Markera the Entrepreneur

The daughter of people who forged their ways in this world, who decided working "on someone's job" wasn't going to work forever.

Father, a Haitian emigrant - age of fifteen, seeking a life that he couldn't find where he was.
Mother, a seamstress - a daughter of two entrepreneurs.

It is in my blood.  If you recall, I gave birth to three children in a four year span.  In that time, after discovering I was high risk, I didn't work during the middle pregnancy.  Let's see if I can break this down, as to how serious this is in my head.

I grew up in a convenience store.  I learned to "keep shop" at an early age (maybe five or six), ring up customers' purchases on the cash register, give change, help keep track of stock...and more.  My mother was a seamstress in back, a steady stream of customers for taping up, fittings, and I on the floor picking up pins with a magnet, learning to clip long threads off of finished garments, playing with scrap materials wrapped on my dolls for fashion shows.

My mother continued to push on after my father died, one venture after another, each all about keeping her independence.  There were a few network marketing attempts, her eye always peeled for the next better opportunity.  Melaleuca, TPG, Mary Kay, and Avon.  I was right there foot to foot behind her.  In between working summers for the government programme to broaden my experiences, and taking over her odd job at the laundromat, there was always the hunt for ways to invest our money.

Just before I got pregnant the first time, I lost my job.  I was upset, deeply.  It was rejection.  After putting in so much time for a boss who could never be pleased, I was fired.  Loving my nieces and nephews the way I did, and having always baby sat them or have one or two with me whenever I was free, I proposed a plan to "school" them at an affordable rate.  I even ended up with one child who wasn't related by blood because her mother liked what I was doing with the older sister who was my niece.  And it was convenient to have one pick up for both girls.

I held a job after that, later that year.  After months of fun learning, field trips, laughter and bonding, they were prepared for "regular school" and I went into the workforce.

My high risk pregnancy ended that employment a year later or so.  After my son's birth, I launch into Avon full time.  I had been doing it on the side for a minute.  I bought my first car with my (ex)husband's help, but mostly bonus cheques from having a downline.

I continued that even when I was working and pregnant with my daughter.  However, when my daughter was eight months old, my sister, mother and I joined up and decided to reopen the convenience store.  We gave that a go, and I got the opportunity once again to have a group of kids to teach.  My (ex)husband gathered desks and carpet and chairs when he did his runs at the dump on his job.  We cleaned and disinfected everything, and my mother laid the carpet.  I had a fully decked classroom.  And my two, along with two friends' little ones, there were four excited playmates.

Over the next few years, after my mother died that year, after I closed the store because I couldn't handle all that was going on, there were constant attempts to make money from home.  I sewed, which I didn't know I could do.  I made slush in the gourmet ice machine to sell to school kids passing by, and finally took a two year contract job as a nanny for a gorgeous baby I grew to love as my own.

Two years later, after sending out my resume to numerous places and going on a few interviews, I was called by a lawyer with a more interesting request.

I spent five weeks that summer, hosting a playgroup at her house for eight children.  Four pairs of siblings.  This evolved, and continues to do so, three years later.

Still on the hunt for ways to make my money work for me, and gain financial freedom and time freedom, as well as get my health on track - I revisited another network marketing opportunity I had brushed off three years earlier.  This one was it.  So many things I needed combined.

Markera the Artist

She's been surfacing.  Bobbing and weaving.  Never in ways she did in high school, early college, pre-kid days, you know.  When there was this odd thing called, what is it again?  Ah yes.

Free time.

The creativity flows, it emerges at work.  When a plastic cup is turned into a crepe papered bell.  Or a cotton ball is wrapped in tissue paper to make a nose.  So much that is often thrown away by others, is reused by me.  Cardboard boxes from pasta, cereal, pot pies, and I could go on.  Oatmeal canisters, balloons. *sigh*

The cats now have a two part home with a cylinder crosswalk.  The result of overflowing angst and annoyance.

Markera the Woman (Not Set in Stone)

I am unsure as to who she is.  Right down to decorating where we now live.  I realize, I do not know what my style is.  Or rather, I am afraid to decorate.

I have big dreams.  At one point, I was afraid to dream them, write them, breathe life into them.  As life threw its shit at me, as I stood and faced staunchly the fuckery people call trials, as I listened to the whole "God gives the biggest struggles to his best soldiers" spiel, I learned.

What?  That it won't get done if I don't do it.  That if I waited for those I needed, on a lot of them I would still be waiting.  That, if I put myself on the edge to rely on those who swear they will be there, I open up to a risk.

The risk of being disappointed.

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I love me. And though getting to where I need to be is taking sooooo long. I know that I love me.

And in loving me, hard truths had to be said out loud. Moments had to be taken. Acceptance has to be balanced.

I often forget who I am sans kids and boyfriend. I let myself get wholly distracted because to mourn the loss of time to do the things i truly love is overwhelming.

However, no matter what. Writing; the urge, the need, the expressing on paper; it never goes away. I don't view myself as a writer. That is my best friend's 'thing'. She schooled in it, entered competitions, seeks to make it her livelihood. Who the hell am I to attempt such?

Markera. That is who I am. And there is no longer this self convincing, this knee jerk comparing.

I will take the scattered moments and note them. And watch out. I swear like an old bard. That, I have also accepted about me. :)

On My Way - December 2015

As I made my way trying products out and making drastic but needed dietary changes, here I stood in front of the mirror not quite sure who I was looking at.  I felt stronger and like I was becoming a great example to my kids.

I began attending the weekly meetings and learned as much as I could.  I went to the once a month training and was blown away by the sheer simplicity of what I had joined.

The conference I attended was what cinched everything for me. So many dots were connected from my mother having started the health journey.

End of December, hot mama!

Making Progress - November 2014

So, I had met this lady in 2012, and brushed her off.  I had been in another company, I didn't have the time or energy to be bothered with building a team and that sort of thing and dealing with unreliable people.

However, we became friends on facebook and her feeds looked a lot like my boyfriend's sister feed.  This company was all up and down their page and the results and that sort of thing Iw ould read and scroll on.

Late one night, as the money had ran out, bills still sat unpaid, the mortgage was backed up, my stress level was up, the kids were feeling my mood, the man was miserable because his job hunt was dead ending constantly - I messaged the lady I met.  We talked at length and I set up to meet her.

I don't know what led me to it. I don't know what made me step off the ledge.  There was a surge in my stomach that was like, oh wow, you can slough this weight off, you can get off the pressure meds.  I was pushed by something I couldn't describe.  I met with her in my filthy pigsty of a house, and then agreed once again to come to her house for another meeting.

This was the result of that meeting at her home.  I tried on a body magic reshaping garment and was in love instantly with the results.  Could this be the turning point in my life?

My birthday was in another month and I was ready to make a serious weight deduction.

Post One

I opened this blog, and never posted.  It is supposed to be the progression from overweight to all svelte and what not.  However, I have been so busy that I haven't been able to work on it the way I want to.

But here we are.  This is me. Last May.  Thinking I was all cute and whatever.  NOT!  This candid shot ended up in the gift shop in the queue of pictures scrolling on the screen.  I was not impressed.  I laughed and smiled, but inside I was horrified.  That 300lb person was unacceptable. I weighed 305 pregnant with my daughter in my ninth month - SEVEN YEARS AGO.  What the hell was my excuse now?  None.

The time came to take a handle on myself and check this mess.  My daughter was expressing growing concern over my stomach's size and my son was embarrassed when his friends pointed out his fat mother.