The Healthy Chef Vol 3. Issue 1 - Chef Sean Leone
Sean Leone is a private Chef for an estate in the San Francisco Bay area of California. He gets to travel with a family to their destinations homes, cook meals for them, their family, guests, and dinner parties.
Sean’s culinary career pivoted drastically due to the global pandemic. His hotel in San Francisco was forced to close, ending his first Executive Chef opportunity after having worked in hotels and restaurants, and powering through a preexisting health condition since 2007. Sean wanted to share his story with his peers in the industry:
‘I got into cooking by the way of music. Ever since I can remember, I was surrounded by and was playing music, records, or guitar. Going to Culinary school was nothing I had thought of even though I interned and worked Garde manager at a country club in Tarpon Springs Florida in high school while working at a grocery store. I went to college for music education, finished my first 3 years, took music theory, quickly noticed that teaching music was harder than I had thought. In 2005 I enrolled in Culinary School while working at Universal Resorts in Orlando FL, and entered the unknown of “kitchen life”, whatever that may be…graduated a year later.
2008 I got promoted to my first Sous Chef role at Universal Orlando, then the recession hit. I was working two kitchen jobs, morning, and night. That year was work driven, barely sleeping, drinking, and a medical problem that I will have for the rest of my life.
I woke up one morning not being able to see out of my left eye. I went to a clinic in Orlando, that lead to an MRI in the hospital that same morning. I was put in an infusion room, getting an I.V of steroids and interferon, surrounded by people taking chemotherapy and what I thought, who noticeably had it worse than me…at least that’s what I thought. I was sent to a neurologist in Orlando who only treated multiple sclerosis and epilepsy. Who would have thought a trip to a clinic would have you sitting a week later in front of people you never of thought you would see before your 26 years old!
They treated my inflamed optic nerve of my left eye, told me that I had symptoms of M.S but did not show any signs of concerns. Cool! Can I go back to work?! HAHA. They gave me a month of at home infusion with a nurse who came to my apartment once a week in the morning and gave me a I.V of medicine for about an hour… then I am golden, go about your day, go work 10-12 hours day like normal.
2011, I hotel hoped and position hopped in Florida, changed jobs, went through the run around of not have insurance for 90 days etc., but now working 12-15 hour days, being career driven and not thinking about my health. 2012, I was working for Todd English’s Bluezoo restaurant and was getting major pain in my left side of my head, the same side where I had my eye problems. I went back to the neurologist who I went to 4 years earlier.
Turns out, I currently had 5 lesions on my left hemisphere of my left brain. My brain looked like swiss cheese. The neurologist then diagnosed me with relapsing multiple sclerosis. Well, what the hell does that mean to me?! What am supposed to do with that? Am I detested to be in a wheelchair or crutches? It is a nerve disorder that exposes the nerve, ruining the nerve coating in your body. It disrupts all controls and communication from your central nervous system to your bodies nerve responses. Your brain telling you to move your finger….and you not moving your finger or any other limb for that matter.
I was told to self-inject myself 3 times a week subcutaneous with medicine that gets delivered to your door as per and controlled by your neurologist. This was supposed to suppress the symptoms of the M.S. Half was covered under your insurance and half was not, depending on what you could afford getting depleted from your weekly paycheck to pay rent, eat, pay your other bills, and try to have a social life or dare take a girl out on a date.
I worked my same hours, did what I was told to do and took my injections. I ignored all basic human demands like eating properly or enough in my matter, sleep, keep working the line, being the “go to person in the kitchen”, getting yelled at my Executives and dishwashers. I moved cities, almost every two years, got higher up on the “Chef chain” in management working bigger restaurants and larger hotels, transferred, got prompted, moved from Florida to southern California through Hyatt hotels. I changed medicines again to a oral from in 2014 and was on this stuff for a year. Great, no more needles, a pill everyday for the rest of my life, cool! Can I go to work now?!
In 2015 my new neurologist in Newport Beach California was maintaining my M.S (and still the only real way to monitor it) through blood work every 2-4 months depending on your condition. He noticed my white blood cell counts were too low, even for a person who has a suppressed immune system. I started a once a month, and still on currently, a I.V “cocktail” drip of my current medicine once a month for under two hours a session.
2018 I took a job in San Francisco as my first time Executive Chef title in a hotel and one of 4 Executives in a 1,921-room hotel that managed 70 million in just food and beverage. You tell yourself, great! I have made it! Now your responsible for a team! Payroll, food cost, buying, creating, cooking, teaching, marketing, scheduling, no sleep, no time off, maybe a half a day off while you still call your fish, produce guys at home to make deliveries for your sous chefs or dealing with the sales team to secure a contract for a banquet.
No sleep, not maintaining your physical health, mental stress of not making budget and call outs for staff, owners and corporate executives giving you projects for the company or their personal work they delegate to you because…well…you wanted this role right?! Ignoring your body of basic function and working but now using not just your skills you crafted, you’re learning how to not be a asshole to people who know less than you (cooks), or you use “fear” of being that guy who you have to listen too or else to get the work done. Sounds like you are an Executive…congrats! (H Careers - Work Life Balance in Hospitality)
In October 2018, a week after my birthday, I still was on my 90-day probation of insurance and did not have coverage. On a busy Saturday night during a busy service my whole left side of my body went limp and numb, and I collapsed, then holding and propping myself up from my right side to move or do any basic motor skills of the floor. The paramedics were called and went to the kitchen with a stretcher and a gurney, where they rushed me to the hospital in the city and treated me for a stroke…but then realize, I was too young to have a stroke, seeing I was fully responsive, except… for that whole “walking thing” …
The hospital doctors confirmed that I had my first M.S episode or “flair up” where the lesions in my body was causing my body to fail, which is what the nerves do, they fail to communicate or short circuit so you cannot use basic muscles in your body.
I was released the next day, Sunday in the afternoon, took at Uber from the hospital back to the hotel to go back to work! Yeah, I did that Not smart! I had muscle spasms on my left side for 3 months. My body would shake at random times and be in excruciating pain where I could not walk and winced at pain. It felt and I looked like a piece of paper you crumble, then going away at 30 second intervals at random. What medicine the doctors gave me would take effect eventually until I saw a new neurologist to get me back on my infusion from relocating to the area. Well…who is going to do all the ordering, the usual Sunday “call offs” the “Chef we don’t have any more of the special, we are out of fish… we are 86ed on three items, John doesn’t know the grill station and is pissed at his wife and refuses to take shit from the Sous Chef on inside expo, etc. Not delegating enough and still career driven. I ignored my body, and my pride took over, I worked shifts until I could not literally stand…
Driving home in a car was a challenge if you are having spasms at random. That shit is intense, and I can mark that off the bucket list! I had to use a walker in my apartment and in public to support walking long distances…the ones you see with tennis balls on the feet… and a physical therapist coming to my apartment once a week to work out with, get my muscles strength back to somewhat normal so my body regain some sense of memory and strength.
The long hours and lack of self-care (45 Simple Self Care Practices) is a way to avoid facing our issues and acting. We secretly crave the stress, noise, and chaos of the kitchen to drown out our chaos.
In March 2020, the “world ended” A pandemic that took the hospitality industry straight to hell. Anyone who worked in a hotel, restaurant, or was a sales representative can interject “their” experiences in this part of the story “fill in the blank…”
My hotel got boarded up, San Francisco, like many cities all-around, shut down. You were not allowed to be around people, work, and there was no end in site as to when “normal” would come back. I was living on a month-to-month basis, had no pressure of time, but pressure on myself, worried, not sleeping…How could I continue my medical infusions and pay for it so I would not have another episode? Would my muscle spasms come back if there was a disruption in treatments because my insurance will not pay for it? How would I afford that? Would I even find a job? What job could I do in the meantime to add to unemployment to pay rent or eat?
I did not work for 3 months; it was like a vacation. All the worrying I had about supporting myself through the crash, kind of went away because my headspace was freed with only myself to worry about, not the pressure of work or the kitchen. I could focus on only one thing, it mellowed me out and didn’t take anything out on anyone. I played guitar, something I ignored because all I did was work, I drove the coast of California by myself, I played disc golf, took runs, cooked for myself! Not cold cuts and cereal or ramen or gas station coffee and burritos and beer. The things you do not get to do when you are in 4 walls and go to work when its dark, and leave…when its dark.
I got an email around June 2020 from a Estate Manager, for an interview for an east coast Chef position that was actually in the bay area. A private estate which you would be responsible for food for all travel, flying private and cooking on site too their destinations, weekly lunch and dinner for a family or 6, weekends off, responsible for cooking their meals, kid’s meals, school lunches, 3 course dinner every Friday night. Baked goods, bread, all snacks made from scratch. Cook out of their home M-F lunch and dinner on site. I am home before 8pm every night.
In a pandemic, anyone who thinks “real Chefs” would not do this job because you’re not in the trenches anymore behind the line sweating it out with you “other family” supporting your community of restaurants. I dare you to challenge that statement.
I was investing time in “me” not the job and getting better at caring for your body and mind. I was only working 7-hour days, doing my own shopping and not compromising my skills or dishes. Had I not done a lot during the pandemic, focused on slowing down and retraining your body and mind to manage without the pressure of kitchen life; I would have had another episode, a health issue, who knows if I would have lived through it at all. Taking a chance and investing in myself paid off. Thrive in the worst time our industry has ever faced.
I hate to say this, but I did read in an Anthony Bourdain book that taking a “private chef job” was for the lazy… In all honesty when I was younger, I could relate with that. Finding a healthy balance with all the events that played out to get me to where I am currently, I can maintain some level of mental health and physical health, focusing, keeping my hobbies while creating. I am still doing what we all do in the hospitality industry, just working for the same people in a smaller scenario, while having weekends off to do things “civilians “do that I never did before, or at least that is how I look at it. Isn’t that the definition of work life balance? Then call me lazy.
You never know what you will be asked to do, or what opportunity will appear for you. Take chances in life, but put yourself first not the job. When you slow down, self-reflect and clear your mind of all the pressure we put ourselves through, we are healthier and not abusing ourselves. We need to embrace the importance of self-care and mental stability over an abusive one to continue to shift “Chef life” or “kitchen life”. The job is not that important, there will always be another one, but not another you. Don’t forget about yourself.’
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