Savor the Success - Business Network for women entrepreneurs

I apologize in advance for the length of this post. I hope you will humor me this once and read through it.

I am an extremely private person. I agonized about the fact that I would be the face of WELLalarm prior to starting the company - and specifically, that I would need to discuss my illness as it inspired me to start the company.

However, I have repeatedly shied away from discussing any details about how my illness continues to influence my life. I have many times downplayed the challenges I face. After much thought and consternation, I have decided it is important for me to venture FAR out of my comfort zone - about as far as i can go - and through a series of video blog posts go right to the heart of what it is really like to be in your early 30's, be a female entrepreneur, and to be one of the third of Americans today living with a chronic illness.

Why My Change in Attitude?Why Venture Out of my Comfort Zone?

My reasons are three-fold:
•    I hope to inspire those who are just being diagnosed or who live in fear of people finding out about their illness – and help them reach out, be open, and fulfill all of their dreams and potential
•    I hope to educate everyone (with and without a chronic illness) about what it really means to live with chronic illness and accurately portray the new face on chronic illness today
•    I hope this will serve as catalyst for other people who would benefit from our products and service to learn about WELLalarm,  why I founded it to protect my life, and how it can protect your life.

Clearly People Do NOT Understand What It Means To Live With A Chronic Illness          

The more I publicize WELLalarm the more I realize how many misconceptions there are about the nature of chronic illness today.  Perhaps for obvious reasons, more and more people with chronic illnesses approach me with their stories and fears. In increasing numbers people without chronic illnesses ask me questions, often in hushed tons, or only after I put them at ease about how my life is different than before I became ill. Often I am also compelled to confront people’s misconceptions and prejudices. People have no idea how many people around them have a chronic illness or of what that means. Of how much those people can and DO accomplish. There should be no shame in it, but there is.

Chronic Illness Today - America's Dirty Little Secret.                                                                        

It really shocks me but the reality is that chronic illness has really become one of those dirty little secrets we are afraid to really discuss. A new don’t ask. Don’t tell.  And when we do discuss it, it is almost always in the negative or with the focus being on the short-term acute conditions. I am not even going to discuss the amazing dearth of resources to support and enable people living with chronic illnesses to become or remain active functional members of society.

There are a plethora of examples out there, but here is a high profile one: Steve jobs decision to not discuss his health at different points with his employees, investors, etc and the uproar around his decision. I saw many articles on the ethics of this decision. However, there has been little to no discussion of how much he has accomplished for Apple while battling a chronic illness. Fear and lack of understanding about the nature of chronic illness today cause too many people to be denied the support infrastructure we all need to prosper and persevere in the tough times.

Clearly, we need to educate people. We have to be open and honest about the good, the great, the bad and the ugly of what it means to be part of one third to one half of our population LIVING with a chronic illness because as far as I can surmise it is the only way we will all live up to our potential as a society – even if somewhere along the way a third of us develop a chronic illness.

Aren’t people doing that you ask?

Yes, there are some blogs about this, online social networks for people with a chronic illness, books written, support groups. However, they are generally centered inward. Meaning, they primarily discuss living with a chronic illness to people who are living with chronic illness.

My Video Posts  

Just to be clear, I will be extemporaneously discussing life as thirty-something female entrepreneur in NYC who happens to have a chronic illness. I will NOT just discuss my illness – because I am not defined by illness – not by a long shot.

That said, I will be very open and honest about some super tough topics including the frustration of feeling like crap sometimes, of living in pain, the experience of having infusions every 2 weeks (not to mention the time drain and inconvenience), the choices I am forced to make as I not only balance work and life – but also my health, my experiences in starting WELLalarm, how my health sometimes impacts my plans, my friends, and my family. I will start posting later today most likely and will make a concerted effort to post at least 2 per week. I will post a portion of the first post here and some post that directly relate to our PR effort on this blog - but the majority of these video posts will be on the wellalarm blog and youtube.

I will ofcourse continue to blog here on Savor the Success as well about our ongoing efforts to meet our PR goal! As these videos do in many ways tie into our PR effort and strategy I felt I should share this idea with you here first - even before I post the first video or discuss it on our blog.

I hope that you will take the time to help me by sharing my posts with your friends, colleagues and families - and spread the word to your social networks and by providing feedback and asking questions when appropriate.  (Id love to hear your thoughts on the idea, good or bad. I would also love to hear if there are specific things you would like to see me discuss.)

Please remember this series is to help enlighten everyone – not just people with chronic illnesses while putting a new face on chronic illness.