I have had the privilege to present The Business of Me many times. The women who have participated in the program are courageous and resilient. There was one young woman who participated in the program who is a testament to that courage and resilience. I will call her Kelly and here is her story.

To say Kelly is beautiful is an understatement.  Kelly is “movie star” beautiful; in fact she looks like Nicole Kidman.  Yet Kelly did not feel beautiful outside or inside, she was at 33 a domestic violence survivor and a breast cancer survivor.  Yes I said breast cancer survivor who at age 33 had a full mastectomy.

Kelly told me she was a breast cancer survivor as during my introduction I informed the group that I was both a domestic violence and breast cancer survivor.  During the break she made a bee line to talk to me to tell me she was just like me.  Kelly sounded so relieved that she met another person who had the same experiences she had.

There was a wonderful moment with Kelly when we were doing the Values exercise.  The Values exercise requests that the participants write the names of people they admire and the traits they admire in those people.  During the sharing part of the exercise Kelly told the group she admired her aunt since her aunt had 2 traits she greatly admired.  One trait was courage and the other was her resilience.  I pointed out to Kelly that she also had those traits and she looked astonished.  I softly said “Kelly you have left a domestic violence relationship and survived breast cancer - of course you are not only courageous but also resilient.”  Kelly started to cry and said it had never occurred to her that she had those traits.  Later during the break Kelly said she was now ready to do the work she needed to get her financial life in order because if she survived both domestic violence and breast cancer she would be able to do that too. 

Hooray for Kelly!