How a Teen Mom Built a Life-Changing Healing Movement

For the longest time, I carried the weight of his loss

“because I was not at the hospital when he passed away.”

Until one day, when? Dr. Xu Cairo Baker is a resilient transformational leader, doctorally prepared clinician and the founder of the baggage exchange. Drawing from her journey of overcoming profound adversity, she empowers women to release what holds them back.

Embrace personal growth and move forward with purpose. baggage weighs you down emotionally. It is a clean, you know, spiritually. You got to release it some way somehow so that you can be Tom the best version of yourself.

The baggage exchange teaches women how to say no and more importantly, that no is a complete sentence. Meaning you do not have to qualify. It was nothing else. And you do this, no, every no to someone or something

is a yes to yourself. [MUSIC PLAYING] It spans the globe. Like a super high school into the mountains. Today, Apple is going to reinvent the phone.

It's our over uptown out here. The living your legacy podcast for those who live to leave a legacy. [MUSIC PLAYING]

“Hey, welcome back everyone to another episode”

of Living Your Legacy Podcast where we have the privilege to talk to some of the best entrepreneurs around the country. You know, some of the industry Titans. And yeah, we have another special guest here from a show. Impact makers.

And yeah, she's going to introduce yourself. What's your name? Where you from and what's your business? Hi, so I am Dr. Chicago Baker. All right.

People affectionately call me Dr. She. I am from Charlene, Carolina. Okay. Live in a small town. South of Charlene, in South Carolina.

And my brand is the baggage exchange. The baggage exchange.

Okay, so what kind of doctor are you first before we get into the

doctor of nursing practice? Doctor of nursing practice. Yes. All right. And how long you been practicing that for?

On for about three years as a doctor of nursing practice. And I'm also a licensed psychotherapist. And I'm going to a licensed psychotherapist for 15 years now. All right. Yeah. The mental health kind of game is just so into the conversation

that internet chatter these days. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah. It's very interesting. My wife gets into all this stuff, you know?

Mental health is a lot. A lot. I love it though. Yeah. I love it. Especially like we're like watching podcast about

narcissism and narcissism. Yes. It draws you in and it really does. It makes you want to understand the brain and the interworkings of it so much more because a lot of the stuff

that you see and hear about on TV or the radio. It gives you pause and you're like, how? Yeah. Could they do that, you know? Yeah. So I mean, with that's a good thing about the internet

because honestly with so much information you get to find out. You know, it's important to know people. Yes. And who are you surround yourself with? Yes.

Absolutely.

Honestly, like we're always saying, yeah, be the

the dumbest in the room and then you're in the right room, right? Yes. But just surrounding yourself with you got to understand who's good and who's bad in that room too. Yes.

And that's understanding people and the mindset. And the mindset, exactly.

“And that's what essentially through the baggage exchange.”

So it's the transformational lifestyle brand and podcast. But what we do is provide a safe space for women to share their personal stresses and whether it be workplace or professional. But it gives them a safe space to set down any weight that they're carrying. So that they can move forward in life lighter and get to where

it is that they see themselves going. Gotcha. So it's the baggage exchange is getting rid of the extra baggage that you have on your shoulders. They think that you're carrying around.

And so the baggage exchange is that what it is. Yes. Yep. The baggage exchange. And so, you know, not only is it a brand.

It's a method. It's truly a method. It's a method where people claim the baggage that they're carrying. Yep. Name it.

And then once they name it, they drop it and they leave it to her. So it's claim it, name it, drop it, and leave it. Okay. Claim it, name it, drop it, leave it.

Yes. It's about all the baggage exchange. And through that process, they begin to go on what I call the hope journey. And hope stands for healing opportunity, purpose, and empowerment. All right.

Yeah. That's strong message all over the post. All right. All right. All right.

You got the music. We should have brought the track here. You know, maybe in the outro, you got to play the track. I can't play the track. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah.

I mean, I'm sure the first step.

Identify what the baggage is. Yeah. And just for some people, just that first step is already a huge weight off the shoulders, because they are feel open of sharing it.

“And now they have a pathway after they identify it, right?”

Yeah. And actually, you know what? Identifying the baggage is actually the second step. The first step is acknowledging your even carrying it. Sure.

Okay. So that's claiming it. So it's a claim it. It's like, but okay. That's mine.

That's my baggage. Okay. And then if you think about it there, for if you have missing luggage, and you go to claim it, they want you to be able to name, right? Okay.

Can you tell us off this inside, right? Yeah. So naming was inside your baggage. Yeah. And then you sort through it.

Does this still mean? Does this continue to serve a purpose? Yeah. I'm not so sure about this. So that's the questionable stuff.

And then the third part is the things that you know for a fat.

No longer serve you. It could even be baggage. They don't even belong to you. Most of us are carrying that type. Yeah.

And you're not sure. The decision to take out the stuff that no longer serves you. So give me an example of like the baggage that's not even your baggage. Oh, gosh.

“For example, if I am worried about my mom's debt, right?”

Hmm. I'm carrying her baggage. I'm carrying her weight. It's hard not to carry that though. It's hard because it means not yours.

It's not mine. Yeah. So this is the thing. While I can so carrying it can look different ways, right? Carry and get could look like I'm paying the mortgage for her every month.

That's carrying. That's a heavy. Yeah. So heavy though, right? Right.

Or I could decide, okay, yeah.

I'm going to shoulder some of this. Maybe I'll pay half of the mortgage every month. I'm still carrying weight, right? But that's not as heavy as me carrying the full weight. Yeah.

I'm not carrying the full debt, right? By me taking off half of that, that now frees up space. It frees up weight for me to actually put something there that I need to be carrying. Yeah. Or myself to get along with my own journey.

And sometimes the funny thing about those situations is that when you're doing that

“for other people, they just kind of expect it, you know?”

And it's just like, what am I even doing this for you? You're not even thanking me. Yes, you're not thanking me for it. And it does become an expectation for a lot of people because it just looks better. Yeah, because you've been doing it for so long and you don't say no.

And you know, the baggage exchange teaches women how to say no. And more importantly, that no is a complete sentence. Me and you do not have to qualify. It was nothing else. And you do this no period.

That's it. No, it's not a no because because what you will find is this, you tell somebody, no. And then you tell them, you're reason why. And then they're going to come back with something else. So just leave it at no.

Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Yeah.

So we're taught to say yes more, but we also got to say no. Guys, it's too strong. Let's be a balance, right? Yeah. Every no to someone or something.

It's a yes to yourself. Exactly. You know, we have to go somewhere else as you was freeing of space to a yes. So I was clean. All right.

And so yeah, you don't have to just drop it off. Like dead weight like all the sudden. You know, sometimes it's like kind of like music. It's all about the fade out, right? Yeah.

So the whole thing has to death, right? And then leading to a quarter of the dead. And then saying, hey, you. That's the baggage now. Because you got it.

That is truly, that is truly what the method entails. So if I had been carrying that particular weight. And then I decided, okay, let me take that. Let me just look and see what I'm doing here. Okay. All right.

So I am paying how mortgage every month. Oh my god, it's a stress in me out. Okay, have a conversation with mom. You know, I know I've been helping you do this.

I can't because I got some stuff that I need to do.

Yeah.

“But what I'm willing to do because this is going to give you time, right?”

I can pay half of it. And then not only that, you can give it time frame. I can pay half of it for the next six months. Yeah. Okay.

Two things are happening here. I'm releasing some weight, right? I'm giving her the expectation so that she doesn't feel like I'm just abandoning her. And then I will then go on to help her figure out where is that other half going to come from. That I'm no longer supplying.

I guess I'm just using this as an example. My mom paid for mortgage just fine. But I know some people who are doing this that hopefully they hear this. Of course. I mean, money is a big thing.

Money is, you know, so it's and it's always kind of carrying us around here there.

Yeah. You bought that $20. Yeah. It's $20. It's $200 to $200 and it's a five and it's the next thing you know. You're not going to be buying the cheap toothpaste when you owe me $20.

That is that part. Like, can I get my money back first or you ask me?

“I would honestly prefer for somebody to pay me back and then turn around.”

The next week the need is saying $20. Like, I'm going to be more at to let you hold it again. So if you repay it the first time. Yeah. So what's the business model behind this?

All right.

So the business model or, you know, actually how it even came to be was the rich,

the rich romantic loss of mine or personal loss. And 2015, I lost my three and a half month old son. Oh, well. Yes, all right. Yes, thank you.

He was born with a congenital defect. And required a surgery that subsequently resulted in him developing a bacterial infection that he succumbed to three and a half months after he was born because he became accepted. Wow. And for the longest time, I carried the weight of his loss because I was not at the hospital when he passed away.

And I felt like well, maybe had I been there that day. I could have seen something that maybe the nurses didn't catch. And I carried that for for years for many years. Until one day when I decided to go. He's during COVID actually.

I'm during COVID. I decided to make a pivot. I was already a cycle therapist. And I was like, you know what? I am so tired of my patients not being able to get to, you know,

the medications that they need to tell me fashion. It's like, I tried to disappoint myself for three months long. Wait time. I'm going to become a change that I want to see. And I made a decision that I would go to nursing school so that I could become a psychiatric

nurse practitioner and kind of sort of be just one stop shop for my patients. All right. And what I could not have done that had I not made a decision to release the weight that I was carrying regarding my son because that weight was occupying everything. I'm sure.

And once I lose the weight occupies like you know when you wake up and it's just feels heavy. Like that's why they call it away. Honestly, it feels heavy. And I'm sure once you make that pivot that mental change, you can wake up without a weight. Yes.

And now you have kind of the direction, right? Honestly, it's it's it's it's weighing on you. It is. I mean, just like it says, you know, it weighs on you.

“That's what baggage is baggage weighs you down emotionally physically, you know, even spiritually.”

And eventually you have it's a trade off. You have got to trade it out. You got to trade it with something lighter. You got to drop it is no different than someone making the decision to physically release weight, which is losing pounds. I did that too.

I used to weigh over 375. Oh, okay, girl. Yeah. I was a 5 26 28. This dress is a size 4. Okay. So, yes, like, hey, I'm living proof of everything that I'm teaching people how to do.

So, but like you say it, waking up at 375 feels a whole lot different than waking up at 143. Walking up flight of stairs at 375, it's so much different at 143. I glad upstairs I run upstairs now and not out of breath. Wow. Yeah. So, you know, is literally like you got to release it some way somehow so that you can be Tom the best version of yourself.

Yeah.

Yeah. Maybe we're digging that to that a little bit. Yeah. But we were talking about the business problems. Yeah.

We are business show, right? Yes. And you are, you know, impact makers. I love the impact that you are making. Yeah. But so when they come to this group, right, is there a subscription model?

Like, how how do they join? Right. So, a person joins a baggage exchange through one of our experience lanes, right? So, we had the podcast. So, that will be tuning in on Wednesdays on Spotify. Okay.

When we release our new episode, so that's one way to enter the exchange. Another way to enter it is through our women empowerment branches. I actually have a branch coming up on Saturday, August the 15th.

Okay. Actually, one of our first branch completely sold out.

I'm so excited. No. So, that would be another way to enter. The third way to enter is through one of our workshops. And these are group coaching workshops where women come who are stuck at some point in your life.

Whether it's our relationship or a friendship or a job. Job, whatever, they just feel stuck. And they're trying to figure out how to move forward.

“So, that's what we do in that, in that half a day workshop.”

Yeah. Development corporate and the most that I call it the deepest. The deepest entry into the baggage exchange comes from our retreats. I call them her retreats, healing, empowerment, restoration. Okay.

And we do them domestically here in the US. And we do them internationally. Oh, nice. Yeah, so they're in too quickly. So Bali. Okay. So next year we'll be in Bali and they are.

I've been in Bali as a perfect real treat. Yeah, so Bali is where we're headed to next year in April. And the retreats are designed to be instantly small. So no more than eight women are accepted to a retreat at a time. Okay.

Because that's where the deepest work is done.

Yeah. That's where I am. That's where I have to kind of hate. Yeah. This is we're getting deep.

Yeah. We're getting deep. This is where this is where that check bag. Yeah. That check bag is the biggest bag that we carry.

Yeah. So right, we have to check it for a reason. Hmm. The lives of the women who come to the reason for this life journey. It's a great idea.

“And that's why you got some really some.”

Yeah. And now she's great. So the baggage exchange is literally like like life through luggage. Life's luggage, right? Yeah.

And that check bag is the bag that gets thrown around. You know, they don't care. They just don't plan on the videos. It's the beaten bag. The worn out bag.

And that's how the women who come to the retreats come. They come just like that check bag. It's usually the oldest bag. The most worn and tired of it back. And it holds the most weight.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You must be a good podcaster. Yeah.

I could see it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. How do people find you?

Okay. So you can find me one of many ways. So I'm Spotify. The baggage exchange podcast. Exactly how I just said it.

The baggage exchange podcast.

“Website is the baggage exchange dot org or g.”

Facebook is the baggage exchange. Instagram, the baggage exchange. And TikTok. The baggage exchange. All right.

You get in the picture of people. Yeah. Well, I would get more into all of all of your baggage that you've dropped off.

The weight sounds amazing.

I mean, what you're doing the pivot during COVID all sounds amazing. And just kind of the journey where you've, you know, what you've been to. And you look fantastic. You feel phenomenal. Yeah.

The days my birthday by the way. Oh, okay. Happy birthday. Happy birthday. Thank you.

When you've got a plan in South Beach. So actually nothing. When I leave here, I'm going to Fort Lauderdale because I have a flight to catch to San Antonio. Okay. Our son is graduated from the Air Force on Thursday.

Oh. So we get to tap him out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. He made it through boot camp. So a lot of things very busy week. But yeah. It's been great.

Yeah. Great. But yeah. I mean. Thank you for joining us here in the studio as a way.

Yeah. Honestly. I'm going to also tune in to her episode when it drops because for impact makers. There's a lot of impact that this woman is making. Yeah.

And there's a lot that to uncover in that story. And I'm looking forward to it. Absolutely. Just the vibe and the energy that you radian. Yeah.

It's going to be a phenomenal episode. So thanks for joining us. Thank you. Thank you for joining us on leaving your legacy podcast. And we'll see you again.

Thanks everyone. Cheers.