Raising Daughters That Run "Like a Girl" and Cutting Through the Isolation in Dentistry with Community

Welcome to the eighth episode of The Story Project podcast! If you don’t know Paul Goodman then you’ve been living under a rock! 

Dr. Paul Goodman is a family guy with his beautiful wife Mary and two adorable daughters, the founder and creator of the Dental Nachos community all while being a practicing dentist. I have to also point out that he was the very FIRST guy on this podcast. All my other guests have been women dentists and he handled it like a champ. No in all seriousness, Paul works with mostly women, is raising daughters and has a lovely wife Mary, so I thought it was about time to interview him. 

Sneak Peak of our Interview...

Meeting Dr. Paul Goodman 

Joanna: My good friend Kiera Dent of the Dental A Team first introduced us and then we really got to know you and Mary at the Smiles at Sea event in April where S8E8 and Dental Nachos were both sponsoring. We had dinner at Three & No. 3 Social in Miami, Florida with you guys and Cory Pinegar from CallForce. Super fun night connecting and hanging out. After that dinner, I told Josh that we finally found a couple we could be friends with in the dental industry! This year we’ve had the opportunity to be a proud Key Resource sponsor of the Dental Nachos community and we also attended your Super Dentist Boost LIVE event in Philly this past August. 

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The Goodman Family  

If you’re in the Dental Nachos community then you know Paul’s daughters because his family plays a big part in life and in his social media. I want to talk with you a bit about raising daughters and what that means to you from a dad’s perspective. 

Joanna: We all know that no two humans are the same, so give us a brief overview of each of your girls’ personalities. 

Dr. Goodman: Drew and Daphne (moderators of Dental Nachos) are drastically different from one another. Drew is more of a jokester and a little more like me. Daphne is more like Mary. Drew when she first was born looked like a baby with a man face, but now has long hair like her mom. One thing that has been lost in this pandemic is a year of our kids using and developing their social muscles. They lost a year of interacting with their friends. We were so caught up in our own story of survival that we didn’t pay attention to them. So I’ve tried really hard to honor this with them and have special days that are just about our girls. I want to acknowledge that they’ve done a great job through the pandemic. 

Paul’s Pro Tip

Dr. Goodman: Whenever anyone asks you a question, say, “Great question, a lot of people ask me that…” works like a charm. It makes them feel normal. 

Fifty year old woman, “what is Dental Nachos?”

Dental Nachos is a lot like a Mr. Rogers neighborhood. Dentists have it harder than you think and we’ve created a community to be kinder to each other and connect with each other while working on their business. 

Early in my career I created a study club called The Rising Dentist Study Club of Philly and printed out the flyers on my iMac. I had to Paul Revere this study club and get my friends to lecture for free, use the bar space that I worked at and get sponsors to pay for the food. The goal was that if dentists met each other earlier in their career they would hate each other less. It sounds a lot like Dental Nachos. I did this for 10 years and I just did it for the good of it. I always had this one event and raised 6K and put on this event. People loved it. I took this attitude and put it into Facebook and created Dental Nachos. I wanted to bond people together whether it’s a hundred people or a thousand people. It has no impact on me whether it’s a hundred or a million people. I created a free park where people can hang out and talk to each other along with sponsors who sell websites, technology and supplies. This is where Dental Nachos began and grew to 35K members. 

Wrap Up

Joanna: Dr. Paul Goodman, I cannot thank you enough for taking this time to share your story and heart with us and for being on The Story Project podcast. I so enjoyed our conversation! If people want to follow you and stay in touch with you, where is the best place to do that? 

Dr. Goodman: You can find us at dentalnachos.com and also follow us on Facebook or IG @dentalnachos 

Huge thank you to our audience and Dr. Paul Goodman for hanging out with us! It would mean the world to me if you subscribed to this podcast and left a review! I love this amazing tribe of people in dentistry willing to share their stories. See you all next time!