Starting Over

There was a time when everything felt like it was finally coming together. I had a thriving business split between New York and Los Angeles. Clients were loyal, press was coming in, and I had started developing my own skincare line. My serum and fragrance were already launched, and the cleanser was almost ready. It was years of work that finally felt like it had direction.

Then COVID happened. Everything paused. And what I thought would be a few weeks turned into something that unraveled my entire business. The momentum I had worked so hard for started slipping away. I tried to hold onto it, to stay visible, to push through it like everyone was saying we should. But things just kept falling apart.

Not long after, my dad was diagnosed with ALS. That changed everything in a way I wasn’t ready for. ALS doesn’t just affect the person who has it. It drags the entire family through something that feels both slow and violent. You watch someone you love lose pieces of themselves every day. Movement, speech, eating, eventually breathing. They’re still fully aware, and you’re helpless. It is a kind of trauma that gets in your body. It changes how you move through the world. He passed within a year, and I still don’t think I’ve truly processed what that year did to me. I tried to keep working during it. Tried to stay present. But I was falling apart and too afraid to admit it.

On top of that, I was also using my voice in ways that felt necessary. Speaking up about injustice, calling out things that didn’t sit right, sharing things that mattered deeply to me. That honesty cost me. I lost clients. I lost partnerships. People pulled away. Some politely, some not. And while I stand by every word I said, it made the isolation even harder to carry.

Eventually I burned out. Completely. I had nothing left to push with. I didn’t know who I was without my business. I didn’t know what came next. For a while, I didn’t want to know.

Moving back to New Jersey wasn’t the original plan. It wasn’t part of the vision I had when I started out. But it’s given me the space I didn’t know I needed. A full reset. For my life, my mind, my work. I’m still adjusting. There are days where everything feels foreign, where I wonder what would have happened if none of it fell apart. But I’m also starting to feel more grounded. Clearer. Like I can build something new without needing to prove anything.

The world is heavy right now. Every day brings something that makes it hard to feel hopeful. I don’t pretend otherwise. But what keeps me going is knowing I’m not the only one who has had to start over. I’m not the only one who’s lost something important and had to figure out how to keep going anyway. If you’ve felt that too, this space is for you. You’re not alone. And neither am I.