Tom (00:01.45)
All right, welcome everybody back to the show. Today we have a very special guest. Her name is Grace Buffa. She is a national board certified health and wellness coach. She's an inspirational speaker as well as an author. She's a registered yoga teacher, a Reiki practitioner. She's also a licensed physical therapist and a therapist assistant. And she's founder of Life Journey Coaching.
So Grace, thanks so much for being on our show today.
Grace Buffa (00:33.027)
Thank you so much, Dr. Ranchi, for having me here today. It was really quite an honor and a privilege.
Tom (00:39.266)
Thank you, thank you. I'm trying to work on the honor. Sometimes, some days it's a little rough, but I try and keep it up. So the first thing I kind of wanted to talk about was a lot of people will experience an event that causes them to seek out help or to change the way their life is going. And what I was wondering was, there's something in your life that
Grace Buffa (00:47.116)
Hahaha!
Tom (01:08.71)
you experience to make you go down the path of being a health and wellness coach.
Grace Buffa (01:15.799)
Yeah, absolutely. There had been several as I look back on my life and I think in combination from, I'll start from in my 20s, I had a child and you know I had worked in
busy physical therapy outpatient clinic and made that transition to a stay-at-home mom. That was the plan that my husband and I had always had. And, you know, when I had that transition, I realized that something was missing. I was not as happy as I used to be, even though I had a great life going on, great husband, he was a great father, child is healthy. So why do I have these
Tom (02:00.622)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (02:04.673)
figure this out for myself and I thought if I can get out of the house a little bit do something to continue to help people then maybe that would help and so I had
remembered that I'd done yoga quite a few years prior to that and I really enjoyed it and I thought well Maybe I can teach a teach yoga while I stay at home and it would be a good Thing that I can do while my husband's home and I can leave, you know, maybe in the evening time So that's what I did and that journey transformed my life From
you know, not feeling really good about myself. I was I had an eating disorder and yoga kind of changed all that. I was being fulfilled in ways that I didn't realize I was hungry for. And I was able to now heal people from the inside out and not so much, you know, yes, their bodies, but really now I was getting to, you know, their mental health as well, being in that community. And that really helped lift me up in that way.
Tom (02:43.903)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (03:10.933)
And then continuing on, there had been things that had happened to me. When I was younger, I had an emergency room visit because I had an allergy to hazelnut, I didn't realize. And that was super scary, you know? And I, it's a super, yeah, exactly. And I thought...
Tom (03:24.258)
Oh yeah. That's a surprise, isn't it? Ha ha. Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (03:31.895)
I never want to wake up one day and have that surprise again, whether it be a heart attack or a stroke or something in that realm. And when I noticed that my husband was suffering from cholesterol issues and, you know.
Tom (03:40.92)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (03:47.187)
things in that nature. I thought, why is this happening? He's so young. And so it was my journey to understand how can we live a long life, healthy life, and not, you know, have to, what's the underlying things that we need to do? And, you know, when people started asking me what I was doing, how I stay healthy, and what I eat, and how I move, I was like, man, I really love that. I love helping people in that way. And I love how the mind, body, spirit go together to
Tom (04:03.323)
Right, right.
Grace Buffa (04:17.461)
You know create that wellness a health and wellness. So yeah, that's kind of where I found myself today
Tom (04:21.672)
Mm-hmm.
Good, good, good. So you kind of were, it sounds like to me, you're saying that maybe you were lacking a little bit of purpose in your life and you went out and sought that again. And it sounds like you used your previous experiences to figure out that, oh, I like doing this thing. And so you're going to explore it a little bit more.
Grace Buffa (04:38.703)
Yes, I believe so.
Grace Buffa (04:51.727)
Yes, absolutely. Yep, that's exactly what happened.
Tom (04:55.43)
And I think that idea of exploring is really crucial for some people. I think that they may not do it as much and that they, you know, once they figure out, oh, if I can just go explore a little bit and I won't invest a whole lot, I can just invest a little bit and see if I still like it or if I can venture on to maybe become, you know, an instructor like yourself. And do you ever find that
when you're coaching somebody, are you sometimes coaching that out of them, meaning that this idea that they can go and explore other things?
Grace Buffa (05:37.275)
Yeah, sometimes that does happen because when you are, you know, people will come to me for say weight loss or something in that nature and when you start digging deep and understanding that whether you have, you know, an eating disorder that you have anorexia or bulimia or if you are overweight it's always some kind of emotional component. There's something lacking. There's somewhere that you're not really fully loving and understanding yourself and so that always does go
Tom (06:00.014)
Hmm.
Grace Buffa (06:07.909)
trail and people do discover other things about themselves when they start to uncover these events in life that have been traumatic for them that they didn't even realize that's affecting who they are today.
Tom (06:21.95)
Yeah, they tend to miss that, oh, this thing happened and it was actually very serious to myself. And I kind of, maybe I stopped loving myself as much, or I let that kind of inner critic come out and push me into this other area and make me do these certain things that aren't really good for my health. And I find that a lot too, that people aren't either believing in themselves or loving themselves enough.
to actually get to that next stage of feeling better or overcome this, like you're saying, an eating disorder like anorexia, which is very, pretty damaging to them. And it's more like you're saying an emotional aspect of it. And I know in mindfulness, when I teach that, the idea is that it's actually called heartfulness. So it's actually like that.
Grace Buffa (07:03.699)
Great.
Grace Buffa (07:08.783)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (07:18.941)
Yeah.
Tom (07:21.002)
You know, it's your heart that you're going after to fix. And then that everything kind of stems from there a little bit. Do you kind of run into that as well?
Grace Buffa (07:25.296)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (07:33.499)
I agree. I love what you're saying because that is 100% true. There's that heart centered, yeah, you're talking about mindfulness and there is that energy that comes from there. And when people don't connect with that part of themselves, they're missing so much and they're missing being connected to everything else around them and people around them.
Tom (07:43.31)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (07:55.902)
Yeah, yeah, definitely. And that connected us with other people and kind of realizing that they're, like it's a bigger part of a bigger whole. And a lot of times they self-isolate. I think especially during the recent COVID epidemic, a lot of people were just isolating themselves and losing that social component that's really, really important for them.
Grace Buffa (08:24.491)
I agree.
Tom (08:26.182)
So do you ever run into somebody, I'm trying to think of different barriers to coaching or maybe change a little bit. I watched some of your testimonials on your website which are really fantastic. There's a lot of good explanation into the value they get from you. And I think one of them said that the way you teach isn't as rigid as he thought it would be.
Grace Buffa (08:39.744)
Oh, thank you.
Tom (08:57.527)
And, you know, can you like kind of expound on that just a little bit?
Grace Buffa (09:03.754)
Yes, when...
you know, when they just, when people meet me and they know my lifestyle, they, you know, they think that they're in, like I'm judging or that, you know, they have to do what I'm doing and it's like, no, we are not the same person. This is a, you know, non-judgment-free zone. Life should be lived. You know, there's 80 percent, yes, make those good choices. Try to eat as clean as you can, but there's 20 percent of life that we need to live. We're going to go to birthday parties.
Tom (09:13.399)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (09:34.745)
There's going to be cake and ice cream. It's going to be okay, you know, but it's what you do the majority of the time. And when you give somebody the control to say, what would you like to do today? How can we, how can we help you eat a little bit cleaner, taking the things that you love that might not be so healthy and making them into a healthy version that you really enjoy better?
Tom (09:38.176)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (09:58.811)
And when you give people that control to say, I'm not telling you what to do, then they feel more free to make those choices and they use their own motivation and their own personal strengths to start that journey and they feel empowered.
Tom (10:16.994)
Yeah, yeah, and can you kind of give an example where you start with somebody? Like what would be some typical questions? Cause I feel like it's the way you kind of teach or the way you talk to them, maybe more like the like Socratic method where you're asking them questions and getting them to think about who they are and actually what their own goals are. Is that kind of?
along the right path.
Grace Buffa (10:48.307)
Yeah, when we start, there is a lot of questions. It's a questionnaire of how do you like to be coached? How do you learn? What are those best methods? What would you like to start with? They have three or four options. If it's weight loss, then say, those questions are, would you like to cut 50 calories off the top? Or would you like to add more vegetables in?
Tom (11:08.692)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (11:18.321)
you know, there's like all these different options are like, wow, I didn't realize there is options that I can do and not just, you know, taking away. It's that changing of being deprived, that deprivation mindset to abundance mindset. What is it that I can have? And is that mindset shift? And that's when I ask the questions, it's giving them the power to understand, you know, hey, what do you value in your life? What...
Tom (11:31.63)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (11:47.387)
what do you find that you want to put into your life on a daily? Like we're not going to do things in our day if we don't find that they are necessary and that they're a value to what we need and have. So a lot of people, you know, they're like, you know, I want to be around for my grandchildren. I want to be able to play with them on the floor. I'd like to be, you know...
Tom (12:00.81)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (12:11.523)
like live preventative health. I don't want to you know grow old and have some kind of you know they want to take care of themselves all the time. So it's you know what do they value in life and that's where you use their own motivations and then you know pointing out strengths to them. A lot of people don't know what their strengths are because they we always look at what's not going right what we do wrong all the time. So you know I can I can really see people and say you
Tom (12:20.559)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (12:37.391)
Right, right.
Grace Buffa (12:41.577)
you've told me so far you really are resilient did you do you feel that do you realize that and they're like no i don't think so i go well you just told me that you did x y and z and that's very hard for people to accomplish and they're like oh yeah i guess that's right so trying to understand like what your strengths are and bring those strengths into your motivations and how we persevere towards
Tom (12:51.675)
Yeah, yeah. Yep.
Grace Buffa (13:04.483)
you know, those blocks, sometimes we have to navigate those, you know, those setbacks. And how do we push through those setbacks without being discouraged?
Tom (13:12.244)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (13:15.774)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's very interesting you point out the strengths of somebody because oftentimes, you know, they don't see it. Like they really don't see that, oh, I'm very diligent about doing things. I've actually accomplished all these things in the past, yet when it comes to my health, I don't believe in myself. And...
Grace Buffa (13:39.419)
Yes, right.
Tom (13:41.294)
And it's such a, sometimes it's such a surprise, isn't it? That they aren't aware that they have these strengths that, and sometimes it takes another person to look at them and kind of just feed it back to them and say, hey, this is actually how you are, and you can actually move forward on these things, which is really interesting.
Grace Buffa (14:03.431)
Yes.
Tom (14:08.691)
It's interesting how we're set up like that, in other words.
Grace Buffa (14:11.927)
It's true and we need people around us to do that and maybe you know maybe our parents grew up in a different way that they didn't realize that they needed to encourage us or motivate us in a certain way to see those gifts in us. And when I found you know people around me that loved and supported me and said you know what I see this in you, that's what really helped me to like grow into the person I am today because I didn't see that
Tom (14:27.213)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (14:41.981)
when I'm helping other people and they don't have this kind of support I said listen I see you I see these things in you and I believe in you and just having that people are just like oh wow maybe I can do this.
Tom (14:50.506)
Yeah, yeah.
Tom (14:56.018)
Yeah, yeah, and so, you know, I really believe in coaching because it actually helped me when I was younger. So I didn't really have a father figure when I was growing up. And so it was very interesting. I actually searched for ways to do things online. And...
It was kind of funny because the way I found it was a coach online, very long time ago, like 20 something years ago, right? Cause I'm ancient. And so I found a guy and what he did was he is very smart. He put it under the guise of how do you pick up women, right? And when you're young, you're like, oh, that's what I gotta do that. And so, but what he did was in the middle,
Grace Buffa (15:27.015)
Wow.
Grace Buffa (15:43.324)
Yeah.
Tom (15:46.57)
he actually brought in all of these experts. And so he said, he was like, look, you gotta have good, strong characteristics and traits and habits. And so he would bring in like a doctor, a nutritionist. And so you would see what their habits are and then learn from those things. And I think it was so valuable that, you know, that there was a coach kind of like that in my life.
Grace Buffa (16:06.863)
Yeah, yeah.
Tom (16:16.61)
to drive me to do the things that create lasting happiness, right? And it's one of the reasons why I really believe in coaching. And I think it's one of the things that everybody should have. And I think we kind of lose it after we get out of, maybe we didn't have in high school, like some type of coach or music teacher or counselor that helps us there, but then we become an adult, there's nobody really.
Grace Buffa (16:39.699)
Right.
Tom (16:44.79)
Like unless you actively go and search for somebody, you oftentimes are just stuck in your life there.
Grace Buffa (16:53.379)
Yes, I agree. I agree. It is super important and it's so new, you know, coaching and like, especially when you're looking for it. I mean, that was it was unheard of, honestly. So it's starting to get more popular and out there. But yeah, and then it's tough to figure out who, you know, who is, you know, who's going to help you the best.
Tom (17:01.634)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Tom (17:16.454)
Yeah, and I think it really, it's such a good way to rapidly change. You can read all kinds of books and listen to audio things, but if you have somebody in front of you, it will shave off years of studying and trying to figure all these things out. If they can just take you and show you, this is how you can live a better life and feel better about yourself.
Grace Buffa (17:46.447)
I agree, I agree. Sometimes we just can't, we have those blinders on, and we can't see past them, and that person is able to give us a different perspective on what we can do. There's things that we can do outside of the box. We're like, oh my gosh, I didn't even realize that. I didn't even know that was an option. And it's that different perspective that helps.
Tom (18:05.103)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Tom (18:12.018)
Yeah, and I know I keep going back to your testimony and it was on your website, but one of the gentlemen that was there, he was like, I've read things for years and I've watched things for years. But then when he finally met you, he was like, oh, this is actually what I needed to do long time ago to figure things out, which is really, I mean, really, really cool. And, oh, go ahead.
Grace Buffa (18:39.971)
No, no, it's we always know what to do. You know, we just sometimes we're not sure how to implement the right way or It's it's like wow, that's I knew that but I didn't realize I could do it in this fashion Or I always thought I had to do it in this order but no, that's not true I can do this in a different way and that way worked instead of the way that they were doing it and
Tom (18:43.862)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (19:03.735)
yeah, they have that different perspective that it's their choice and not me telling them, you know, what to do. So.
Tom (19:11.706)
Yeah, yeah, and that's very interesting because as a doctor, I have to balance that out too. Like I can't always be the expert like telling them what to do. It doesn't work very well at all. It works well if they're dying, you know, like they're in the hospital or in the ER and they're dying. Like that's when I gotta be the expert. But in the clinic in general.
Grace Buffa (19:28.756)
You're right.
Grace Buffa (19:33.569)
Yeah.
Tom (19:37.751)
It's as if I have to be like what you're doing, as like a little bit of a coach, and then ask them questions to bring it out of them. And yeah, go ahead, yeah.
Grace Buffa (19:47.355)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (19:51.299)
No, and that's why I was, I love your style of practice because you are able to take.
you know, time with your patient to ask those questions and to navigate where they wanna go and understand them and see them fully. Whereas, you know, maybe in another doctor's office, there is just so fast pace and they don't have that time with the patient per se. So they just have to directly tell them what to do. And that's why a lot of people are still sick. And because the doctor isn't able to take that time to understand and coach them.
Tom (20:02.874)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (20:21.811)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (20:28.909)
I just love that you do that and that's why I gravitated towards you as well.
Tom (20:36.39)
Yeah, yeah, and I know exactly what you're talking about. I used to have those 15 minute appointments with patients before and there is no way, like no way you can teach them any lifestyle medicine. And that's why doctors prescribe so much too. And because they just don't have time to actually teach those things because the next patient is already there, right?
Grace Buffa (20:54.557)
Right.
Grace Buffa (21:04.412)
Yeah.
Tom (21:06.242)
And it's one of the reasons why I found the American College of Lifestyle Medicine. And that's the group of, it was started by, I think, internal medicine doctors and a cardiologist as well. And they actually recommend doctors send people to a coach. Like that's one of their like strong recommendations is like,
Grace Buffa (21:28.563)
Wow.
Tom (21:32.618)
Hey, you guys, as a doctor, you should be sending them to a coach if things don't work out very well for them. It's like three to six months down the road and they haven't accomplished any of their goals. And so they actually say, hey, you need to send them to somebody who can help them outside of your practice. And it's very interesting as a doctor, you're like, well, I don't wanna lose that control, right?
but that's my own thoughts coming up, right? And kind of blocking that idea that coaching might work, but in fact, it works extremely well. And people have great success with it as you know very well. So I heard that you work with other doctors, right? You had told me that as well.
Grace Buffa (22:28.047)
Yes, yes. Cardiologist, chiropractor that owns a wellness center as well. And yeah, I love it. I love the, you know, just having the mindset that you have and these other integrative doctors have that it's a whole body approach and you can't just do, you know, fix the symptom.
Grace Buffa (22:57.621)
with people like that and to help people in that capacity.
Tom (23:02.314)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. So can you tell me some of the, I guess, success stories that you've had with some of your clients that you've helped?
Grace Buffa (23:16.539)
Sure, yeah. Well, you had seen the one online as well. And, you know, there was a couple other people that one lady, you know, she was juggling a lot of things on her plate and this lady didn't realize that she had all these strengths either. She was raising three children and she, her husband passed away and she's still very young. She was in her thirties.
Tom (23:22.193)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (23:36.55)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (23:45.513)
end up her own business for autistic children and she had two autistic children herself as well as getting her PhD degree at the same time. And she told me that her stress level was very low and I thought, what? How could that be? Right, so I said okay, you know, I didn't say anything. I just let her continue to talk and just with...
Tom (23:54.346)
Wow, yeah.
Tom (24:02.379)
Yeah, yeah, me too. I'd be like, what are you talking about? Yeah.
Tom (24:10.967)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (24:13.171)
prompting her and asking her questions. She came to me because she wanted to lose weight and feel good about herself and understand how to balance her life more of a work life integration and to be that mom, to have meal prop.
you know, and cook dinners without having to do takeout. Yeah, I mean, we took her from having, you know, this sad diet that she was giving herself and her kids. And she had really no idea. We said we're starting from scratch. She had no idea about whole foods and she didn't know what processed foods really meant. And...
Tom (24:39.215)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Tom (24:52.369)
Oh wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (24:53.123)
Yeah, so you know I took her from her really realizing her strengths, realizing that maybe she was emotionally eating at night and that she was stressed out. Understanding how you know to make quick dinners even in the midst of raising three young children and her having a you know having a business of her own you know she wasn't leaning on anybody she was trying to do everything
Tom (25:01.806)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (25:23.017)
herself. And her family around her saw that she's a strong person, they didn't offer to help her. And I said, Listen, you need help. You know, it's okay to ask for help. And so, you know, asking these questions to her and, you know, having her discover these things about herself. After a few months, she, I mean, she was very responsive to
Tom (25:32.443)
Oh, yeah.
Grace Buffa (25:47.591)
coaching. She was very open-minded. We understood how she learned. She really needed to do the research when we talked about processed foods. She's like, well, you know, maybe...
Tom (25:49.304)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (25:59.183)
I says, you know, if you're open to it, I go, you should think about researching a little bit more on what that means. And, and, uh, you know, I gave her a couple links. She looked at a couple links and, you know, it was, uh, her motivations took her in that direction. Um, she wanted to make sure that her kids had a mom too, because they didn't have a dad anymore. So she had, she had very strong motivations and yeah, she, she ended up losing more weight than she thought that she could.
Tom (26:03.809)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (26:19.598)
Oh yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (26:31.5)
pre-pregnancy, even closer to high school weight in her 20s, from her 20s. And she never thought.
Tom (26:36.686)
Oh yeah, yeah. I heard that's a goal for a lot of people. Every time they come into my office, I wanna look like I did in high school, so.
Grace Buffa (26:42.095)
Yeah. And it's like, well, we have to understand, you know, we're in our 40s or 50s. And sometimes, you know, our body has changed and we have to accept that. But of course, why can't we feel good in our bodies and have that balance? So, yeah. Yeah. And she found that out and she found strengths in her that she didn't realize she had. So it was very.
Tom (26:52.086)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Tom (27:02.995)
Yeah, you know.
Grace Buffa (27:10.24)
It was amazing to watch her grow in that way.
Tom (27:13.682)
That's an amazing story because a lot of people, I mean, that's a dream for a lot of people is to actually be at that level one of that weight. I mean, that's just kind of a number there, but then how they feel when they get there and then that journey of learning all of those things in the process that will sustain them over time as they get older. And
Grace Buffa (27:20.304)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (27:36.368)
Right.
Grace Buffa (27:41.898)
Yeah.
Tom (27:43.178)
Yeah, it's, and I think a lot of people don't realize that it's actually usually small changes that they have to do. It's not as big as our brain makes it out to be. I think there's a lot of, in mindfulness, I'll teach like there's a lot of catastrophizing about the future. If I'm gonna fail or I'm gonna have to make too big of a change to actually change myself.
Grace Buffa (27:51.773)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (28:03.995)
Mm.
Tom (28:11.886)
Or maybe in her case she was like, well I'm gonna take away from my kids, oops, to actually make changes like that. So I think that that's at least what I face in my clinic. Is that something you kind of see as well?
Grace Buffa (28:21.327)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (28:34.175)
Yeah, so you got a lot in there. It's, you know, feeling guilty about doing time for yourself, taking time for yourself, feeling, you know, I've already I've tried to lose weight before and I gained it right back. So they're feeling that it's almost like shame, you know, that they feel like they can't do it. They always fail at it. And so there's that mind mindset piece of it, too. I've done this before. How is this going to be different? How can you tell me to be different? It's not going to this.
Tom (28:40.758)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (28:52.939)
Mmm.
Grace Buffa (29:04.009)
it's not going to work for me. So it's, there's a lot in there. Yeah, definitely. Yes, I definitely see that.
Tom (29:09.562)
Yeah. And do you, you know, for me, I only have so much time with my patients, but when I was talking with you before, it seems like you have the ability to be with people more often. And I think those touch points really matter.
Grace Buffa (29:29.455)
Yeah, I definitely see them once a week, either in person or on Zoom, depending on where they're located at. I send a text out to them every week, some kind of inspirational...
quote and to see how they're doing and if they need any kind of extra support throughout that week. So they do get some touch points in there as well. And you know, I send out blogs and email campaigns to all my lists. So you know, they always get that too in between. Yeah.
Tom (30:01.218)
Oh, nice. Yeah, that's really good. Yeah, I've thought about doing that myself. Like what medical expertise can I send out? And and I also know I also noticed that on Facebook, you give some talks, is it is that right? Or like you I know you had an event coming up, I think.
Grace Buffa (30:08.559)
Yeah. Yes.
Grace Buffa (30:24.627)
I had an event a few weeks ago and I spoke to a large, ScanWayne is about 50 people or so, which is I think an organization.
Tom (30:27.586)
Hmm.
Grace Buffa (30:36.219)
that helps families kind of come back from some kind of traumatic experience or children that were raised in an environment that is not so conducive to growing up and that they needed extra support. Maybe they had some traumas or abuse or something like that. So it's these group of people that help elderly all the way to children. And I did a talk on work life balance. Those people that they sometimes talk to are that sandwich generation where they
Tom (30:58.374)
Oh.
Grace Buffa (31:06.253)
have children that they're taking care of but they also have elderly parents that they're taking care of. So when do they have time to take care of themselves? How do they balance that out? And that's what that talk was all about. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Tom (31:08.339)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (31:16.638)
Right.
Oh, wow, that's really nice. And switching up a little bit, when you had answered some of my questions on the initial podcast survey, you said that you really like having deep conversations with your two children. And I try and do that with my three and a half year old. It doesn't go very far, but
Grace Buffa (31:47.219)
That's good though.
Tom (31:48.686)
Yeah, it's probably good, you know. And so how old are your children and then what do you talk with them about?
Grace Buffa (31:51.251)
I'm gonna go.
Grace Buffa (31:58.831)
So I have an 18 year old that's just trans kind of going to Oakland University. So he's kind of making that transition from high school to university and you know really more adulthood. And then I have a 12 year old son as well and you know he's different. He's got a different outlook. He's more he could be more an avid anxious child. He's had some experiences.
Tom (32:04.872)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (32:22.42)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (32:28.085)
that brought anxiety out in him. Whereas my older one wasn't really like that. He, you know, was just very content and happy, not worried about stuff. So the conversations are both different. My younger one had an event a few years ago that he had an accident on a scooter. He felt he was using a ramp to go up on a scooter, the ones that you push and you pull onto the handle.
Tom (32:58.055)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (32:58.105)
and he fell on his face. So he yeah he broke his two front teeth and needed like a year worth of you know dental work and all kinds of root canals in the two front teeth. So it was it was rough but that it yeah absolutely and he had you know a bad effect the last the last time he had.
Tom (33:01.563)
Oh no, yeah.
Oh.
Tom (33:09.602)
dental work, yeah.
Tom (33:14.306)
Oh man, that's traumatic. Yeah.
Grace Buffa (33:25.227)
you know, they had to go twice to the to get root to a process for the root canal is two times. The second visit for some reason anesthesia or something happened and he threw open the car and he thought
Tom (33:31.453)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (33:38.692)
Oh yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (33:40.079)
He thought, man, if I throw up in a car like this so fast, I didn't realize it was coming. What if that happens at school? People are going to make fun of me. Like he had all these different things going on. So the conversations for him are, you know, and I got him to actually be more mindful, understand why he.
Tom (33:48.384)
Oh yeah.
Tom (33:59.468)
Oh good.
Grace Buffa (34:00.451)
you know gets that way. What about school? Can we locate the trash cans in the classroom? So you know if you feel like you have to throw up you can just you know. So setting up these different ways for him to look at things and then really understanding, hey what did you do well today? Like you're doing amazing. Like you know all these so.
Tom (34:06.318)
Right, right. Exactly. If you gotta go, it's over there. Yeah.
Tom (34:19.197)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (34:25.114)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (34:26.639)
to understand all his positives. He, and we still have that conversation today every night. What went well today? What were your best things that happened to you? Did you have any times that you were worried today? And so we go through that. And then the older, yeah.
Tom (34:39.209)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (34:43.286)
That's that's really good. Yeah, that's like I mean to have a mom who can do that. It's like a treasure trove, right? Like, you know, he'll look back and he'll go. Oh yeah, she was pretty good.
Grace Buffa (34:56.236)
I was, I'm, I'm blessed that I, you know, I wish that I had these skills when my oldest was younger. And, you know, but it is what it is that we do it now. And I check in with him. He's, you know, he had, you know,
Tom (35:03.143)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (35:07.808)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (35:11.803)
He's gone through some things over his senior year summer and that I was like, hey, are you doing emotionally okay? And I feel like I try to have an open dialogue where he feels comfortable telling me things. And so every night I take time with each of them to see how they're doing, how their day is. And we kind of dig a little deep and...
Tom (35:27.33)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (35:36.591)
And I really, I feel that's, if I can walk away with one thing I did well that day, at least I can say I've connected with my kids. That's my most important, you know, thing.
Tom (35:46.482)
Yeah, yeah, and that is probably one of the most important things is to connect with your kids and people in general. You know, having connection is by far one of the, I think, greatest happiness factors. So like if you look at the United Nations happiness report, that's one of the main factors is saying, you know, I was able to.
teach people and connect with them. It wasn't that I owned a Ferrari, it was that I could talk with people and teach them. But that's really, I mean, really good. And I'm sure they're gonna grow up great with you.
Grace Buffa (36:25.213)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (36:29.331)
Thanks for watching!
Grace Buffa (36:32.927)
Right? Fingers crossed. But same with you, same with you. Like for you to know the mind, like all that mindfulness and the way that your out view on life is and to have a child that's young like that and that you are connecting, even though it's for, you know, five minutes. I mean, three years old, their attention span isn't as much as a 12 or 18 year old. But, you know, she's going to love that time with you and she's going to look forward to that. And it's just going to continue to grow. So that's amazing.
Tom (36:34.554)
Yeah, exactly.
Tom (36:46.194)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (36:55.23)
Yeah, yeah.
Tom (37:02.543)
Yeah, yeah. And, you know, he's a little trying sometimes. And, you know, I have to remember that, hey, he's only three years old and there's not much, you know, that's gonna be his time span, you know? And he's gonna have periods where he's just gonna ignore me and do what he wants. And I'm like, all right. And I'm like, I'm gonna do the same thing.
Grace Buffa (37:07.798)
I'm sorry.
Grace Buffa (37:12.434)
Right.
Grace Buffa (37:17.851)
Yes, exactly.
Grace Buffa (37:31.017)
Yeah, right.
Tom (37:32.906)
Yeah, yeah, but I try to have some conversations with him and bring up how he was feeling and how he acted in a certain way and let him think about that. And I think it's very important to talk to our children when either they have a certain breakdown or a certain temper tantrum,
Grace Buffa (37:49.212)
Yes.
Tom (38:00.718)
talk with them about it and really kind of let them see like, oh, it's okay that those things happen sometimes and I can go and talk to my parents when it actually does happen. I think it's really important to do that for them.
Grace Buffa (38:13.788)
Yes.
I agree you're laying down some awesome foundation. Yes.
Tom (38:21.102)
Yeah, yeah, giving it a shot, right? Like, um, so you, you told me that, um, you work with a cardiologist and you do, um, some type of genetic testing. I think it's called Cardia X. Is that right? And yeah, tell me a little bit about that.
Grace Buffa (38:39.887)
Yeah, yeah, cardiac, yes.
Grace Buffa (38:44.955)
So that is, it's a simple test that we can, once you order it, it comes in a nice little box and it has a tube in it that you spit your saliva in. And then it comes with a prepaid fax, like bag that you stick it in and it gets overnighted back to the lab. And when it gets back to the lab, the markers that we're looking for are things that are blood pressure markers,
cholesterol, the family cholesterol history in there, you know. Also Alzheimer's, there's dementia markers. Also we have the heart attack gene is in there. Some mental things that are going on like COMT is more...
Tom (39:19.633)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (39:28.701)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (39:33.087)
of a gene that helps you process adrenaline. So if you're not processing the adrenaline correctly, if you get upset and those fight or flight is going off, sometimes it's hard for us to relax and come down from that. It takes a long time and having that filter around in the body without getting out fast enough, wreaks havoc on, you know, you can experience high blood pressure at that time. Maybe you experience being angry faster
Tom (39:39.653)
Oh, interesting.
Tom (39:46.237)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (39:59.239)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (40:02.741)
Thanks for watching!
you know, not managing your stress correctly, but it could be just because that chemical is still lingering on in the body. So we can understand these things when they get that they have this family history, this genetic history, doesn't mean that it's going to happen to you. It means there's a possibility if we don't navigate the proper lifestyle. And that's why they do the tests. So they can understand what lifestyle changes can they make so they don't turn on quote unquote the gene and that they can keep it
Tom (40:23.795)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (40:33.073)
you know, not so it's not predominant in their in their body.
Tom (40:40.358)
Yeah, it's not being expressed like the rest of their genes. And I think what you're touching on is the epigenetics where we can activate our genes. And I think that a lot of people don't know that. And I see it, the reason why I say this is because when they come into my clinic, they will say, well, doc, that's just how I am. And that's my family genetics. And then we'll have the conversation about how you can actually activate these genes.
Grace Buffa (40:42.54)
Rice Express.
Grace Buffa (40:49.243)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (40:52.976)
Yes.
Tom (41:10.274)
or suppress them through your lifestyle changes. And then a light kind of goes off in their head and they're like, whoa, I never, nobody's ever told me that. And I think it's really cool that you can actually order this test and then show them that it's there.
Grace Buffa (41:14.116)
Exactly.
Grace Buffa (41:22.14)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (41:29.111)
Yeah, exactly. And I believe it's about 100% accuracy. It's somewhere in that range. Yeah, it's very high. So yeah, I did it.
Tom (41:35.13)
Oh nice. Nice.
That's really good.
Grace Buffa (41:40.971)
It is, it's amazing. It really is from just doing, just spitting. And I had performed it on myself and quite, I can understand it. My dad has uncles that had heart disease, they died of heart attacks. My grandfather had a heart attack, he had open heart surgery. My aunt, my dad hasn't had any of that, but he's had issues with
Tom (41:47.134)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (41:59.438)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (42:10.865)
heart maybe heart irregularity, like an irregular heartbeat or something, but he hasn't had, thank God he hasn't had anything. He understands the preventative health and food is medicine, he gets all that. So I'm very blessed that he gets that. So it's interesting when I saw my panel, I said, oh yeah, I got all four copies of the heart attack gene, that makes sense.
Tom (42:16.398)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (42:24.58)
Oh good, yeah.
Tom (42:29.102)
Yes, uh-huh. Mm-hmm.
Tom (42:39.247)
Oh wow, yeah.
Grace Buffa (42:39.523)
you know, but it's not scary for me because I know how to navigate that. I feel good about what I do.
Tom (42:46.03)
Yeah, yeah. And I think there's a, and I kind of looked at the test online and it gives you back like ways to improve yourself as well. I think through, you know, lifestyle changes and nutrition and exercise and all that stuff. So that was kind of cool to see. It wasn't just like a blanket statement of, well, your clash file is gonna be high, you know, good luck. It actually gave you some good recommendations, I think, in there.
Grace Buffa (43:02.736)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (43:10.898)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (43:16.299)
I thought so too, yeah, it is pretty good. If you didn't want to have somebody read it, you could just look at it and be like, okay. But I do take it another notch further from what...
Tom (43:27.424)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (43:28.335)
you know, from what it is that it says on there. Again, like giving them some coaching around what it is that they eat, and we kind of talk about swap outs or whatever it is, and making them think a little bit deeper than just having the paper giving them. Yeah, absolutely, really good recommendations, but yeah, taking another step a little bit deeper when they have that consultation with me.
Tom (43:51.282)
Yeah, yeah, and it was interesting. They also had certain medications on there that were like, that I would prescribe, you know, that I saw, it's like, oh wow, they actually include that in there. That was interesting. And so, but yeah, that was really cool. And I know that you had also said that you feel, I'm just gonna read it here, you feel strongly that nutrition, movement, stress management, and sleep
Grace Buffa (43:59.355)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (44:03.157)
It is.
Tom (44:21.102)
play a huge role in longevity and quality of life. And I think that's, you know, it's profound in the sense that a lot of our current media and you know, pharmacological approach to things, you know, really don't touch on that at all. And you bring that in. I mean, it's a broad set of topics to talk about.
Grace Buffa (44:27.067)
Yes.
Tom (44:51.028)
I think.
Grace Buffa (44:51.463)
Yeah.
Yeah, I do. And I feel like when you understand what each of them brings to the table, then you can understand your body a little bit better and understand, you know, gosh, what, you know, how do I feel my way through this? Am I feeling stressed? Do I need to do some kind of self-care here? Or, you know, is my food, what am I eating? You know, like I look at it like, okay, if I can say that this food that I'm eating is actually doing something
Tom (45:09.66)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (45:22.261)
healing in my body or is it you know is it creating illness or is it creating disease which way is it so when people understand and have that different perspective then they can really understand the better picture where as you know I mean a lot of people they well I won't I won't say too much about social or you know like news and whatnot but yeah we want to educate people and I feel like that's what you want to do too you really want to
Tom (45:28.362)
Yeah.
Tom (45:41.536)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (45:52.041)
to understand what it really takes to live a higher quality of life. Because just by putting a band-aid on something is eventually it doesn't prevent heart. Like if you do cholesterol medication, we know like it's not gonna prevent a heart attack. It's not gonna prevent anything, a stroke. But it could, you know, it is there for a reason if you really need it. Some people have, you know, the genetic components where their body just continues to produce that cholesterol and you do need something to help back.
Tom (46:08.184)
Yeah.
Tom (46:13.851)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (46:20.072)
Yeah, yeah.
Grace Buffa (46:22.201)
that but to be get have it give out all the time just because your number is a little elevated you know it's I mean I feel I know that there's a better way and I know you know that too I mean of course modern medicine like you know the pharmacological industry yeah there is thank God we have so certain things like that we do need those things but how often is it just given so you know rampantly like just immediately
Tom (46:31.191)
Mm-hmm. There's a better way.
Tom (46:41.415)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (46:50.638)
Right, right. Yeah. And that's what I tell people, you know, that even though I'm gonna put you on this medication, as long as they don't have something like familiar hypercholesterolemia, where it's just, I mean, that's what their body does. You know, I tell them, hey, we're gonna start this medication, and then we're gonna also focus on the lifestyle changes that to where you get then get off that medication, like the goal, I mean, overriding goal is to get them off of that medication.
Grace Buffa (47:04.164)
Right.
Grace Buffa (47:11.196)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (47:14.855)
Mm-hmm.
Grace Buffa (47:19.164)
Right.
Tom (47:20.31)
by teaching them the lifestyle changes and stuff like that. And I think now I'm going to tell them, you can work on your own, or maybe you could get it done in six months with a coach. And then, you know, like if you, you know, if you feel like you have problems, you know, maybe accomplishing that, you know, let's go for the coaching approach and like really knock it out of the park and get it done.
Grace Buffa (47:24.957)
Right.
Grace Buffa (47:35.611)
Right? True.
Grace Buffa (47:50.867)
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. And, you know, thank God nowadays, we were just approved to have, if people have flexible spending accounts or health spending accounts, they're able to use that money towards coaching. That was just approved recently and we're still trying to, yeah, so it's a big, you know,
Tom (47:59.566)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (48:06.299)
Oh wow.
Grace Buffa (48:11.295)
gain on our end to help patients. You know, but we're still fighting for that code that helps insurance bill for our services. It's still a big fight that we're trying to get to.
Tom (48:16.738)
Mm-hmm.
Tom (48:24.11)
Yeah, you're right. And I know that the American College of Lifestyle Medicine is fighting that. I know that they're trying to get it pushed through because it makes so much sense. I mean, it's just point blank. It makes absolute sense to get it done. And I think we're coming back to that thing and medicine and holistic life approach where we're now we're recognizing the base
Grace Buffa (48:36.348)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (48:39.979)
Exactly.
Tom (48:53.034)
root cause or etiologies of what's going on. And I think it's really good you're coaching them to have a better life. And I mean, there's almost no other higher purpose, than teaching somebody else how to live a really, really good life. But I really, I appreciate what you're doing. And
Grace Buffa (48:56.847)
Yes.
Grace Buffa (49:20.039)
Thank you.
Tom (49:21.218)
Can you tell everybody how to get in touch with you?
Grace Buffa (49:26.083)
Absolutely. So you can find me at lifejourneycoaching.net. You can, that's all my information is on there. I am on social media as well on LinkedIn. That's just Grace Buffa. I think that is just Grace Buffa. And then my Instagram and Facebook is Grace Speaks.
Yep, Grace Buffa speaks and that's those two links. And I guess Amazon too. I mean, you can go on Amazon and my book is on there.
Tom (49:56.051)
Okay.
Tom (50:00.57)
Yeah, yeah, tell me the title of your book one more time.
Grace Buffa (50:05.063)
Losing Weight is a Spiritual Journey and it's a long title. It's a long title, but yes, if you looked up Grace Bufa Losing Weight is a Spiritual Journey, you'll be able to find it.
Tom (50:11.026)
It's highly rated from what? What's that? Ha ha.
Tom (50:22.33)
Okay, great. I'll put it down in the show notes so people don't have to remember the really long title. But that's really good. And it's, I mean, it has like five stars on Amazon. I was looking at really nice. And I think I'll refer my three year old to it. Maybe he can get through it and learn how to handle those tantrums just a little bit better.
Grace Buffa (50:28.161)
Yeah.
Grace Buffa (50:33.479)
Thank you.
Tom (50:46.486)
But I really thank you for coming on the podcast. It was fantastic talking with you. And I'll be sure and definitely refer people to your way. And maybe we can make a part two in the future.
Grace Buffa (50:51.675)
Thank you. Same here.
Grace Buffa (51:02.555)
That would be awesome. Thank you so much for having me. This has been amazing!
Tom (51:06.526)
Yeah, thank you so much, Grace. All right.
Tom (51:13.198)
Let's see here.