In this episode, Kimberly speaks with Dr. Vanessa Calderón, an emergency physician, master executive coach, and healer from a lineage of ancestral healers in Mexico and El Salvador. Introduced by an ER doctor Kimberly met on a flight, Vanessa traces her path from the five-year-old who dreamed of being a missionary doctor, through healthcare access activism and UCLA medical school, to the emergency room, where diagnoses like "abdominal pain, not otherwise specified" showed her the limits of Western medicine. She describes the voice that told her, mid-run on a Northern California beach, that it was time to come home, and the decade of apprenticeship with Latin American healers that followed. They talk about what med school does to the nervous system, the new language of well-being entering medical training, and the pain that told her to step away from the ER for a season. At the heart of the conversation is a practical question for anyone who listens to their body and still needs a doctor: how to advocate for yourself from regulation rather than fear. They close on rewilding, motherhood, Vanessa's vision of medicine built on power with rather than power over, and how the current framing of menopause reflects a broader shift in consciousness.
Bio
Dr. Vanessa Calderón is a Harvard graduate and board-certified emergency physician, a Master Executive Coach, and a Neuroplasticity Trainer with more than 20 years of leadership experience and a decade of business development expertise. A first-generation Latina from a long line of ancestral healers, she apprenticed directly with Indigenous healers of Mexico and Central America. Through Calderón Co., she coaches physicians, executives, and mission-driven leaders, weaving leadership and business strategy with nervous system work, identity work, and ancestral wisdom so they can create meaningful impact without sacrificing their health, relationships, or sense of self. She also leads Resourced Wealth, a six-week, healing-centered program on money, power, and capacity. She is the host of The Authentic Path podcast, which explores the intersection of leadership, performance science, and ancient wisdom. She continues to practice emergency medicine and lives in Atlanta with her family.
What She Shares
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How a lineage of Mexican and Salvadoran healers, and a teenage rejection of them, led her into Western medicine
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Why "abdominal pain, not otherwise specified" became the crack in her faith in the system
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The voice on a beach run that told her it was time to come home
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Building a meditation practice in residency, one minute at a time
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What medical training does to the nervous system, and how the language of well-being is changing it
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The attending who taught her that a patient knows their body better than the doctor does
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The left wrist pain that told her to step away from the ER, and how she listened
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Why the patient-physician relationship should be a partnership, and when to walk away from one
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How to advocate for yourself from regulation instead of fear
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Rewilding as coming home to yourself and to everything around you
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Her vision of medicine built on power with rather than power over
What You'll Hear
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How a chance first-class seat brought Kimberly and Vanessa together
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The five-year-old who wanted to be a missionary doctor
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Christianity, shame, and women's bodies, and what she kept from her upbringing
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Whether anything in the core medical curriculum could make room for trauma and energetics
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Kimberly on Brazil's cesarean culture and doctors who were never taught vaginal birth
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Do doctors have to quit medicine to practice in line with their values?
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Kimberly's doula years and how defensive boundaries escalate a birth room
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Recognizing your own signs of dysregulation before you walk into an appointment
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Small, human requests in the exam room: eye contact, warm hands, a pause
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Setting an intention for the outcome you want before you see the doctor
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How motherhood changed the way she treats children and parents in the ER
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The "menopause mafia," the hormone debate, and a shift in collective consciousness
Resources
Website (Calderón Co.): https://www.calderonco.org
Podcast, The Authentic Path: https://www.theauthenticpathpodcast.com
Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/id1807391306
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0t14N6wKrEvh3MsfklhGMn
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vanessacalderonmd/ (@vanessacalderonmd)
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/vanessacalderonmd/
Resourced Wealth (six-week program): https://www.calderonco.org/resourced-wealth
