The value of seeking support & expertise for a robust career | Letitia Hill, BAS, RDH x Diamond Dental Hygiene Coaching
Interview with Letitia Hill, a hygienist who has worked extensively with Diamond Dental Health Coaching to jump start her career, explains why seeking outside expertise is one of her best professional decisions to date.
In this conversation, dental hygienist Letitia Hill details the challenges of beginning a clinical dental hygiene career amidst a pandemic and the pivotal role her decision to seek the help of Diamond Dental Hygiene Coaching’s founders Laura Bettencourt & Danielle Avila played in her success – highlighting its continued impact on her personal and professional growth today.
Erin Fawl
Hey, Letitia, thanks for joining me.
Letitia Hill
Hi, thanks for having me. I’m good. How are you?
Erin Fawl
I’m great. Well, so I’m so excited to learn a little bit more about you and start off with, you know, how did you get here? How did you become a hygienist? Tell us a little bit about that journey.
Letitia Hill
Yeah, so I actually knew I always wanted to be in the dental field. So when I was in high school, I did some shadowing opportunities, and I thought I wanted to be an orthodontist. So when I graduated, I ended up working with my orthodontist who did my treatment. And I worked as an assistant for six years,all while going through college, did my bachelor’s all of that, and then I had decided that dental school was not a fit for me. But I still wanted to remain in the field. So I decided to pursue dental hygiene. And I started that in 2018, and graduated in 2020, during the pandemic, and now here I am, which was craziness. So would you say that you got interested in dental school because of your orthodontic treatment? Was that how it kind of started? Like, you became fascinated with that process? Yeah, absolutely. I was, I had such great experiences. And I just remember the aha moment I had when I got my braces off, and how it made me feel and the transformation. And so I was like, wow, this is amazing. I would really love to help people along in this process, and give back and help people gain their self confidence and just be happy.
Erin Fawl
Totally, totally, I feel like I remember the same thing and being amazed that, you know, you’ve gone through all this time in this huge journey, and you know, tightening and all these things. And yeah, at the end of it, you know, your teeth are perfect. If I’d wear my retainer, that would be perfect.
Um, so it must have been crazy to graduate in the middle of the pandemic. So I’m sure there were lots of adjustments and things that you had to make, you know, that the officers were making, you know, when you were graduating, so, so tell us a little bit about that, I’m sure. Yeah, yeah. So, um, it was a very difficult experience to go through, I just remember, we left for our spring break, and I was so excited to just have a couple of days to like, reset, and then come back and finish off that last month of senior year, get all the testing done, and everything. And when, over our spring break, we started getting emails, you know, we’re gonna delay coming back for a week, so you have an extended break, and then it just kept getting extended and extended. And it was very hard to navigate that unknown and what was gonna happen, you know, I’m supposed to be doing X, Y and Z, and this is where I’m supposed to be at. And, you know, now it’s different. It’s different for everyone, right.
Letitia Hill
So it was extremely overwhelming and stressful and scary.
So when everything you know worked out, and we were able to kind of get back and finish up and get our testing and start our new, you know, normal. There was this sense of excitement and eagerness to get out there. And I was ready to do it. And we were, at that time, there was a whole transition in the field to right, a lot of practicing hygienists have retired because of the pandemic and decided they didn’t want to go back. So there was that huge demand for all those new grads coming out. And we were like, oh, you know, this is, this is great, you know, we’re gonna we’re gonna rock it. And then, it just kind of hit me like a freight train. I got out there. And I was like, Oh, my gosh, this is overwhelming. You know, how do I find my footing?
Are their mentors, who do I talk to? Am I doing this? Right? So it was just this very overwhelming sense of how do I find you know, exactly trying to graduate? Probably, yeah, yeah. And it felt amplified. Because it was like, you know, I had an idea of what this was supposed to be like, without the pandemic and now it’s just so different for everyone’s like, what do we what do we do? And so I just feel like that kind of fueled a lot of my passion and my mission for all the other stuff that I have started on social media and been connecting with you guys about as well.
Erin Fawl
The great thing that I love about that is that as much as it was such a struggle in the beginning, it’s really turned into motivation and opened doors, you know, as it is, you know, as time has gone on. And that’s really affected you in a positive way in the end. So tell us about some of the things that you’re doing. And you know, the things that you’re pursuing outside the office here that maybe you would or wouldn’t have, you know, had an up in for that.
Letitia Hill
Yeah so, as difficult as that time was, I’m very grateful for it. I think it definitely shaped me into the clinician and the person that I am today. And it’s been a big driving and motivating force for what I’m doing now. Which is, I’ve delved into the social media realm, because I was feeling very isolated and very alone. And I wanted a sense of community, I wanted a sense of connection. Because I knew in the back of my head, I was not the only one that was experiencing this, even though it felt like it. Right. So I turned to social media, right? Yeah, I think everyone goes through that. It’s like, you just feel so alone. And you’re like, you know, there’s gonna be other people, but where are they?
Um, so I turned to social media. And I just very authentically and openly started sharing my experiences about my journey into real world hygiene. And what I was feeling was very open, very honest, very raw. And I received such amazing, you know, feedback from people that graduated when I graduated, or, you know, had been in the field for maybe three to five years. And we’re starting to feel the same way.
And that led me to create something that I called Sunday Scalies, which is a play on the term ‘Sunday Scaries’.
Tying in all the mental health, burnout, and everything. And right now, it’s alive on my social media page. And I connect once a month with other hygienists or new grads, and we talk about our experiences. And we support each other and encourage each other and uplift each other. And I help mentor new grads a little bit with just kind of guiding them through my experiences, talking to them about the importance of being aware of these things and what they can feel like and what they can do to navigate it or hopefully avoid burnout, or impostor syndrome and things like that.
And with that, I started writing, and I got connected with some lovely women at Diamond Dental for some coaching. And, yeah, it’s just it really opened up so many doors and so many opportunities that have been so fulfilling outside of my clinical career, right? I mean, I’m very impressed with the hygiene community. And it’s, it’s, it’s great if you raise your hand and say, I need something or I have a question. Everyone will circle around you and be like, I have the answer, or I’ll connect you with the person who has the answer. I just think it’s so supportive like that. But when you were talking, I was thinking about how impressive it is that you were able to be so open, you know, as you know, a newer hygienist, you know, still probably finding your footing to some degree, would you say that that’s just a feature of your personality, where you’re just, you’re sort of comfortable being vulnerable, because it’s like, you know, not everybody is necessarily like, super comfortable putting themselves out there like that. Yeah, I think I’ve always leaned towards sometimes maybe sharing a little bit more than I should or what people feel is appropriate. But I feel like that’s just true to who I am. I like to be extremely authentic and real and raw and say, hey, you know, this is what I’m going through, this is what I’m feeling or, you know, this is something positive that I experienced, like, I’d like to just get it out there and share it. And again, I just, I know that in my heart, that I’m not the only one facing that. So I feel like that also plays a role in why I share things because it’s like, even if I just connect with one other person who’s feeling this way, to me, it’s worth it. Because now we’re supporting each other and encouraging each other and helping each other through it. We have so much to learn from each other.
Erin Fawl
I think that’s amazing, because I think that, you know, that type of vulnerability requires a ton of strength. You know what I mean? It’s not easy to say, I don’t know what to do, or I’m struggling, you know what I mean? So, and I think that as generations go on, I think people become more comfortable. Hopefully, you know, that it’s more acceptable to say, I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what the next step is here, you know what I mean? So I think that’s amazing. Absolutely. Tell us a little bit about your experience with Diamond Dental because I’m fascinated by everything that you gained and learned while working with Diamond Dental.
Letitia Hill
Yeah, so yeah, so Diamond Dental is two lovely ladies, Lauren & Danielle, and they have their own, you know, experience in clinical hygiene. And I got going with them through social media. And I realized that they have a coaching company. So I was talking to them, you know about what they offer and what they do. And they set up a little virtual consultation to kind of meet with me and talk about how I was feeling what I was experiencing, and what I wanted to do with that, what my goals were to kind of help me overcome those feelings or reignite my passion and my spark. And through that, I decided to go through their coaching program. And they just, I, they have different packages that they offer, I chose a little bit more of an extended one. So I was with them for like about three months. And we met every other week, online virtually. And they gave me homework and different assignments and things like that, just to kind of help connect the dots with my goals. So I had a general idea, this is what I want.
And this is what I hope to accomplish, and where I hope to go in the future. But I had no idea how to get myself there, though, they helped connect all those dots for me and create a framework to kind of help me along and they helped facilitate in opening up the doors of all these other connections, like you said, you know, just a couple minutes ago, the hygiene world, when you raise your hand and say, hey, you know, I need help with this, or I want to do this, there’s someone there that can help you and guide you and connect you to more. So they were a key part in facilitating that. And I completed their program in July. And they’ve continued to stay in contact with me and touch in with me every once in a while and support me on my social media. And now I am going through a different program of theirs, which is kind of like a maintenance program. So I check in with them once a month to kind of help continue to make sure I’m on the right track. And I’m checking off all those boxes and continuing to further my career.
Erin Fawl
I love that I love that you’re continuing to work with them. And I think it’s just so smart that you that you did seek out some assistance, you know, because many people will just say I don’t you know, I’ll figure it out as I go and think about how much time, you know, it’s like, to me, it’s like when you were talking, I was thinking while she really fast tracked her way toward her goals by just saying, hey, I need some help, like I’m gonna find somebody that’s an expert in the space and get some career help that you really don’t get in school. You know what I mean? And so I just think that was so smart of you. What made you think that you just saw them on social media, and you were like, I think they could help me or again, you know, I’m just impressed by the fact that you seek them out that it occurred to you to do that. You know what I mean? Yeah, so we are on our own?
Letitia Hill
Yeah, so we kind of inadvertently got connected on social media, which was like one of those pages that as I was creating my page, like just following dental pages and kind of branching out that way. And then as I was posting my content, they started reaching out. And they were saying, hey, you know, this is what we do. And then I kind of followed along and looked into it a little more. And they were like, you know, let us know how we can support you in any way. And so I kept in contact with them for a little bit a little over a month after I first started the social media journey. And then I was like, You know what, let me see what this is about. Let me see if, you know, this can help me. And it was, it was scary kind of taking that that dive because you know, you don’t know what’s really going to happen with everything. But it was in hindsight, it was so worth it, it was so worth it to invest in myself. And that I think that was probably what I was scared of the most was like, you know, should I really be investing this time and some of this money and you know, is this going to be worth it? Is this something that I truly want to do?
But I just bit the bullet, and I was like, if you’re gonna do it, you got to just do it, and you got to commit. And so yeah, so I did and yeah, in hindsight, it was one of the best things that I could have ever done for myself, especially just fast tracking everything. Like you said, I can’t imagine where I would be if I had not taken that step. I think I would still be struggling to find my footing in the social media world and like, where’s this going to take me? What should I do next? Who do I talk to?
Erin Fawl
Wow. I can just imagine you know, I just love that you said all that because I can just imagine being a newer grad, you know, sitting listening and being like, maybe I really should do something like that. You don’t mean, maybe I really should invest in myself. And I think the earlier you can learn that in your life and your career. Honestly, I think that’s a great lesson. Because I think it’s easy to say, well, I don’t want this money, I don’t have this energy, whatever it is, it’s time for myself. But then it’s like, what happens? Maybe time passes, and you don’t reach those goals. So was that your main goal was to really like, do what you’re doing with the Sunday Scalies?
Letitia Hill
Very early on, I knew that I wanted to just connect with others and support others. And a goal of mine is speaking, you know, I’ve always seen all the RDH conventions and all the ways that people connect and how they get out there. And I always was, like, I want to be a part of that I want, that’s something that I definitely want to do. And so when I was talking to them about just how I was feeling with my burnout, and, and my need and want for connecting with others, that’s kind of how we formulated the idea of Sunday Scalies, so I, I knew that I wanted almost like a, like a coffee conversation kind of thing. Sit down, we all chat and say, Hey, I experienced this this week. And you know, it really bummed me out. And I had a hard time, you know, overcoming this, and then having all that support around you. And so the more I kind of tapped into that, the more fine tuned it got. And yeah, that was kind of the birth of Sunday scalene. I just love the fact that you wanted to community and you figured out how to do it, like you created this safe space for people to come at the end of each week, and say, This is what I experienced, you know, this is my goal for this week, you know, whatever it is that they feel like they needed to share, they want somebody else to hear or, you know, bounce off of people, I think that’s great.
Erin Fawl
So it sounds like with Diamond Dental, what you got, you know, what you take away is not only this kind of fast tracking your career and your progress around your career, but it’s also this connection that you’ve established for ever, basically, you know, as you said, you know, they still participate in what you’re doing, you know, you still check in with them here and there. Is that what you would say, if I’m a new grad sitting here thinking, Should I connect with Diamond Dental, what’s the main reason?
Letitia Hill
The main reason would be to invest in yourself and give back to yourself and find your true passion and calling in your motivation. And fast tracking that and creating that network of support that you’re always going to have going forward, that’s always going to be there for you, and supporting you, and helping you just get to where you want to be in and set those goals. I mean, that’s an invaluable list of things, you know, what I mean, learning to invest in yourself.
Erin Fawl
That’s the key – finding what your real goals are and then figuring out the steps to achieve them. I mean, that’s really that’s coaching, you know, and there’s the best people to do it. There’s those types of people, they’re so warm. And I think they’re great tapping into people and, you know, like, really connecting. Absolutely, they make it easy. And I could, I could honestly say that, even if all I got out of it was, you know, a support network, or people that support and encourage me even in just my clinical career alone.
Letitia Hill
It was worth it. It was worth it. 1,000% I could not say enough good things about these ladies. Isn’t that amazing to think that even if you only got one fraction of everything that you got, you’d be super happy? Yeah, it’s like it just seems like it was, you know, one of those things where it was like a huge return on your investment. And so that’s exactly, yeah, it really, it really changed my outlook and perspective on everything. I met with them the other week. And I think this is a good way to explain it. I have never in my life been a person to say something positive about myself.
And I’m always like, yeah, you know, like, I’m pretty good at that. But there’s always the but you know, and there’s been a transition in my clinical career. And there’s some things that I’m going through and I said, without your coaching, I could never say this today, but I feel like I have too much to offer. I have too much value and too much promise for this specific part of my life that I’m struggling with right now. And for me I was able to recognize that through their coaching and to say that confidently, it was just like, that my aha moment like this was worth it because it gave me everything that I needed to kind of come to that. That realization. Wow. I mean the value I mean, the value is immense. You know, I’m so happy that you did it. So what will next year look like for you? What are some of the next steps for you? So the next steps for me are turning Sunday Scalies into a podcast. So that’s in the works with you know, planning and recording and getting that out.
I am going to be doing a couple of speaking events and connecting with students in programs around my area and just offering them resources through Sunday Scalies. And I will be attending RDH Under One Roof next year.
Erin Fawl
That’s exciting. Did you go this last year or?
Letitia Hill
No? No, I unfortunately did not make it. So I was like next year is the one.
Erin Fawl
That’s awesome. I mean, I mean, I haven’t been either. And I mean, I hear the best things about it. I want to go next year and just kind of mess with this year. Yeah. Well, it sounds like you’ve got some exciting things coming up. I hope you’ll, of course, let us know, you know when the podcast is coming out. And then you know your speaking events. I mean, that’s amazing. It’s you know, you’re really on your way.
Letitia Hill
Yes, yes. It’s sky’s the limit from here. Oh, my gosh, I love it. I love it.
Erin Fawl
I hope you’ll come back and talk to us again. I know there’s so many other subjects that we could touch on, and learn even more about you. So I hope you’ll come back sometime in the future. And I appreciate you sitting down with us today.
Letitia Hill
Absolutely. Thanks for having me.
Learn more about Diamond Dental Hygiene Coaching & check out their RDH Connect article ‘How oral disease can influence heart disease’.
Learn more about Letitia & check out her RDH Connect articles ‘Recovering from failing the dental hygiene clinical board exam’ & ‘Why professional boundaries are important for hygienists to succeed’.
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