Monthly Archives: June 2016

THE RELUCTANT ENTREPRENEUR

June 30, 2016Uncategorizedfallingbackonfunny

I aint selling shit to my friends. And I cuss too much.

Two VERY big reasons that direct sales/multi level marketing should NOT be working for me!!! I don’t know what to tell ya about why its working other than I am just ME. Beginning to end. Im honest about what works and what doesn’t and Im pretty blunt….I think you knew that. Whooda thunk I’d succeed? I think I did….

I have always been pretty blunt. If I dont like something I’ll let you know. So I started using Beachbody workouts almost a decade ago. They worked. I have never and will never do pills, drinks, or anything else to be fit. I will always and forever believe that eating well and exercise (of the effective kind) is the ONLY thing on Earth that will make you healthy and fit. So I loved Beachbody because you know…just workouts. And some eating plans that taught you to eat more protein and less sugar. Basic shit really.

But when approached about “multi level marketing” all I heard was “PYRAMID SCHEME”. No way. No how. Not happening. I aint selling shit to my friends and I KNOW none of that crap works anyway. One guy at the top gets rich and all the people below him are stuck selling crap and barely breaking even…because I knew it all. So NO. No way in Hell..

7 years of NO. SEVEN. YEARS. Brain Rot, a move to Colorado and not knowing anyone, lots of stuff…who knows…but lots of stuff that probably led me to “Oh why the hell not”. Plus- my friend had been having more and more consistent success over 7 years. And she wasn’t in jail. Or Bernie Madoff. Or crooked. HA! Go figure.

I was reluctant though because….I cuss a lot. Im not “family-friendly” most of the time. Who would look at me as a legit business owner? Plus- I aint selling shit to my friends. So I joined as a “coach” and decided not to ask any friends or anyone to buy anything or be a coach under me or whatever. I just worked out, used the products and posted about it on social media. Then a strange thing happened. People started asking me what workout I was doing. My body leaned up, I got muscle, I got in good shape, my skin got better, hair grew faster, I had more energy. People noticed I guess. So my sales pitch was…..and I shit you not….”Im doing this 21 Day Fix crap that you do some workouts and use some containers to put your food in. The workouts are only 30 minutes and Im too lazy to drive to the gym soooo…if you want it…it’s like $140 for the entire program and these Shakes I thought would be disgusting but turns out I like them.” DAMN….thats a good sales pitch.

And so I reluctantly became a business owner. A representative. An entrepreneur. I sold some shit to my friends! Turns out the shit was good. Amazing workouts,meal plan, Shakes, people saw results. Then asked about coaching…and a team started to build. All despite my lack of tact, business acumen, ability to “sell” and quite often not knowing what the hell I was doing and having to constantly look things up.

And I am forever grateful. Humbled, in awe, floored, financially better off, fulfilled, happy, healthy, and glad I told my friends about it. Huh. Turns out you can cuss and still be successful! I’ll be damned.

KISS MY ASS CIGNA

June 24, 2016Uncategorizedfallingbackonfunny

Dear Cigna,

Good Morning. I hope this finds you well. I hope you are well because I wouldn’t wish chronic, terminal, or any other kind of illness on anyone. My husband has been dealing with a degenerative issue for over 4 years now and it is not fun. Well….I guess you know that. I don’t know if you have ever heard of Ataxia..it is what he has. I lovingly call it Brain Rot. His cerebellum is shrinking. It is a rare disease. Very rare. And there is no treatment and no cure. Because it is so rare there is very little funding for research. Therefore we just sit. And wait. For his brain to shrink away.

I am writing you because we have a fabulous doctor in Denver. She does so much for Ataxia patients. She is desperately trying to get research done to help fight this terrible disease. Again- we need money to do research to get medicine trials funded. She went to a LOT of school. Like 12 or more years I don’t know I graduated Barely Cum laude from a state school. She’s smart. Like very smart. Years and years of neurology classes and she’s been a doctor, practicing for YEARS. She knows the brain. Do you? Did you go to medical school? Do you even know what Ataxia is? Im beginning to think, like many, you’ve never heard of it. Because every test my husband has to take…every scan or blood test or spinal tap or whatever the shit our doctor tells us to do…you deny paying for it. Why is that?

Are you aware of something about Ataxia that we are not? Do you have a special knowledge that none of these tests or scans will help him so you just choose not to pay for it? My husband has worked over 40 hours a week for 20+ years. He went to college, got a degree, and has had a job, taken care of this family, paid taxes and paid into an insurance plan (a shit ton of money each month) for 20 years or more. We follow the rules.

My husband doesn’t smoke. He doesn’t do drugs. He was very very healthy and ate well and exercised and was never overweight. He did his part to stay healthy and avoid the healthcare system. It didn’t work. Sometimes shitty things happen to good people. He got the Brain Rot anyway. And of the thousands and thousands of dollars we have paid into health insurance over the years we had barely used any of it. We hardly, if EVER, went to the doctor. We are healthy people. WERE healthy people. Then Brain Rot.

And you have systematically decided…YOU….who sits at a desk in a chair and looks at numbers and does not know my husband or his doctor or even what the fuck Ataxia is…YOU have decided not to pay for shit. What qualifies you to do this? Im just curious. Are you more knowledgeable about my husband’s brain and what it needs than his doctor?

I am not political. I don’t give a shit about Democrat or Republican or Obamacare or if it helps or hurts or whatever. I care about my husband. And the fact that his FUCKING doctor doesn’t get to decide how he’s treated for his condition——YOU DO. Really? You? WHY do you get to decide? We were on one of those uphill, hopeful swings recently. Our doctor had a new revelation and there is 1 trial that my husband MIGHT have qualified for. He needed to be genetically tested AGAIN to see if this particular gene was in his DNA. If it was then he could participate in the drug trial. We got the call this morning that you wont pay for the test. Its thousands of dollars. So we can eat, or we can maybe get him the drug that might help him.

I don’t care about the system. I don’t care about how it works or the details or the red tape or any of that bullshit. As Im sure no one who is living with a degenerative or terminal disease does. We don’t give a shit. We want YOU to pay for what our DOCTORS say is best for us. Shouldn’t a fucking doctor get to choose what best for a patient. Not some analyst with barely a 4 year degree at a desk who’s never set eyes on the patient?

I tell ya what….Im personally inviting you, Cigna, to my home. You can meet my husband, watch him try to walk, talk, function. You can ask us questions. I can tell you the horror stories of what he’s been through. What our family has been through. You can see the canes he uses to walk, his adaptive trike, the space we have so he can get through the house. You can look at the 10 spiral notebooks full of notes Ive taken at doctor visits over the past 4 years trying to figure out why the FUCK he got this shitty ass disease. THEN….and only Then…if you decide he is not worth the treatment….THEN you can deny us coverage. To our faces.

You don’t get it. You don’t get it. And I pray to Gd you never have to personally find out. I wouldn’t wish this shit on anyone. But please, for the love of God, please, before you just systematically hit DENY without thinking about it. Before YOU in your little chair at your stupid desk with all that power that you shouldn’t have. Before YOU decide whats best for MY family….please think about YOUR family. And who you would want making decisions for them.

HANDS & FAMILY

June 20, 2016Uncategorizedfallingbackonfunny

Its been over a month since Ive published a blog. Not sure why other than I haven’t felt like it. I’ve written a few. Just didn’t publish them. Sometimes life is endlessly inspiring and the words flow out. Sometimes it’s not. Halfway, almost, through 2016. I cannot believe it. Crazy how fast time flies. I just returned from a trip to visit my grandmother for her 90th Birthday. She said to me…..”90 years is a lot of years that went by really really fast.” Her father died in a work accident when she was 5 years old. Her mother died of cancer when my grandmother was 19. She’s been an orphan since the age of 19. Her husband died over a decade ago of cancer. And her son died almost 10 years ago in a motorcycle accident. She has seen and lived through things that could not have been easy. And when I left the party I was acutely aware that I may not see her again. A woman who helped raise me.

I got to spend some very funny, quality time with my Mom and brother on the trip. We missed my sister. And its funny how family works. I’ve been married ALMOST as long as I wasn’t married. It’ll be 19 years for us next month. I added Nugent to my last name 19 years ago. And we have 2 amazing children. And Im 43 years old and I go somewhere with my Mom and brother and we bicker like we are 13 years old with mom having to fuss at us. You can marry. Have kids of your own. A home, a life, a mortgage, and not often see those people you lived with the first 18 years of your life but you come together and you know you are them. Family began with them. The Cannons and Ellis’ and my grandparents and my Mom and Dad and my brother and sister.

I also got to visit with my cousins. I am the oldest grandkid by quite a few years but the next born was my cousin. He’s the oldest cousin on that side and is married with his own beautiful family now. We got to talk for a few hours and it was nice. My grandmother was sitting on the couch and he was next to her and I was next to him. He was talking and moved his hand a certain way and I noticed it for some reason. I looked at my grandmother’s hand and realized she moves her hands that way. And I move my hands that way.

My brother and I were able to talk a bit about my Dad. The three of us all handled his death so differently. Each in our own, needed way. We both talked about how it makes us sad that he feels so far away. Like a person we just used to know a long time ago. That first year after he died I could smell him, I could hear him, when the phone rang I honestly had 3 solid seconds I thought it might BE him. And as the years have passed he has faded. And that makes me so very sad. It makes me cry now. I cant remember his voice. It bothers me so much. Because I feel like if it all goes away then so does he. 53 is too young to die. And 10 years is too long.

So I couldn’t quite figure out why my cousin’s hand movement caught my attention and drew me to my grandmother’s hands. And then to realize I move my hands that same way. So alone by the pool in a hotel in Nevada I looked at my hands. And there he was. My Dad moved his hands that way too. And like stumbling across a photo of an old boyfriend or hearing a song from a moment that meant so much- there he was. And I smiled because I know he can never completely fade away. Family.

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