Jennifer Wren Tolo, R.N, is an award-winning health & wellness educator, speaker, and stress and resiliency coach who empowers multitasking, success-minded women to leave survival mode behind and reclaim their power over their lives. As a former critical care nurse, and after experiencing life-threatening illnesses with two of her four sons, Tolo developed her signature PAUSE method, and “ABC’s of Stress Management.” For over 20 years, she has helped clients connect with their inner voices and the wisdom of their souls to move from overloaded to calm through holistic healing, intuition, and resilience coaching. Jennifer is a bestselling author and an Adjunct Professor at Endicott College School of Nursing. She holds a Master's degree in Nursing as well as certifications as a Whole Health Educator and Patient Advocate, Personal Trainer, Reiki Master, and Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction. She hosts the Simple Awakenings Podcast and has been featured in BRAINZ, Women’s Journal, US Business Insider, and on FOX and ABC News.
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[00:00:00] Hey guys, Corey Poirier here. Welcome to bLUTalks and I hope you enjoy this video.
[00:00:28] Hello everybody and welcome to our, what I kind of call our bLUTalks live podcast. I like this because oftentimes as a podcaster, a lot of podcasters are doing their show in the basement of somebody's house and I like the idea of having an audience and that kind of energy. So that's sort of what this is like today. We get a chance to learn from and meet someone new. So I have Jennifer Rentolo here with me today and Jennifer, I'm going to jump right in. I take a different approach than most
[00:00:56] interviewers. I don't read a bio. Sometimes off the top we'll add it later, but I like more to ask the guests to tell us a little bit about themselves because they're going to tell me something different than I would read. Plus I don't have to worry about reading a big name. So having said all that, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and your journey before we dive right in? Sure. I only have two minutes though. I was told to tell you about it. It's a long journey.
[00:01:20] So I was a critical care nurse and I thought I thrived in chaos, but it wasn't until I had children that I realized that I was drowning in the chaos. So I thought that if I became an administrator, then I would be able to change healthcare and I'd be able to fix things. And I quickly learned that that was not the case. I had very little power there.
[00:01:42] And it really took my own personal experiences to show me the path. And my second son had a massive neonatal stroke at birth and it really awakened me to the gaps in healthcare. And so as challenging as that was, I had a dear friend that said, you need to learn Reiki. He's going to need Reiki. And when it's your child, there's nothing you won't do for your kid. So I learned Reiki.
[00:02:07] I dove into understanding about the brain so I could help my son. I became a certified nutritionist. I became a holistic health coach. I dove into mindfulness for myself, but also for my kids. So I, and I became a personal trainer. And so all of this was kind of just helping me help my son. But what I really learned was the power of my intuition. I learned how to trust myself more.
[00:02:36] I learned to stop looking to everybody else to tell me what the answers were and look to myself. And I learned to build that self-trust the more that I did that. And so I started a business called Butterfly Family Wellness with my holistic coaching lens. But I realized that everybody was looking to me to tell them the answers. So yes, I could tell them what to eat. Yes, I could tell them how to move their body. But what I saw the root cause of a lot of the illness was stress.
[00:03:04] So that's when I really, by managing my own stress, learned to help others kind of reclaim their power over their lives by stop looking to everybody else and to start trusting themselves and to calm their nervous system so they could actually hear what it was that they needed and trust that intuition. So that's kind of my transition, my quick nutshell journey. Well, I love it.
[00:03:30] And I have to say, because it resonates with me currently, you know, when you talk about the gaps in healthcare, we have a son that has a rare disorder called MCAD. And the Children's Hospital, like whenever something happens, we go into the hospital, we hand them that, and he jumps everybody. Like it's, so he gets great healthcare. Yeah. But the flip side of that is where we live, there's literally a mega shortage of doctors. So it's not even like, you know, there's close.
[00:03:57] It's like, I think the waiting list is 38,000 people in a population of 150 have no doctor. But what also we see is when you go to the waiting room, or sorry, I'll correct that. When you go to a walk-in clinic, you actually have to take a number. And what they do is they allow like, say, 20 people to see that doctor that day. And if you go there and you're for 21, sorry. Yeah. And it's two or three days a week.
[00:04:22] So if he didn't make that one, and so you have to get there at like 637 for a building that only opens at nine. And this happens in the winter. So what I'm saying is that's the gap I'm seeing. And so the question I have is, after all of that, is I know there's no easy solution. I mean, it's a big ship that everybody's trying to turn. But what do you see as some of the solutions? Is it us taking more accountability ourselves? And like, you know, you're practicing as well and offering people other solutions.
[00:04:52] Do you think that is it? Like, we start looking at alternatives to the traditional system? I think it's all of the above. I think that when we stop looking to other people to fix us, and we start looking at our own lives to see what's out of balance, understand those subtle signals of our mind, our body, and our soul that tell us that we're out of balance, and then being accountable to figure out for ourselves, what do I need? That's a start.
[00:05:18] I know for me now, I teach in a nursing school. I teach a course called Holistic and Complementary Approaches to Health and Healing, because I do believe in the complementary and alternative approaches. When my son had leukemia, I used everything I learned with my other son. And I did Reiki on my son going through cancer treatment every day. I learned about visualization. I learned about kind of connecting with that higher power for guidance.
[00:05:47] So all of the things that I learned, I practiced and I saw the benefit to my son. I think that that's the beauty of complementary and alternative. Not an all this or an all that, but learning to kind of like, I needed the chemotherapy to cure my son. I needed the doctors to kind of help me. But I also needed to be empowered with my own knowledge and with my gut and trusting that to lead me on the journey too.
[00:06:15] So I think it's a combination of all and a combination of not looking to the quick fixes, but recognizing that it's a lifestyle thing. We have to own our health. Well, and I'll add this, and please know when I say this disclaimer, it's not me sort of trying to attack the existing system. I just think it's acknowledging where there's gaps. But one of the things is an example that I see right now where we live.
[00:06:41] They finally made it so pharmacists can prescribe stuff and they can prescribe it. If let's say you've been on it for a while, they can prescribe it. If you're like, okay, I can't get in to see my doctor. What I found out because I just went, what I found out is they can only prescribe it once. And then you have to go back to the doctor in between. And I said, so why is that? And she said, my understanding is because they don't get paid. They get paid by that visit that you go. So if we take away, if we do all the prescriptions, they don't get paid. But the question becomes, when you're short of this many people,
[00:07:10] you're sending somebody there that doesn't need to go there. And now somebody else doesn't get in that might need that care. At what point do you look at the system and say, you know what? We're just going to let the pharmacies do the stuff if somebody's been on a medication for 10 years. You know, you still would look and see if they're stockpiling so they're not selling the stuff. But I mean, if you can tell, because you can see how long they've been. They'll tell me. They'll say, well, you still have 25 left. They literally know that. So the pharmacists, in my opinion, why not let them start prescribing stuff for the people that shouldn't be going back in? But I was told it's because somebody won't get paid.
[00:07:39] But at the same time, you don't have enough room anyway. So in theory, you're still getting your maximum amount of paid because you can't see new patients. Anyway, that's just my little one little gripe. But it's, again, not meant to attack a system. It's just questioning, could we do it a different way? Well, I think also is sometimes we're looking for that pill and that prescription to fix things when sometimes we need somebody to show us other ways. Like I think about, for example, ADHD. That is something.
[00:08:07] And again, this is my personal opinion, but I've worked with enough families to see that there are a lot of kids prescribed medications for ADHD. But it's really not a problem all the time that is fixed with a pill. It's a lifestyle. It's an environment. It's an energy situation. So I think that we need a little more education and knowledge. I know that in the U.S., a lot of the medical education, I can say this because I'm married to a surgeon and I also have a son who's pre-med.
[00:08:37] A lot of the medical education is about a pill for an ill. When we're not talking about food as medicine. We're not talking about connection and energy and balance, whether it's movement, whether it's environment. We're not looking at those things. So I think it's an education problem, not so much a funding problem.
[00:09:03] Because as I teach in my class, a lot of the health care expenditure is because we've gotten so far away from lifestyle that we now have chronic illness that is costing a lot of money and that is requiring a lot of medication. And that's what drives up health care. So agree. I'm going to ask you the unofficial question and then ask you as well, since we have one minute to share any advice you have or closing words, we'll say.
[00:09:31] And we were at 111 when you finished that question, which I thought was wild. But I'm going to ask you, can you tell us how we can learn more, Jennifer, about you, like where we can follow you, all that kind of stuff? And feel free to share any sort of last thought or parting thoughts. Sure. Well, you can follow me at Jennifer Rentolo, W-R-E-N, Tolo. That's my website. That's my website. Or on Instagram at Jennifer Wren, Tolo. Yes, it rhymes.
[00:09:55] And my parting thought is really that we need to stop looking outside of ourselves for answers. And we need to start looking inside of us and trusting our own wisdom, that connection to guide us. And we need to start owning our choices and recognizing that our greatest power is in our choice. And that choice can help us or it can harm us. And it's only you that makes that choice. Amazing.
[00:10:25] Well, Jen Jennifer Tolo. I was going to say, I was going to say Jen Jennifer Tolo. Yeah. Jen Jennifer Tolo. Thank you so much. It's been an absolute pleasure to be continued. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Literally for the second. You do good. Yeah. Thank you.
[00:12:04] This podcast is a part of the C-Suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c-suiteradio.com. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.