Meet Wendie Trubow and Edward Levitan of Five Journeys in Newton

Today we’d like to introduce you to Wendie Trubow and Edward Levitan.

Wendie and Edward, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
There are so many paths in our story. There’s the story of how we met, didn’t like each other, then re-met years later and wound up married.

Then there’s the story of how we got into business together in 2008. We founded Visions HealthCare, which was wildly successful, and prior to its closure, was the largest functional medicine group in the country, with 120 employees, 30,000 square feet of real estate, two locations, and 20,000 patients. We were experts in medicine, and through Visions, got “hands on” experience in business; unfortunately, that learning came too late for Visions. The weaknesses in that business’ design left it unprepared to weather the financial losses sustained in the winter of 2015, and we closed in August of 2015. That path led us to personal bankruptcy and a lot of soul searching.

But the real story is why, after getting our hearts broken, we would open up another business that is an evolution of the one that failed so spectacularly.

That “Why” is because we believe that we are meant to transform the paradigm of health and wellness from one of reactivity and crisis management into a deep, profound and sustainable proactive paradigm of health.

Ed was the first to become interested and then trained in functional medicine; a branch of medicine that evaluates and addresses the root-causes of illness and disease, and seeks to uncover and restore vitality and health. His successes inspired Wendie, who grew frustrated with her inability to get women well, which inspired her to get trained in functional medicine too.

Our belief is that health depends on balance within and between five critical aspects:
The physical body (bones, muscles, ligaments, tendons, our movement)
The chemistry (our minerals, nutrients, digestion and absorption, as well as hormones)
The emotional/psychological (the relationships to others and their health and/or toxicity to each person)
The social (where do we fit in our society? are we included? Isolated? Do we experience belonging and support?)
The spiritual (Leading a life of purpose, integrity and being connected to a higher purpose, whether it’s religious or not)

Most physicians focus exclusively on what pill will improve each symptom. We both have wide ranges of training that allow us to listen powerfully for what is out of balance, and what is the appropriate therapy, treatment, intervention or lifestyle change that will impact the aspect that is out of balance.

But back to the story…

We opened Five Journeys because we felt (and still feel) compelled to continue the work we started at Visions,

Our mission is Vitality, Health, Wellness and Ability/Desire to be intimate until 100 years of age. Our vision is to have our approach BE the standard of care throughout the United States.

We learned a lot in the “school of life” and have brought our learning with us to ensure that this time, we create a company that:

-makes a profound contribution to the health, wellness and lives of our members, and by extension, their families and communities

-is financially sustainable, scalable and reproducible, to enable us to either franchise or grow organically

-creates communities and connections, and calls forth the best in others

-is good to the earth, and utilizes both technology and durable goods to reduce our waste.

We opened in January 2016, and are growing steadily. We’ve just hired our fourth employee, and will likely hire another one by the end of the summer. We are a membership-based, insurance-accepting wellness organization with just under 300 members (today), and growing at just under 10% a month.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
It’s definitely NOT been a smooth road!

When Visions closed in 2015, it was extremely traumatic for our employees, our patients, and for us personally. Ed had signed personal guarantees, and when Visions closed, they all became due, so he declared bankruptcy. The closure impacted our reputations, our finances and our jobs (all of which we lost).

When we opened Five Journeys, there were people who were angry with us for opening. Visions had helped an enormous number of people feel better, and they were upset that Visions had to close. Because we were determined to learn from our mistakes, we struggled with getting credit (because we chose not to sign any more personal guarantees!)

Visions grew way too fast; we have, perhaps, been guilty of slowing our growth down so as not to recreate the uncontrolled growth we had the first time around.

But the bumpiest and thorniest struggle we face is how to get complete with and move past the trauma of our past business experience, and move forward to creating something that will leave a powerful, positive, lasting impact on the health of individuals and communities.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Five Journeys story. Tell us more about the business.
We are all about being vibrant, healthy, alive, able to be and interested in intimacy until 100 years of age. As a wellness organization, we focus on addressing the underlying issues that cause a person to feel unwell, or suffer. We believe in finding the root-cause of each issue and fixing it, rather than starting a treatment program with medicines.

We use a combination of functional medicine (https://www.functionalmedicine.org/) and our unique approach to get people vital again.

Our unique approach looks at the entire person, and addresses imbalances in the following areas:

Physical (bones, muscles, ligaments, tendons, movement and sweating)
Chemical (minerals, nutrients, hormones, digestion, toxins, excretion; this is the functional medicine piece)
Emotional/Psychological (relationships; both to self and others)
Social (the community around a person)
Spiritual (working on leading a life of contribution and purpose, living in integrity)

A major imbalance in even one area can throw off the entire system, so when we work with our members, we address all five aspects.

We specialize in Listening and Curiosity. We listen deeply to identify imbalance, and then are relentless in our pursuit of uncovering why the imbalance is occurring, so that we can work with our members to fix the imbalances.

We are known for diagnosing and addressing issues that our members have struggled with; sometimes for years. We are the detectives, who continue to search until we find explanations that will help each person heal.

There are a number of things that set us apart:
-We do functional medicine, which is not widely practiced in the U.S.
-We accept insurance, which is even less common for functional medicine providers
-We are a membership organization, which allows us to spend more time with our members (a typical first visit lasts 60 minutes, and follow up visits typically last 30 minutes; the average length of a medical visit in the U.S. is 10 minutes).
-People actually get better, more vital, and lose weight under our care, and not because they’re on 10 different medicines!

What we are most proud of as a company is that we and our employees are all on the journey together and that is reflected throughout every touch point.
-Ed and Wendie walk the talk and are gluten free, dairy free, sugar free, exercise, (work to) get to bed on time, don’t smoke, limit alcohol, and work constantly on balance!

Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
Hmmm. We’ve been extremely blessed. I think we need to start with the fact that we live in the United States, with parents who believed in education and had the commitment and means to back that commitment up.

We had the good luck of both being raised in the Boston area, which is a hub of progressive thinking, great medicine, good food, and the ability to experience all the seasons.

We had the good luck to open a company that so clearly filled a deep seated demand that grew like wildfire, and the bad luck to fail to see that it would be so successful, or recognize its success in the midst of it, and design our company around our future selves (instead of our current ones). This includes our systems, our hires, and our pattern of growth.

We had the bad luck that the winter of 2015 was so severe, and exacerbated all of our business issues and was the “straw” that lead to our closure, but the good luck that the skills we learned will stay with us forever, and that we are still able to do what we love. But by far, the best luck we’ve had is in hiring the staff who work at Five Journeys (Gail, Andreya, Meg and Gabriella), since without them, we would not be able to provide the level of care and service that we do.

Pricing:

• Monthly membership costs: $59 for the first family member, $44 for the second family member, $30 for the third family member and $15 for the fourth family member.

Contact Info:

• Address: 181 Wells Ave, Suite 202
  Newton MA 02459
• Website: www.fivejourneys.com
• Phone: 617-934-6400
• Email: info@fivejourneys.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fivejourneys/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/WendieTrubowMD

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