It’s so much more than mascara

                                   

      In a flurry of emails, texts and message from Y corporate yesterday it was confirmed that our flagship product, Touch Spray Foundation, is being pulled from the market due to production and manufacturing issues.  News travel fast, I’ve been talking with my core Tribe, we are all in shock and pretty upset.  we know this means we all lose over 50% of our sales.  After the economy the past three years, all of our sales have been cut in half each year just from the way life is been going. 

    

      My core group, the one that I go to conventions with,  My Tribe, they will be lifelong friends but I am still struggling knowing that I’m not gonna get to see them anymore it’s hard to get to a convention that you don’t have product to sell to fund your trip with I’m not blaming any of them and I hope they’re not blaming me, this has just been a really hard few years watching something that I worked so hard to build and grow and bring others into with me slip away.  I’m really going to miss this. 

     I know it’s just a direct sales company, that’s not what I’m going to miss. I’m going to miss the Tribe that I’ve built. We were all just trying to earn trips and pretty little shiny charms on a bracelets but ended up becoming family. Younique does it right.  I earned my first trip with them within two months of joining, but didn’t realize it til I got an email asking me to pick a date to come tour the new headquarters in Utah.  The first time I visited corporate I got to tour our brand new facilities go through and see how manufacturing shipping is all done. I worked out and had a tai chi lesson with the corporate leader of health and fitness. I had a make up lesson by a beautiful and talented artist who shared techniques and how to get the most from our products.  It was my first time traveling alone since I had become a mother. There were gifts left on my pillow every night in our hotel.  Little journals, ink pens, a T-shirt,  Younique has treated me like family by sending  cards in the mail, giving us gifts to mark accomplishments. It’s no wonder I felt loved, because those are all the ways that I show love to my own children. Tate’s charm bracelet is full of gymnastics and now soccer charms. Mine is full of goals that my friends helped me reach, charms from each state and country my Tribes visits.  

    More than any recognition or financial success Younique has helped me start my healing journey from an assault that happened 20 years ago this August on my birthday. I had stopped at a party I’d been invited to by a friend at the diner i started waiting table at in Phoenix.  I thought I’d  have a drink with my new coworkers because Brad was working late and  I didn’t want to spend my first birthday away from all my friends family in Louisiana alone.  I was given a laced drink and my life forever changed with what happened for the next 36 hours with three men from the diner I was waitressing at.  Brad had  reported  me missing after driving calling and looking for me when I didn’t make it home. Everything after that changed in me forever.  Sadly it changed our marriage forever too. 

    Younique helped to start healing me.  I stood on stage and received my Black Status award in front of 10,000 women on my 40th birthday. Recovery from sexual assault is possible. I’m living proof.  My son and daughter got to see their mom’s biggest professional accomplishment and be right there with me.  The broken young wife that struggled with shame and guilt from a violent assault kept going….. I had a failed suicide attempt in the weeks following my assault.  If I could go back and sit with my 24 year old self I would let her cry, I’d hold her and whisper over and over that it’s going to get better.   In my darkest hour I would have never believed I would survive to stand in a ball gown, being presented  a Tiffany’s necklace in front of my husband and children, then celebrate with 40 of my closest friends. I would hold the young wife I was then and tell her   “You don’t know it now, in your pain, while you’re trying to end your life, but you will grow life soon.  Tiffany I know you think your body will never quit hurting, you can’t sleep because you feel their hands on you as you drift off…. Keep holding on.  You will be holding a new baby boy in two years.  You will become stronger than any nightmare. When you grow to protect your child, you’ll become strong enough to protect yourself.  You’ll be so strong again, just hold on a little longer.”

     In my darkest moment, I would have not been able to imagine the stark contrast of the brighter future that awaited me because I just  held on. On stage is what I imagine Tate felt every time she won a gold medal. It was the best birthday I’ve ever had. I finally got to have a good one. My husband, my kids and 40 women that I got to know, train and love celebrated with me for me on my 40th.  This night was God. Nothing else could explain getting to have all of this on my actual birthday.  All the years I spent crying and pleading with god to not feel alone and relive that night…. God sent so many friends that on my 40th birth I was never alone, not even to go to the bathroom. I couldn’t see God in my life so he sent an army, he sent My Tribe to make me finally feel safe and loved on my birthday again.    

                            

    I became completely dependent on and driven by our work trips. I’ve earned seven incentive trips all over the world in the eight years I’ve been with Younique, I’ve even got to speak at a couple of conferences in Atlanta and here in Texas.  Booking a flight, picking up friends at the airport and heading off to a girls weekend  was my drug of choice.  We all got to learn and laugh together while  having a break from our daily lives. This will will forever be the best part of my life. Getting to be in the room with other mom as they just decompress laugh and cut up. I finally got to have fun, we all did. We actually acted like our kids while on vacation. We had an Indian leg wrestling tournament in our hotel room on one of our last trips. We all laughed so hard that joy leaked  from the corners of our eyes. Every year when that video pops up on my Facebook memories, I laugh and I give myself a few minutes to sit and remember just how much fun My Tribe has had.  I don’t know if the women who signed up under me know how much I love them.  They have each saved my life- God sent them to call, check-in, become my friends any time I felt alone.  When I had no light of my own they loaned me theirs and walked with me til I could find my way again.

                             

      I would go and be one of the older ladies at all of our conferences, the younger ladies having adapted to social media and technology more than a lot of us Gen X moms.  I am fiercely proud of the “old Broads” that have joined me. I see their names on on Top Ten Leaderboards out of 50,000 women… My Tribe worked harder and dominated. They outshined all while driving minivans, working full time, being room moms.  

       We all just met and decided to be friends, because we wanted the same things: a little bit of spending money,  a way to have a minute where we got to concentrate on ourselves.    For me, it was getting dressed every morning and talking to my friends on my Facebook lives. I got to know so many people by sharing my life while experimenting with putting make up on.  I realize it started to heal me. In many ways I began to have self-worth every time a new friend reached out and asked if I could help her feel prettier.  I’ll never stop helping women feel beautiful, that is a life’s mission of mine, aside from the makeup.

      I’ve helped direct women to our Haven Retreat for adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse. I began to get comfortable sharing information and telling parents how to protect their children by having plain and simple conversations to make sure they stayed safe. As my confidence grew I shared more.  People that may not buy make up have messaged me over the years to say thank you.   I helped them be able to talk to their child about boundaries, this is why sharing my story matters.  I need sharing I began to heal  a lot of my own past with an assault that happened when I was 24.

    It’s some times overwhelming, but I felt like I needed to share because I wanted other women to heal in the way that I had. I still don’t talk openly about the assault and prefer to not answer questions, its hard to visit in my mind.  But in sharing I’ve been messaged in the past three years by over 35 women disclosing their own assaults to me.  Some reached out to get information on what kind of therapy has helped me(EMDR). A few have made it to the Haven retreat to begin their healing journey. Sharing my story matters.

       I’ve connected with other leaders in Younique and we’ve been each other’s touch point over the past several years encouraging each other to continue seeking healing and recovery. I was able to hit my biggest career goals while getting help to stop drinking. After the assault I numbed with alcohol to be able to go to sleep, be in groups, and always to black out so I could forget my birthday. 

     Instead of feeling ousted or set apart when I quit drinking, My Tribe folded their arms around me.  They stayed with me every second of my first convention sober.  They didn’t let me go anywhere by myself when I was struggling with the social anxiety of being around thousands of people.   They literally held my hand as I learned to do life without wine. 

   Younique was and is the safest place I’ve ever been.  A company based on protecting children, run by mama bears.  It was built by a brother and sister, that wanted to provide a way to fund a healing program for adult who’ve been sexually molested as children. There couldn’t have been a more perfect place for me to wind up.  I signed up for a multi level marketing company because my friend sent me a used mascara. I wanted to go on a trip like she just got back from.  I didn’t know she was saving my life by telling me “I think you’d be great at doing what I do”.  At that moment she was my hope dealer and I’m forever grateful.  

      Working with bunch a of moms, slinging mascara has been one of the greatest joys of my life. We really did run the world for a few years. I will hold on now, just like I have had to learn to do in the past.  I go in and out of having faith in a God that I felt abandoned me on my 24th birthday.   I’m learning that he didn’t abandon me, in my darkest hours he was preparing My Tribe. I’m hard to reach, so it’s taken an  army of women to Uplift, Empower and Validate me until I could see God in my life again.  My Great Couselor couldn’t reach me  in church, I struggle in large groups and can’t hear God I’m being hyper vigilant.  The Creator literally made me a Haven and knew it had to be unique- all female- for me to be able to recover .  My Holy Spirit called in the right women to love me through til I could love myself again.

     We are taught to “Find your Why?”  Why do you do what you do? I thought I sold makeup to make money but I was wrong.  I do this to lead others to heal.  I share so parents can become comfortable talking to their kids, to point them to the Saprea.org site for tools to make talking easier.  The Spray Foundation my be retiring, but mascara saved my life.  A little tube of makeup has saved the  lives of many other survivors who are struggling. I will keep sharing, keeping telling women “I think you would be great at doing what I do”.  I’ll keep reaching out and maybe I’ll be someone else’s hope dealer because it has always been SO much more than mascara.