E75: The Social Domain of Exploring

Katie: Welcome to the 7 Domains of Exploring. Today we're diving into the social domain. And I have to say, I've been really loving this series. It's been so much fun.

So one of my heroes, Mark Twain, once said that travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. And I don't think it has to be just travel. Stepping out of our comfort zones, whether those are across oceans or just across town, being able to make new connections with people can really change our lives. So today we're telling some stories about how exploring created social connections for us.

I'm Katie Ward. I'm a professor in the College of Nursing and Women's Health Nurse Practitioner. And with me today, as always, is my co-host and partner in exploring, Dr. Kirtly Jones, who's in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology and explores reproductive endocrinology.

So the first story I wanted to share goes back 45 years in my life. I was 16 and skipping school, and I went skiing for the day. In the afternoon, I stopped for lunch. And near me in the lunch counter were these three cute boys from New Zealand, and I struck up a conversation with them. It was their accents. I mean, they were cute, but it was the accents that gave me an opening to start a conversation.

They were an odd number, and we skied together for the rest of the day. And it turned out they needed a ride down the canyon, so I ended up driving them down to the valley. And by then, I just took them home with me, as you do. We skied together for the rest of their weekend in Utah.

I remained friends with those three young men for a few years. But when they went back to New Zealand, they . . . This is back before you had the internet. They gave a piece of paper with my name and number to their friends.

And the next year, the next generation of New Zealanders came over and they looked me up and they also stayed with us. And that couple, that second generation, have been my friends for 40 years now. We don't see each other all the time, but due to social media, we've been able to stay in touch more and more actually as time has gone by.

Our children have all traveled back and forth. So my kids have gone without me to New Zealand and stayed at their house. And their kids have come without them to the United States and stayed with me. So it's gone on for generations and we continue to enjoy traveling together.

When I travel with them in New Zealand, people tag me as having an accent and wonder how it is that I possibly have these friends in New Zealand. So this all started because I skipped school and went skiing one day.

Kirtly, do you have a story where exploring started a friendship for you?

Kirtly: I gave this some thought and I would say going back to college or university where I went . . . I would say I'm not a terribly social person in college. I mean, I didn't party and I didn't drink. There had been some trauma in my family during my second year and I didn't really hang out.

Katie: And you didn't stop school like I did.

Kirtly: No, I did not. But I did make friends with two women, one was a freshman and one was a junior. They weren't my dormmates. I mean, one was sort of my dormmate, but I just reached out to them and they were interesting. And we lived together when I was a senior.

So here were these two women who weren't anything like me at all. They weren't from around here, from where I was. And they were amazingly talented and lovely women who attracted a network of men, boys really at the time, but who used to come over and just ogle them.

So here I am in our apartment with these two amazing women and these guys sitting around ogling my roommates. And through them, I met my husband and some of my very best friends that I hold dear.

Just as your web, Katie, in New Zealand, that web of friendship comes from node to node. It's like when a node makes a bunch of different connections and people who do neural connections. That's what we do socially, and that's what humans do. One friend introduces you to another, and then you have a social universe to explore.

So I'm very grateful that I said hello to these two women at different times and that we actually got along, and we roomed together, and I met my husband and his friends. Now I have dear friends all over the planet.

Katie: I think when we're thinking about exploring, often we have one destination or goal in mind. Perhaps we want to go see the Coliseum or learn to ski, or in your case, you were getting a college education. So what we're thinking about is the geology or the edifice or the history or the degree.

And I think what really connects us and what we often discover and remember is not those things, but it's the people that we meet, like you said, and sort of thinking about how that grows from one person to another person.

But the common denominator there is that you're in a new place. And when you're in that new place, your senses are open and you're open to making connection. You come in contact with people that aren't maybe like you that you make friends with and that you didn't expect. But it's those connections that expand our social network, and so that's the thing I want to explore in this episode today.

So I want to bring in our guest. Sarah Robertson is an RN and recent graduate from the University of Utah College of Nursing. Congratulations, Sarah. And she was one of the students who went with me on a global learning trip to Rwanda last year.

So these are trips that the College of Nursing is doing and they have a mission in Rwanda. We're working with the University of Rwanda there and with some hospitals. So we have objectives about what we do in Rwanda.

But one of the other things that comes out of this is this opportunity where I get a chance to see our students expand and explore the world. And Sarah was just one of many students who got to have this wonderful experience.

Katie: I wanted you to tell us a little bit about that experience on that trip, Sarah, and the connections that you made.

Sarah: Happy to. First of all, I'm just really excited to hang out with you guys. Kirtly, I feel like maybe I'm going to have to pick your brain at some point because I just started at the Utah Diabetes and Endocrinology Center.

Katie: Well, please do. I love to have my brain picked.

Sarah: It's hard to know where to start with this, Katie, because there are just so many good things to talk about. I made a couple of notes.

But it was, obviously, an incredible life-changing trip. My entire life I've always wanted to go anywhere in Africa. It's been on the list for a really long time. So just the fact that my first experience in Africa I got to be in Rwanda was pretty special.

I didn't know much about the country going in. I am a '90s baby, so I knew a little bit about the genocide, but mostly what I had grown up seeing on TV. And so I didn't have a lot of formed thoughts about what the country would be like.

But I got there and was just . . . It's always so invigorating to me to go to a new place and just experience everything. Your senses are enlivened when you're there, right? The food, the smells, the weather, everything, it just all feels kind of magical.

And if I'm guilty of one thing, it's probably seeing magic in life. And so I always really, really enjoy just exploring and seeing everything.

So, yeah, that's a long-winded way of saying that it was a fantastic trip and I got to meet so many wonderful people.

Katie: One of the things I enjoyed about traveling with you was that you have this former life as a photographer. And so Sarah brought a number of cameras with her. It was a little bit of an assignment that we asked her to take pictures and document our trip. But being a photographer gave you a unique way of engaging with people, I think.

And I'm just curious how you feel about . . . did your camera influence your interactions? It seemed like it helped break the ice. But tell me about how that is for you when you're looking through the lens.

Sarah: I have a BFA in photography that I got 10 years ago, and I've always loved the camera. But one thing I've always been really aware of is how people kind of act differently as soon as you pull out a camera. And so my goal is always to get people really comfortable with me as a person before I bring out the camera. That was interesting to do in a new culture and not kind of understanding what cultural norms were and all that.

And so one thing that I thought might be fun is I brought my instax, which is kind of just a Polaroid camera, really. You pop it out and you get an instant photo within a minute. And that was something I used to break the ice a lot.

And it worked out sometimes. It scared a couple of little kids, so that kind of backfired on me. But in general, it was a really good way to make friends. I would give them out to people just because it was kind of a fun thing.

But yeah, I was thinking through how I see the world in photography, and it's nice because sometimes if I get nervous or I'm just trying to figure out how to interact with people, I can always kind of step back and think, "How would I photograph this? What lines are happening here? How is this person looking? How could I best put them in the right light?"

And so I'm always kind of constantly thinking . . . In nursing, we use so much of, "Are you critically thinking?" But a lot in photography, I'm kind of composing everything in my mind a lot of the time. And so my view as a photographer impacted a lot of how I did it, how I interacted with people.

But one of the things I was thinking about was, when I was in college, one of my favorite photographers . . . Her name is Ruth Bernhard. One of the quotes that I just really latched on to was "If you're not interested in life, then photography has no meaning." And that just really is something I like to live by. You have to be interested in people and you have to get curious.

And so that was what I tried to lead with on this trip and, honestly, how I try and lead in my interactions with patients and just people around me. Everybody has a story and everybody has a unique perspective. Yeah, I don't know. If I get to be a witness of that or document that, then I'm just really, really grateful.

Kirtly: In the business of exploring, it was often for me, what I'm looking for is that magic moment, when something that I expected to be X turns out to be Y or leads me to Y. It's like a magic show because you're watching somebody do something, and all of a sudden something completely different happens.

And I think photography is like that. You take a photo and if you have a sensitive eye, you kind of see what you want. But then when the photo comes out, it's often something magic.

As part of being an explorer, and for me, I'm a cognitive explorer in this part of my life, when you come to that node, either socially or physically or it's a sense or it's a smell, it's a sudden onset of, "This is new. This is not what I expected." And it is the most amazingly wonderful feeling. Sometimes scary, sometimes not so wonderful, I guess, but it's where the magic happens.

Sarah: You know what? Just bouncing off of that . . . Oh, I'm getting excited, guys. Just bouncing off of that, I was really lucky in high school, my first photography class was in the dark room. It's a dying art. And my professor was very adamant about us learning the dark room. And so we would go shoot film and we'd have to turn off all the lights and develop things in the dark.

There's something really magical about you put the paper under the enlarger, you've got the red safety light on, and then you expose everything as properly as you can, and then you slip it into the developer, and then it's like by magic, this photo appears.

But in reality, the chemicals have to be right, the lighting has to be right, the exposure has to be right, all these things. To get that magic moment, there has to be just a lot of little thoughtful steps along the way. And I think that's how I like to handle my connections with people too. It's really something you have to work for, but in the end, it still feels magical.

Kirtly: Yeah, absolutely.

Katie: And I think the instamatic photos when we were in Africa, they were really fun. Honestly, people loved them. It was fun to see you right in that moment take a picture of somebody and be able to give them that picture and leave that as a gift. And I thought that was really fun to watch wherever you went with the exception of that one kid that cried.

Sarah: That one didn't go well. I think what's cool about the instax, just the Polaroid camera, is that it crosses all cultures, right? It doesn't matter if I'm in the middle of Rwanda, in Kigali, buying bananas from a lady. That was one. That was a really fun experience when I went out and I bought some bananas and then I said, "Can I take your picture?" And a lot of people are really like, "Oh, no. No, I don't . . ." And I'm like, "No, this is for you, not for me." That was something that I really liked to do, to give it to them.

But I don't know, I think there's just something that can really bring us together with photography, and especially when it's physical like that. A physical thing that you can all come together and look at and touch and feel is a pretty cool experience.

Katie: Sarah, were there any social customs or ways of connecting in Rwanda that made an impression on you?

Sarah: It was just little things, right? Sometimes the women would . . . there was just a little bit of a nod or a wink to each other, or just small little mannerisms that you were able to pick up on. It doesn't matter where you are in the world. It's always a little bit fun to just kind of get together with other women and be like, "Oh, man. This thing."

Katie: There was a thing that happened to me a lot, and I finally asked somebody about it. Generally, of the women I know, it's much more of a European greeting where you embrace and you kiss each other on the cheeks, or at least air kiss on the cheeks.

If I was being introduced to a man, he would reach out his hand to shake my hand, but he would also take his other hand and as he was raising his hand to grab mine, he'd sort of do this power grip on the arm that was about to shake my hand. So it made this sort of right angles shape with both arms.

I didn't understand it. I wasn't sure what that meant until I finally asked somebody, "What is this?" And they said, "This is an issue of respect that you do with your elders." And so it probably was not a thing that you experienced that I experienced because I was elder.

Sarah: I think you mean wise.

Katie: I didn't recognize it or acknowledge it. I didn't realize. I would sort of imitate it because I thought, "Oh, I'm supposed to shake my hand like this." So that was a fun little custom that I bumped into and it took me a minute to learn about it.

Well, Sarah, are there ways that you think this chance to explore going somewhere else in the world changed you in any way? Friendships you've made? Connections you made? What impact do you think that had on you?

Sarah: Oh, absolutely. Before we were going, you and I were chatting. You said, "This is going to impact how you practice for the rest of your career." I'm a brand-new nurse. I went back to school in my 30s, and so I was like, "Oh, intrigue. Curious what that means." And it really did. It changed the way I view so many things. It just made me realize going to Rwanda how creative healthcare can be.

One of my favorite days on the trip was we went and toured a community center. There was a midwife there named Betty. And we were just asking her questions about the birthing suite and how everything worked. There were two beds and we were like, "Wait, what happens when there are two women giving birth?" And she was like, "I just move really fast back and forth." And sometimes she has help, sometimes she doesn't.

But it was fun asking her about her postpartum hemorrhage protocol and her preeclampsia protocol. She had these little boxes and instead of . . . Oh, I'm blanking on the name right now. When someone's hemorrhaging. So tamponade? Is that the term?

Katie: Kirtly, you're the . . .

Kirtly: A Bakri balloon? You put a balloon inside?

Sarah: Yeah, Bakri. There we go. And so I just thought, "Oh, wow, look at how creative she is in approaching these problems." And I think sometimes when we have less resources, we have to be more creative.

It made me realize just how creative we can be here and just realizing that although there's a system set up, there's room to grow and be creative and think outside the box.

And it also just made me realize . . . I mean, how it impacted me . . . We are all so much more similar than we are different, I think. And it just really highlighted to me of you can go to a completely different place across the world and find friends, right? We all have so many commonalities between us.

I have two little kids. I met a lot of moms who it was sort of like, "I see you. You're tired. I'm tired. We just get each other right now."

And so I think in the long run, it just made me realize that with my patient interactions, everybody has a story and everybody has a way they see the world. And in reality, so many of us just want to be seen and heard and validated. If anything, this trip just made me realize that if I can provide that to one patient, that just really means a lot.

Katie: And I'm sure you do. I'm really excited for your career and that your career started out with this influence. It's the kind of multi-generational thing that makes me proud and it makes me enjoy what I do.

Kirtly, do you have another story about maybe a non-travel connection that happened as a result of doing something new?

Kirtly: Well, this goes back to my time at university. As I mentioned before, I took it seriously. And I thought I was going to be a biochemist, but I realized I wasn't smart enough to really understand physical chemistry. I bought the textbook. I took a look at it. I didn't understand what's going on. So I said, "Well, I need a change."

So I branched off to explore a new field at the time, which was molecular and cellular and developmental biology. And it linked me up with two men who were the . . . I guess you'd say rock stars now, but they were the high priests of the field, and they rocked my world. I'm not kidding. I became almost spiritual about the beauty of developmental biology.

These two men took me under their wing and they were internationally famous for their work they did, but they glowed with the beauty of this work. I was transformed.

And I sidetracked a little in medical school, but then came back with my career in reproductive endocrinology. I am so grateful of that sidetrack to meet people I wouldn't have met had I stayed in chemistry. And these two men who were famous, they took little kidlets like me under their wing. It was amazing and I'm grateful.

Anyway, I was curious about the origins of life and about the grand gorgeousness of the difference on the planet. And it's a deep dive and I am still diving. It's thanks to my willingness to explore something different and their willingness socially to take this little kid under their wing and transfer her to . . . Now I'm the high priestess, I guess.

But it was amazing. And when people are generous, when you explore and you meet people and they reach out, or in this case reached down or reached to see me, I am very grateful when people do that. It's wonderful.

Katie: I think we're experiencing a little bit of that. So you have a nod to your mentors, but, Kirtly, I've mentioned before on this, you've been my mentor for really all of my career. And now Sarah is one of the people that I get to mentor. So we're sitting here with three generations of people.

Kirtly: Oh, it's so lovely.

Sarah: What's so fun, Katie, is I always . . . In nursing school, I was like, "I want a mother hen. I want a seasoned nurse to just take me under her wing and just teach me the ways." And I had so many good professors and friends who really taught me so much, but I don't know, Katie, you're kind of my mother hen. So thank you.

Kirtly: Oh, Katie, good for you.

Sarah: Thank you for that.

Katie: See, here we are, unexpected connections that come from a thing that you didn't quite see coming.

So as we wrap up our discussion on the social domain, I do want to share some sobering and important research from the U.S. Surgeon General's office. We've really been talking about in different ways on this podcast. But over the last 20 years, the amount of time that we spend in social isolation has been increasing.

It's actually increased by about 24 hours a month. And time we're spending with friends has dropped by 20 hours a month. And even our companionship time that those moments we spend with the people that we love just for joy has decreased by 14 hours a month.

But they aren't just numbers. They represent missed conversations and lost connections and opportunities that have slipped away. And it's why we're talking about a loneliness epidemic.

I think what's important about the stories we've shared here today is they start with sort of being brave enough to step out and get across that connection gap and do something new and different. And that leads to a conversation and a connection, whether it's the Rwanda trip or the New Zealand skiers or that you meet your husband. These happen because someone decided not to stay in their bubble. And I think that's the thing that's really vital to our health.

Kirtly, you probably know a lot about how being in isolation or being in friendship is important for women.

Kirtly: Oh, especially, because women's superpower is their fluency with language and their social bonds with mothers and sisters and girlfriends. And women have traditionally run the social organizations of schools. Think PTA or whatever we're calling it now, and think religious social groups, think League of Women Voters.

We had our wings clipped, men and women, but women especially had our wings clipped during COVID when we couldn't use our superpower. And many of us needed the in-person social contact with hugs and laughter and gossip. It helps ground us. It was rough, and I'm not sure people have gone back.

Thinking about exploring socially, what you call your friends on Facebook or whatever social media you use, they aren't what really makes your heart sing kind of friends. I'm hoping that we don't lose that sit-down-and-giggle-together. And I can giggle with guys too. That works. But sit down and giggle together because that can't . . . Or I haven't been able to experience that on social media. So exploring socially means, I think, that you've got to be in the presence of the other.

Katie: Yeah. And I think that's what makes it important about Sarah's experience traveling to Rwanda, that chance to meet the other nurse midwife, Betty. Even though there was a bit of a language barrier, we could understand each other and recognize that we were both trying to solve the same medical emergency.

And so I think that's what's so important about doing that, about stepping into a new environment where you're forced to open yourself up to connections, whether it's like me hearing people speak with a different accent and wanting to talk to them. But in those new environments, our usual barriers are the things that lead to increased isolation and they fall away when we're in exploring mode.

So I think the remarkable thing about our stories is that these connections wouldn't have happened if we hadn't taken that first step into the unknown. I think for our listeners in this era where data shows we're spending more and more time alone, we want to encourage you to think of exploration as your prescription for connection.

It doesn't have to be a grand trip to Rwanda or someplace like that. Meaningful connections can happen anywhere: a ski lodge, a dormitory, a classroom. The key is being willing to step out and look up and engage.

So we're talking about exploration in the "7 Domains" as a tool to reverse some of these trends we're seeing in isolation. And however you choose to explore, wherever you choose to explore, whether it's a new place or a new activity or starting a conversation, we're creating an opportunity to close that connection gap.

And in a world where our default seems to be increasing isolation, I think exploring becomes more . . . It's not just an adventure. It's a vital act of self-care.

As Terri said in our Physical Domain of Exploring, it's a need. It is a need and it's also that acronym for having a New Experience Every Day.

So while you're exploring, explore the other domains in the series. It's been one of my personal favorites. We have more coming up. They're going to drop about once a week, and you can get them all wherever you get your podcasts or at womens7.com.

So, again, thank you for exploring with us. And Kirtly, thank you for being my mentor.

Kirtly: Well, thank you for being my mentee.

Katie: Sarah, thank you for being my mentee.

Sarah: Happy to. Anytime.

Katie: Thank you all for being here with us today for the 7 Domains of Exploring, the Social Domain. We appreciate you exploring with us on "7 Domains of Women's Health."