Patrick: All right. I got my jitters out, I think. All right, let me, let me do a couple of things here and welcome to the 18 Wheel Talk podcast show. Today is an exciting day because we finally got Hope Zvara, from Mother Trucking Yoga to join us on our show. We're gonna talk health and fitness.

Janet: I'm so excited to have her here today.

Patrick: Welcome, Hope.

Janet: Welcome.

Hope: Hello. Hello, Janet and Patrick and listeners. I'm so stoked to be on the show today. Uh, there was already a lot of energy going on before we hit record. So, I this is gonna be a great time

Patrick: here. Hey, don't mind our primitive, uh, studios.

Hope: I love it. I love it.

Patrick: Anyways, Hope.

Welcome to the show. Um, you, Janet, do you wanna start with the questions you want me to start? How do you wanna do it?

Janet: I had a malfunction.

Patrick: You had a malfunction. Where did you go? Oh, there, you're,

Janet: of course it started with,

Hope: I have malfunctions in life, so, uh,

Patrick: I, I'm usually IT, but I can't fix her problems.

Janet: I'm like, I don't even know how that came. Our business card took over my screen, my screensaver. I'm like, wow.

Patrick: Oh, there's one for the blooper reels. Woohoo.

Janet: Well, I, I have one big question to start with, and it's, I'm all big about learning and everything, and you've been going to school for like 20 years, and I wanna know what's the best thing you've learned in that 20 years?

Hope: Yeah. Well, first I have to say school, not in the sense that some of you might be thinking. Um, I'm a college dropout. I, uh, went to college for a year, did that thing, and realized that was not for me. And at the time, yeah. And at the time I was struggling with addiction and anxiety and depression and just, Wasn't finding the help that I was looking for and had been just starting to practice some yoga and I was finding that it was really helping me mentally as well as physically.

And when I dropped out of college, I was like, Hey, I'm gonna go take a yoga teacher training and did that and found that that could really be a path for me personally, but also professionally. I found I was good at it. I really enjoyed it. Um, it gave me kind of a place where I could be myself. Uh, and just like many of you listening, it's really hard when you feel like you have to be someone that you're not or that someone for someone else, or they won't hire you or approve of you or like you or whatever it is.

And I was really struggling with that at that time in my life. And that 20 years you were talking about was really me. Not only. Learning how to live again and get into recovery, which I've been in for about 15 years now. Congratulations, but congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, it was also me learning about the body.

Like, I didn't realize when I first started teaching yoga that I could hurt people,

I could actually hurt somebody, and, and I recognized. How many people are out there teaching fitness, especially in today's world with Instagram and TikTok and all this stuff, people just can wake up and decide, Hey, I'm gonna be a fitness expert because I took a weekend class. Yep. I have been studying health and fitness and biomechanics, which is how the body moves.

Yeah. Right. Functional anatomy, all that stuff. For 20 years, I have hundreds of thousands of hours put into training, certification, studying. And the number one thing I've discovered is that we're complicating fitness way too much in today's world. Even today, these big elaborate programs, this five day cleanse, and then people go back their old lives like all this.

For me, it's all about small, simple changes. And that's really how I got into recovery was I kept trying to wake up the next day and be healed. Uh, for those of you that are listening, I'm quoting my fingers, be healed. Right. And it just wasn't working. And then I saw that people were doing the same thing when it came to their health and fitness.

Without an addiction. And so I started to approach yoga and movement and, and this whole kind of fitness aspect with just little bite-sized pieces. Like I would rather have a driver do a stretch or two in bed before they get up and then maybe remember to do an extra twist when they're buckling their seatbelt or doing a stretch when they're filling up with fuel that looks like they're tying their shoes and do that every day.

Maybe it's a cumulative of five minutes.

Patrick: I like how you said that. Yeah. I like you said it, pretend like you're tying your shoes, pretend like you're reaching for something. Yeah. No, no, no. It's it, and, and that's what I, that's what I like about you that we found in your, in your research, I actually got your 11, your, your, your download, your 11 stretches that, that you can do.

Hope: Oh. I think they're showing that if you guys can't see it, but they're showing the download.

It's all simple stuff.

Janet: I'm horrible at showing things on camera.

Patrick: I actually, I, you know, I, I have a day job and, and Okay. My, my day job, I do a lot of standing, so, so, We're both, we both recovered from Covid last year, November, and. Ever since then, I've had aches and pains in my body that I, I, I had maybe years ago that, that were from broken bones and, and stuff like that. And now it's, it's aged related that my hips have been hurting, my knees have been hurting. And, and ever since I got your, your 11 stretches, I've been trying, you know, little here, a little there, and I'm like going, I, I find that I, I have better movement throughout the day.

Janet: He's been doing the hips, especially

Patrick: ju just, just a little. And I agree with you. It's, it takes that one little, I call 'em baby steps. Yep. If you take that one baby step, that one baby step leads to two leads to three leads to, you know, eventually, uh, she's, she's in physical therapy right now and, and, and, and I told her, I said, I said eventually it's gonna get easier.

Janet: Well, and the ironic part is, is. As a truck driver and ex-military and ex restaurant being 15 to 20 years in high heels in management. My back when I. Started hurting post covid. My doctor said, you have the back of an 85 year old man who worked hard all his life. I Oh, thank you.

Patrick: Oh, awesome. I said, I said, Hey, hope's gonna help you

Hope: Does that come with a badge of honor.

Patrick: Yeah. You're gonna get, you're gonna get a big star.

Janet: No, but my dad predicted it, so, so then they put me through this, it's called RFA, radio Frequency Ablation. I did that on my lower back and then they said, well, you're gonna go to physical therapy. So then we downloaded your stretches and I'm like, oh, I do this and, and I do this one and I do this one.

I do these in physical therapy and, uh, my computer's going nuts today. Anyway, I do these in physical therapy, and it's like, a lot of them, I'm like, well, I recognize a lot of these, but there's some I can't do because of my injuries. And it's like, well, I didn't know I had these injuries until I had covid.

But

Patrick: it's baby steps. But I do, I definitely like the way you explained it though. Pretend you're tying your shoe, pretend you're reaching for something, you know, it doesn't have to look pretty. You just have to make it feel, you gotta be able to feel it.

Hope: Well, and something that you said, Janet, that is something I preach all the time. It's about mobility that as we age, I, and I used to work in a nursing home teaching yoga, and so I got to work with people all the way into their nineties. And one of the things I recognized working with these men and women is they would give anything to be mobile.

To be able to reach up on their own, get out of their own wheelchair, put on their own clothes. Mobility equals independence. And a lot of times in the fitness world, we're hyper-focused on strength or we're hyper-focused on flexibility. Mobility is the combination of those. Plus balance. And so this idea of stretching up overhead or bending down and just kind of fiddling with your, your shoelaces, like you're touch, like you're touching your toes or, or putting on your shoe while you're filling up with fuel.

Nobody knows what you're doing, but you're releasing your lower back, you're releasing your hamstrings, you're allowing your hips to move more freely. Like all of these little things sprinkled throughout the day is really how we stay healthy and fit. And we're still trying to sell truck driver, school teacher, plumber.

I don't care who it is. We're still trying to sell the package of fitness and health, like this extra thing. Like, oh, I have to set aside time to go to the gym. Oh, I have to make sure I have a kettlebell. And what I'm trying to say is, This is about you being more mobile and active in your everyday life.

And as a truck driver, the response I often get is, well, I I don't have a lot of time. I beg to differ. I I beg to differ. You may be moving all the time, but you have time. And so that's where I'm teaching drivers things. In the driver's seat. Everyone has a 30 minute mandatory break.

How about you take two of those minutes and you do a little bit of stretching? Once you park for the night, you can't go nowhere. So how about a couple of laps around your truck when you're doing your pre-trip check in the morning, add one or two extra laps. Cuz 32 laps are on your truck and trailer is a mile.

I'm not saying walk 32 laps, but if it only takes you one or two or three in the morning, why not do five?

Janet: Yeah. You would've loved my dad

Hope: It all adds up. The cool thing is, is that no one can take away. The little things that you do. It's kind of like if you are trying to improve eating and you still have the Big Mac, I was just say, eat the dang salad because the Big Mac's not gonna cancel out the salad.

It doesn't work that way. Like you're still gonna get the nutrition, you're, you're, maybe, you're maybe not eating that whole thing, but you're still getting nutrition. Or drink the water bottle, have the soda. I'd be a hypocrite if I say Never drink soda again. But how about one bottle of water before the soda?

After a while, your body's gonna naturally crave that soda less. And we're gonna have so many other benefits. So it's all about small, simple changes. It's all about consistency. It's all about integrating things and movement into your lives.

Patrick: Exactly. Exactly. I totally agree with you. 100%.

Because that's what I do. I pretend I'm tying my shoes at work

Hope: and you have Velcro ones, it's like, oh wait, no. something on the floor was there.

Patrick: I'm adjusting my pant leg. It was up against the Velcro. It was driving me nuts. It's a short, it's a short drive, but it's okay. So I have a question for you now.

How did you come up with the mother truck and pain relief cream? I know it. Okay. You know, it's, and, and, well, it's kinda like a two part question because I know that. You know, as, as an ex truck driver, whenever I went to the doctor and, and she wanted to prescribe, uh, a medication for me, I'd be like, is this gonna make me drowsy cuz I drive a truck?

And so that was always on my mind. So when it came to pain relief and stuff like that, it was, it was, I was always leery of. Trying different products and, and when we were reading about your product, I was like, I was like, I gotta ask her, I gotta say, how does she come up with this? Because it's it's all natural, and yet, you know, it, it should be D O T approved. It's, it's one of those how,

Hope: well, I have always, I've been an entrepreneur for over 20 years and I've always loved the creation of things. And so I have been dabbling in product creation, you know, most of my, my entrepreneur journey, um, from making my own yoga bags and eye pillows and branding them and doing all that to, once I started mother trucker yoga almost six years ago, um, I knew I wanted to help truck drivers.

In as many ways as possible utilizing all my skill sets. And, oh gosh, it was 2019, just before 2020, um, I started creating a pain relief cream because in the yoga world I was always using everyone else's pain relief cream. But I always had a disclaimer, this one's greasy, this one smells bad. This one's a chemical S H I T storm, like I don't like this one looks good, but like you gotta reapply all the time. And I always said one day, I wanna create my own. Yeah, it's too expensive. All stuff was that. And so, well,

Janet: Let me put gloves on cuz I don't like the way it feels on my hand.

Hope: Yes, yes.

Patrick: That's why, that's why I'm like, I'm like, how did you come up with this formula?

Hope: So, so I, along the way throughout my studying, it's like I. Kind of started to collect information. Like, these are the things I would wanna have in a pain relief cream. I'm not a chemist though. I'm not a formulator. I just knew the things that work and I knew the things that help relieve inflammation.

To help with mobility, help cre uh, help with nerve issues. Like I knew all of these things. I had no idea how to combine 'em together. I was at a conference, um, on the business side of life and someone heard my business name and was like, oh my gosh, I love your company. Have you ever thought about a product?

And at the same time, we both said a pain relief cream.

And so that was about, uh, I know, right. It was about a year of trial and testing. We did about 10 different rounds of product formulation. Because I didn't like the consistency. It was too watery, it smelled bad, it was too cakey. Um, and I wanted a certain type of ingredients in there. And part of my thing was, It had to have no synthetics, no dyes.

Um, no carbons, no nothing. Cuz I have skin allergies. And so I was like, I want something and it has to be made of America. That was the other big thing. Yeah. Our manufacturers in Arizona. Um, yes. Oh yeah. You guys are at Arizona. I love it. And we finally hit a home run, did a bunch of trials with some drivers to see what they thought about it.

And then I started going door to door, literally asking truck stops and travel centers, um, and media if they would review the product and just see what they think. And the reviews kept coming back. Like people were like, wow, this stuff is really good. It really works. It's not greasy like the, the sensation lasts for a really long time.

I actually have increased mobility, and the reason behind that is a big part of our product. We use capsicum, which is a pepper extract and it creates rapid blood flow. So part of the reason why people have chronic pain is cuz there's lack of mobility, which creates inflammation. And so we're trying to reduce inflammation really quickly to enhance mobility.

And so yes, there's some, you know, like a nerve desensitizing if you're familiar with like Icy Hot or Bengay. Um, they have one to two active ingredients and one of them being menthol and it's usually at a 10% level. So they're numbing, but nothing's really happening beyond that. And so what we have is we have six active ingredients and so we're trying to penetrate deeper than just the nerve desensitization. And then after I created Stiff Mother Trucker and doing that for about, I don't know, two years through Covid by the way. Yeah. Yes. Uh, I recognized a few things.

One was people loved our product, but some people did not like the name. Um, and two, I did a bigger product line. I know, I know. All right. I'm, I like puns.

Patrick: Listen, you know, It works though. It works. With your name, you know? Your, your, your mother trucker yoga. It's, stiff mother trucker, you know? You're a truck driver who has stiff joints to me. I love it.

Hope: I know, I do too. We actually six months ago, um, decided in order to move into some other retailers that we wanted to, um, we actually rebranded to Road Relief Wellness, Stiff Mother Trucker is our parent company.

Um, but that allowed us to expand our whole product line. We have now, 14 different products. Uh, and we have several different versions of the pain relief cream. We have it as a cream, we have it as a roll on now. Um,and that's a cooling. And we have it as a warming balm. So you can roll it, you can put it on your skin, and it has a warming effect instead of a cooling effect.

So now we have other variations, which is great.

Patrick: Very cool. That's very cool.

Janet: I missed that in my research.

Patrick: Well see, I, I, I did mention that, uh, I did mention to her the, the other day that, that you had a product line coming out and that we should talk about it. But I that's like further down the list.

Hope: Yeah. No, so my big thing is for me, I, I want to be able to help truck drivers in every capacity that I can. When it becomes to, when it comes to fitness and health a big part of that other piece is quality. There are so many people out there going Amazon and you'll see it right away.

That are selling crap products. And I feel like drivers are constantly overlooked. Constantly underestimated. And you walk into a truck stop, no offense to any of the truck shop, the owners that are listening, a lot of the products are still crap.

Janet: It's cause it's what's available. Yeah

Hope: Absolutely. And so I wanted to create a product line. Where we could go into the wellness and grooming section and kind of own that space, and know that this is a, you know, small business with high quality products that they stand behind, that are made specifically for truck drivers. There's nothing out there.

Specifically. Made for drivers. And that is the one thing that I really wanted to accomplish. And I'm super excited that we're able to expand our line. We have an awesome trucker, camo line, T-shirts, hats, water bottles.

Patrick: Yeah, I did see those. Yeah, we saw those. Yeah, like those look cool.

Hope: So they're super great. They're an awesome, one of our best sellers. We have mini travel massage guns. Um, and so just really trying to, Check off all the boxes for drivers that they could walk into any truck stop and be like, man, I need to feel good, or I wanna take my health back. Or, wow, I need to drink more water.

There's a water bottle that could help me with that. And since they tend to live at a truck stop, I'm not saying all drivers do, but a big majority of 'em are, why not put them there so that they have access to them?

Patrick: That, that makes total, that makes total sense. And, and

Hope: so I mean, aside from trying to create world domination,

Patrick: hey wait, wait, wait.

Hold on. I want, I want world peace

Hope: And mine's gonna world domination in a good way though. We're be friendly in that. So.

Janet: That's cool.

Patrick: That's okay. We'll, we'll, we'll let you,

Janet: so you have a lot of stats about truckers, like 86% of truckers are obese. 13 new tongue, 13.6% of truckers suffer from depression and 50% of truckers have back pain.

And I was wondering just, where did you find all your stats on this?

Hope: Oh gosh. Um, we researched all of those. It's been a little while and we try to update those annually. Um, anywhere from the American Diabetic Association to the C D C, to ata. I mean, we grabbed and we tried to compare statistics amongst all platforms and then there, yeah, there was kind of an average. Some of 'em, it was the constant statistic, you know, over and over again.. But on average, between Australia's stats, the US stats, European stats. Uh, American Diabetic Association, again, like the cdc, um, there was a couple different trucker associations that we were looking at that collects stats.

On average, it was like 86% of drivers are obese. Mind you mind you that are, we have a skewed perception on what we think is obese in America.

Patrick: Yes. Yeah. I, I was telling her that, that if, if I go through like any kind of chart, That, you know, it says, you know, tell us how old you are and, and, and height, weight, are you male?

 You know, height, weight. I'm, I'm classified obese. I'm like, no, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm skinny fat. I, I was always told to protect the things I love. So I, I, I put a, put a wall around my six pack abs.

Hope: Mm-hmm. Well, remember that when it comes to measuring, you know, body fat and bmi and obviously some, some ways to measure people say are outdated and you need to do all these different things.

Like, I don't wanna get into that.? But if you are Okay. Male, female. 25 to 30% over what your recommended body weight based on your height and all of this and your age. And again, you can go into deeper statistics. That's not a lot. That's like 20 pounds. For some people, 25 pounds. And so when, I mean we have a skew skewed perception on what that is.

Sometimes people hear that stat and they're like, oh my gosh, but the majority of Americans are walking around obese. Yeah. Like, yeah. Well that's the reality.

Janet: But that's the reason I ask is because like if you look, I've lived overseas and if you look at say Americans, compared to Europeans, we eat twice as much easily every meal that they do.

Um, our perception of food is. Totally different here.

Hope: Our plate sizes are larger.

Janet: Our plate sizes are huge. Even if you look at, and we did a podcast about plate sizes. I don't remember the exact one, but in it, I was talking about food and perception and eating healthy. And if you look at plates like that, I inherited from my grandparents and his gr his great aunt.

Um, what we had is dinner plates in say the forties and fifties that I inherited

Patrick: are now app appetizer plates here.

Janet: Now our appetizer plates. It's amazing cuz what I use as a bread and butter plate, that's what came with the set. I use that as a dinner plate and people look at me like that's not a dinner plate.

I'm like, well it was before I was born. My grandma used it as a dinner plate and chicken breast four ounces is a serving, but I have weighed chicken breasts that come, you know, in a package. They're over a pound for a boneless, skinless chicken breast. I'm like, I've weighed some that are like 20 ounces for one chicken breast.

I'm like, that's way too much food. I can feed three or four people on that.

Patrick: I could eat that much in one sitting.

Janet: Not when I cook.

Hope: I mean, though

Janet: I know vegetables, but that's what I was,

Hope: people do that. Yeah. They feel like, oh my gosh. And I'm not trying to attack, I'm not trying to put down, I, I hate, I try to actually never focus on those stats because drivers know those stats.

They know if they're healthy or not. As much as I hear sometimes from my drivers when I'm working with them, there's a little bit of resistance and I think sometimes it's because they've never been given a solution that works for them. I mean, how frustrating to show up at your doctor and to be told that you're overweight?

Well, no crap. I just looked in the mirror. I'm pretty sure I know that. Like, but not

Patrick: you just, you just put me on your scale and it said, fat, fat, fat, fat.

Hope: Not to be given solutions. That actually work for them. And that is like my mission for drivers. I believe it's the small, simple changes that lead to the big results.

And I want drivers to know that I see them and I hear them, and that you should not have to be ashamed or put up this wall when it comes to wanting to take care of your health. Because the flip side of working with drivers now for six years is once in a while I come in contact with drivers that have this super hard exterior.

Like, oh, I don't need to take care of myself. I drink, you know, five Mountain Dews a day and just smoke 12 cigarettes. And I'm like, how's that working for you? And they may say to me, oh, just fine. But it's like, are you really, like, are you really as good as you could be? Well, I don't sleep that great. Well, you know, I got gout like, well this,

Patrick: I'm guilty of the five Mountain Dews and you know, three packs a day. Don't, don't do it no more, but.

Hope: Starting small. And also the other piece is, so in our brain when we're told that we can't have something, we actually hold on tighter. It's a proven fact that our brain, like the second week someone says no, or don't, or can't we actually have a tendency to grab.

And so my whole approach with drivers isn't to say no really to anything, but rather add this one piece in. I don't what else you do. Yeah. But just commit with this one piece with me and what I've discovered, I've ran a 90 day program a few times over the last few years. So I get to work with drivers consecutively for 90 days, um, where I'm seeing them all the time throughout the week.

The one thing I've noticed is by showing them these things that they can add in. Automatically they start taking the crap out. Like, I'm not even telling them, don't do that. Don't do that, don't do that. I simply delivering them the information and saying, Hey, try this. And letting them decide.

And that's a really empowering thing. And I go back to getting into recovery because so much of how I approach health is based on my own experience. In that people tried to help me get well. For years. My parents dropped me from therapist to therapist. Like eventually it was just like, I don't know what to do with her.

And I just kept on trying to do everyone's program. Follow everyone's thing. But it wasn't until this idea of breaking things down into micro steps mm-hmm. And just taking it one day at a time, it really came to life for me that that wasn't just a recovery or, or, or, you know, uh, catastrophic approach.

That can also be an approach that we take in every aspect of life.

Patrick: I agree. Yeah. I agree.

Janet: Ironically, I'm one of the ones that gained weight after I quit driving, but I quit driving cuz I went through a windshield. So Yeah. Yeah. Six one half dozen the other. I'm here to talk about it. It's all good.

Patrick: Because that was, that, that was one of the next questions, you know, it's just this, just when you're working with groups, how, how do you deal with it?

How, one, how, how are you, how are you able to, to, to help each individual within, within the company that wants help

Janet: without being overwhelmed yourself. Yeah. Or, or overworked. Or overworked.

Hope: Yeah. So one of the things is, uh, we do have an app. Yeah. Um, and so that is a really great way where drivers can kind of self-select and self-serve when it comes to a company level or a CDL school.

Um, it's just really group coaching in, uh, depends on, depends on the company. Once a week or once a month. Usually once a month is, is usually kind of where most companies are at. And it's a live q and a, ask me anything, I'm here to help you. You know, I usually come with something to the table, that coaching session to kind of give them, to help motivate them.

Um, but really it's just allowing them to be seen and heard and reinforcing the things that they're doing or not doing, that they should start. And I have talked to dozens of trucking companies, especially over the last two years. Some of the big ones, I won't name their names. Um, and what I've discovered in these conversations is many of them have wellness programs, but drivers aren't using them.

Janet: Yeah. Right. And, and that's, I can tell you that's true.

Hope: And, and one of the reasons why, and I'll go to the grave with this, is they're pushing too hard. They're asking them to do too much. They're bribing them with too much stuff. Like I, I, I'm sorry. At some point or another, giving a driver a cooler, um, or a jacket or whatever it is like.

Clearly you aren't hitting the mark because even that isn't motivating them to continue. And why? Because the way you're delivering it is built for an average corporate person, you're, you're building programs for people that don't live over the road, that aren't isolated, that don't have the restrictions drivers do.

And although it's commendable, they're, they're just approaching it all wrong. And I've tried to help some of these companies yeah. But again, the company has to be willing, the wellness coordinator has to be willing. Yeah. Sometimes people feel their ego is bruised and I'm, I'm just speaking frankly, um, I'm not here to take over anyone's job. I truly want every driver to feel like health is accessible to them.

Patrick: I Wish. I, I wish I knew you five years ago, six years ago. I might, I might still be driving.

Hope: Yeah. The health of a company is not based on new Kenworth's. It's not based on having an extra day of pto it's if that driver is not healthy enough to pass their cdl, get in and out of the truck, be on time, you know, sleep a quality night.

Like they're not an asset to you, they're a liability. And they are your biggest money maker. Why are we not putting more attention on this still? It's 2023 people wake up.

Patrick: I know. I now, I was in, in, uh, 99, I worked for a flatbed company who's no longer in business, uh, on a regional board. And I think I slept in the bunk once in the, in the 11, 12 months that I worked for them.

It was 20 minute power naps behind the steering wheel because it had to be the next stop, you know, come hell or high water. And I'm like, uh, burning the candle at both ends. And eventually when I hit the bunk, I slept for 12 hours.

Janet: And see the company I worked for was a small company. They bought the rig spec, uh, specifically for me.

I was blessed. I can't even pretend I wasn't, I took took me to the Peterbilt shop to pick it out, but then they, yeah, that's, he hates that

Patrick: this story gets better every time I hear it.

Janet: It does not, but then they,

Patrick: oh wait, oh, wait, wait, wait. Story time ding.

Janet: But then they, they let me upgrade the mattress and they, you know, they let me do the little upgrades to make it more comfortable for me, you know, and. Little things like that. So it was really nice because they cared and like I told him, I said, I have to have a good quality seat. And they, the owner says, well, nobody else has really said this.

And he says, well, can I ask why? And I said, yeah, because my Dr my father started driving when he was 14 years old. And he is got a bad back. He retired when he was 86. Mean he rest in peace. But, you know, and back then he was still alive. And then I said, my, my dad still drives and I don't wanna have his back.

I, I still get it up with it for a different reason.

Patrick: Oh, believe me. Hope. I wish we had a, a microphone nearby every time he, he, he opened his mouth. There was a story behind it. I, I wish I had recordings because, oh my god. Yeah. When I, when I grew up, before I got into trucking, I listened to all the old guys' stories.

That's what made me wanna be a truck driver. Love it. Yeah.

Janet: But anyway, so yeah, he, the owner that I worked for, really believed in, you know, listening and paying attention and, you know, he did the little things and, you know, it was, it really helped that I woke up one morning and my, my truck had been, you know, personalized on the outside too with, with a caricature of me and my dog, and our, my cb, my CB handle, and, and everybody gave my dog a CB handle too.

Blondie and the squirrel.

Patrick: Blondie. And the squirrel.

Hope: I'm glad that you said that. I'm so glad that you mentioned the seat and the mattress. Because all those, though, those can be big investments upfront. That is preventative medicine, preventative care, and that can save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars.

Yep. Of post care, not to mention time off. Mm-hmm. Because of injury, because of a herniated disc, because of neck problems, because of a pull that back muscle. So having that couple of extra dollars to spend up front and just bite the bullet and do it can really save you in the long run. And I think the biggest thing for drivers is when you start with a company, Ask.

Yeah. They may say no, but in that interview process, be like, I wanna drive for you, you know, for a long time, and I wanna be set up for success. You know? Do you accommodate anything else inside the truck? Yeah. You know, would you put money towards a new seat? Uh, maybe you pay part of it, you know? Right.

Would you be able to invest in better mattress than the factory one? That's like a quarter of an inch thick. Mm-hmm. You know, and, and one of the things I ask for company owners is that, would you want that? Yeah, no, I think that's one thing that we forget as humans is like put yourself in that other person's position.

Although they may do it anyways, it's probably cuz they feel like if they voice up you're gonna say no and they could lose their job and they don't want that. And so let's open the conversation. Mm-hmm And start having these conversations and start treating people on both ends with respect. When it comes to health, when it comes to wellness, what if your driver turnover rate drops even by 10%?

Like imagine the cost savings that you'll have with that just by having driver, a few of 'em that stick around a few more years. Yeah. Because you're treating them with respect a little bit better. Yep. Yeah, I mean I think it's more than money cuz I don't know about where you guys live, but I drive around Wisconsin and I see in front of trucking companies, we live in a trucking town, in a manufacturing town, and you see sign-on bonuses anywhere from five to 10, some places.

20 k. Yeah. And they're still looking for drivers. So here's what my mind thinks. Clearly money isn't working anymore.

Patrick: No. Although, although I have thought about coming outta retirement and signing on with some of these companies.

Janet: Yeah. But for the 20 grand bonus, it's like, oh, I told, well,

Patrick: I don't know if I could do a year behind behind the wheel again.

Janet: I told him he could.

Hope: That's just it. So trying to say to ourselves, well, what if we treat our drivers a little bit better and then bonus them on the back end, which they're just gonna feel even more appreciative of. Right. Um, but it has to start with the driver also. Respecting themselves well, and, and, and seeing that they're worthy and they're worth it, and that their body, you know, and that they deserve to be healthy.

I watched my dad for years, beat his body up. He was a sewer pipe layer, the guy 80 feet down in the hole. Oh. And he's now 65 years old. And, uh, he'll never tell anybody, but he is disabled. Um, it's difficult for him to get in and up out of the truck and out of, uh, you know, out of his house, out of a chair.

Uh, he can't stand too long. Can't sit too long, can't sleep too long, can't lay too long. Uh, numbness in his hands, numbness in his feet, and he's, he's still ticking. He is doing the best he can, but the number one thing I've seen from him now at 65 years old is I wish I would've gone back and done things differently.

Yeah. I wish I would've advocated for myself. I wish I would've just said, oh, rub some dirt in it. Yeah. You know, I'm actually, actually taking care of himself and now he's paying the price for it, um, and doing the best he can. But it's, it's hard to watch him sometimes, and I don't want anyone to go through that.

Because I've got a first, you know, row view of what, not taking care of your body and what constant, repeated. Repeated, yeah. You know, kind of just punishment on your body going into the same environment that impact on the seat. You know, constantly driving for eight, 10 hours a day for 5, 10, 15, 20, 50 years is gonna wreck your back.

Yes, yes. And so how can we prevent that? Or how can we at least reduce the symptoms so that you can retire eventually and still have a body to celebrate life in?

Patrick: Well, that, I retired my, my last job of 21 years, I, I worked for a medical waste company, so I drove a truck. To the hospital and then it manually offloaded and loaded.

So I drove two trucks, I drove the big truck, and then I drove the little hand truck. And after 21 years of doing that, my body's like, Hey, enough. Yeah. So I was like, I gotta get out. So, so then I went back to work for the, I work, work for, work for the post office now, so I could get, be abused even more.

Hope: Well, and prove to all those postal workers out there. My aunt was one, she just recently retired about a year ago. That is not an easy job as well. Mm-hmm. I mean, just doesn't matter what vehicle you drive, doing the post office thing, that is incredibly challenging on the body. You're constantly bending funny, leaning, funny.

Um, there's no good way to do that. And so kudos to all the, the postal workers out there that are listening.

Patrick: Yeah. Trust me, they, I, I work on the backend, so, so it's like, it, it's, it's, it's, it's an easy job, but yet it's a, you do a lot of standing. That, that's why I I, I utilize your

Hope: equal problems in itself too.

Right? So, I mean, take your pick,

Patrick: which is why I utilize your stretches. I'm like,

Janet: you're saying it's easy. And this is the man that comes back and tells me all the twisting back and forth and, okay.

Patrick: My first week on the job, I, I, I felt like somebody roll rolled over me with a steam roller. I, my hips hurt so bad, my knees, I was like, don't,

Hope: well, standing on concrete is not great for you either.

Patrick: I'm like, I don't ever remember having this much pain ever in my life. And I used to be a garbage man when I first got into driving. So it's like, I don't ever remember feeling that ache. I mean, I was just like, Oh my God. Something

Janet: I told him, welcome to adulthood.

Patrick: Open the Jack Daniels bottle and just pour it down my throat please.

Janet: So I have some more questions here. With all your skills, like you, core fitness and yoga and Pilates, uh, relaxation and meditation and stress management, and I think the list just keeps going on. Do you have something that's like a go-to that you begin when you're trying to help someone with their health in general?

Like when you're working with these companies and someone stands up and says, Hey, I got this problem.

Hope: Three things. First thing is posture, okay? Because if you don't fix your posture, everything you're doing is just going to enhance the posture that you currently have, okay? So that hunched over, shoulders forward, head forward.

If now you're gonna go and work out, but you are not self-aware that your posture is crappy, you're just going to keep working out and improving, quote unquote. With that crappy posture. Um, and if the instructor doesn't understand the body, they're not catching that because they're just obsessed with the memorized exercises they saw in the book that they learned that they're not even keen to that.

So first thing first is we gotta fix our posture. If you're a driver listening, you know, use the seat. Sit up straight, right with the bottom part of your back of your head, that's called your occipital bone. Just kinda lean back and find the headrest. Now, I'm not saying drive like that all day, cuz it's gonna be awkward, but ever so many hours maybe set an alarm every hour or 45 minutes.

Have a have an alarm. Go off that different than your wake up alarm, okay? Trigger different, different patterns of brain and just recheck back in. See if the backs of your shoulders can touch the back of your seat. Just open up your chest. I, I believe in today's country, in America especially, maybe we don't have a mental health issue as much as we have a movement issue.

Because hear me out. When you exercise, when you move, you boost oxytocin, serotonin, dopamine, neurotransmitters in the brain immediately. And isn't it interesting that most people that are struggling with depression and anxiety and addiction also do not live a very active lifestyle equally as much when you are depressed?

When you feel lonely, when you feel sadness, what do we do? We hunch forward. We hide our heart, we hide our chest. Now you can't breathe,

Patrick: like as I as you're talking about, I hunch forward.

Hope: Now I'm anxious because I can't breathe deeply. Now I have anxiety 24 7. So posture is one of them. When we sit upright, when we stand up, right, we open our chest, we deepen our breath, we immediately boost good endorphins and all that good chemicals into our brain.

And we're kind of getting two for one here, and that we're lowering stress. We're approving posture, using muscles we normally don't use. Uh, when it comes to digestion, it's really hard for your organs to do what they're supposed to do when you're crunching down on them. So just the art of sitting upright can allow your, all of your digestive system to do what it's supposed to do.

So, posture is one, breathing is two. When is the last time you took a deep breath and you were aware of it? That you breathed in through your nose and your belly expanded and you took a deep breath out and your belly contracted and you did that two or three or four times in a row and you paid attention to your breathing.

Patrick: My lungs my lungs

Janet: Well I do it all. I do it daily. So

Patrick: when, when I did when I did that, my lungs were like, whoa, time out.

Hope: And so we forget though, that our lungs are a muscle. And so when you breathe, You are working your muscles. I worked in a nursing home like I was telling you, and a lot of the men and women there, the, the PT would come around with a little device and they'd have to blow in it.

Why? To strengthen their lungs, because if your lungs aren't strong, those are muscles. You're not pumping oxygen to the brain and to the body. Yeah. And so teaching drivers how to deep breathe has a mental effect that goes far beyond just taking a deep breath in the moment. When I was able to step out of addiction and depression and anxiety, I did it medication free.

I'm not advocating everyone do that, but I leaned on. The practices of yoga, like breathing, like mindfulness, like improving posture, moving my body, and over time, that really allowed me to step into a new space. So first is posture, second is breathing, and the third one is to drink one bottle of water every single morning before you get out of bed.

What I mean by that is the night before, put a bottle of water or a cup of water on your nightstand. If you're in your truck, stick a bottle of water or your travel thermos right by your bed. And when you sit up and your feet hit the ground, I do this every single morning. No matter where I am, I pick up my water bottle and I just chug.

So you gotta do it before your mind thinks about it, and it's the perfect time to do it in the morning. And drivers will say, well, I'm gonna have to pee. I'm like, no, no, no. This is where I thought about this all. I have this all planned out. If you would drink that bottle of water right away when you wake up.

By the time you go to the bathroom, do your pre-trip check, get dressed, get breakfast, you're gonna have to go to the bathroom again. And then you get to go out on the road and do your thing. And if that's the only water you drink all day, you have jumpstarted your system in a way that you have never before.

Dehydration is also directly linked to depression and anxiety. It is linked to people with back pain. Mm-hmm. Muscle cramps. Muscle aches, digestive issues. So what if you don't have those problems at all? You're just dehydrated.

Janet: Never thought about that. So I have a They have a personal question about that.

Patrick: Go ahead. You, you, you go ahead. I was gonna ha I was gonna say something funny

Janet: then you could say something funny. Every night when we go to bed, I put a bottle of water on each our nightstands every morning when I wake up, because I wake up frequently, I just always have. My bottle of water's empty already.

Patrick: She's, she's a night drinker. Well, usually like, like if you go to like a, a baseball game or something, the, the beer guy's saying, you know, hi, uh, dehydrate now hydrate later. He is selling beer and water. That's why I keep water by the bed. I dehydrate at night and then hydrate in the morning.

Janet: Does that what my question was, do I need to keep two bottles of water on my side?

Hope: Well, one, I would ask myself, am I thirsty when I wake up in the middle of the night? Because if I am, you're going to bed dehydrated. You're going, if once you're thirsty, your body has already been dehydrated, uh, for several hours.

And so that, that feeling of thirst is like your body's natural alarm system saying, Hey, hey, hey, things aren't good. And most Americans. Are dehydrated. Yeah. Um, a lot of our issues, dry eyes, brain fog, stomach upset, can actually be resolved by hydrating more frequently during the day. Um, and so maybe try to shift your water drinking a little bit.

The other part is, is try adding something to your water, a little bit of sea salt, um, or a little bit of lemon. Most of the time if your water is like pure clean water, you use a reverse osmosis water or something like that, that water is actually not attaching and bonding to your cells. It's cleansing.

So you want something in your water for your cells to attach to. Um, and, and that's like a whole nother conversation. But, so really looking at what you're drinking. Is really important. So for drivers, you know, I recommend to them take, take your water bottle, just travel with a little sea salt shaker, one shake in there, and you know, if you wanna squeeze lemon and they're great, that's awesome, but you don't have to.

But just a little shake gives you also all the trace minerals that you need for the day, which is a whole nother thing when it comes to nutrition, when it comes to health. Um, but I would consider myself, you know, if I'm thirsty at night, I'm waking up and I'm drinking in the middle of the night, I didn't drink enough water during the day.

Janet: See, I think it's just a habit for me. Because I still drink about six bottles of water a day. And this isn't juice or anything. This is, um, a, what's that stuff called? Uh, that's the brain injury kicking in.

Patrick: Crystal light.

Janet: Crystal light. I don't drink sugary drinks. I drink crystal light. Right? So that's what that is. But I drink that and then I drink like a cup of coffee in the morning and then I switch to water. So, but yeah.

Hope: But even in the morning, you wanna jumpstart your system.

Janet: Yeah. I You want grab a bottle of water outta the, yeah.

Hope: So you wanna cleanse your system, you wanna start fresh? Um, I'm not against coffee. I like a cup of coffee in the morning as well, but I don't want coffee to be the first thing that I'm drinking in the morning. I want that water to be the first thing that goes into my body and kind of sets everything for the day, um, and gets me going. And when I hear from drivers, I don't like water.

Well, I don't like chemotherapy. I don't like surgery. Yeah. Like I don't like a lot of things.

Patrick: Yeah. I don't like stubing my toes.

Janet: I get up and get another bottle of water outta the fridge and then I drink that while I feed our dogs and take care of them. Cause that's a whole half hour walk and then a half hour to feed em. Get their day going too cause

Hope: Love it. That's a perfect example of just trying to be more active and move and for drivers that travel with pets. I think dogs are great in the fact that if you get out and you walk 'em, you know you get out and you exercise and cuz it forces you to exercise. Be funny story though.

So I'm at, I'm at this truck stop, right? I used to travel around and go to TA, truck stops and I'm at this truck stop and I'm like, what is going on? And I like, look down the hill. Honest to God, I should have took a picture. It was a truck driver with his, I think it was like two or three dogs and his pet pig.

He had a pig in his truck, a large, like, it wasn't like a cute little piglet. This was like, how the heck did that pig get in the truck? Like, I like just about lost it. I was, I was like, I'm accepting. I love animals. I have chickens. Like we've raised lamb before. Like I, I have dogs. A pig in your truck.

Janet: But the um, what are the small pigs that everybody think are so cute? Potbelly. Yeah. Pop belly pigs get to be a couple hundred pounds. And people don't realize that.

Hope: Yeah, that was definitely a couple hundred pounds.

Patrick: I bet it was. I bet it was cute when it was little.

Janet: Yeah. And because people adopt them or they give him as gifts because they're so cute and tiny, but they don't realize this is gonna get to be a potbelly pig is a pig.

It's gonna get to be a couple hundred pounds. They don't realize that,

Hope: I don't even, I don't think I'm fully expressing how large this pig was. I mean,

Patrick: Was it stretching.

Hope: So all of you listeners out there, if you travel with a pig in your truck, please send Patrick and Janet a photo.

Patrick: Oh yeah. I, I wanna see that. I wanna see this.

Hope: Or if you find someone traveling with a pig, we wanna see it. Yeah.

Patrick: Yeah. You can send it to the hosts@eighteenwheeltalk.com.

Janet: Yeah, I've seen, I had a girlfriend that traveled with three Bassett Hounds, and she was five foot.

Tall flat. And she traveled with three Bassett hounds. She used to pick them up 3. She used to pick them up and put them in the truck. And then finally I was talking to her one day and I'm like, I was doing some remodeling for her. And I said, why don't I just build you a ramp to that can like extend and they can just climb up in?

And so I built her an extendable ramp that just she'd open the passenger door and slide the ramp out and the dogs would climb up. And then I said, you're gonna save yourself a lot of back pain in the future.

Hope: Oh, a hundred percent. Well, and traveling with pets on, on the idea of health. You know, having dogs, research does show, you know, people that have dogs do live longer.

Um, they are less depressed. They do have less anxiety. They do seem better. Um, and dogs are, I'm a big fan. When I see drivers with dogs, I'm like, Hey, like, And I, I, kudos to you. They, they're happy, you know, they, they have something to care for. We, as humans, we're pack animals, so having to care for something gives us purpose.

I th I love when drivers have pets with them. It just gets a little weird for me when I see animals that I would not think probably should be in a truck. Right. No,

Janet: I knew a guy that had a parrot in his truck

Hope: that was a guy that I met that had a snake, and I was, he's like, do you wanna see it? I was like, hell no.

I do not wanna,

Janet: oh, I'd be like, show me the baby. No, no, no.

Patrick: It's like I had snakes growing up, so it's, you know, I had two of them.

Hope: I'll take your word for it. I'll take your word for it.

Patrick: They're, they're, they're not that that bad, but Yeah, they can, they, they can be a handful.

Hope: I'd be sleeping with one eye open, being like, where are you buddy?

Patrick: Well, well, what the, the, the female did ex, it was a two foot by four foot screened in cage. And, and, and the, the, my female boa Constrictor ma, managed to squeeze through a hole about this big in the cage and wrap herself around the cable box and wires because it was warm. I'm like, really?

You gotta be kidding. It took me and a buddy of mine, like, like almost an hour to untangle her. I was like, cuz she was eight and a half feet long and she wrapped herself around. No, I was like, you gotta be kidding me. No. And then all I did was I put a piece of duct tape over it, over the hole. She, she wouldn't go near it because she, she, she, every, every time she pushed on it, she got stuck to it.

She was like, Nope, I don't want nothing to do with that.

So now I have one more question. Now, now, uh, I was, uh, in, in my research I came across that you're, you're, you're trying to. Uh, where did I put it? Where, uh, million Driver You Want, you wanna do the million drivers by 2031, I believe. Yep. Yep.

And I was just wanted to know whereabouts are you in your quest?

Hope: I'm so glad that you asked. Uh, in our quest, do we do our research, I know, I like this tough question. The quest to help 1 million drivers change lanes in their health and fitness with small, simple changes by 2031. We have impacted Health helped, um, directly, indirectly through companies, through like we've mm-hmm.

We've have a lot of channels, uh, of outreach. Uh, roughly about 200,000 drivers.

Janet: Wow. I was wondering how you tracked that.

Hope: Yeah. And climbing. Um, we have a couple different metrics that we follow. Uh, one is through our platform and through is through some of our partners and how we outreach. Um, we're able to track some of those stats.

Patrick: And that was how many again?

Hope: Oh, we're at about 200,000 right now.

Patrick: 200,000. You are you still on?

Hope: And that does not, so people sometimes hear that that does not mean that those are 200,000 drivers that have come through our program because I believe whether or not drivers work with me, I'm going to help them. I'm going to give them the resources.

Patrick: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I agree.

Janet: Even people that listen to our podcast will take something away from it. Absolutely. People, they, do people see you on social media or listen to a snippet of your podcast or

Patrick: sign up for your emails because your emails very, very intuitive. You know?

Hope: Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. And we do write all of our own stuff, by the way. Um, we do not use AI at mother trucker yoga. Uh,

Janet: kudos. I don't think, I don't think there's a lot of us left

Hope: in today's world. I, I don't know what you guys, but like I look at stuff and I'm always like, is that them or is this something that wrote this for them?

And I have theory. I have a theory in two years or so, maybe sooner than that, everyone is going to start sounding very similar. Um, because nobody's thinking for themselves anymore. Yeah. Like, part of what I believe we've done so well with mother trucker yoga is because yes, I am taking all the research, all the things that I've learned, but I'm packaging in the, in the Hope Zvara package.

Yeah. Like you can't AI your perspective onto things. Right. And that's the one thing on the business side of life that really irks me right now is everyone's like, AI, AI. And I'm like, wow. All that tells me is that you can't think for yourself.

Janet: Yep. I agree. I've everything that you, all the research and the notes and the podcast, that's all my research, all my notes

Patrick: Now I've, I've used AI, I've typed in like some random questions just to see what comes out for ideas. Yeah. And then we've taken those ideas and put our own spin on those ideas

Hope: a hundred percent. And I think that is a great leverage of AI. Or if you're like, I just wanna find some bullets of topics that then I can go and do my own thing with.

Janet: Yeah. That's what he's talking about.

Patrick: That's exactly how I use AI.

Hope: Yeah. When you start using that as your voice. No, no. I feel like that is deceiving. I feel like that is inauthentic. As a creator, I pride myself on the 20 plus years in my industry. Yep. Building my craft and doing the work and showing up.

Um, and so I do, I do get a little, a little salty, uh, when I see people come and I'm just like, seriously, like do thework? Do the work. I know. I like, I like working smarter. Not harder, but not if it's the sacrificial point of where, where's you in the process, right? Yeah. Like Patrick and Janet can't be replicated.

This conversation can't be r