Shedding Shame & Increasing Intimacy with Heather Florio

There are some parts of women’s health that still get pushed into the shadows. Pelvic pain, sexual wellness, bladder issues, intimacy, even the right to talk openly about our bodies without shame. But that silence has a cost. It delays care. It fuels stigma. It keeps too many people disconnected from their own agency. So today’s guest is a special one. She has built her work around

changing that. She’s helping lead a much needed shift into how we talk about pelvic health and sexual health. One that is more honest, it is ⁓ more informed, it’s less apologetic. So before we dive in, ⁓ I want you to listen for this. What changes when we stop treating these conversations as taboo and start treating them as essential?

Welcome back to the vocal pelvic floor, where we explore the powerful connections between voice, breath, body, advocacy, and pelvic health. I’m your host, Dr. Ginger Garner, and today we’re talking about what happens when we finally bring pelvic and sexual health into the open, not as something niche or embarrassing to talk about, but as a vital part of whole person health, agency, and quality of life, and also mental health.

So my guest today, I’m super stoked to introduce her name is Heather Florio. She is the CEO of Desert Harvest, a leading advocate for women’s pelvic and sexual health. She’s known for challenging stigma, advancing honest conversations around intimacy and wellness and helping connect healthcare, advocacy, which I love, and entrepreneurship, which I stumbled into myself and here I am, you know, 20 plus years later.

She also writes the Dear Sexpert column for Bella Magazine, love that title, and speaks widely on the intersections of sex leadership and women’s health. Named one of Authority Magazine’s top 50 women in wellness, 2021, and spotlighted in Forbes 2022 as a top one woman in business. Awesome mic drop there.

Heather is recognized globally for bridging the worlds of entrepreneurship, healthcare, and advocacy. She has presented at the White House on international trade, sits on the board of the Northern Light Health Center for Healthy Brain Aging, and regularly speaks at conferences about the intersections of sex, power, and leadership. When Heather is not dismantling outdated narratives about sex and leadership, she is happily busy with her husband.

three sons, which we realized we were fellow members of the Three Boy Mom Club. That’s a special one. And dogs, which are also male, which I just learned. So Heather, welcome to the vocal pelvic floor.

Heather Florio (02:57)

Thank you for having me. I’m looking forward to this talk.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (03:00)

I’ve been looking forward to this for a while. I’m really glad that you’re here because you’ve been an important part of so many conversations in pelvic and sexual health. And I just, want to take this in a direction that’s, that really hits home for a lot of people. We are constantly talking about on the vocal pelvic floor, obviously anatomy, know, anatomy, but as expression, as voice.

as identity, as a relationship with ourself and others. I mean, that holds a lot of pain, but it also holds a lot of truth. And so I’d love to begin there talking about, ⁓ you talk a lot about ⁓ bladder and pelvic symptoms, but there’s always something that, I mean, and that’s my day job, I’m talking about it all the time. What do you think gets lost as we talk about the pelvis?

only as a side of symptoms instead of like a whole expressive body.

Heather Florio (04:01)

Yes, we lose that feeling. In yogic expression, this really becomes that root chakra, that hammock, our pelvic floor. And inside this is all the beauty that makes up a woman. And we focus on it so much as a…

a problem because we deal with so many issues with endometriosis, uterine fibroids, interstitial cystitis, PCOS, mean, take your pick and the let alone pelvic floor dysfunction itself. But we don’t focus on the amazing energy that is in that area and how to capture it and how to transform that and think of it as a pleasure center, that root chakra, that, you know,

gives so much to us and in really thinking about it in that sense, it can be transformative in a sense to think of it less as a center of pain and struggle and more as a center of positivity and pleasure and embracing your femininity.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (05:11)

Yeah, you know, it reminds me of a study I was reading yesterday that came out not too long ago, and that’s the sad part, is that we know, I know you know this already, audience, you may not know this, but, ⁓ you know, it’s shocking that the clitoris has only been mapped, you know, in recent history.

And so we know like anatomical models, like I have one on my desk. You have one behind you, I think, but here’s mine with the fist in the air. I need a little sign that says vaginal estrogen for everyone on this. But that’s right.

Heather Florio (05:40)

Yes, right there.

Yes. This is your clitoris.

It’s funny, my father-in-law sometimes walks in here and he always asks what that is. And I was all like, let me teach you. And I’m like, take you to part the parts and to show him. he just turns red and walks out. So, yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (06:01)

Ha

Yeah, that’s great. I love it. Education

is good for everybody at any age and phase. what was really shocking about this is that there’s not been a proper nerve map done of the clitoris. So if you think about that ⁓ and you take it a step further and you realize so much effort and time goes into preserving nerves around, know, penile function or dysfunction and et cetera when surgery is done.

But if it hasn’t even been properly mapped, if the nerves haven’t been properly mapped, that has not been a focus, right? So pelvis as a pleasure center could never have been a focus with any surgery, anything that’s done with respect to female or orthopedic health, if it wasn’t even properly mapped. So this conversation is very timely. And of course, know, thousands of years overdue because this is just now starting to be mapped.

Heather Florio (07:01)

Yes, I was actually looking at the model that they just, you know, did with the mapping where it took a neurologist to go, hey, why aren’t we thinking about this? Asking questions over in Europe and saying, why aren’t we having this mapped? And looking at the complexity. So I was looking at the actual images of the new mapping of the clitoris that just came out and looking at these nerve endings actually last night. So you want to talk about timely.

And it’s so much more than we have ever realized. We had the first true mapping in 2020.

Yeah, 2023, November 2023, we dropped that at the sexual health conference. And that was only just the beginning because this new mapping with this digital looking at the nerve endings is, is, know, you’re watching it go around and through the mons pubis. You’re watching so many more nerve endings. And this is going to make a huge difference. you know, when you’re talking any type of vaginal surgeries, whether you’re, you know, restoring from genital mutilation, whether you’re

you’re transitioning and having a transition surgery, whatever you’re having done down there, and it’s gonna be a life changing because so many people have these surgeries, but yet we can’t map and figure out how to give them sensation back. And especially when we’re talking genital mutilation, which still happens in many countries, and then they come to the Western world looking to restore

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (08:36)

does.

Heather Florio (08:40)

that feeling, that sensation, that experience, and we’ve never been able to do it. And so with this new mapping, this is going to be a game changer for women.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (08:51)

Yeah, it really is. Everything that’s taught in sexual health counseling, sex therapy, pelvic health, pelvic floor physical therapy, occupational therapy, et cetera, will greatly shift. And of course, changing surgical techniques, attending to that sense of preservation, stimulation, arousal, et cetera, it’s it’s huge. So it brings up one…

important word that has probably been, I bet if I mapped a word that I said the most this season, it’s probably safety, not sex, although that’s a big one, but sex and safety go together. So tell me a little bit about what you feel like with respect to like chronic pelvic or bladder symptoms. How do you see that as impacting a person’s sense of safety in their body?

Heather Florio (09:41)

think that it becomes, especially when you’re in a chronic pain state, it becomes really a withdrawal into yourselves. It feels like sex is the last thing you think about or want to deal with. in a lot of cases, this isn’t true. ⁓

And we actually see this a lot actually in cancer patients. So we work a lot with breast cancer patients, with our relievium for radiation dermatitis. And we find that they’re not having these conversations. They’re just starting to, and that’s not everywhere where these people want to get, they’re going through all this experience.

all this trauma and they get to the end of all of these treatments, they want their life back. And we really need to focus on that idea of quality of life because when we talk about safety, whether it’s when we’re talking vaginismus and you can’t get anything in there.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (10:29)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (10:44)

into your vaginal opening, that vestibule, it becomes the question of how do you still experience pleasure? And that’s where self pleasure really comes in because you can spend time, it doesn’t necessarily have to be penetrative sex. You can explore your own body, get to know your own body, get reacquainted with your body when you’re experiencing trauma and chronic pain and…

other issues, you can definitely begin that self-exploration. That’s not like going right to the clitoris and orgasming. That is feeling yourself, feeling your body, hold of, you can actually literally grab hold of your mons pubis and hold it and feel that and feel what that sensation is. Feel the sensations all over your body. have so many erogenous zones.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (11:19)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (11:38)

feel what feels good, feel all of your body. Start here and work your way down. Feel your thighs, feel everything. And then begin that self-exploration of your clitoris and feel what that orgasm feels like to you and understand the situations where we get into issues or things like PGAB and things like that where necessarily.

you know, they’re already constantly and so they’re looking to bring it down but in a lot of cases you need to bring it back up and that will do so much for your body, your pelvic floor, you know, that contraction and that release and then at the same time also for your mental health.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (12:28)

Yeah, yeah, and the mental health issues, know, ⁓ mental wellbeing, those symptoms will negatively impact confidence, know, identity, the way you move through your everyday life. And…

being open to that, and sometimes it takes time. It takes guidance, you know, and that’s where I think pelvic floor PT, OT, sex therapy and stuff comes in, is to get that conversation to shift, you know, from symptom management to restoring agency and quality of life and the ability to feel seen and heard and to feel that pleasure. And I think one of the interesting things that make up

⁓ this conversation, what it is, is that pelvic health is so often isolated, but it doesn’t exist in isolation. It impacts everything, how you breathe, the tension you feel in your body, how you express yourself, performance. I work with a lot of performing artists. And the way we take up space. So it’s like the very nature of what we’re talking about is rooted in the voice-body connection. And so I’d love to explore that a little bit more next.

Like how do you see and how have you experienced in all of your work pelvic symptoms start to impact the way someone does that, how they take up space socially, you know, how they use their voice in the world, not just, you know, how they’re breathing, because we know breathing impacts the pelvic floor, which we can talk about a little bit, but how do you see those pelvic symptoms like, you know, impacting ⁓ people’s ability to like take up space socially and use their voice?

Heather Florio (14:11)

It becomes very hard. I think it becomes traumatic almost on our self-confidence. That same chronic state is causing, it causes you to withdraw inside of yourself in a lot of cases. And it causes you in some cases to withdraw from the world. When you’re talking interstitial-cystitis, there’s situations where they map out the patterns to the bathroom and where they’re going and they’re scared to go on vacation.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (14:38)

Yeah.

Heather Florio (14:40)

and it becomes almost like a fear state. And when you’re living in a fear state, you can’t go on, you know, when you talk about performers, they can’t go on stage and perform with that level of confidence when they’re experiencing such a ⁓ pain state. A great example is like Halsey.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (14:52)

Mm-mm.

Heather Florio (15:00)

and dealing with her diagnosis through so many different journeys of endometriosis and the constant suffering where she would have to cancel concerts and stop. And she had to finally take a pause and take a pause for her own life before she could get back out on stage. And now she’s killing it. But she had to take care of herself first.

And without being able to do that and address what is causing your pelvic pain, what is causing your issues, what is causing you to withdraw with inside of yourself and figure out how you can have a different quality of life than you.

you’re going to stay and constantly stay in that state. And that fear response can be triggers that can only exacerbate the symptoms further of whatever condition you might be experiencing. So we don’t realize that when we’re sitting there constantly like this, what’s happening to your pelvic floor? You know, the same thing. It’s becoming hypertonic, it’s tightening. And…

you know, that becomes almost like an upregulation of the entire autotomic nervous system. And you’re in this constant state, you know, we tell a lot of interstitial cystitis patients too, that, you know, they’ll be like, I was doing so good and I was taking your SSAV and I’ve been doing so great. They’re like, but I had a flare.

Why did I have a flare? And there’s so many reasons why you could have a flare, breakthrough flares in interstate. It could be histamines, could be diet, but it could also just be that stress response, that fear state that you’re living in, and that stress response. We had one customer, think their parent had just died, and they had gone into a huge upregulation.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (16:44)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (17:03)

of their autotopic nervous system. so as a result, they’re just living in this state and wondering why they’re hurting so much more. And you have to realize, you have to bring that back down. You have to.

to regulate your nervous system. You have to calm your pelvic floor and you talked about breathing and stuff like that and we can talk about that but that is one of the best ways to do that. There’s so many breathing exercises that can be done just to calm that response and help you regulate your nervous system.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (17:38)

Yeah, and I think your background in entertainment and ⁓ live events and venues has really amazingly shaped the way you think about performance and how much endurance a performer has to have, the body awareness they have to have, ⁓ and the fact that they sometimes, and we do this in everyday life too, doesn’t take a performing artist on stage when people…

Women get up, they’re in pain, and they have to go to work anyway, and they have to take care of their kids anyway, or they have to do that performance anyway. And I’ve seen the most interesting things by ⁓ using musculoskeletal ultrasound imaging to identify what people may not feel, because you mentioned breathing and the stress response. And I think that one of the ways that I help

offload that blame game that women tend to do with themselves is like, well, I can’t reach arousal or I’m not aroused or I have low libido or I can’t reach orgasm or I can’t do what I want to do with my kids and play outside or whatnot with them or even take care of myself. I must be wrong. I must be doing something wrong. I must be failing. I’m just weak. I mean, I had a patient in clinic this morning saying that.

you know, that same thing. In fact, that was what their provider was insinuating, that they were just weak and needed to be stronger and that they wouldn’t have these symptoms. And I just, my head wants to just, you know, set on fire. what you can then do, you know, to show them the difference is I just see the most profound shifts out of that self-blame and shame, like Brene Brown calls it the shame gremlin, I think.

Heather Florio (19:13)

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (19:31)

out of that shame cycle, when they can, I know it’s awesome, ⁓ when they see it on the screen, when they see that they’re not physically causing their own fascia to tighten down and then inhibit the pelvic floor, that all they had to do was think about something stressful. All they had to do was talk about something stressful and then I can, know, we can together, we see that on the screen. We see things closing down and then the pain comes.

They’re like, ⁓ that’s where that’s coming from. And then they can shift out of that, which is important on multiple levels because I think with the medical gaslighting that happens, whether it’s inadvertent or not, it doesn’t matter. The end result is the same, is then women end up gaslighting themselves. Yeah.

Heather Florio (20:04)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, they do. They do.

end up, you know, they reverse it on themselves essentially based on the gaslighting that they’re getting with it from within the medical community. And we see it all of the time. We see people.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (20:34)

Yeah.

Heather Florio (20:38)

constantly call us crying because they’re unable to find a doctor that will listen to them. They’re unable to find, you know, this is why we hear so many awful stories of it took me 10 years, 30 years to get to diagnosis. And in that entire time, they’re suffering. But at the same time, having to manage, I can remember being in my 20s and and curled up and the ball like

on the couch, you know, as soon as I got my kids to school because I was in so much pain because I had endometriosis and uterine fibrosis and PCOS all at the same time. And I can go to the doctor and they’ll be like, you know, they’ll treat you like a drug seeker and, and that, that you’re suffering and you have no, you know, and that is an experience. So many women experience. watch, I watch my daughter-in-law every month.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (21:22)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (21:35)

from adenomyosis like literally once a month she’s gone for a week. We don’t see her and because she is in so much pain, but because of her age and because she’s still of childbearing age, she can’t have kids one, but yet they won’t let her have a hysterectomy to be able to be in that level. So we have this shift where…

We can’t even necessarily get the care we want because of old standardized ideas that you’re still in this age of which you could have children. And it’s like, but I can’t even have children in the first place. But it’s trauma that we see over and over and over again and hear about over and over again.

And I like to think that it’s getting better, you know, when we had the introduction of the Urogyn field and we combined Uro and Gynecology together and gave women a place in which they could go. That made a huge difference, you know. So we’re making incremental steps, but it’s still a conversation that needs to be louder and prouder because we still need so much research and now we’re limited in the NIH funding.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (22:35)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (22:57)

to make that happen. And so it really has to come from outside of the government, outside of the medical community, to push this forward and to help fund these research projects into endometriosis and other female-related conditions. Because otherwise, it is just going to be a constant state of suffering because we have such limited options in a lot of cases.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (22:58)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Well, I mean, one thing that you said really resonated ⁓ with me too is that, you when you thought back to when you were in your 20s and in pain and with the endometriosis and I think that’s a really common, I mean, it’s a one in 10 thought to be one in nine now condition, which makes it more common than diabetes. And everybody knows about diabetes and it’s well acknowledged ⁓ and also much better funded for research.

⁓ That’s right. Funny not funny. ⁓ But yeah, that’s absolutely true. Anything that’s historically impacted women has just been pushed to the side. it’s women are treated like drug seekers and you mentioned that as well. And I remember back to my last ER ED visit before

Heather Florio (23:56)

because it affects men.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (24:24)

⁓ I ended up getting surgery for endometriosis several, several years ago. And I knew that really the only way I was gonna get them to listen to me was to keep my wits about me. I was in a lot of pain, but to immediately, first thing out of my mouth was I’m not taking pain meds. I need you to listen to this story. And I need you to rule out these specific diagnoses. But that also brings up another point.

I had the privilege of knowing what the diagnoses were that they needed to screen for. And that’s the exact opposite of the experience you should have when you’re in extreme pain and going into the ER. You’re going there to figure out what’s happening. And instead, it has to be the opposite where you need to know what you need before you get in there for women’s health, which is terrible.

Heather Florio (25:10)

It is, it really is. mean, we have very limited, I mean, now you go on the internet and you get fed 10 different versions of something. And the internet has almost done a further disservice to women because you can go listen to a TikTok and then read something that you think is coming from a medical guidance and it’s not. And the misinformation is so rampant.

We really have to figure out how to educate women to follow the science. think the best book out there, but this is more for menopausal age women, ⁓ Dr. Sharon Malone. She came out with a book called Grown Woman Talk. And it really is an amazing guide on how to…

not necessarily specific condition specific, but for all women it can definitely be a guide on how to advocate for yourself within the medical community, what information you should have to empower yourself and how you should follow this trajectory. like her book, I highly recommend to people all the time.

just because it’s the best guide I know out there that really gives the necessary, women the necessary tools to guide themselves through their own medical journey because no one else is going to do it for you. You have to be your own best advocate.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (26:37)

Yeah, which is terrifying when someone is already, you know, in pain and or they don’t have, you know, the background or the access or they live in a small town or whatever. And and historically women have felt as soon as they have any kind of pelvic pain symptoms, it was easily dismissed anyway. But then on top of that, just the generalized, you know, suppression of expression, whether it’s creativity, intimacy, work or just using your voice.

you know, as a woman in general, has led to a lot of ⁓ shame. Add to that the stigma that everyone feels when they have pelvic pain, because I have men come in and they don’t know how to talk about it. And they’ve actually been gaslight with pelvic pain too. And then that impacts everybody’s like happiness and intimacy, you know? It really, and that’s one of the things that you talk about is like, you’re just willing to talk so openly about topics that, you know, many people were like whispering about or not talking at all.

Heather Florio (27:07)

Yes.

Mm-hmm.

It does, yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (27:37)

For example, had a young ⁓ patient this week who is finishing up with college and it just was so, was heartbreaking to me that she had been through 10, 12 providers before she got to me, but she was also very adamant about using her voice, continuing to speak up and not whispering about the fact that her chief goal for coming in was no longer having dyspareunia, painful sex, right?

And it’s just encouraging to me that the next generation is willing to talk about that, but then we have everybody else, right? That shame is a massive part of the story. So what do you see like with the role that shame plays in, gosh, pelvic pain, bladder symptoms, sexual health, what do you see that people don’t talk about enough?

Heather Florio (28:26)

I see constant shame ⁓ from everything from the… I think the first time I ever really heard an advocate, we worked on a project in the UK with Helena Bonham Carter for ⁓ advocating for pelvic floor physical therapy during your natal care. And she talked about being on the set of Harry Potter and literally like, whoosh, but she’s on set.

So she can’t stop, she has to keep going, she has to keep playing her role, while at the same time she’s just leaked all over the floor. And those are active conversations that women need to have more and more. Because there’s no shame in that fact, there’s no shame in the fact that we’ve all had an incident. I can’t say that there’s not a woman that probably hasn’t had an incident.

where she’s leaked through a tampon or a pad or something else like that and had an embarrassing moment where you have something on your pants. And I think we probably all experienced that. That is not shameful. That is just part of what we have to experience as women and part of our journey. And same thing with sex. Like sex is…

I’ll use this as an example. This just happened yesterday. So a woman called and she said, you know, she was an older woman and she had called and she said, I don’t want to hear about pelvic and sexual health. She’s like, I didn’t call sex company. I called a supplement company. thought I want my supplement. I don’t want sex and I don’t want you to use the word sex on the phone with me. I don’t want you to talk about sex.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (30:11)

No

Heather Florio (30:13)

I don’t want to anything and think about the repression that that woman has experienced to think that and to feel that, that she can’t even connect with the word sex, that we are a pelvic and a sexual health company, that she can’t even connect with the word sex. that repression probably came from constant stigma and being made to feel that that was wrong.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (30:18)

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (30:40)

And I

mean, for me, as a young girl growing up, I had no sexual understanding growing up. We don’t educate our kids in a ⁓ sexually healthy manner. You know, we support projects for raising sexually healthy children in which from birth to nine years, you have to understand when you’re sitting there and telling your kid, don’t touch yourself in the bathtub.

or things like that, you’re beginning that sexual shame. That from birth to nine years, they’re not seeing what you see as sex. They’re not seeing their anatomy as sex. They’re exploring their bodies. They are understanding what feels good, what doesn’t. What you have to do as a parent is give them time and place. There was one mother I was talking to and her daughter just kept going behind the couch and touching herself.

And she didn’t want to create sexual same, but at the same time, honey, that’s for your time and by yourself in your room and and understanding you don’t do that in the living room. And it’s more about educating about time and place versus creating that shame to say, touch yourself, don’t do this. And…

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (31:49)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Heather Florio (32:00)

then you get to begin that educational journey of understanding your own body and the understanding of your own body is an empowerment. And especially for women where we get to the age where we might get into high school and start having sexual pressure and other things like that. But you know what, if you’ve been raised sexually healthy, you have the tools and the ability to say what you want, what you don’t want, to advocate for yourself, to have that power.

And as we, know, for me as young girl, I didn’t have that power. I didn’t have that knowledge. It was something I gained later in life. And I didn’t even know what an orgasm was or if I was orgasming. And, you know, I’ve been married almost 30 years and I think it took the good part of the first part of our marriage to understand, ⁓ that’s an orgasm.

⁓ I do need clitoral stimulation along with penetration. But these are conversations where my husband and I have been very actively open in our conversations with each other, saying what we like, what we don’t like, what feels good, and understanding experiences with each other because we’re lifelong partners and that’s what we want to do, but you have to be willing to have those open conversations.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (33:01)

Mm-hmm.

Yes, totally. Because the symptoms that, you know, that may, the wide, wide range of symptoms that can be felt during pelvic pain, which can also, I just want to emphasize, include hip pain, back pain, ⁓ vocal issues. I see that all the time doing imaging studies with my patients. ⁓ It affects you physically, emotionally, know, relationally. And so my question is,

knowing it has this whole like biopsychosocial, whole person impact, for somebody who feels disconnected from or frankly betrayed by their body, where does that rebuilding trust begin to kind of put shame down once and for all?

Heather Florio (34:10)

It goes back to that original conversation I had where we at the start of this with yourself. It begins with yourself. have to understanding your own body and understanding with maybe a condition or with whatever you’re dealing with. Understanding what feels good to you and what doesn’t feel good to you is a personal journey. And you should figure that out before you choose to engage with a partner.

before you choose to have maybe different sexual experiences beyond with yourself. Because if you don’t understand yourself, you can’t engage health in a healthy manner with a partner. And you can’t advocate for yourself, you can’t have those open conversations and engage in healthy sex.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (35:04)

Yeah, I heard the writer, ⁓ Young Pueblo, say you can’t be connected to someone who’s disconnected from themselves. yeah, and so it does fit. He was talking about relationally and mental health and that kind of thing, but it really does fit with pelvic and sexual health. so being able to, ⁓ when I talk to patients about how to do that, like,

Heather Florio (35:13)

Yeah, that’s perfect.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (35:32)

They need a mirror. They need to be willing to look down there. It’s a pants off situation that they will do at home on their own. Lock the door, kick the dog out. Make sure there’s some quiet time. then kind of map, map what’s happening. Just like you would, like a dentist would like map the teeth, right? Or when I’m dealing with like TMJ or something like TMJD.

Heather Florio (35:43)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (35:56)

I’ll have them map, know, orofacial pain ⁓ or vocal issues or that kind of thing. So I think that when we take the stigma away from the location of where it is too, that it really makes it easier if they look at, you know, I’m mapping anatomy and ⁓ how things feel just like I would if, you know, my tooth hurt.

Heather Florio (36:15)

Yeah,

no, definitely taking it from a very analytical perspective is one of the best ways. Volva mapping and getting that mirror down there and understanding your own anatomy is a great way. And then if you want to engage one of the easiest practices, not just traditional masturbation, but more of a tantric practice that I typically always recommend is one, engage all five senses.

engage all of your senses, know, set that mood for yourself, the scent, the sound, engage. And then at the same time, ⁓ know, set a timer for 20 minutes on your phone and touch yourself. Just touch yourself, engage with yourself. You can even bring yourself up.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (36:44)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (37:04)

but then let yourself go back down by doing what’s called, it’s called ocean breathing. So it’s very much a type of diaphragmatic breathing in which you’re calming that autotomic nervous system. It’s very much like, ⁓

and really kind of releasing. And what that does is that brings you back down and then you can begin touching yourself in other areas where I mentioned grabbing your mons pubis, touching your thighs, starting up here. Just really kind of engaging with your body. And then at the very end of that…

ending right when that 20 minute timer goes off, use a toy, use a bullet, use something. You couldn’t even engage with a partner at this point if you’re feeling healthy enough to do that. But then you can also orgasm at the end of that. And you don’t even have to orgasm if you don’t want to. But if you want to, when that 20 minute timer goes off, you will have the most amazing orgasm of your life.

because you’ve just engaged with your body in a different way. And so I always highly recommend that tantric practice when you want to learn to engage your body, take that shame and take that power back for yourself. That’s how I recommend that women do that.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (38:21)

Yeah, think that we often bypass that because our world is so busy and we’re taught to ignore so much because there’s such sensory overload all the time that it is a lovely thing to come back to those five senses. And then, you the other thing that you made me think about there was kind of the sixth sense of the vagus nerve. And there’s a study that I think until that study was done, was not really

Heather Florio (38:32)

Hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (38:51)

Again, here’s another mapping problem of the vagina that it wasn’t really understood. It was thought that women with complete spinal cord injuries couldn’t orgasm. And so what the researchers learned was that the upper part of the vaginal canal is innervated and has inputs via the vagus nerve. So that sixth sense of the vagus nerve is involved in creation of sound.

One of the things that’s so amazing that I use in clinical practice all the time is inclusion of sound. Like you’re talking about ocean breathing. In yoga, there’s Ujjayi, or it’s called overcoming breath, which is very similar. There’s also Brahmari breathing. And we’ll put links to everything we’re talking about ⁓ so you don’t have to go, you know, pause and write things down. But ⁓ there are so many different breathing techniques like that that we’ll use.

Heather Florio (39:31)

Mm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (39:49)

subphonation that then stimulate that sixth sense of the vagus nerve, which also directly connects to the vaginal canal, which is so cool. It’s not great that we had to learn that through other people’s adversity, through looking at women with spinal cord injuries, but the fact that they could actually still have arousal and pleasure and orgasm because of the vagus nerve when they had lost sensation everywhere else is pretty amazing.

Heather Florio (40:15)

Yeah, we’re actually right now here at Desert Harvest, we’re developing a platform that women will be able to engage with to actually, so when you think of that yogic practice, that, you know, the lines of the chakra, the seven chakras, you’re going along that vagus nerve from top to bottom, that you’re following that vagus nerve. So when you’re engaging, you’re engaging with…

different parts of the vagus nerve from top to bottom. And so we really wanted to give women the ability to engage at each level in a different way and then understand scientifically what part of the body they’re engaging, what part they’re activating. so we’re actually kind of getting ready to follow that ⁓ with, you know.

yogic practices essentially that I’m partnering with ⁓ Sarah Fingers. She’s the founder of Ishjaya Yoga, which kind of combines a lot of Hatha and Tantra and a variety of different disciplines to really, you know, we’re going to call it yoga for chronic pelvic pain and teach women how to engage that vagus nerve because it’s so critical.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (41:30)

Yeah, you’re speaking my language, singing my song. No pun intended. ⁓ it is, yoga is a pretty powerful tool. It’s actually how I landed in the realm of pelvic and orthopedic health and the overlap between the two because of that. It’s just incredibly effective. ⁓ And it’s why I spend a lot of time in that

particularly that pelvic pain and hypermobile community, because endo, hypermobility, MCAS, all of those things tend to really go together. And yoga used for stability is really ⁓ a game changer. It’s kind of when I retrospectively look back on when I wrote my first book, which was on yoga, ⁓ really was based on that. And I might not have fully understood that at the time, you know? But that was really the ⁓ force of that. So I just encouraged listeners to…

⁓ explore that, that you’ll find some really amazing things. Because I think that yoga’s very popular now, and when I first started to practice and teach it, it was fringe. It’s not fringe anymore, which is great. But it is, to kind of get to my next question, think, it’s pointing out something important. Like when you first start doing something, when I first started doing yoga, ⁓ everybody in my like,

Heather Florio (42:35)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, yeah, no.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (42:57)

my colleagues and the professional association was just like, that’s just, that’s not a clinical treatment. You can’t use yoga as a clinical treatment. I was like, watch me. I was like, find out, because that’s what’s gonna happen. And now it’s so accepted, but I think that that brings up one important point, that our clinical practice and what we do, what we feel, what we experience in our bodies is going to be

Heather Florio (43:09)

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (43:26)

out ahead of where the research is because now it’s like, ⁓ of course, yoga is a clinical internship intervention as if they knew that all along, right? So the field still gets things wrong, right? ⁓ Oversimplification, one size fits all stuff, wellness messaging that sounds like empowering, but it doesn’t serve people in a nuanced way. So I would love your perspective on how

Heather Florio (43:33)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (43:55)

things, what still needs to change, right? Like, what do you think the pelvic health world is still getting wrong about? Well, really anything. I think strength is one way in which things got skewed, right, in the past, because a well-meaning gyno or urogyne might say, here, you just need more strength, right? And the rest of us in the pelvic health community are like, I wish it was that simple.

Heather Florio (44:15)

Mm-hmm.

⁓ yeah.

Like, you know, one of the worst things that I see out there is, you know, we made Kegels so like popular and everybody’s like, I’m doing my Kegels and I’m doing my Kegels. And I’m like, are you sure you should be doing those Kegels? Like, have you been evaluated? Has your pelvic floor been evaluated? Because if you’re hypertonic and you’re like a Titan dish rag, you’re just making it worse.

And I think that word strength is very scary in that sense because that’s what they kept thinking is we needed strength and we needed to strengthen. But I always use yoga as a great example for the pelvic floor because, and I really think that in my mind, pelvic floor physical therapy was really born out of yoga exercises, born out of yoga practices in a lot of sense because you always have

one part of your body that’s engaged, one part of your body that’s relaxed. And that’s what, you know, we’re trying, in a lot of cases, when you’re trying to do things is you’re trying to create a state of relaxation and a state of strength at the same time. But so many times we go straight to strength and we need to realize that we need the balance of both. And I think that…

that that is kind of one of the one things that mass media gets wrong when they talk about pelvic floor physical therapy. ⁓ think that, ⁓ you know, as I’ve watched this field grow from like, you know, nothing to an active and more more, you know, I can remember being at the International Pelvic Pain Society meeting, the very first one that ever happened, and there was maybe 75.

total and that might have been all of us like industry everybody all together and the workers and everybody and so to watch it grow into this amazing field and and make a difference is great but at the same time when we get something too trendy and and we turn it into a trend we need to come back to the roots

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (46:27)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (46:32)

of what created that practice, what created that discipline. we need, like, you know, I talked about all that noise on social media and everything else like that. We need a balanced, active voice and everybody wants to be an Instagram celebrity and an Instagram influencer and tell you what you should and shouldn’t do.

But really what we need to follow is the science. And I think in a lot of cases when I tell people that they’re not sure that pelvic floor physical therapy did anything or did this, and then I mentioned yoga and they’re like, that’s too much for me. And I’m all like, I’m not talking about going and doing hot yoga and the most intense yoga that you can go find. I’m talking about relaxing restorative yoga and get back to those basics and maybe find a different pelvic PT.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (47:14)

Yeah.

Yeah, exactly. I just did a rant the other day on YouTube that turned into something. I was only going to do it for like three minutes and I think it turned into like a 17 minute video or something because there’s too many people that are told, well, know, pelvic PT failed for you. Well, it could be that it was frankly crappy pelvic PT or because it is very trendy now to do pelvic floor PT or pelvic PT. And so a lot, there’s a lot, think of practitioners that are so well-meaning.

Heather Florio (47:31)

you

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (47:56)

but they don’t have enough experience to actually have screened everything that needs to be done. So, you know, I have a bit of a ⁓ soapbox feeling about that too, because I feel like they need to have a background in orthopedics, and then they need to go into pelvic PT, they need to have an understanding of integrative medicine in addition to functional medicine, in addition to lifestyle medicine, and that takes like decades to accumulate that type of experience. And that’s only looking back because…

Heather Florio (48:15)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (48:24)

I’ve almost been in this field for 30 years. And so I think one of the things that when you test yourself all the time is to say, I’ve accumulated this much knowledge, but how little do we know and how much more can we learn and how much better can the research questions be? And how will we fund that research and how will we get that legislation passed ⁓ is to realize that.

There’s so much more to learn and so much more to do. ⁓ Yeah.

Heather Florio (48:55)

There is, there is.

mean, even, you you mentioned men. mean, there’s so, men are scared to death of pelvic floor physical therapy in a lot of cases. And one of the best male pelvic floor physical therapists that I know isn’t even in the United States. You know, Dr. Gerard Green over in the UK. Like he really, yeah, he’s amazing. I love Gerard and.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (49:15)

I know, Gerard. I taught

yoga over there for him. ⁓ Yeah, yes, I did. I taught the medical therapeutic yoga ⁓ over there for them, yeah.

Heather Florio (49:21)

did you?

Yeah, and I mean he’s doing amazing things for men, really focusing, you know, he’s getting out with the cyclists and, and, you know, we work with all the UK football teams over there because they’re required no matter where the injury is in their body to do pelvic floor physical therapy on all of the UK football teams because it gets them out on the field three times faster than if they hadn’t done pelvic floor physical therapy. And it’s those amazing clinicians that are creating that education and that

environment

and really pushing at least the male athletes. But we need to have this larger conversation with men in general, because if we could really talk about prostate health and the incidence and rise of prostates that have been removed and prostate cancer and everything else like that, we’re so afraid of pelvic floor physical therapy or anal manipulation. it’s like…

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (50:05)

Totally.

Heather Florio (50:25)

you know, this, that you need this. You wouldn’t have, you wouldn’t have sensor, you know, you wouldn’t have nerve endings in there if this wasn’t necessary because just, just the same when you’re orgasming, anally, it’s, you know, having that profound effect on the prostate. And so I think there are a lot of active conversations that need to be had and things that are missing within. are amazing clinicians doing…

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (50:27)

Yeah.

Heather Florio (50:52)

amazing things but it’s like you said it’s like wading through oh i just got out of school i’m gonna go start my own practice and it’s like

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (51:01)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was in orthopedics for 15 years before I even considered that I was ready to learn more about the pelvic girdle, which technically I was already a, I’m air quoting this y’all, an expert in orthopedics at 15 years in. I was like, no, I don’t feel like I know anything. Now I’m ready to go and learn more. And that was a long time ago.

It was almost two decades ago. Yeah, absolutely.

Heather Florio (51:28)

And then we’re still always learning, you know, I’m

33 years in here, you know, working with pelvic and sexual health and pelvic pain. And I learned something new every day, every time I go to a conference and I sit there and I listen to, you know, a clinician, I learned something new constantly and I love it. So.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (51:50)

Yeah, you know,

if men too, if men only realized how much quicker you were talking about the footballers in the UK, if men only realize how quickly they could get back on the field of stronger orgasms, if they had pelvic floor PT we would have, you know, scores of men in line, you know, on the wait list, because I don’t think that

Heather Florio (52:05)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (52:13)

maybe they also realize that it’s not just about pelvic floor function, it’s not just about leakage, it’s not just about controlling whatever ⁓ gas or whatever that may be, it’s also about powerful orgasms, it’s about sensory input, it’s not just about painful erections or that kind of thing. Yeah, it’s very much about quality of life.

Heather Florio (52:32)

Mm-hmm. Yes, exactly, exactly. I mean…

You think when you have, and you know, when you get into a car accident and afterwards everybody is like, go to chiropractic care and everything else like that, but you think about what happens. The reason why they do that is because you tense up in that moment and everything tenses up, including your pelvic floor. And so same thing with all these athletes and injuries on the floor. And then same thing, you mentioned vocal and musicians and artists. So, you know, when they have that trauma, they need their diaphragm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (52:45)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (53:07)

you know they need that diaphragmatic breathing they need to be able to because it creates that trauma for them that they need to be able to get that diaphragm moving and functioning at optimal levels and so same thing for that vocal approach you need to be able to have that strong hammock and that strong diaphragmatic breathing.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (53:34)

Yeah, yeah, I think that there’s so much to be said on that. That’s a whole other, we could just talk and talk and talk about that. Yeah, because using imaging studies or doing imaging scans, it’s just it reveals so much about what’s happening ⁓ with the voice. ⁓ But I think, you know, an outstanding question that I have before we talk about some practical pointers, support and hope is, what do you think?

Heather Florio (53:41)

Yeah, talk a talk.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (54:03)

Like what would you like to see change in the first conversation a patient has when they have bladder pain, pelvic pain, or painful sex?

Heather Florio (54:12)

Sexual health should be a part of that conversation. We need to stop thinking of sex as just sex. We need to think about sex as sexual health. And that should be part of our conversation and have active conversations about what type of sex they’re having, how they’re engaging, what safety practices they’re utilizing, everything else like that. Because if you understand their sexual practices, you’re understanding a larger.

part of who they are and how they engage with their bodies or don’t engage with their bodies in some cases. And I think that that is a big part of the health picture that we go nowhere towards. And I think that just needs to be the larger, more active part of the conversation anytime you enter a clinician’s office.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (55:02)

Yeah, absolutely. It is really the chief reason why I decided to focus on sexual health this season is because it’s too often a tertiary conversation or it’s a side thing like, and by the way, I had a painful sex, right? Or I can’t even have sex or I haven’t had sex in 10 years because it’s too painful. And they bring it in as like, sorry to bother you, but instead of leading with, hey, this is the problem, you know, and people feeling like they’re

Heather Florio (55:13)

Mm-hmm.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (55:32)

worthy of that pleasure because so often they’re like, well, it’s optional. No, it’s actually not optional. It’s how we thrive in life. So for the person listening right now and you’re seeing yourself in this conversation, you’re feeling that. I want to close with some things that might help them move forward. So where’s a good place to begin if someone’s realizing for the first time that stress, breathing, voice, intimacy and pelvic symptoms

might just all be connected.

Heather Florio (56:04)

Well, of course, seeing amazing pelvic floor physical therapists like yourself is the first and most important place that I would send someone and recommend that they start. That is the start of the journey and finding those right PT’s can be helpful. There are platforms out there.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (56:06)

Yeah.

Heather Florio (56:23)

where you can definitely locate different PTs, whether you go to the APTA section on pelvic health, ⁓ IPPS has one, the Pelvic, Tracy Sher, there we go, Pelvic Global. Like they all have access to information about amazing clinicians. And so I think that those are amazing places to start and to look for guidance. But at the same time,

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (56:36)

Pay for public global. Yeah.

Heather Florio (56:52)

If you are experiencing what you feel is sexual shame, you don’t feel like you can have those active conversations, that you do not feel sexually healthy, there are also sexual health experts that can help you along this journey. There are sexual mental health experts. There are a variety of different clinicians that can help you with

this entire journey and there are amazing organizations like Ishwish that lists their asect. ⁓ They have amazing lists of sexual health experts that you can find in your area to engage with. And it’s not shameful. There’s nothing wrong with going to these clinicians and learning how you can engage with yourself, engage with your partners.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (57:27)

Mm-hmm.

Heather Florio (57:46)

and understanding that you don’t need this sexual shame and how to shed that because I think that’s the biggest thing is in a lot of cases we don’t know how to shed that sexual shame and how to move forward and if we don’t have a supportive partner in that journey or we can’t have active conversations it’s learning how to create those conversations and how to create those moments in which you can shed that and

That’s what those are probably the two best things that I can recommend to start off with in your journey.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (58:23)

Yeah, because they’ll also have so many resources, you know, ⁓ in their list. I mean, I am in ⁓ a larger facility with multiple sex therapists, mental health providers, myself. It’s just like a beautiful environment all together, working together to just get rid of that stigma and get people where they want to go. And you talked about that, you know, the touch practice, getting in touch with yourself, helping people really move out of that vigilant state.

Heather Florio (58:50)

Yes.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (58:51)

because goodness gracious, just existing on the planet is enough to, you know, create that vigilant state. So when you have pelvic pain, ⁓ you need a little bit of assistance there. So I love that, I love that practice. I do have another question before I ask, like, where can people find you and, know, what you do, et cetera, is if someone has been dismissed, and I always ask this question because I get so many amazing answers. If someone’s been dismissed, they’ve been minimized in healthcare settings.

Heather Florio (58:55)

Yeah. ⁓

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (59:21)

and they’re feeling like, what do I do? How can they start to advocate for themselves?

Heather Florio (59:27)

So one, there’s a few different things. That book I recommended really helps you on your journey. That’s called Grown Woman Talk with Dr. Sharon Malone. Highly recommended. You can listen to it. I actually, she narrated it herself on ⁓ Audible. And so you can listen to this online as well and really listen on to how you can advocate for yourself. That is a great place to start. The other thing is, is if you are in a hospital setting,

There are health advocates there that can also be your advocate within usually though only in large health care systems. So if you’re in rural health care systems, things like that, that might not be a possibility for you. But in large health care systems, there are health advocates and you can really go to those. don’t have to be, if you’re feeling minimized by a clinician, find another one.

You do not have to suffer through that. And the great age is with telehealth these days. There are a lot of options where if you just start that initial appointment, even if you have to travel a little bit, I would travel four hours to see an OB because for a while I lived in the middle of nowhere. I live in nowhere, Montana.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:00:25)

Yeah.

Heather Florio (1:00:48)

to Nowhere, Maine and I drove down to Boston just so that I could have the right type of clinician and then afterwards I was able to do telehealth after I established that care and that’s the great day and age in which we live in and I think that access to that is going to become more and more more standardized and hopefully across state lines ⁓ so that then you know I think that that that should be a thing.

where we can access, we’re not limited by state lines. And so hopefully that will change, but for now there are options and don’t feel afraid. If you can make it somewhere, if you can travel somewhere, there are options and then just establishing that care and creating that telehealth experience, but don’t settle and don’t ever feel minimized in a healthcare setting. And if you do, find a different clinician.

advocate for yourself and learn those tools that might help you along that journey.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:01:52)

Yeah, that’s a really good launch point. the other thing, because I lived in, we have so much in common, my goodness. I lived in middle of nowhere too for 21 years and I had to like drive forever just to like give birth with a midwife and it was just like, it was a whole thing. I’m sure we both have crazy stories from that. But one of the things I learned through living in the middle of nowhere and having to advocate for myself, I had to.

fire two practices before I finally found a midwife that would actually, that was following the evidence base. Like you would think, and that’s one thing I want to impress the listener. Like just because you find a provider does not mean they were following the science or even up to date on the science. And so there are practitioners out there that will help. And you may say, well, I don’t, can’t drive far and I don’t, I’m uninsured, right? So I can’t access that care. I would add one more thing to the list of resources.

Heather Florio (1:02:24)

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:02:48)

That’s a lot of, because when I lived in the middle of nowhere, I took insurance as a provider, but insurance was cutting off all the people that I was trying to see in chronic pain, because they’d say, oh, well, you get six visits, and you had them somewhere else, so we’re not going to pay anymore. So I had to drop my insurance contracts and go outside of the insurance world to provide low-cost alternatives for people to be seen. So what myself and a lot of other colleagues across the world

have done that are no longer in the insurance model is we provide first free consults. So now if you’re uninsured or your insurance sucks, well, I’ll just be frank, we can swear on this podcast. If you can’t find that hospital advocate, go to the local, you know, we call it cash based, but it can be fee for service that don’t take insurance because…

Heather Florio (1:03:23)

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, we…

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:03:42)

they are worth their salt, they will do a first free consult for you, they will talk you through in triage, just like I do, 10 minutes, ⁓ 15 minute conversation, because they care. They care enough to point you in the right direction. And then maybe they do say, there’s an advocate at this hospital, or here’s a practitioner that is in network, or has your insurance, et cetera, so that you can get access. Because we are very early in the access phase.

It’s why advocacy is so important and being involved in legislation and policy and stuff. But so many good resources, Heather, that you have mentioned. This is a full podcast from top to bottom on everything about autonomic nervous system and getting proper regulation of vagus nerve, of yoga resources, of how to advocate for yourself.

how to get comfortable just touching yourself, knowing that all the resources that are available to you are there to improve your quality of life, especially in including sexual health. ⁓ So I have one kind of weird question left. Well, two, one is this weird question. Two is where can everybody find you? But before we wrap up, I wanted to ask you one final question, because it feels ⁓ kind of right for the show. And that’s ⁓ if the pelvis had a voice,

What do you think it would say that medicine still struggles to hear?

Heather Florio (1:05:15)

I think our pelvic voice in general, we don’t have enough advocacy going on. We don’t have enough and we have so much going on in the pelvic region, whether it’s our bladder, our pelvic floor, our uterus, take your pick, your ovaries, know, your fallopian tubes, like just take your pick. And I think that if the pelvis had a voice, it would say, research me, understand me.

and guide me and we need this cyclical environment for women and you mentioned, you know, that there are different ways in which hopefully we can start advocating for ourselves and that’s the great thing about women. We are a network and eventually we will find a way around. Look at what we did with menopause and now you can’t go talk to your doctor about menopause because they had no active training in it.

You can go online, $49.95. You can get your no insurance needed. You get your appointment. I get three months worth of medication for $150. And I never have to step into a doctor’s office and I get everything done online. We will find systems and we will create systems to affect change. And that is what women do. And that is what we will do. And I think our pelvic floors, our voice of our pelvic floor is definitely telling us that that is what we need to do.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:06:16)

Yeah.

Alright, hands in the air on that. my gosh. Alright, tell everybody where they can find you.

Heather Florio (1:06:48)

Woo-hoo.

Yes, so our website is desertharvest.com. You’re welcome to check out any of our products. We’re also on Instagram, @DesertHarvestAloeVera and I am also on Instagram, actively having these types of conversations at @hmflorio

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:07:13)

Thank you. Thank you so much. I was just at the endo summit. So, yep, shameless plug for the endo summit, everybody. And you all were there and, it was so nice to, this is a whole aside. I was not planning on talking about this, but it was so nice to meet him and ⁓ to talk to them. But hilarious story. I’m gonna share this with you because it’s just, it’s so funny.

Heather Florio (1:07:20)

Bye!

You met my son.

you

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:07:41)

⁓ We were on our way back to the hotel after, this was like day three of the conference. And of course it’s in Florida. So when you’re gonna blow off steam, what do you do? You go sit by the pool. So at least one person was sunburned. And we were, this was one of the gynecologist surgeons. ⁓ And we’re all walking back to the hotel together. And this person was ⁓ kind of burned. And ⁓ he said, well, you know, I went by Walgreens, I’ve got some aloe. was like,

What is in that? Is there endocrine disruptors in that? You can’t be putting that on you. And I was like, yeah, exactly. was like, hold one moment. And I had my backpack. So I reached into my backpack and I pulled out a bunch of samples from your company, Desert Harvest. And I was like, there has to be something in here that will work for that. You know, it is aloe based. It’s a fantastic product. Patients love it. And I was like, here. And so on the way back.

Heather Florio (1:08:17)

Was it green?

Yeah.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:08:39)

He’s using vaginal moisturizer on his sunburn.

Heather Florio (1:08:42)

on his face.

Yeah, when all else fails, you can use our sex lube for sunburns.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:08:46)

That’s right, you can

use lube. So then we had a very colorful conversation on the way back to the hotel of all the ways that you could use lube or vaginal moisturizer for these various things, one including your squeaky, high-low pelvic health table. ⁓ It turned into this hilarious conversation, but it all started with the samples that I got from Desert Harvest

Heather Florio (1:09:09)

from Desert Armas,

that’s wonderful.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:09:10)

And realizing

that my good friend needed something that wasn’t going to be an endocrine disruptor on his face.

Heather Florio (1:09:18)

I love

that. I hope he threw that bottle away that he bought.

Dr. Ginger Garner PT, DPT (1:09:23)

I checked in later, I was like, how’s that vag moisturizer working? And he was like, brilliant, it feels great. ⁓ Yeah, so multiple uses, multiple uses for it. Heather, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. This was just a wealth of knowledge and assistance and encouragement and engagement and giving people a sense of agency, giving them their power back. And that’s what it’s all about. So thank you so much.

Heather Florio (1:09:31)

Yeah, I’ve done it many of times. Yes.

Thank you for having me and letting me voice all of this. appreciate it.