93. Healing Beyond Medicine: How Rest, Connection and Salt Therapy Can Transform Your Well-Being with Myra Maldonado

What if true healing isn't found in doing more, but in slowing down?

In this episode of Joy of the Hang, I sit down with Myra Maldonado, owner of Salt Caves & Spa, to explore the powerful connection between stress, wellness, and healing. We discuss why so many people are living in a constant state of overwhelm and how practices like salt therapy, mindfulness, and intentional self-care can help us reconnect with ourselves and others.

Myra shares her journey into the wellness industry, the science and benefits behind halotherapy (salt therapy), and why creating spaces for restoration and human connection may be one of the most important forms of medicine available today.

If you've been feeling exhausted, disconnected, or simply in need of a reset, this conversation is your invitation to pause, breathe, and prioritize your well-being.

In This Episode, We Discuss:

•  The hidden effects of chronic stress on the body 
•  What salt therapy is and how it works 
•  Why rest is essential for healing 
•  The connection between wellness and human connection 
•  Practical ways to create more peace and balance in everyday life 
•  Why self-care is not selfish—it's necessary 

Connect with Myra Maldonado:
https://thesaltcaveslwr.com/

Subscribe to Joy of the Hang for conversations that help you build connection, resilience, and a more meaningful life.

#JoyOfTheHang #MyraMaldonado #SaltTherapy #Wellness #SelfCare #StressRelief #MentalHealth #Healing #SocialWellness #Connection

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Imagine watching someone you love slowly disappear. You sit in doctors' offices, you hear words like terminal, chemotherapy, and there's nothing more we can do. You Google late into the night, searching for something, anything, that might bring them comfort. Not necessarily a cure, just hope. Because when someone you love has cancer, one of the hardest feelings in the world isn't sadness, it's helplessness. Today's guest knows that feeling all too well. Myra Maldonado watched both her mother and her mother-in-law battle cancer. As they grew tired of treatments and longed for comfort and peace, Myra began searching for holistic ways to help them feel better. That search eventually became a mission. Today, she and her husband Ralph have created the Salt Caves and Spa in Lakewood Ranch, a place designed to help people slow down, breathe, heal, and reconnect with themselves. It's a story about grief, hope, purpose, and what happens when we turn our pain into service. Please welcome Myra Maldonado. Hello, how are you? Welcome. I'm so glad you're here. We were just having a great conversation before we started, which we'll get into. But before we do that, take us back to the moment your mother and mother-in-law were diagnosed. What was going through your mind?

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Well, um, let's see. Both of them were diagnosed at two different times. So the first one, we kind of knew that my mother-in-law had cancer, but refused to tell us. We knew something was wrong. She was doing these, going to the doctor, very like not telling us what was going on. And it was about a year into that that she finally told us that she she had cancer. She didn't want her son to worry about her. She worried about everybody else. She always took care of us. She cooked, even while she was sick. I mean, she did everything. Yeah, and it took it it was about a year after that she finally told us. And that's when she started really declining because she needed more and more medication. So it was it was really progressed at that point. Wow. Yeah. Sorry. And how about your mom? Was it both both around the same time? Uh no. And my mother uh told me on my 50th birthday uh that she they had found something on her liver and that she was gonna have it checked out and she was gonna let us know. It took about probably six months after that when she told us that they found that she had liver cancer. Now she had already survived lung cancer, thyroid cancer, um, at which she they had cut out a part of the lung and they had taken out the thyroid. So she that was probably about three years before that. And so now here we are, fast forward that she they found something on her liver. So we then, once we found out all of these different that what was going on with my mother-in-law and with my mom, in 2022, we sold our business and came down to help them. So we're like, you know, we don't know how long the you know they're gonna have. Let's let's retire. So you were in New York then? We were in New York, Long Island. And they were both here in Sarasota? They were both down in Florida. My mother lived in Claremont and my mother-in-law lived in Orlando.

SPEAKER_02 3:16

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:17

So we had come down to Lakewood Ranch because I had a third mom. She lived in Lakewood Ranch. So we really loved the area, and we were just gonna travel and you know, go see them. So Okay. So you were able to be here for both of them. So we so we got down in September of 22. She passed away in October. My mother-in-law passed away in October of 22.

SPEAKER_03 3:39

Oh wow.

SPEAKER_01 3:39

My mother continued her journey, and it was in 23, early 23, that she told me she wasn't gonna do chemo anymore. And that's when I kind of was like, What do you mean? You know, you know, I don't want you to leave us. You know, that desperation just started, you know, like my brain was like, No, no, no. Um, you gotta do something. And she's just like, I'm good. You know, I've been doing this now for a while. I've been through it years before this, and I've been doing chemo for a while now because she had lived in Arizona before they had moved to Florida. And when she got here, that's when she was like, I'm done. So kind of like a year or two into being here in Florida, she was like, I'm done. So that's when I started Googling. I started doing the whole, you know, don't know what I'm doing, but I don't even know what I'm Googling because it wasn't a world that we lived in. It was like a complete, what is this healthy, holistic thing that people talk about?

SPEAKER_02 4:36

Right.

SPEAKER_01 4:37

You know, you're you're in a whole nother world. Where do you start? So it was like Google, what can I do? You know, substitute for chemo. You know, you're coming up with all these kind of different words to kind of see what pops up. And um, you know, we started with hope for cancer. There was a place in Mexico, there was a place up in north of us here in Clearwater. And you're, you know, I'm telling my mom, we're gonna go to Mexico. We're gonna take you to uh Clearwater. And, you know, at that point, my mom said Mexico, no, because people were talking to her and saying it's a waste. You're wasting your money. It's not gonna be a scam. And then I was like, listen, there's a place in Clearwater. Let's just go see what they have to say. So we went there and she did a blood test, which was sent out to Greece. And they came back with this whole two weeks later, with this whole schedule. You gotta be here for a week and a half. It's fifty-two thousand dollars. You gotta be here day and night. This is what we want you to do. And my mother was so funny that she just uh smiled and said, Okay, thank you. Walked outside. I just remember her look and she's like, Yeah, we're not doing this. I don't want that, you know. So she was just okay with whatever God wanted for her. And, you know, whatever was gonna happen, she was okay with it. She was she was, you know, like she was just good with her life and what she's accomplished. She was at peace. Yeah, like she was like, I'm good, you know. Yeah. But of course, that wasn't good enough for me. So I continue to to see what I could do. And be as because I was a business owner, you know, my husband and I owned a business prior. I'm like, what can I do to open and help? So that's when I saw a picture of a cave. A cave. A cave, a sort of salt cave, and I was like, okay, what is this? So salt caves weren't and it's not used for cancer, but you know, she had asthma. So I'm like, okay, it says it's good for asthma. It's great for a nervous system reset, you know. So she lived in that fight or flight. Yeah. Most people we all live in fight or flight. So I was like, okay, this will be a place for her to relax. She'll spend time with me. It will help her asthma. You know, I wanted her to disconnect. And that disconnection in itself would would have been amazing for her, you know, because we are always connected to our phones. We're connected to our TV, to people, to everything that's going on in the world, you know. Being able to disconnect and just allow your body to just be just, you know. So that was my thought process. So we just started on our journey of oh, salt cave. And they actually, there is actually a salt cave builder, which I thought was okay, amazing. I'm like, somebody does this for a living. Thank goodness. I would know what it's like. Like, who does this for a living? Right. And uh yeah, so I met with the I talked to this woman over the phone for months um while we're getting ready to get our permits and all of this. And she happened to be a doctor from Poland, a naturopath. And uh she lived in, you know, like she knew all about salt, salt caves or salt mines because in Poland that's where it started back in the 1800s. So this is not something that, you know, like yeah, out of the blue that we decided to do, 1800s. So she just told me I was fascinated about all the benefits and and um how many she she she was building them all over the country and the knowledge this woman had. So um my mom started on the journey with us, and she came to the first place that we started was down on Clark Road, which was a room. It wasn't a cave. And that's when I really kind of said, no, I don't want to build a room, I want to build a cave because my mom that disconnection piece. Because when you're in the cave, it's a little different than just sitting in a room for with um with a bent with with a therapy, right? Yeah, yeah. I wanted her to be, I wanted it to be more than that, more immersive, more right, right more, and not only her, but anybody in the on their journey, those people who really struggle with kind of that uh tuning out everything and disconnecting from everyone because this this the caves are just that amazing. I love that it disconnects everybody. So, and she loved fiction. So my mom lived in her books. She can read a thick book for and in a day or two. And what better place to to what better way to create a fictional place for her to be in? So, and that's what we're doing with the rest of the rooms that uh now, you know, unfortunately, mom passed. Um, and then I was left there, like, oh my God, what a I have some, I have this place. I don't really know what I'm doing. You know, where do I go from here? And, you know, God has really kind of taken us through our journey and even to the point where I didn't know, you know, we weren't getting any business. We went, we opened up during the hurricane season. So just last year? It was in 24. 2024. So May of 24, we opened. Okay. We went into rainy season that entire summer, and then we had that flooding. What was that, Debbie or something? In f in Lakewood Ranch, we were underwater. Okay. It was terrible. And then went into the two back-to-back hurricanes. Yeah, Ian and Milton. And uh so we had to fund our our shows for for for the first year. And that's when I was like, maybe I'm not supposed to be doing this. You know, and I was trying to grasp at every possible pushing myself, getting myself out there, trying to drum up business, trying to get people to come in and to a cave, which nobody understood what the cave was about, right? You know, like trying to educate people and trying to get them to understand, you need to get in here, you need to get in here. But I just at some point I just cried out and I said, Okay, what do I need to do? Why am I here? And it's been it's been pretty good since then, you know. But it's been really good turning that corner, people understanding, getting people, and that's when I kind of had to start, all right, this is what we have. Let's start building around it. So that's when I started looking to infrared saunas and cold plunges and red light. What is this? What does it do? And even changing my own lifestyle. Because I'm saying to myself, all right, here I'm in this business. Shouldn't I be looking, shouldn't I be doing the same thing? I'm here preaching it to everybody. I'm trying to tell people to get in a cave. Why am I not doing it myself? So I had to get into changing what I'm eating, you know, somebody who at my family has high cholesterol and pre-diabetic, and I was 30 pounds heavier, and I had all of these different things going on. So it was like, all right, so now I have to start changing who I am and what I'm eating and what am I putting on my body and the hydrating and the water that we're drinking. So there's just there's a whole lifestyle around us. Yeah. It's not even like I know, it's huge.

SPEAKER_02 11:28

You know, just getting into a cave. And it always changes too. That's the other thing that I find. It's hard to keep up with. I mean, but so much of it is so important for sure. So how many people can fit in the cave?

SPEAKER_01 11:38

So we have about um 12 chairs. Right now we have a setup like stadium seating in the large cave, and then we have a private cave. So for people that which is good for like two to four people. So you want to come in, you want to talk. You don't want to have anybody in the room with you, you know. Um, so that's the private cave.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

So the big one you can bring a group of girls and have your girlfriends, and it's how long do you stay in there for? It's 45 minutes. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 12:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:03

And you can yeah. So is it heated? I mean, is it cold? It's cold. Yeah. So how do you dress when you go in the salt cave?

SPEAKER_01 12:10

So I tell everybody you want to expose your skin. So it's great for the it's great for the respiratory sys system, it's great for the skin. So you want to not only breathe, but you want it to fall on your skin. So shorts, skirt. I also tell them, get yourself into the salt. So the large cave is big enough where there's six inches on the floor of salt. Okay. And it's like sitting in a salt bath. So people just dig themselves in there, they do salt angels, like they do the silliest things, but they come out and they're like, oh my god, my skin is so soft. So, um, so yeah. So I I tell them bring a sweatshirt or a jacket. We also have blankets, so if you know, we'll give them a blanket. So once your body, because it's a nervous system reset, once your body starts to come out of that fight or flight, that stress starts to kind of melt away, your body starts to get colder. So that's when the blankets in the sweatshirts. Gotcha. Yeah, and a lot of people fall asleep. Their body just needs it. It's like it just turns it, they just fall out, they just fall asleep. So it's kind of cool to see that. And I was like, yep, it means your body really needed. Needed the rest. Needed the rest.

SPEAKER_02 13:18

I have to get in there. It sounds amazing. So you and your husband have used the word hopelessness. What does that feeling look like when you're living it?

SPEAKER_01 13:30

It was it it would the the word doesn't even the feeling knowing that I was gonna lose my mother. Um I can tell you is I I I mean, I'm just tearing up the just thinking about the word because I was I I didn't know what to do. For me, my life, always having being able to kind of come up with solutions and not being able to was very frustrating. So I I I didn't know what to do. So it was it was terrible. I uh my just my whole body um going to bed and knowing that my mom might die. You know, what God, please help me. Please what can I do? Please give me the words, please give me the direction.

SPEAKER_02 14:17

It sounds like you did everything you could and created a beautiful space for her right before she passed. Yeah. That's more than a lot of us get to do. So you should feel proud of yourself for doing what you did.

SPEAKER_01 14:31

I hope that. You know, I mean it's funny you say that, you know, before my mom passed, I wanted, I said, Mom, I'm almost there. And I wanted her to know that I was doing this for her. I didn't want her to leave without me, without her knowing that I was doing this for her, because she had done so much for her me and my family. So that hopelessness of not being able to for her to know that she left loved, like she's leaving, but she's loved. I want her to know that.

SPEAKER_02 15:04

She knew that. Yeah. She knew that. Did either your mothers teach you something about courage or resilience during their cancer journeys? I'm sure they both didn't. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:15

My goodness, they I mean the way they they didn't even want us to know, they just wanted to know that they were the strongest women that I've ever known. Going through going through something like that. I was scared. I couldn't even imagine what was going through their mind knowing that they were dying. That'd be like just they definitely thought, you know, like no matter what, you do what you have to do for your family, and uh you can be strong no matter what. Comes your way, you know. So and faith she loved God, they loved God, and they know they were gonna be okay. So definitely faith was a big one as well. What do you miss the most about your mom? I wish I had more time now. And I think you hear that a lot about when people pass. Because you just think you have all the time in the world to go back and sit with them and talk about when they were younger and what they did and the things that just things that I would have probably if I had more time now, I would have asked her. Like I didn't and I did know her. I I did ask a lot of questions, but you know, there's always those other ones like laugh more with her or go and do more things with her because she didn't do anything for herself. I didn't take her to go get her nails done. She didn't like to do things, she didn't want to do like she was one of those, like, don't spend the money on me, spend it, you know, here's money for yourself. And I wish I could take that back and and and and do that with her more and let her know that she is important, self-care is important, taking care of yourself isn't selfish. You know, like think the things now that I tell everybody else now in our business is, you know, you have to take care of yourself. And those are things that I wish that I could have done more with her and been able to talk to her about it and know that she's special and just just so many things that I wish that I can go back and and do.

SPEAKER_02 17:27

We were kind of talking a little bit about this before we started recording and that all the material stuff means nothing in the end, right? On your final days, what you miss the most is just time being together.

SPEAKER_01 17:41

She used to do so much uh with us. She used to go to our gym I was a gymnast, so she would go to my competitions, and she was always there, and she was always rooting for me, and she always, you know, even if I didn't do well, she would say, Okay, next time. She always said positive things and never kind of said anything like that would be like make me feel like I wasn't good enough. You know, she always was very positive, but she always went to f you know, whatever games, uh baseball games, and she always did all the things. So she never worried about anything but the family. And like you said, materialistic. I mean, we didn't come from much, but we had family. And it, you know, it's unfortunate that the family now is just so separated, you know. Um, she was our glue. She was matriarch. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:33

Did she see the salt caves? Was she able to? She never scared to see it.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

She passed away in February of 24 and we opened in May of 24. What do you think she'd think of it if she could see it now? I think she would love it because we're creating all the rooms are being created in a fiction like like she's reading a book. So all my rooms will have like something fictional. So I have my caves. I have a room called the observatory, which is all the different planets, so it's dark in there with all the stars, and um we're all the other rooms will be created uh with some type of theme. So, you know, so I think she kind of find it pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02 19:08

Oh that, you know, in memory of my mom. I'm sure she'd be very proud of you. So you and your husband both had careers as police officers. That's pretty cool. In New York? On Long Island, yeah. Wow. How did that experience of serving and protecting shape the way you approached this new mission?

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Oh my goodness, that was the the best job I have ever had. It was amazing.

SPEAKER_02 19:33

Being a police officer was the best job.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

Oh, it was the best job.

SPEAKER_02 19:36

Why'd you stop? Injury. Yeah, an injury. Yeah, I had an injury.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

It you see all walks of life and you really kind of take a take a step back and say to yourself, you're fortunate, you know, you're blessed. Because there's a lot of people out there that really don't have anything. It really give gave me a new d different perspective about life. And being able to be in people's lives helping them because that's the only reason why they're calling the police, is because they need help, right? So being able to approach people with a kind heart and and understand where they are, I love that. I love being able to help people. So it really helped me with that same perspective, knowing that when people are coming through to right now into salt caves, they're coming because they're looking to be heard, they're looking to get better, right? They're here to they're on a journey of wellness. So I kind of look at them, what can I do for you? You know, how can I help you? So, and I love to be on the journey with them. So it's not, you're not just a number. I want to know you. I want in I want you to know that we're here for ya. So I kind of like that relationship. Did you always want to be a police officer? I did. Um, my father was a police officer. He was uh he worked on Rikers Island, actually, he was a correction officer. My uncle was uh New York City detective, and uh I've had other another uncle, so yeah. I kind of followed my dad's footsteps.

SPEAKER_02 21:02

Did you ever have a situation where it was scary or something I mean bad happened?

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Not really. I've been I was fortunate. Good. I think that there's so many there was things in there that I didn't think was very scary or anything. It's just you do what you gotta do. So I didn't approach anything like like that. Okay. Because anything can go sideways if you ma you know what I mean. You can go into a situation that's completely harmless and it can turn into something bad. I did have one car stop that was kind of crazy and the way I handled it with my partner, I think that we got out of a si a possible situation. And after I left that that car stop, uh I found out that he had multiple like pages upon pages of uh attempted murder and all of these different things. But again, it's how you approach a situation, how to talk to people. You know, you respect people, people are gonna respect you, you know. So we're really that really that that and that's in everything that I do. You know, I I I believe that everybody should be treated the same way that I want them to be treated. So I thank God that I got out of that situation. But uh there was a lot of different things that I I've I witnessed that uh I probably I would never want people to get to so unfortunately that's something that you carry, but I can't imagine how many years were you a police officer? I did 17 completely with the police department. Um because I worked for them prior. I was a cadet, I was in a pro in a program first, and then uh then I went over into uh the police department side of it. So 17 years with the same department. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

That's great. That's great. Then after that, you owned an edible arrangements, right? For 15 years.

SPEAKER_01 22:57

For 15 years.

SPEAKER_02 22:58

All right. Tell me about that. It was again centered around helping people.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

Yeah, so I was in, I was I was a gymnast, uh, I loved working out. So fruit was like, you know, my husband had um a major surgery where he lost his ability to use his right foot. So he has a drop foot, and he was sitting home and watching the baby, and I was working, and I was like, why don't we open a business? And he's like, What do you mean, open a business? And uh I was like, Well, I just was driving and I saw this sign and it said edible arrangements, and I went in there and it's all about fruits, and you know, it's great because I love nutrition and I want to watch what I eat because I'm gonna be competing because I did fitness and everything like that. So fruit was up my alley, you know. So um, even though I only knew a little bit about it, I was like, fruit is good, so let's let's do a business. We like fruit, we like fruit, you know. So um, yeah, so we we did we we all you know we went into the business. We went into a franchise and was that you must have done pretty well if you had approved. 15 years, we actually um we sold in we sold it in 22. It was the highest we got we got the highest bid for ours out of all the stores on Long Island. So I we did really well. We were the number one store for a very long time. Um we created it from nothing and uh it did really well. People really came to us from all over, they loved our service. Um such a fun gift to send. Yeah, in the beginning, my husband didn't understand it. You know, people were like, what do you mean? Like edible underwear? Like, what do you mean, edible arrangements? People didn't really understand what it was because back then in 2008 is when we started that journey. Um, and people just didn't really know what it was. So it was it was very interesting to see what the other comments were people saying so far.

SPEAKER_02 24:56

Can I have one shaped like yes, dot dot dot that's funny? So at what point did your idea become actually gonna open a wellness spa? When did you say? I'm like, this is what's gonna happen. I guess when you saw that thing on the internet and said, I saw a picture of it and I was like, what is that? Okay, so that's kind of cool.

SPEAKER_01 25:17

You had never been to a salt cave before? Never went to a no, no, no. And now that I know about it, um, there were some on Long Island. They're all up north. I didn't even know that it existed until I came down here. And I'm like, oh my god, they were they were right under my my nose, and I didn't even know.

SPEAKER_02 25:36

Yeah. So you weren't, you've never, I mean, before this, you weren't into red light therapy or cold pl none of the holistic no hacks that they have nowadays. No.

SPEAKER_01 25:46

I mean just working out because I was a gymnast, you know, working out and youights and the whole thing. But really, it wasn't that big. Red light, I think, has really become more the last light has become big and cold plunges. But cold plunges, I do know that I've always heard of people like going into um the ocean. You ever hear like people do those polar plunge? But I didn't really understand why they were doing that. I mean, besides, I guess they were raising money, right?

SPEAKER_02 26:13

It's a charity thing, right? Charity. A lot of times they do it in the new year. They did it up in I'm from Maine, so they did it in Maine a lot on New Year's Day. Yeah, they would all run, and it was very cold. Yes, yes, like ridiculous. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:25

But other than that, I mean, why would anybody want to jump into a cold cold barrel? I know. Have you done it?

SPEAKER_02 26:30

No, I've done it. And the longest I've been able to handle it, it's about three minutes. It's it's cold. Your whole body gets numb. And I don't know. So I have a girlfriend that does it regularly now, and I said, Have you really noticed any benefits? She goes, I don't know. You can't really tell.

SPEAKER_01 26:48

I don't know how long you have to do it to really um tell it depends because if you have if you're somebody who's got an injury or you know, who has a lot of inflammation, yeah, you you're gonna see a difference. Okay, you know, but also people are doing it just for biohacking. Biohacking is a big thing right now. So everyone's doing it just to gain like time, like their age, right? There's people who are 60, and because they're doing all of these things, their age really now is maybe like 40, you know, like they're trying to be versed age now. So biohacking is pretty big. They're using the red light and they're doing the infrared sauna as cold plunges and all the things. So, and salt therapy is actually one of those as well. So, yeah, it's it's really about kind of reclaiming the years. That's fascinating. So, salt does the same thing. Salt is great for the respiratory. So you're literally trying to keep inflammation down, you're trying to kill anything that might be going on in there, dry up any fluids. We're breathing in so much crap right now. Excuse the word. Yeah, no, it's okay. I've heard words. I was right words. We're breathing in all this stuff. And, you know, a lot of people are like, why would I go into assault room? I was like, well, is your respiratory out is your respiratory uh like an important system in your body? I mean, you need to breathe, right? So they're like, Yeah, I guess I never thought of it like that. You you do exercise for your heart, right? Right. So why not keep your respiratory system clean without any, you know, whatever uh fluids and keeping the inflammation down, allowing more oxygen in?

SPEAKER_02 28:21

So now that you're bringing that up, how often should someone go into the assault therapy? Do you have a I mean to assault room? Do you have a monthly membership where people come once a month? How often what how how do you get the most benefit from it?

SPEAKER_01 28:34

Well, depending on the reason. So people who have like a lot of allergies, they come in, oh, they can come in every day. So it's not something that it's gonna there's an overload or anything like that. It's like going to the beach. The difference between the beach, because there's salt air in the beach in in at the beach, it's moist. This is a dry salt, so it's a little different. Yeah. Um, but people can go come every day. Some people just come for maintenance, so they'll come like two or three times a week. But the ones who get who really need it, like the allergies, asthma, sinus issues, especially like when the weather changes, people I mean, we get people come in all the time and they just spend every day, every day they're there, and it really helps them.

SPEAKER_03 29:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 29:15

You know, you stay on top of it, it's better as opposed to be, you know, be proactive than beactive, you know. So do you sell memberships though, or is it just that you pay as you go? No, it's uh it's all um membership. We just redid uh our memberships actually. We just changed our name. We did a whole bunch of different things to try and um because we're hoping that we can evolve n continue to evolve and then have all the locations. So my locations, uh software, and now we have new membership tiers.

SPEAKER_02 29:46

What's the new name? Halo house. Halo house. We were just about to talk about what's what halo therapy is. So for people who've never heard of it, what is halo therapy the same as salt therapy?

SPEAKER_01 29:55

Yes, correct.

SPEAKER_02 29:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 29:57

So and that's why we we went with the name Halo House is because halo in Greek is salt. So it's salt. Oh, okay. So halo therapy, known as salt therapy.

SPEAKER_02 30:08

Yeah. Okay, excellent. So what benefits have you personally experienced in the salt caves?

SPEAKER_01 30:14

Learning how to relax. It took me a long time to sit for 15 more than 15 minutes. I couldn't sit. I I am You're type A, you're a police officer, you're on alert all the time.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

I can't sit. Right?

SPEAKER_01 30:29

Yeah, I couldn't sit. I can imagine. And um what's nice about it is being able to go in there and learn how to sit and allow your body to relax. Because believe it or not, when you're able to get your body, teach your body to relax like that, when you go home, your body will know it's time to relax. You shut the lights off because it's nice and dim in there. Your body will, you're, you're kind of teaching it to do that. So for people who don't know how to, who don't sleep well, you know, who take an hour before they, you know, before their eyes will even shut, you know, or they're doing the wrong thing, they're watching their phones and everything, but they have to teach the body to know when it's time to go to bed. So that the body will then shut itself down and you'll get that nice deep breath. So you're able to now sit in there and for 45 minutes? And yeah, and actually close my eyes. So it was it was 15 minutes before I got up, and I don't even know if it was 15 minutes and walking around trying to look at my cave. Okay, what what they built. That's fine. Um, or just staring up at the ceiling, trying to figure out, okay, maybe they could have done this, or you know, like that whole she's trying to rewire and restructure. And I'm like, oh, I should have put a screen over here. And I'm just like, oh my God, why can't I just focus? And it really kind of made me figure out, like, oh, I got an issue here, you know, like I don't know how to relax. And I'm at that fight or flight. That's where I live. Yeah. And for my body, for anybody, in order for your body to restore itself, it needs to come out of there. It needs to come out of fight or flight. So you can eat well, you can exercise, but if you're stressed out, you're still gonna have a lot of issues. You're not gonna get to where you need to go.

SPEAKER_02 32:16

Oh, stress is one of the worst things for your body. Yeah. Yeah. And people don't even realize they're under stress a lot of times. Because they're so, like you said, you're so used to living in that fight or flight place. Yeah. You don't even realize you're there.

SPEAKER_01 32:29

It's normal. It's it's yeah, it it's and it's sad that it's normal. But if you go to all these other different countries, try it, try France, try Spain. They all have it built into their lifestyle. Italy stops in the middle of the day, and what do they do? You can't have you can't go to a restaurant because it's all about family. They sit down together, they watch their TV, they play their soccer, and I'm sitting there waiting for them to finish. I'm like, you're gonna, you know, there's seven people here, you're gonna lose seven people to dinner. And they're they don't care about that. It wasn't about the money, it was about it's time for family, it's time for me, it's time for you know. So I found that really interesting. And I didn't even know that at the time because I didn't have a wellness center. And now that I look back, I'm like, oh my goodness, that is so weird. Yeah, they're way far ahead of us when it comes to wellness. And their life expectancy is at least 10 years longer than ours. So when you go to Japan, they do like they have this whole routine, breathing and moving and with the I mean, I was just like, oh my goodness, are we we are really not doing what we're supposed to do. But you know what? This is we're in that thought pattern, like, the more you do, the more you get, the more you have, you know, like we just go, go, go. You gotta make the money, you gotta, you know, so it's like That's our culture. That's our culture. And it's like, wow.

SPEAKER_03 33:55

Yeah, not good.

SPEAKER_02 33:57

But to your point, and I always say if we don't take care of our wellness, eventually we're gonna be paying for our illness. That's correct. So either way, what are you gonna invest in?

SPEAKER_01 34:06

That's right. You know, uh and when you're able to kind of relax and and and allow your body and take care of yourself, you're actually able to pour into others much better than you were to be half full or you know, half empty or whatever you see your cup.

SPEAKER_02 34:22

Exactly. Exactly. So so much of wellness today is reactive, which we just talked about. You're encouraging people to care for themselves before illness happens. Why do we struggle to do that? It's just what we're told. Just what we're taught.

SPEAKER_01 34:37

We are taught go, go, go. It's definitely what we're taught. Yeah. And especially, you know, from where I grew up and not having much, the first thing you want to do is to be able to not be in that same place, right? You so you want to you want to keep, I'm never, I don't want to be there. I don't want to be there. So you're push, push, push. And then you're teaching your kids to do the same thing, to grind, to keep pushing yourself and not to ever fall back. And, you know, so I just think it's generational.

SPEAKER_02 35:05

It's just gonna be generational. I also think sometimes we feel selfish, don't we? And we so we're selfish, you know, like a Yeah, we feel bad for wanting to take 45 minutes into ourselves because we're told told, okay, we have to work out at the gym for an hour, you have to meditate for 20 minutes every day. Now you want to add going to the salt caves. You know, so you do when you start thinking about all the things that society is telling us we should be doing. Yeah. You know, it all seems selfish. And you know, when you're young and raising kids, and you know, I remember not doing anything for myself when my kids were little, right? I mean, just don't you, I was the last one on the totem pole, which was fine. It was that season of life for me. But yeah, now it's like you do have to reflect on okay, I'm tired, and what am I gonna do to rejuvenate myself, right?

SPEAKER_01 35:55

Exactly. And it's like I've I would say that I remember the age, I tell everybody this, I remember 25, and then, oh my God, I'm I'm in my 50s. Yeah. What happened here? I don't I don't know. Where'd it go? Yeah. The kids are out, and now it's like, you know, since having the place, it's like it's time for me to do what I need to do for myself. And I thank God that I'm able to do that. Because some people don't have that, some that time because they already are sick, they already have multiple issues, and now it's like they're trying to scramble and try and figure out what I can do to kind of do, you know, to fix what I've allowed to happen for years.

SPEAKER_02 36:33

And to your point, I mean, uh, we talked about it earlier. I'm 60 years old, and I have already lost several friends to cancer who are my age or younger.

SPEAKER_03 36:43

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 36:43

That I've already lost from kids, people that I've gone to high school with or people I knew from back home. And yeah, it's very it's shocking to me how young, and a lot of them are women, young women dying of breast cancer or ovarian cancer, or yeah, it's sad. But you just never know when your time is up, right? So you have to do your best to take care of yourself while you're here.

SPEAKER_01 37:05

Stay on top of, you know, a lot of people that come through my door actually don't, because they're holistic, like they don't want any medicine or anything, they haven't taken blood work, they haven't done any of the things. They just yeah, they just rely on just trying to eat right and so forth.

SPEAKER_02 37:23

So yeah, and I, you know, I'm also a wellness coach, and I don't think half of us are eating right. We think we are. Yeah, that's true. We think we are. No, I mean because we don't I don't know. I think there's a lot of misinformation. This is a whole sub separate topic. Yes. There's a lot of misinformation about what's healthy and what isn't, and what we should be eating and what we shouldn't be eating. And I'm not gonna go into it all on this podcast, but there's a lot, and I think there's a lot of labels on foods that are misleading, and there's a lot of marketing, you know, on the media that that kind of sways people different ways. And yeah, I think for me, I think it talking about holistic, if you eat holistically as well, meaning eating whole food, then you're gonna be better off than most people because I think a lot of cookie food, cookie food and know where it's coming from if you can. If you can, yeah, absolutely. Don't eat out of a box, people. Don't eat out of a box. Stress and anxiety are at an all-time high. Do you think people are craving spaces where they can simply slow down and breathe? I think so. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:29

And I and I and and that is my our goal to create spaces where people can go and relax. So there's so much in wellness coming up right now. Oh my goodness, it's just it's exploded. Yeah. There's so many different things. Oh, it's a billion-dollar industry, isn't it? My goodness. There's so many, you know, so many places now.

SPEAKER_02 38:49

So your spa isn't just about salt therapy, it's about creating a safe haven. Why does environment matter so much to healing?

SPEAKER_01 38:56

People want to know people need to feel safe. There's so many people that they wanna they wanna know you care. You're not they're not a number. Connection. Yeah. Safety. You know, a lot of people trust you. When they trust you, they feel more comfortable. And when they walk in, they're like their guard kind of comes down, and uh, and and that's when they really find their their their healing from that, you know. I have so many people that come in, they've just said, I love coming here because I feel so comfortable. And I love hearing that.

SPEAKER_02 39:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:30

You know, they love coming and talking with me. I know their name, I know what's going on with the cat, I know what's going on with the dogs. I know that they are going away, you know, and um it's like having another friend. So I like that.

SPEAKER_02 39:43

Oh, that's great. So many people are looking for that nowadays. So we talk a lot on this podcast about connection and belonging. Do you think healing happens better in community than in isolation? Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 39:55

Absolutely. Especially you don't want to go through something, whatever you're going through, you want to go with you want to know you have your tribe, that you have your, you know, you have your community. That's important to know that you meet you you matter.

SPEAKER_02 40:06

Yeah, it's interesting you say that because there was a study done on this very topic that a doctor was saying that he would visit patients in the hospital, and the ones that had visitors or somebody by their bedside did so much better than the ones that were alone all the time. They would tend to to pass a lot and or get sicker a lot quicker than the ones that had support and love around them. So it makes sense. Yeah. It makes sense. It's so important in this day and age. Have you seen people come into the spa carrying emotional pain and leave somehow lighter? Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 40:41

I've had pe I have people that I have cancer that come in and um they know my story, my our story, and they kind of feel connected and I'm able to talk with them and I love telling them that, you know, like you're gonna be okay. I tell them that because I want them to know that I'm praying for them, that I'm here for them, that that this space is here, like this place is here for for them to come in. But I think overall that the connection, I love that connection that they're able to talk with me about what's going on. And then they leave, they're like, I'm so happy that I came. And and I like that. I I like hearing that.

SPEAKER_03 41:23

Yeah, create a lot of things.

SPEAKER_01 41:24

And they come in with this burden, right? And I think of my mother, what what should this what's on their heart, what's going on in their mind, and they leave kind of like, I'm gonna be alright, no matter what, I'm gonna be okay. So I like that.

SPEAKER_02 41:41

It's beautiful. What's one lesson grief has taught you about living?

SPEAKER_01 41:50

I think we talked about this right before. We did. I wanna make sure that it's not about what I have or anything. I think I want people to know who I am. You know, I think I was listening to this um I don't know if it was a podcast or radio, and he says when we go your whole life is gonna be in like 200 words or a hundred word on your obituary. And what is that gonna say, you know? Like how do you want it to read, you know? So grief for me, I said I say that I know it's gonna happen. Your love, you know, you it's gonna happen. And how do you deal with it? And how do you want people to know who you are when it's your turn, when it's your time, and you want your loved ones to cut, you know, be around you. And you want to give make sure that they know that I love that I have given the you know, how do you say I hope they know that I do truly care and I and I love my family and I I mean just I just want them to know that I hope that I did what I was meant to be to do while I was here. So I take my grief and I I've learned so much about when I want to leave behind and um like my mom, I took her I took my pain and I I put it into others and and and I try to help them with theirs and I don't know. I don't even know if I even answered that question correctly, but I just I just feel like you could take it and you could do something good with the grief. So I'm hoping that I live my life like that. That I hope that I can leave.

SPEAKER_02 43:36

I love fathers. But I already know you do. I already know you do. I've seen you in action. And you might not think people are watching, but people are watching, and people do have a lot of love and respect for you. So you're already there.

SPEAKER_03 43:49

I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 43:50

Oh, you're gonna make me cry. I can't cry on my own show, but I want to. All right, our final five, our joyful moments. We're gonna bring joy back into this. All right, number one, what brings you joy right now? My family. My family.

SPEAKER_01 44:06

Tell me about your family. We have five, five children. Um we're a combined family. So I've been with my uh husband now 30 years. So he had two, I had two, and then we had one together. So number five is we're we're now we're now by herself. So number five went into the Navy and she's living in Japan. So I'm extremely proud of her. So she's 20 years old and she's she's on her journey. Um, I have the uh two kids that are in the police department. So one's a detective and one's a sheriff, so I'm super proud. And then the third one is actually um she does cybersecurity, like forensics with with computers and everything. So that's kind of kind of really cool. That's cool. And um, I have a uh the last one, he's kind of he loves medicine, so he's kind of trying to figure his way through school and medicine and so forth. So my kids are my I I really did a I re really redirected my life to my family and my friends and my faith. Faith is my first very, very top of my list because without God, I don't I don't know where I would be. So I think that that's my important right now. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 45:16

And number two, what do you wish more people understood about caring for someone with cancer? Um I'm sorry, say it again. What do you wish more people understood about about caring people, caring for people with cancer?

SPEAKER_01 45:30

Okay, so to understand that patient, you have to be patient because they're not gonna want to do what you want to do. Because my mom didn't want to do what I wanted her to do. And it's a struggle for them. They're struggling inside because they're also trying to figure out what I can do to get rid of this, what are why me, all the different questions. So understanding and putting yourself, I'm gonna say, in their shoes and understand what and understand what they're going through, right? And and taking that and and being patient with them and loving them, letting them know, reassuring them, no matter what, I'm here for you. I love you. You're gonna be okay. And I think that's I mean, that's the best thing that I can say is stay with them. They need you, they need to know that you know they're scared. Stay with them, you know.

SPEAKER_02 46:25

Beautiful advice. Number three, what is one act of self-care that everyone should practice?

SPEAKER_01 46:32

Do something. Do something do something for yourself. Go and have your hair done. Go and do your nails, spend an hour just by yourself, get away from everybody, you know, read a book, whatever. Do something for yourself, get a massage, spend the money on yourself. You know, it's okay. Yeah, yeah. It's okay, you know. Um, we we spend our money on pocketbooks, extreme, you know, on all these materialistic things. And we don't even think twice about spending the money on those things. But you want to spend a hundred dollars on a massage or spend forty-five dollars to get your nails done, whatever the price is, you're like, I don't really want to do that. You know, so they don't why you don't value yourself is so strange.

SPEAKER_02 47:20

I agree. Yeah, I agree. I agree completely. Number four. If you could sit down with your mother and mother-in-law for one more hour, what would you say?

SPEAKER_01 47:44

I want to watch our favorite shows. I would say, let's go to lunch. I would say, let's go get your hair done, let's go get your nails done. I would say, what do you want to do? Actually, instead of saying what I want to do, I want to say, where do you want to go? What do you want to do? Whatever you want, it's it's it's on me. Do you want to travel? Do you want you know, like I think they both never were asked what do they want? Because they always did that for everyone else. And I wonder sometimes, like I wonder if she ever wanted that to be asked. You know, maybe she was thinking, why doesn't anybody ask me what I want to do? Or how come I was never invited to do this or do that? And you know, what did you know, like those questions? And oh then these are the things that I would love to talk to her about. Like, what did you what was your dream that you never got that never came to fruition? You know.

SPEAKER_02 48:51

That's a good question. That's a good point. We should ask more people, what do you want? Because we tend to be so caught up in what we want or what we think other people want, right? That's right. But we never actually ask them, what do you want? No. And what can I do for you? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 49:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:10

Yeah, we do. It's true. It's a wake-up call right there. It's an aha moment. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:15

I mean, especially it's your mother, so you always, you know, as we get older, we don't know anything, you know. I mean, she doesn't know anything. We know everything, right? As we get older. What you're talking about. Yeah, a different generation. Yeah. Right? I mean, until we got older, and we're like, oh, now I know what she's talking about. You know, as we got older, you start thinking of the things that your mom's trying to teach you and everything like that. But even when she was going through what she was going through, it was like, what can I do? You know, what can I do for her? What can I do, you know?

SPEAKER_02 49:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:44

Yeah. Instead of what do you need me to do? What do you need me to do? And it was, you know, it w it was that same moment that my mother said you that somebody told me, like, why don't you she doesn't want to do anything. Why don't you just respect that she doesn't want to do the therapy? Because of course I'm like, you gotta do it, you know, you can't leave us. I don't want you to go anywhere. You have to stay here. You're young, you need you and that was really difficult for me to hear that.

SPEAKER_02 50:08

Yeah. Yeah. One final question. When you look back at your own life, how do you hope you're remembered?

SPEAKER_01 50:27

Bunny. I'm silly, I'm quirky. I I want people to know me as a person that uh I'm real. Like I I am very sincere and with my heart. Like I op I I wear my heart on my sleeve, unfortunately. I'm a giver. I I g I sometimes too much, but um it doesn't change who I am even when things don't go right. I it's just I want people to just know me as somebody who always will help out no matter what. I would be that three o'clock in the morning phone call.

SPEAKER_02 51:03

Yeah, we talked about that before we started recording. I said we're lucky if we have friends in our lives who are close enough and know us well enough and love us enough to if something were to be tragically wrong, that they would pick up the phone call at three o'clock in the morning if we needed them to. And I was saying to Myra, I think I can think of maybe two people that I could count on to answer the phone. So that's beautiful that you think you could be one of them or would want to be one of them because it's uh it's a rare gift when you have that person in your life who you know without question when the shit hits the band, they're gonna show up for you. Yeah, yeah. I did another podcast with them with a former Marine who he was involved in the movie 13 hours. He was one of the guys uh who was a subcontractor who was over in Benghazi in fighting and ended up losing his arm and other things. And that's what he said uh in the show too. He said, you know, even with this brotherhood of men, he goes, You are the greatest gift is when you have that person or persons who will be there for you. And it's not always the people you expect. That's right. That's the other thing. It's true, it's oftentimes the people that you aren't thinking of that will be there when the call comes in. So anyway, it's uh I'm sure that that's a beautiful thing to think of that you would want to be that person. And I love that. I love that. So before I close, I want to tell our listeners how they can find you at Salt Caves. So you have a new website? It's the same website, it's the Salt Caveslwr.com. Okay. And we won't give the phone number, but I can put the link in our show notes. So if you have trouble finding it, you can. And they need to make an appointment ahead of time. Yes. To come? Okay. So this way we make sure that we can get you. Get everything in. Excellent.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

And you're open seven days a week, or um, we're closed on Tuesdays, but we're growing, so we're probably going to open seven days and we're going to be adding some hours as well.

SPEAKER_02 53:07

Okay. Exciting things to come at the salt cave. Well, cancer changes families forever. It teaches us that time is precious, that health can never be taken for granted, and that sometimes the greatest gift we can offer someone isn't a cure. It's comfort, presence, and hope. Myra Maldonado took one of life's most painful experiences and transformed it into a mission to help others breathe easier, slow down, and feel cared for. And maybe that's a lesson for all of us today. Pain doesn't have to be the end of the story. Sometimes it's the beginning of purpose. Because life is fragile, our people are precious, and healing often starts with something as simple as creating a space where someone feels safe, seen, and cared for. Myra, thank you for sharing your heart and for reminding us that even in our deepest grief, we still have the power to create hope for someone else. And to everyone listening, don't wait to take care of yourself. Don't wait to tell someone you love them, and don't wait to create moments of peace and connection. Because the joy really is in the hang. Until next time.