216: Fighting a Chronic Illness and Growing a Business as a Single Mom, Elva Treviño

 Welcome to episode 216. This is a story of a single mom who has been battling chronic illness, Crohn's, and has also been in the hospital for at least 13 kidney related surgeries. in spite of her doctor appointments and uncertain health status every single day, she continues to go all in on building a  business that expresses this: we are all that we are all champions inside. Today's guest is Elva Treviño.  Elva is an entrepreneur with a passion for fitness, leadership, entertainment, and making a positive impact as a celebrity trainer and public speaker. She captivates audiences with her motivational talks, drawing from personal experiences and providing actionable advice to empower individuals to overcome challenges and achieve their goals. Elva is living her mission. She's an example. An example for anyone that is finding themselves constantly in the hospital or constantly facing failures and challenges. And also an example for those of us who frankly are not. Yes, to be human is to struggle but some of us at least we have our health and this episode, I would really encourage you not just to hear Elva's words and see that she's super passionate, but I want you to feel, feel the sense of urgency that Elva has with the way that she is approaching her one life, despite being a single mom and having a chronic illness.

Let's connect: https://www.instagram.com/melissallarena/

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Grab a free chapter of Fertile Imagination: https://www.melissallarena.com/fertileideas/

HIGHLIGHTED QUESTIONS

1) Share any stories you have of single parenting with a chronic illness (Crohn's) to help listeners with health concerns

2) What are your go-to self-care practices to combat business and/or single motherhood fatigue?

3) How have you navigated having a chronic illness to spread your message of building a community of champions? Any practical  tips?

4) What single most important life lesson are you hoping your daughter takes away from seeing her mom move forward despite a chronic illness?

This episode is brought to you by Fertile Imagination, my book, a guide for stretching every mom's superpower for maximum impact. I share in this book also an example of a mom who was facing a major illness. Esther, who's a DJ in Amsterdam, big shout out to Esther. Serves as an example of what the mind is capable of when a mom is facing a really big health scare and is able to have so much confidence in herself to take the onus on herself to heal so that she can be the best mom she possibly can, and then also live out her dreams.

Totally no BS dreams, just like the ones that are on her heart, even if that includes playing Tupac at a former cathedral in a nightclub in Amsterdam, just like Esther. So that is in my book. And if you're inspired by Esther's story, I have other stories as well of humans who have thoroughly Used and express themselves by using a fertile imagination.

A fertile imagination is the ability to cast a vision that is so big that you may have never seen a mom accomplish it ever before. And Elva is also such an example of that. So take all her words to heart because they are, they have the potential to really set you on the path of deliberate action. Deliberate advocacy in your community and deliberate mommying to, to your kids. Enjoy the conversation. And if you're interested in the book, just go to ..

www.fertileideas.com.  

About Elva

Elva Trevino is an entrepreneur with a passion for fitness, leadership, entertainment, and making a positive impact. As a celebrity trainer and public speaker, she captivates audiences with her motivational talks, drawing from personal experiences and providing actionable advice to empower individuals to overcome challenges and achieve their goals. Additionally, Elva serves as a charismatic spokesmodel, effectively representing and collaborating with brands/non profits while leveraging her engaging presence to connect with a diverse audience. Her multifaceted approach, encompassing fitness advocacy, entertainment, charity work, community engagement, mentoring emerging leaders, owning her own businesses, and being a sought-after celebrity trainer, positions her as an influential figure across various domains. She's also been recognized for her visionary contributions, having been nominated as one of the top 100 visionaries in healthcare globally in 2021.

Follow her journey

https://www.instagram.com/advo_elva/

TRANSCRIPT

Elva Treviño,  I am so excited to have you on the podcast.  Thanks. I'm excited to be here.  So this is something that listeners might not know.

So I am actually, which is unexpected, interviewing someone that is also in the big state of Texas in the United States. And you're in Houston, right? Yeah. Growing more every day.  Yeah, I think the only time I've been there was to Minute Maid Baseball Park. So that is my impression of Houston thus far. And my little boys really enjoyed it.

So it was a really good time. And I wanted to just learn about you, your experiences, a little bit of your background, a bit about your champion mindset. I'm very intrigued by that. And also just. Tell us a little bit about what, what it is that you're looking to accomplish in Houston and the greater and the greater world.

What is your vision?  

I love it. I'm really excited to be here. And just a quick shout out to Sev when you hear this for connecting us. And it's always great to connect with like minds in so many different ways. So, but to kick off that question, my name is Elva Trevino. I'm 38. I'll be 39 in April this year.

And I'm just a woman who has had a lot of. Dreams and visions, but has persevered through a lot of challenges that most people feel like they really wouldn't be able to get through to me. It's just a way of life, but it's always been the driving force of why I started pursuing entrepreneurship, why I started pouring into community and why I always just looked at my story as a backbone of something that could unlock others.

So in 2019, I started a brand called Champions Club that was actually built from my garage. And at the time I was marketing two different brands, working for others, seeing a need here in Houston for just helping people to wake up with health, personal training and things of that nature. But growing up severely asthmatic and having so many challenges when it came to my asthma, even as an athlete, I didn't realize how much mindset training that that actually.

Created throughout my life to get to a certain point where, as I was helping people in those years, marketing those two other brands prior to champions club, I noticed that there was something in the mindset that there was a gap that was needing basically being needed to fill. So when I say that you take the person who wants to lose a 50 pounds or race in a marathon or iron man, like I did, you see the bodybuilders and the athletes from teenage up to professional sports.

But what drives those results was always. And when I started getting to the average people, the stay at home moms, which are really not average, but just the everyday type of goals, I noticed.  Why do we, why can't everyone feel like a champion at some point in their life? So fitness really became the gateway for me to really pour into others in my community.

And I never would have imagined back then that the pathway that took me on. Being that I just stayed relentless in my pursuit of my own personal health challenges that it would turn into this massive brand that's been able to serve clients in 15 different countries online, where we were able to open our first brick and mortar here in Houston that we're currently franchising a concept for, that we were able to spin off dreams like music and entertainment and community work and leadership and mentorship all through the walls of my gym.

So since 2019, we've basically created an umbrella company to actually, and we're working on a couple of sister concepts that have really aligned to the community in terms of leadership and just helping people to pursue their dreams. Now, when we look at those commonalities, the mindset's at the root of all of it.

So before champions clump came into existence in 2019, I'd gone through years of having so many health issues with my asthma, but it was the need for 13 kidney surgeries and having two tubes out of my left kidney that really put the fire in my heart and just my mindset to use my voice in a larger platform to really help people to wake up before they found themselves in shoes like mine.

And I know that we won't always all be here, but When I say I want to leave everything out here before anything ever were to happen, being that I'm a single mom and my daughter's entering her high school years. I've done just that over the last five years. It's really just been about the pursuit of making sure that we're leaving our mark behind so that The future of my daughter's being raised in is going to look a lot better than the way it's been  And I think there's  there's so many people that you are impacting by demonstrating just how How anyone can, can continue to like go after their dreams, even if they have a chronic illness, even if they are a single parent.

And, and I thought it would be really, really helpful to just share with the listeners a little bit about maybe like a story about a time when having a chronic illness for you or any of those surgeries. got in your way, but then you use the power of mindset to not let it stay in your way.  Oh, there's some like, as you were speaking, I had like a flash of pictures and it's interesting because when I first started doing podcasts, it was typically the testimonial of this very thing.

So I think it's actually pretty cool that I'm coming full circle to come back into that health story as I still battle health.  Issues every single day, basically. So taking it back to when I first started to find my voice, they always say, if you want to give, give some, get something done, give it to a busy person.

But when it comes to business too, when you have a parent or just someone who is waking up, hitting the floor, running for, for a mini them or nieces and nephews or siblings, just something that's bigger than them. There is no stopping. There are people who are relying on your efforts every single day. So back to those days where I was finding that voice inside of me and having to quietly go to my doctor's visits.

I ended up having about 13 different doctors towards the end of the two years of my surgeries. And most people didn't know what was going on at the time. The people I worked for at that time, there were a handful of people like a dot of people outside of my parents and my daughter who knew what I was experiencing, but I, in those days, it was really a time where I knew that I needed to isolate.

Myself away from the noise to stay clear and stay focused. You can probably compare it to someone who was told, Hey, you made it to the Olympics. You have three months to train. Like what kind of mindset would that take from someone? So taking that  picture of the Olympic mindset, that's how I felt back then  I was standing on stages, dolled up with hair and makeup.

Wearing a beautiful dress, speaking to people in the thousands at times, training on fitness and health and business and leadership. And all the while, when I had my two nephrostomy tubes out of my left kidney,  which at that point, the doctors in my hospital had never put two tubes, two incisions into one kidney before. 

They had no clue that I had these bags. That were taped to my ribs under my dress. They had no idea that I couldn't see sometimes past the first couple of rows. In fact, actually, after the last surgery. My mom was in the stands on that one. And it was supposed to be a big weekend. I had just gotten the tubes out.

It had been a long 22 months, financially and all those things.  And I remember almost blacking out on stage. And if I showed you the picture, you wouldn't be able to tell. I'm sitting up there, going on a panel for 22 minutes, and as soon as I walked off that stage, I looked at my mom in the eyes, and she came from the medical industry, so she knew something was up.

And I grabbed her by the hand and I said, Take me to the hospital right now. Post surgery, I had a blood clot the size of a golf ball, but what they don't know, before I spoke, was that I was violently ill in the bathroom, vomiting, and just dizzy. But it was my pursuit of the people who needed to hear my story that day that didn't let me say, I can't talk today.

And there were so many moments through my career where I pushed through. There's another where they were going to first put the tube in my back, but I was doing my first gala that I was organizing for 250 people at Univision Studios on behalf of the brand that I was representing. And I looked at the doctor and I said, you can't do that.

I have a gala that's my gala for 250 people tomorrow. This is revolutionizing health in Houston for Latinos. You can't, you can't put that tube in my back. I have a backless dress. I have to wear it tomorrow. And I left the ER. Before I should have. So it's so many moments like that where we can find ourselves maybe being a little bit on the brink of,  Tim Grover always says, a little bit of insanity.

And sometimes you have to have just a hint of that for you to truly make things happen. And I firmly believe that if we, if we test our mindsets, far enough, our bodies will always follow. So no matter if it's a health issue or a bad day, if it's a business idea or a family challenge, we all have moments like that.

Maybe mine come with medical records that are through the roof, but I feel like everyone listening to this can relate to those pivotal moments in themselves where they found a fight. They couldn't always explain where it was coming from, but they knew that they had to listen to that. So, like I said, there's so many moments I could go over, but those are two that I can recall right now.

Yeah, I think it's, it's, it goes back to what you said earlier, which is just that people are relying on your efforts. And it reminds me of, you know, The book that I wrote, Fertile Imagination, I have a chapter there that's dedicated to a woman who decided to become a DJ in her fifties and like play every kind of song you could possibly imagine.

And at one point, her daughter was six and her daughter had cancer. And of course, being a mom, she completely let go of herself. And some years later, she contracted cancer. And Esther was able to, with the same inner resourcefulness that you exhibited over the course of three years, not even knowing what kind of issue was going on.

She was bedridden for three years, right? She was able to like stop her own medications and, and, and feel her tailbone again. And it's like. I mean, anybody that's going to be able to go through all of that is going to know that, you know what, I'm going to light the world on fire with my passion. And I'm going to, now that I get a second chance, third chance, 15th chance, however many chances you feel you've been given, it's kind of like, well, what are you going to do with it?

Pardon for the tiny little interruption, but I wanted to tell you something that's so important. I wanted to tell you that I have created a program to help visionary mom entrepreneurs through the use of their fertile imagination. You know, that book I was talking about a little bit earlier where I'm helping you cast this vision that maybe you've never seen a mom accomplished before a income generating impact making business that you can actually do while being a present mom.

Yeah, that I'm going to teach you how to use that capability, that superpower of your fertile imagination so that this way you could accomplish whatever vision you have more quickly. I'm going to help you establish, earn the trust and gain the support of the mentors, moguls, or market makers who can take your business idea to the next level, all without awkward, nor having to pretend to be anyone else than your playful self.

Actually, your playful self is going to distinguish you and become your competitive edge. I want to talk to you. If this sounds right up your alley, if you're committed to really, really. Seeing your business idea and making it come true. Then I want to talk to you on a free consultation, 30 minutes over zoom confidential, so that this way you can articulate your precise vision, which is.

Huge, a lot of us have a hard time doing that. And second, we could come up with a clearly defined road map. One that takes into account the stage of motherhood in which you find yourself. I did that the other day. I was actually speaking to someone who wants to build out an HR consultancy practice. And in that 30 minute free complimentary session.

Complimentary and free being repetitive,  we were able to figure out that what she needed to do right now in light of her kids school schedule was build relationships on the East Coast, a whole different time zone than where she is in the Rocky Mountain area. And she had it to, she had to figure out who would be the centers of influence so that this way, once her schedule cleared up in 2025, she could run, just hit the ground running and build out her HR consultancy practice.

We went through other things as well, but I wanted to just give you the nutshell so that this will, you have a good appreciation for the fact that these free 30 minute consultations, they will be limited because I really want to understand the business challenge that you're facing in the moment in not seeing your vision through.

And I also want to take a really, really keen. I and see what you might not be able to see or what is right under your nose and doable at any stage in which you are in as a mom, I E, maybe you're at that stage where you don't want to hop on airplanes and meet all these strangers in order to network. So I'll meet you where you are.

Just go to the link, melissalarina. com forward slash. Sessions, there is an application because it is really important that you are committed to the process of building out your business. And the application is so easy. It's absolutely insane how easy it is, especially in relation to everything that needs to happen in order for you to see your vision through and be a mom.

So I invite you to join me. On a free breakthrough session, let's go through your vision, articulate it, and I will help you with a roadmap so that this way you have a really good idea of your best next step. Meanwhile, if you do want to hire me as your coach, so that this way you can actually leverage the support of mentors, moguls, Or market makers who can actually take your business to the next level, then absolutely we can do so and have a conversation about what that might look like for you during those free consultations.

No pressure. This is really in service to you, a podcast listener. And I want to make sure that everything that you heard today, you're able to put into action in your real life. Again, melissalarino. com forward slash sessions. Enjoy the rest of the conversation. And this will be in the show notes.  Exactly.

And, and, and honestly, it takes some of those moments for ourselves for a lot of times for us to feel like our backs against the wall. There is nothing else to do, but fight and fight. When we say the word fight, people take it as a negative thing. We're fighting for what we have every single day. And whether you feel like that's you're on the offensive side or the defensive side of it.

 People don't realize they're in a fight every single day for their families and themselves, their mental health and all these things. I mean, the world is changing every single day. So when I look back, all those challenges were absolutely necessary because for it to have grown me into the person it's grown me into and what it continues to do.

Had I not had all those dark, crazy internal Courageous moments and moments that could have passed me by  all the people I've impacted that we've impacted together. It never would have happened. So we have to embrace those moments and we need to actually sometimes want a few more of them because it helps us level up a lot faster when our backs against the wall like that. 

I completely agree. And I think as I think about my own history and I think about My mom, right? So she has manic depression. She's had it since forever. She was a single mom, but there's so many inside the psych units, outside the psych units. And she told me, she said, Melissa, I do it for you. Like,  and it's like, holy cow, like little me, like when I was like five, six, seven.

And what that did for me, just to give you perspective, cause I'm going to ask you about your daughter. But what that did for me was kind of like, I was like resilience. I was like. I eat that for breakfast.  It's like that, that's who I am now. It's like, there's no one to tell me who I can talk to. Cause I've spoken to everybody I've needed to talk to.

And as a kid to survive. So what do you think this witnessing of you and how mommy's handling all these adversities and challenges, what do you think this is doing for your daughter? What do you anticipate? When she was three years old, I made some conscious decisions to start doing things in a way that were not normal.

And what I mean by that is traditionally not always looking at working for someone else. And I knew then that these years that she's walking into, I had a full circle moment last week when we had parents night for her high school, which is in a great district here in Houston.  I fought like hell to make sure that that that vision never stopped.

And for me, it's not about her living vicariously, me living vicariously through her to the way that I would enforce these, these responsibilities on her back. But as a first gen myself, as well as her because of her father, it's a responsibility where we've been able to embrace and empower our family lineage and say, how can we honor what's been done for us?

And how can we take that even further?  So my daughter, when I see her spirit, her character, her work. willingness to learn both traditional education and to be open to the wisdom and the real talks and the very deep talks at such a young age.  It's, it's being put into action every day. And now with her eyes set on being the first kid, uh, the first person in our family to hit Ivy league, whether or not that's going to happen for her is ultimately up to her.

But it's, it's already happening and I'm so proud of her more every day. And I know that her seeing me, mommy in the hospital up and down those early years where she was in elementary school, it just makes me appreciate the people who were around her in those days from teachers to counselors, to some of our family and just people that really created that support system, despite the term single mom.

Yes. I did a lot of this on my own, but for her to.  Have seen that witness it that strength is already embedded in her at the same time I feel blessed that God gave her to me in this time frame because a lot of the things that came out of her mouth While those years were happening Well, she was sent to me for a reason and those words were a lot of affirmation and things I needed in those moments where it got tough and she's a little Champion.

So I'll let her continue to define that in her own identity. But until then she knows character over anything else. And I'm, I'm really happy to see how that continues to unravel in her life.  Yeah. And I, and I'm wondering as a business owner and a parent and a leader and, and, and advocate for Latinos,  I mean.

How do you, how do you incorporate this, this notion of, of self care so that every day you give yourself a chance to get back up and do it again and then do it again and then do it again because it can't be like a runaway train, you know what I mean? So like, what sort of practical tips can you give someone that.

Also has chronic illness, but, but the vision and the dream is, is, is so freaking big that they have to keep going, but you've, there's gotta be something in check, you know? Yeah. It's interesting because I spoke to a thousand, uh, teens this, this Saturday and the same question came up without the health part in there.

They didn't know all of that. And they're like, mystery, what can I do? And the same exact question. And so I broke it down to them. I said, give me three things. And I was like, well, there's not just three, but What's helped me is, oh, and we hear it, but we need to really live in it. We need to submerge ourselves in it.

Gratitude, whether you're in a high or a low in that day to everyone listening to this with respect to what they believe. For me, my faith has grounded me through all things, especially since those days of my illness took over. I mean, it threw me into that in a whole different level, and I'm grateful to be able to pass some of those things on psychologically, physically, this.

Having to stay in this constant state of alignment really does help. So we can have weeks and months where we're great. For me in this season, I experienced a lot of flare ups. Those flare ups can come in so many different ways. When I say they're debilitating, it can be debilitating at times. I remember waking up last year out of my bed and I couldn't even walk on my feet every morning just because of the inflammation and chronic disruption from head to toe. 

It's not always easy to kick flare ups out like that, especially when you do your best to do things holistically. Every morning I would wake up and every night I would go to sleep with gratitude, whether it was in tears, whether it was a productive day, we have to set that intention and keep that intention first.

And we have to mean it. We can't just say these things or look at a couple words and affirmations and just run through that. If you are not in love with your processes, it's time for you to fall back in love with your processes.  And those processes have to be a formula that works for you. Now, I also mentioned that having a great state of like a stress maintenance in your life is so important.

And take it from me, you, you juggle all these things, whether you run businesses or not. We have to make sure that the way that we are understanding ourselves in each new season, stress management needs to be in there because if not, it's going to continue to make us sick because it does. We have constant things that are distracting us.

We have tech, we have the air quality going to crap every day. We have food working against us. We have family stress, emotional distress, COVID stress, all these things. And if there's nowhere to put it. There's no outlet. Yes, working out is a good stress reliever, but I'm talking about what works for you.

Is it writing it? Is it talking about it? Is it breathing techniques? Is it yoga? Is it music? Music is a great healing process or maintenance thing for me. There's, there's certain frequencies to music that help heal the body naturally. So there's so many different things that we need to find in that formula.

But for me, having a state of gratitude, making sure that each season, whatever I choose to be my stress maintenance, that I'm attaching it to my every single day. And then making sure that I'm staying around great people in this season of my life. I'm just not willing to put up with the things that are toxicities.

I'm just not willing to put up with the people and things that could try to intentionally or subconsciously pull me down. I don't have the capacity for it. And if anything, it makes me sick. So I've removed a lot of things that it's probably taken a decade for me to really get to this point where there's no people pleasing.

Elva says no more. Elva preserves her energy more. She makes sure she gets her rest more. She's not going to take any invitation to a social, because guess what? Her body and her mind need rest. And if we don't do those things, all of it will catch up to you. I promise.  What is it that, that you wish someone who's listening to this, who is completely healthy,  completely healthy, completely resourced, they have a dream in their heart, and they're just Scared as hell to jump and take a leap.

What do you want them to hear?  Right now, and I just got chills as I heard you say that,  you know, there are so many things that you can look up on Google to see what Elva's involved in, and there's a reason for that.  A lot of the mentors that I follow, um, they're in stages of duplication. And to me, true success isn't just about hitting a mark financially or career wise or with family. 

I can always tell someone who's successful because they, they, they know it's their responsibility at a certain point to pass that knowledge and wisdom down, to duplicate that into others and to, to keep that success rolling.  There are some people who are not. as open and selfless to helping their community up.

That's okay. Be who you want to be and do what you want to do. But for those who feel like fortunate and that they've got some of those things together and they're, they're trying to make a leap into something unknown.  We don't have the luxury right now in our society for everyone to not step up to their full potential and to be in their A game. 

And when you're in an a game, it doesn't mean rigidly working your days and hours in the calendar like you're maximizing what you could be doing in those hours  that requires taking a step back and really looking at how am I serving my. community, and how am I leaving an imprint in our society?

Accumulatively,  because to be honest, at 38 years old, some of the things that I've done, yeah, they've been pretty cool. They, yeah, they've gotten some attention. Okay, great. The top 100 visionary in healthcare globally. Cool. Okay, great. The mayor's Hispanic Heritage Awards for community activism. Great.

Honestly, I feel bad that there's a lot of room at the quote unquote top that people feel this inspiration towards some of the things I've done because in my head I'm just over here waving my hand saying, Hey guys, you see me over here? I really need some help because you have the knowledge of this and you have the wisdom of this.

And we are leaving behind a tainted future for our children. We are in this, I'm in this generation where it's parents, health and getting older and children and looking at what we're leaving behind for them. Um, if you care about what's been given to you, whether it was in a great way or in you did it in spite of what wasn't given to you,  we have to keep coming together to pour in and to lift up our communities.

We have to, there is no,  any person can sleep. We can't afford that right now. And I just really want to inspire you that whatever is on the other side of that fear, once you take a step into courage and you commit yourself to always having courage to pursue those things that are whispering at you every single day.

Whatever is on the other side of that there is something that you have been Limiting your potential with because you just won't answer that call.  So answer that call and take a step of courage because everything else you'll eventually figure out what to do with and how to do it.  Thank you, Elva. So Elva, where can people continue to follow your journey and, and help you out?

How can they reach out to you? Well, for one, stay tuned on to this podcast because we know that she's going to continue to bring great people on trailblazers and people all over the world. As far as communication in this season, there's so many things that we are driving very, very strongly in our community.

So I've been warning everybody that the best form of communication is just my email. If you have a testimony or some, some sort of organization or anything that we can walk arms with, whether it be in Houston or some of the outside communities we're working with, We have our hearts set on some really big activism coming up this year in DC.

We've got a lot of things happening down here in Texas, which is the eighth largest economy in the world right now. There are so many displaced leaders, quiet, silent warriors who are looking for communities and people who can just understand them to lock arms with. Just email me info at championsclub.

global. I love connecting with pioneers. I mean, we're living in a history book every single day right now. So if it's not a connection to something, it could just be a, Hey girl, I see you across the country keep going. And if everyone tells you, you can't. Text me in a month and I'm going to tell you the same.

Keep going. Besides that, my Instagram and LinkedIn, Elva Trevino, Elva underscore Elva. I've been a little less quiet there the last 90 days or so, but it's because we're working really hard behind the scenes on some big things. So that's, that's pretty, the easiest way to get ahold of me and for. Most of the things that we've done, you can Google and kind of research some of the work that we've done, but we're just getting started.

And let me tell you, mistakes and making mistakes is a lot of a large part of that process. So if you're in a season that you're still trying to get some clarity, it's okay. I've been there too. And I promise you, I've gone through more challenges than most of you guys had. So if I can do this, so can you.

Thank you, Elva.  No problem.  You could feel Elva's. Enormous sense of urgency. And I want to really express these three thoughts to you. And I would encourage you to immediately think about them for yourself. The first one is who's relying on your efforts. Really have that person in mind. Every single time you feel like quitting.

The second is about community. Elva doesn't have to be thinking about other people. As a single parent, she has enough to think about for her daughter and of her business. But she wants to leave the world better off than she found it. And she's finding it within her to also want to impact the Latino community.

What about you? Might you want to impact your own community? Third one, what dream are you deferring? And why do you assume that you're going to be around forever in order to see it through its fullest execution? What dream are you deferring? This one hits home because Elva is facing death every single day and so are we.

Except we might not physically feel it. We might not be going to hospitals every single day. We might not be in physical pain every single day. But at the same time, life is risky too. And so with that I really hope that you feel inspired to do something, even a little thing for yourself today or your community or your loved ones, and really just take to heart the fact that even if you have a chronic illness, even if you feel, feel ill, there's a value to your story.

There really is. And that might be enough. So I hope you enjoyed this conversation. And I urge you share this with someone who's a working mom. With her own business, her own vision, who is experiencing a chronic illness today. Elva has the potential to really turn her life around.