We move she opened up a pharmacy and the mayor set her up in a farm in a space and we lived in a hotel in town in the city here of us and wow, of travel and happiness and global blackness. So that's what I get to do. Now I was raised by a community of black people who were loving and educated and wanted me to grow. And I was raised by a family who had trapped my mom's army brat. So I always knew of world I traveled around most of my life. And that combination of valuing blackness, but also believing that there was something bigger across the world. That's
Jessica Hartley:yeah, so you were always connected, because you just said your mom opened a pharmacy. How amazing is that? So you're always sort of connected to this idea of health and medicine and helping others take care of themselves. You think that sort of influence and and then when you went to school, did you go to school and say, Hey, I'm going to go, I'm going right to go to medical school, or was there a little bit of some other things?
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Yes. I was to be an international banking major, I had all my father's a physician. My mother is a pharmacist. So I was supposed to go into medicine. I was like, No, I am a socio economics I am into you know, I want to travel this medicine thing is too restrictive. And then I got pregnant.
Jessica Hartley:I was like, let me help you. Let me help you make some decisions. They're,
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:like this called have to grow up fast when you're 20 and pregnant. So I'm one of the few people that people it's a funny joke that when I found out I was pregnant, like I go to med school, I need a career and like, the world No, no, no, no, ma'am.
Jessica Hartley:You're like, No, I gotta keep going. Get it? Let's go. Yeah,
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:I love I really went into medicine as my safety. It was something I knew concretely. I understood. So I know I have a skill. I can do surgery. I know how to take care of patients, but I also have a love for this policy and advocacy and travel. So I can use my skill as a physician now in the work that I do with policy advocacy, around the world.
Jessica Hartley:That's amazing. I love that I love that, that fire in you. It wasn't something that I mean, obviously, I'm sure there were feelings of being scared and not knowing the future, and all of that, but I love that you double down and be like, Okay, let me just sort of pivot and do this. And do this. So how was it? Can you talk to me a little bit about how it was to be a brand new mother? And in school? And I mean, yeah, I mean, we're not talking about and I have a communications degree communications degree is not a biology degree is not a medical degree. I mean, I got my prerequisites for math and science done very quickly, and moved on into, you know, Spanish, and you know, did I minored in political science, so did some of that stuff. But ma'am, I was not training to save people's lives. There is a very big difference from that. So shout out to all of the caregivers and doctors and physicians and people who are out here saving lives every day. But how was that being a new mom and navigating all of that? Yeah, you
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:know, it's exciting. I think. I started medical school. My daughter was only six months old. And I was only 2122. I'd started med school. I turned 22. That August. So I started in July. So yeah, ignorance is bliss. You know, I didn't know that. I should be afraid. I didn't know. You know, like, hey, got a baby. You gotta go to schools, but I do. And my ex husband was a policeman. And so he would work at security at the nursery at the school. She was in daycare at Loyola University, and he would take her to daycare, he would just sit and stare at her all day, you know, when you're 20 and goofy, like, and I would study, you know, at night, I would take care of her be mommy cooked dinner, whatever. And then 10pm to 2am every night. Yeah, and I would go to bed and wake up start again. So it made me very structured. It made me focus. I had classmates that were still you know, they're 22 they were still going to party already hanging out. Yeah. Rollins I was training it, you know, charity hospitals, they were going to football game, the LSU game. I can't even imagine tailgating like the times they was tailgating or partying or going to bars. I was at home being mommy and wife. You were adulting it? Yes, I had to learn very organized. Not that I wasn't already but like to really complete all the tasks and be sure that I'd be mom, mother and student. I mean, wife and student ahead to be very organized.
Jessica Hartley:Yeah, no, man, but just tremendous. And just a lot to take on and manage and lots of burdens to shoulder at a very young age
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:28 right now and she laughs cuz she's like, when you were 28 you are divorced from dad with two kids and one with special needs. He's like, I'm trying to figure out
Jessica Hartley:I read most of these young folks, I was like, a lot of them I you know, and not everybody comes from a privileged background. A lot of them are just so you know, you said ignorance and blessed with Oblivion, right? In the ability, I want that for my children to be able to be singularly focused on themselves in their care in their happiness and hoping that the sacrifices that my parents and grandparents and you know, for parents have made and that we are making, as parents will support them to live more of how they want versus how society is dictating fee
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:with teach yoga living in Malibu, like, Listen, I'll get all the intergenerational trauma that we have. out to your body
Jessica Hartley:may be part of
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:maybe all the generations of women who didn't know how to do self care in our family. Yeah.
Jessica Hartley:So talk to me a little bit about so you've got children. And you finished med school, going into residency, I imagine and and starting in practice, what was that like making that transition? I guess both personally and professionally sort of moving out of because in the medical field, and you know, lawyers, and you guys are professional students for a long time. And that is a huge shift to go from being a professional student. And that's really sort of your career too. Then shifting into actual practice. How's that transition for
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:you for residency? It was similar to school because you're still training and you don't make that much money. And my ex husband was a policeman. So he would text me things like we didn't have, you know, the old so he would message message me, we paid me back I'm like, what happened? He's like, Oh, I just need something. No, no, I'm an actual physician. Like when you text me 911 People actually could be dying, dying. It's not anybody thinks like when he's going to start collecting days, right? Because most people when they go into professional lives, they have jobs, they collect days where you have right you can take off. Yes. What I learned quickly is that as a black woman, it is difficult to be a relationship and be a physician and be a medical student because our lives are so different from everybody else's. Like there's no collecting days. I can't get off work. I have to work Christmas, Thanksgiving holiday. Five o'clock in the morning. Yeah, like you sign up.
Jessica Hartley:Especially you're I mean, you're dealing with women and mothers and pregnant individuals. Yeah, that you can't have that baby today. You can have it tomorrow. That's not
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:a bigger transition was moving from residency to private practice. So I applied and was accepted into a fellowship, where they only take 28 people a year in high risk OB, so I was accepted in 2001 was a big to do you know, 1000s of people I got in to go to Houston to train the fancy people to be a high risk doctor. And by then I was divorced. And my ex husband said to me, if you take my kids to Texas, I will fight you. And so I couldn't I sent them a dear John let him and I didn't leave. And I stayed and opened up my own practice. And 28 years old, I just opened up my own small business, and my dad was Who the f ma just said, Well, you only made $35,000. Last year as a resident, you won't you'll make at least
Jessica Hartley:nowhere to go. But up baby.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Nowhere to go. But up. If you do a couple surgeries, you'll be fine. Yeah, that was really my life. And many of my advice from that though, is 2001 2005, Hurricane Katrina hits my excellent moves to Texas with this new wave.
Jessica Hartley:So are you looking at your watch my brother? It's like, my, it's like life, but you have to learn. I mean, I think about you know, I have a number of family and friends who are divorced, and especially if it's younger, those are all also, you also think about, like how people co parent now versus how people cope pair and there was a lot of sort of antagonism and feel, you know, versus just how can we collaborate and partner as CO parents together? Obviously, putting the children first but still not in, we sacrifice literally the day you say, I'm gonna keep this child sacrifice. I tell people, we were like, I don't know, if I want to have kids. I'm like, Okay, it's all right. There are enough number of us that are delusional, that are propagating for the world. Okay, I got three, you got three, I have covered several. But this idea of co parenting, and I think also just getting to a place of how do you navigate and sort of mediate challenges like that, right?
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Andre? was good, because we were dating and get married. And he would help me when I would become a freshman with my ex husband, too, you know, so like things like, he moved to Texas. I was like, I can't believe he moved to Texas and but you know, they still children. So we're gonna use Yeah, it was helpful that Andre also didn't come with the same level of animals that I had with my ex, so he could help me to decrease to relax my shoulders.
Jessica Hartley:Well, I mean it but it's also think about what your life would have been like, if you had gone, who knows what trajectory occurred to you? Who knows you could have gotten sucked into the system. And, you know, you wouldn't have started your practice so young. You wouldn't be doing all the things, not necessarily and you who knows you, it could have been a full circle moment. But that decision was probably a big catalyst for the impact that you're making in the world today,
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:I thought I would get to do what I do now. So high risk OB is essentially taking care of short and high risk moms and babies can try. But it's really that feels three more years of training where you do a lot of training around ultrasounds and diagnosis of anomalies. But that's not why Black moms and babies die. Policy policies around racism and devaluation of black bodies. So actually, I feel like I won because I get to do high risk OB Yeah, and I get to work with all these fancy. In fact, the woman who I said that Our Dear John letter to I was on a fancy panel with her recently, I was like, I don't know if you remember my name.
Jessica Hartley:Remember me? I was at rising star.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Letter. I'm sure you were cussing me out. Like girl, don't you know how lucky you are? Exactly, exactly. But I get to work with people like really brilliant. Researchers have been looking at the biological basis of disease, illness. And I get to talk about the social and political basis of disease and illness and write me That's amazing.
Jessica Hartley:Yeah. So as part of your career, and I mean, just really part of your journey and talking about high risk pregnancies talking about literally the systemic racism that is embedded. We talk a lot about challenges in the justice system. We talk a lot about challenges in policing. We do not talk enough about it. The challenges in systemic racism when it comes to the medical field. Just anecdotally, I just we've been working our way through over the holiday break the blacklist on Netflix, and there is an episode with Laverne Cox, representing a factor. And she, you know, she sort of rattled off some, there's a whole thing of our own pain. And this idea that people of color, particularly black, individuals, Black and African Americans in the United States, don't feel pain, the same as white people. And it's a small thing. And it's showing up Interesting enough, and entertainment and media, but when it is all rooted in facts, in truth, so how did you go from, I guess, and maybe it was always there. But we'd love to hear how you were sort of, obviously, you know, you're in the trenches every day meeting mothers taking care of them in various communities. You're both doing it in private practice, but you're doing a lot of community outreach and support. Was there a moment or an incident or something that was really a catalyst for you that said, I can go bigger, I need to talk more, I need a bigger platform, not in service to yourself, but literally in service to others? Or was it sort of a gradual build over time?
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:I would say it's a gradual build. It was always there. When you start medicine, like I trained at a medical school that was hospital was named Confederate Memorial, about 15 years before I was there. And so
Jessica Hartley:Laura's a very may talk about embedded in the foundation, right?
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:No, every day you go to work and you're thinking to yourself, as you're learning in medical school and in residency, that the way that they're talking about this is off, right, like there's no black gene, there's no black pill I was taught. So even when you mentioned that about the feelings of pain, my professor, the name of my class, every other medical school, United States has a class called embryology my class at the Louisiana State University, the state funded medical school was called human prenatal development. And our professor would show us videos of fetuses that they could feel pain, and he would talk about Mongoloid, Caucasoid and Negroid skin as if they were actually biological, real things. And so that sitting here being trained and taught by you Genesis taught by white supremacist, and they in a normal tone, it's not like they were saying it and like, oh, black is evil, black is bad. And have been codifying a belief in a hierarchy of human value based upon race into textbooks. So I grew up in a black place, I was like, this doesn't make me
Jessica Hartley:feel like I bought my elbow, I hurt it hurt like I hurt you. Yeah.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:So even when I'm professor did that, as a first year medical student, my classmates came to me and we organized to try to get them fired. Like, I've always been fighting against this false narrative that black people are biologically inferior or biologically different. So getting inside the hotbed of medicine, in the Deep South, hearing it constantly, you're constantly as an individual fighting it just with nurses with doctors with pay, like all the time, then you move from that to you now you're in practice, you're fighting within your institutions to not blame and shame and horror, I had a patient once who had a child who was born deaf. So when the second child was born, the father came to the hospital and took the baby. So the hospital was in a panic. he stoled has cancer is his child. You can't he doesn't trust y'all I understand. He feels like something might happen to his child, if he leaves his child here. I think he has a valid point, I want to call the police on him. And he's afraid of you, you see that orientation difference. And so that is hard to always like, as an individual thing individual patients have to deal with all the time. And the Hurricane Katrina hit. And the person who was my I rented space from him, I covered him, he was the city health director, the mayor had appointed him to be the city health director. And so when the storm hit, I called him up. And I was a young 32 year old right there to realize, hey, I have all these ideas about public health. And he said, Well, Joy, I don't have any money. But if you come to City Hall, I have a desk and a computer and you can be director of maternal and child health. And my public health career went from me kind of fighting as individual things and the build up, right. Always doing that work to really, Katrina for all that's the Hara. I got to see so many things. I got to go to the White House. I got to go to HHS, I got to see what happens and the choices that policymakers could make pray if they really want to invest in black people. Right. And so right now, yeah,
Jessica Hartley:yeah. So that then I imagine then led you to get to founding the National Birth equity collective. Talk to me a collaborative excuse me, talk to me a little bit about the mission and sort of vision of what you all are doing how you all are affecting policy and change. And what you're seeing is the impact of that over time.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Yeah. I mean, when you're appointed by a mayor than when the mayor's No, you serve at the pleasure of the mayor, some of the mayor's no longer there, then they're no longer pleased. Because I had the experience of doing that work and public service, I have relationships with philanthropy. We also recognize that having black maternal and child health, not have a home outside of government, it needed a nonprofit that could help push. So that's really where we started in back to say, okay, when you're appointed by mayor or governor and you're working on maternal and child health, is turnover is so fast. So like, we need long term strategy. And I was blessed and honored to be a part of the reproductive justice movement. So having both kind of this maternal child health, public healthy frame of understanding medicine and public health, but also the need for justice. Reproductive justice is a term that 12 Black Woman coined in 1994. And it was really in response to the conversation around reproductive rights and health. So often, it focuses on access to contraception and abortion, which we need. But for black women, that's not how we start off our day thinking, you know, like, we need all the things we Yeah, to outlive our children, right? Yeah. I frequently say, you know, I have a 10 year old son, I don't allow him to play with a toy gun outside because like Tamir Rice, his mother, yeah, I don't want people to think of him as an adult and shoot him. As a black Mama, I'm not just worried about getting an abortion and contraception, I'm worried about race, violence, mass incarceration, all the things and stuff that's all connected all the things. So that's why we get to do so I will get to really take away from this compartmentalised idea of there's one solution to creating a global conversation transnational. So we have a team now that works with in Brazil that's working Sub Saharan Africa, really this connection of anti blackness and gender oppression. And truthfully, we've come we're a lot further along in our understanding of race, and we are the gender museum.
Jessica Hartley:And, you know, I think a lot of people would think that it was the reverse, you know, because we've done so many things around gender, and that we are further along
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:bad, it's really bad. Like, I'm gonna give you a concrete example. Yeah, I can tell you that black women who die in childbirth, are that dying because of some biological thing around blackness? Right? Like, we don't have a black kidney, we don't have a black lung. So if we have higher rates of hypertension, or diabetes, since we have higher rates of diabetes and hypertension, then we can know that that's because we're racialized as black, not because there's a gene in our body that's making us have these things. There is estrogen like sex is a real genetic thing, like we have no. So I don't know if there is something around having X Y chromosome that makes me have higher rates of heart attack. And there are things about my gender identity, that made me die in childbirth as well not being listened to not being valued. We have no framework to be able to separate out which parts of the things that are happening to women in childbirth, or from their gender identity, and which parts are from actual biological sex like their right hormones. There's,
Jessica Hartley:yeah, yes, well, I mean, some of my colleagues and I in the 40s and 50s. And we were having a conversation last week talking about perimenopause, menopause, post menopause, and just talking about how a lot of people don't talk about it, or people only talk about some of the things like hot flashes and things like that, and it's just not studied. And there's just not enough data. And what does it mean? And how does it and you know, my mom, she'll probably, she will be fine with it. And she recently shared with me earlier this year that, you know, after she had my sister around 37/38, that kind of triggered perimenopause, your her? Yeah. And, you know, it was a holy cow moment that, you know, here I am now in my early 40s. And my mom was telling me that she was already going through it, right. And so how do you know the signs? How do you recognize and what does it mean for a black woman to go through menopause versus a white woman versus an Asian woman? And, you know, and and all of the things that work again, there's just not enough. There's that information and data,
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:and part of it is who the people who are asking the questions and what they value, like I met a woman recently, who does studies on menstrual flow, she could diagnose fibroids and endometriosis from your tampon. And I thought, you know, the reason we've never done that before is because men have been in charge of research, so they're afraid of tampons? Yeah, for biopsy. Why wouldn't it work? We've been doing that like, right, right, right.
Jessica Hartley:Well, and also that this idea that use the term recently, like our bodies are beautiful and ridiculous things as well, right? Our bodies were capable of so much, but they're so fragile in so many ways, but this idea I mean, for so long in history, women's bodies were viewed as defective, viewed as gross and nasty and
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:ugly, right? So that's the thing. So like the patriarchy part like, I'm an engineer. So when I talk to people about a midwifery model of care, because when I listened to how midwives were trained around birth, it's the opposite of how we were I was trained as an obstetrician. So that comes from patriarchy, and white supremacy. So it's, you're on a clock, we measure how long you are on this clock. If you get off this clock, we start Pitocin. Like our job is to think of we think of your body as something we have to support, not something that's automatically beautiful and amazing and capable of birthing for generations for 100 centuries before we got here, just a totally different orientation. For me, that's the patriarchy, right, so that I'm here with metal objects and forceps and instruments. And I'm not to use all those things I do, but I wish I knew how to use them under the premise that I'm only here if all else fails, that the person is totally capable of doing all these things, regardless of who are we hearing that, and at the last resort versus believing her body's broken, and I'm here, so fragile, think about like, early obstetrics, they put people to tough Twilight sleep, put forth of songs to pull the baby out. But the baby can body's just so fragile. No, no, that party is strong and powerful. And it's been it's so strong and powerful that it scares you screaming so much that you want to put her to sleep.
Jessica Hartley:That's it. That's caring women are here. That's right, because we're amazing empowering. So you spend your day you spent your life taking care of others. I mean, literally ma'am URL here saving lives and taking care of others. What does self care look like for you? How are you taking care of yourself? I know for a lot of us as I keep saying I'll say in every episode work in progress.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Learning well even Yeah, young me so young me learned how to leave New Orleans and take breaks. So I was a very busy private practice solo practice OBGYN so I could not have any breaks like I was always if I went to dinner, I would see patients I was in the grocery store. I would see like, my life. My daughter would go to movies and see my family like.
Jessica Hartley:Thanks. Thanks. Great. Hey, Mom. Yeah, my mom was a pseudo mayor. You know, the unofficial mayor. Yeah, everybody. My mom was a teacher. And everybody knew my mom is a teacher.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:Yes, about every six weeks, I would take a trip, cut off my phone go somewhere. So I realized that my self care is travel is I love to just go to a beach, go to a place go, escape, turn off things and be gone. And so even during this pandemic, I've been I've gone all over the place. We just got on a plane going to Jamaica next week. You have to I have to I will go insane. My mental health can't tolerate being inside. I finally hired an assistant. I do not have one. Yeah. And she I mean,
Jessica Hartley:I'm looking at my clock like now. I was so happy when we were scheduling this and you said, Hey, can you make sure my sister knows what that's great.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:It's big. It's huge for me, because it also helps me to model for some of my friends who still do everything at night and on the weekend. So it's like when you want to have a life if your podcast is on Sunday night? Yeah. says when you go have a life, if you do in your webinars on Tuesdays at 7pm. To like, I really try to use my attempts to only work from 10 to six, Monday through Friday, like I'm trying really hard to have a life outside of this work. Right make room for wrist. So
Jessica Hartley:make it room for us. I love that. Thank you. Thank you for sharing. If you had to think about a lot of the women listening to this call, and a lot of the them they will be women of color for allies to women of color men out there as well. What can we do to I guess probably two parts. If you had to think about how can we advocate for ourselves? A lot of us are professional women, and great salaries, amazing careers can command a court room can command a board room can command all these things. But there is something that is scary, particularly if you're going to the doctor because something doesn't feel right, something's off. There is an apprehension. And dare I say a little bit of, you know, intimidation when you go to the doctor, even if it's someone you trust, even if it's someone you've been going to for a while. How can we advocate for ourselves in those moments? It's always hard.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:I would say that, um, I think it's almost impossible to be both the patient and advocate frequently asked people to have someone with them. And I know that's hard because we're so close. customed to doing everything on our loan, and we're
Jessica Hartley:private, yes, don't tell anybody, especially people of color, don't tell anybody your business.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:But the truth is, you're getting so much information when you're in any appointment. And so to be able to absorb all that, and to be able to explain things without having another ear without having another person, like so much gets lost in translation. I when I both of my parents, and last several years have both been getting ill, and I don't let them go to the doctor by themselves. If they go by themselves and make them FaceTime, the doctor comes in the room, I mean, my children the same way that you would think about your children that you can't even imagine your children going to the pediatrician alone, truthfully, for black people, you should think about that in general, right? Like, we need another ear, we need another person and we need someone to support us to hear even someone that you trust, because you hear it differently. I would love people to bring someone in that when they see me as a patient, because I want us all everybody, all hearts and minds are clear. We all understand the information we feel comfortable about the decisions that we're making together, that you need to not feel like you're alone and those things.
Jessica Hartley:Yeah, I think that is amazing advice. And I think something that all of us can take away whether or not you are a person of color or a woman is that support and that network in Yes, you get here at wrong, you might get stuck and not be able to ask additional follow up questions that you normally would have if you didn't just had time to process in the moment. So thank you for sharing that. And then I guess as we close in this has just been such an amazing conversation. And I have learned a lot in grow just as part of this and enjoy the conversation even though we're talking about some things that are really challenging. What advice would you have for another young Joya coming up trying to make decisions about life and you know, so bringing that sort of passion in purpose and work and in sort of finding their place any advice you have for and I say a young joy, it could be joy in her 40s trying to make a pivot. Yeah, we're all I feel like we're always growing.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:And that's changing my advice, honestly. always growing. I just prayed yesterday, I was like, You know what, I'll take another 50 years. Good. If you want to give it to me, I'll take it. I understand if you don't want to give it to me because I love I feel like I've lived three different at least lifetime.
Jessica Hartley:Mm hmm.
Dr. Joia Crear-Perry:So being prepared for the changes or being excited about the changes, excited about the new opportunities excited about what's next lead with love and not fear, you know, like, live a life out of curiosity and what could happen next, and where can we go? Every time I look to have that openness. It's amazing. When I let fear creep in, that's when things get hard and scary. So even the middle of a pandemic, I'm feeling love and openness and excitement about what tomorrow could be.
Jessica Hartley:And with that, we will thank you I love it, lead with love and be open and another 50 years. I'll do it. My love Frenchies. Juice, beet juice and crushes is gonna get us there. I love it. Thank you so much joy for your time and your beauty both inside and out. This has been an absolute joy and pleasure. And I look forward to hopefully having you on the show again in the future. Thank you. Okay. Thanks. Thank you for listening to another episode of hustle, grind, shine and reignite. If you'd like this episode, like, subscribe and share on all your favorite podcast. I hope you'll tune in to the next episode featuring another amazing and talented professional. In the meantime,
