March 27, 2025 • 58 mins
When Shay Moraga found a lump in her breast at 38, doctors dismissed her concerns: "You're too young for breast cancer." That dismissal led to a delayed diagnosis of aggressive stage three cancer and a grueling treatment journey. But the real challenge came after she was declared cancer-free.
"Everyone celebrates and helps you through treatment," Shay explains. "Then you say 'I'm cancer-free,' and it's like a stop sign—a dead stop." She found herself alone with third-degree burns, physical changes, and the constant fear of recurrence, discovering a critical gap in cancer care: robust support exists during treatment, but little is available for survivors navigating life afterward.
Drawing from her entrepreneurial background (she owned her first home at 23 and built a successful property management business spanning Minnesota and California), Shay partnered with fellow survivor Eileen Alvarez to create Shay's Warriors. Their nonprofit offers fully-funded retreats where cancer survivors find understanding, healing, and community among peers who truly comprehend the psychological aftermath of cancer.
What began as a women's breast cancer retreat has expanded to include programs for male survivors ("Yo Bro, I'm Brave Too"), recognizing that men face unique challenges expressing vulnerability after cancer. Now partnering with the Ritz-Carlton for their signature four-day retreats, Shay's Warriors provides a transformative space where survivors can process their experiences and rediscover themselves.
Shay's story reminds us that sometimes our greatest challenges become our most meaningful contributions. By creating connection for those experiencing the isolation of cancer survivorship, she's turning her personal trauma into healing for countless others. As she puts it, "If I was paid to do this, I would be paid to do this because it's amazing to get somebody's testimonial back and say, 'literally you saved my life.'"
Ready to support this vital work or know someone who could benefit? Visit ShaysWarriors.org to learn about upcoming events or nominate a cancer survivor for their retreat program.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What is going on?
Everyone, I'm Robert Mraz.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
And I'm Fina Mraz.
And this is.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
CV Hustle, the podcast dedicated to supporting
entrepreneurship here in theCoachella Valley, and today
we've got a special guest.
We're going to kind of take aU-turn and talk a little bit
today about nonprofits.
Now you may say, well,nonprofits is not a business.
But actually, if you thinkabout it, nonprofits fill gaps
where businesses and governmentcan't really feed the need of
(00:25):
the people.
That's where the nonprofitsstep in.
So today we have a real specialguest.
She not only runs a nonprofitShays Warriors but she also runs
her own business as well HOAToolkit.
And that guest today is ShayMarenka.
Thank you for coming in, thankyou for having me Good to see
you.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
I'm so happy that you came and are going to hang out
with us, because I feel likeyou've got a lot to teach me
right?
Well, I hope so.
No, I'm just kidding, no youwill.
You will.
So I want to know because Shayand I met.
I don't know if you rememberthis, but Shay and I met through
a mutual client that I have,and one day she walked into my
(01:04):
showroom and we just hit it offRight, and we just sat there and
like, talked and talked andtalked and I'm like, oh shit, I
got to go back to work.
But it was just sister love fromthe beginning.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
It was like this energy that just kind of blew up
.
I'm like, oh my gosh, this isdefinitely my sister from
another mister and she's aScorpio too, literally a day
apart A day apart that explainsit 18.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah, exactly.
But so when I met you, I knowyou were, you know you had been
the owner of Shays Warriorsright, or the founder for a long
time.
But I want to delve into.
Well, let's take it back alittle bit, not too far back,
but you grew up where, wherewere you born and how did you
(01:51):
get into the business part?
Let's talk about that first,because I think that's what came
first.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
I think that's one thing that most people don't
know about me, or they assume,is that I grew up in the Midwest
, which I did partly.
But if we take it back to whereI was born, I was born in
Ventura, california, so not toofar up the coast.
We lived in that area until Iwas about 10 years old and then
my mom and dad decided to up uskids and move to a small farm
(02:23):
town in central Wisconsin.
The thing is is about thevalley.
I've been in the valley since Iwas under a year old.
My grandparents came down herein the early 70s.
They built their homes for mygreat grandmothers and us, and I
spent almost every summer andevery holiday of my life out
here with my family.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Well, I mean, Palm Springs has the perfect pools
during summertime, right it?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
does, or Palm Desert, yeah so, and went to church in
Indio like forever and I mean Iremember actually Fred Waring,
where my family's homes were.
Literally it was a dirt roadwhen I was a kid.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Oh my gosh, yeah, that's how far it went, I love
it.
I remember La Quinta, when youknow I grew up Jehovah's
Witnesses Right, we had to goknock on doors, or my parents,
my mom did and we had to drivefrom one house to the next
because there was just dirt.
So that you know it's kind offunny.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
I know it's weird, because, like I remember being
the kid and in my grandparents'pool in the backyard, 7, 7.30 at
night, I'd be laying there intheir lounge chair or whatever
and there would be two planesthat always went to the airport
and that is consistent from whenI was a kid, even to today,
like it must have been, like Ithink it was like American
(03:37):
Airlines or something.
I looked it up one day because Iremember being that kid and
being like someday I'm going tolive here, someday I'm going to
raise my family here, like thewhole nine yards and of course,
here we are.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
So you went over back east when you were small and is
it because your parents had ajob?
So you grew up there, you wentto high school there and then
what happened?
Speaker 3 (03:57):
I guess.
Yeah, my dad's family owned alarge heating and air
conditioning company in Chicagoand we were in Chicago for like
a split second.
But he didn't want us kidsgrowing up in Chicago.
It was pretty rough in the areaand just the traffic and
everything.
Chicago's a great town, don'tget me wrong.
(04:17):
Oh, believe me, but my dad hadseven brothers and two sisters,
so it was a whole familybusiness and, again,
entrepreneurs, right.
And he just said you know, Iwant my kids to grow up on a
farm, where I did.
And they grew up on this farmbecause when they were small a
lot of the brothers would getinto brawls and everything in
(04:38):
the early 40s and 50s.
And so my grandfather, like,sent them up to the farm and
they worked, and so mygrandfather, like, sent them up
to the farm and they worked youknow, and did all that I did not
work a farm.
Luckily, we were in the minicity.
Riding a tractor is pretty cool, but my love for real estate
and homes and everything camefrom my dad, because my brother
(05:01):
was.
My brother is 11 years youngerthan I am, so I was the eldest.
I had a hammer and tools for aslong as I can remember and a
dirt bike.
I was very much a tomboy and mydad would take me around and he
would show me how to fix thingseverything from tiling to
flooring to showers, plumbingand heating and air conditioning
(05:24):
.
He literally showed me that,from the time that you know, I
was seven years old talking howto cook Like I owe everything to
my dad and I grew up in an old,1800th, old Victorian home.
So I was like the kid that wasin the round room with the
little you know, I felt likeCinderella in there and it was
(05:44):
great.
Like the kid that was in theround room with the little you
know, I felt like Cinderella inthere and it was great.
Yeah, it was just again.
It was in this very old,historic town of about 630
people.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
So everybody, knew everybody.
You could have started a handywoman business.
I could have.
I would have been way ahead ofmy time back then.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Yeah, right, so that's.
But yeah, I went to high schoolthere.
It was great.
I hated the town while I wasthere because, again, when
you're talking about 600 people,it was very small.
Everybody was up in yourbusiness.
And the other thing is, I wasthis kid from California.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So You're kind of always an outsider.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
I was always the outsider, and we're talking
generations on, generations offarmers and farmers' kids that
wanted to be there.
So I always felt a little outof place because during the time
where they're getting togetherwith their families, we're
flying out here to be with mymom's side of the family and
everything, and you know we'regoing to Chicago to be with my
dad's side of the family.
(06:40):
So it was a little hard growingup but again I was a tomboy.
So you know like I literallyhad some five of my best friends
still to this day from highschool are all guys and we've
been in each other's weddingsand saw each other's.
You know children grow up andit's, you know, it's been great.
And now I appreciate it when Igo back there because it's very
(07:03):
serene and the farm country it'slike different than a city.
But I'm definitely a city girlbecause then, when I graduated
high school, I moved toMinneapolis-St Paul.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
I still haven't gone there.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I heard it's like freaking awesome.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
You know what she should go in the winter?
Because then you can go to Mallof America, because everything
is there and there's no salestax on clothes or shoes, by the
way.
Oh, we should go.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Well, I have a lot of clients that are from there.
Yeah, yeah.
So you know who's from there,good old Wicca.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Right Minnesota, love right there.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Yeah, so yeah, minnesota is great and it's an
awesome city.
I always call it one of themost perfect cities in the
United States because it's nottoo big, not too small.
It has all of these, like youknow, sub-cities that are all
around the larger cities, andit's very similar to the
Coachella Valley because, as weknow, in the Coachella Valley,
like if you live on the Indio orPalm Desert side, you don't go
(08:02):
to Palm Springs and vice versa.
Well, minneapolis-st Paul issimilar to that.
If you live on Minneapolis side, you rarely go to St Paul, and
vice versa, but the old moneyand the old homes, historic
homes, are really in St Paul,and then the newer money and the
newer homes and track homes andall of that is in Minneapolis.
So it's really it's very, verysimilar to being here in the
(08:27):
Valley.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Do they have the mountains?
No, and what about traffic?
See, that's why I like, I don'tknow that I could ever move to
a big place, right?
Speaker 1 (08:36):
Yeah, you don't do well with traffic.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
No, because I'm such a psycho Like, let's go.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
I would say that personally, because I drive all
the time and I did while I wasthere as well.
Traffic is worse here than itis in the cities and because you
get to know when the rush hoursare Sure and there are so many
more side roads that you can godown to get to home, versus just
(09:03):
the freeways or anything likethat.
So, yeah, traffic's not bad,but it's bad if you are during
those times and of course theyhave, like you know, they have
the whiz through the little.
You know what are they called?
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Express lanes, express lanes and everything.
Yeah, got to have the expresslanes.
So what did you?
Go to school?
Speaker 3 (09:29):
So what school did you go to and did you study to
be like I want to open my ownbusiness?
How did that?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
kind of yeah, how what?
Speaker 3 (09:31):
was the evolution on the evolution of me wanting to
have my own business actuallygoes way back to third grade.
Oh, wow, yeah.
So, and it actually was at myhigh school graduation that my
third grade teacher pulled thispiece of paper out that said,
like do you realize that that'sall you wanted to do?
And it was.
I used to make these littlemagnets for you know like you
pop them in your oven and youmake them for your family, and
so I would sell them three for abuck or whatever, because I
(09:55):
wanted to earn money to pay forthe Christmas gifts for my
little brother and my parents.
So I put all of these postersup around the school and I was
like three for a dollar or, youknow, five for five bucks oh my
God, I love that.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
You know, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
It's crazy, right.
And basically like I got caughtby the school, like my
teacher's like what are youdoing?
You can't do this, you can't belike hustling kids at school.
And I was like, yeah, but it'sfor the fair.
And they're like, well, no, youoptimize on the fair itself.
And I was like, well, so that'swhere I came.
(10:31):
I was a junior in college andmy friend at the time.
We decided that we did not wantto live in a dormitory, so we
invested in a condo and in thatcondo, decided to fix it up and
once we were done with school,we went to the next condo.
He actually moved out and movedinto another condo in the same
(10:54):
building.
We invested in that and wedecided to rent the condo that I
was living in.
Yeah and go from there, andthat's kind of how it started.
Then people started asking usto rent their properties and to
manage the HOAs, and this allcame before 2008.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
And to get to your question, because I realize I
skipped over that.
So I went to the University ofMinnesota Twin Cities.
I am a proud Golden Gopher.
Thank you, I was a theatercommunications major, so with a
background of also a minor inart, pr, marketing
communications, but I worked inthe theater department building
(11:31):
set designs.
I originally thought that I wasgoing to go on Broadway and
build and paint sets, but thatdidn't happen.
I mean it did for like threemonths when I was in Hollywood,
and then I was like, yeah, thisisn't for me, and so it fell
back onto that managementProperty management.
Yeah, Because my dad alwaystold me save your money for a
(11:51):
rainy day and the best way toinvest is always through real
estate.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
That's true, that's our family motto too right.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Do you have your real estate license?
No, I just got mine last year,and it's, I mean, I'm like we're
going to be buying and sellingreal estate till we die, yeah,
right so, and it's, and we, Imean we're also trying to, like
you know, have our kids notsaying like we're trying to set
them up for them, you know,forever, but they'll learn from
us, right so?
Speaker 1 (12:20):
That's the hope.
At least, that's the hope.
So you're what at this point?
When you started the business,how old were you?
Speaker 3 (12:27):
23.
23.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
So you're already in the real estate game, fixing up
houses.
At 23 years old, I mean that'spretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
It was before all those shows came out on TV, it
made it look like yeah, it wasjust this.
Everything just happened thisquick.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It really came naturally to me.
This and everything justhappened this quick.
It really came naturally to meand you know, when I was doing
the theater tech design and allof that and the set stuff, it
really kind of was some of thesame things, because you think
about, if you're doing aShakespeare set, right, you're
finding furniture, you'rebuilding something, a set, that
is to that era, and the nichethat we had in St Paul is the
(13:07):
old Victorian homes, hence,which I grew up in and my dad
taught me how to kind ofre-varnish different things and
strip things and bring it backto life.
And in the theater department wealways had this motto that you
know bring something back tolife to make it beautiful again
or leave it better than what itcame with.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
So yeah, okay, so we are familiar with HOAs, yep, and
do you have any advice?
Let me no.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
There is no advice, I'm just saying out of that All
right.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
You know what Some are better than others.
There is no advice, I'm justsaying out of that.
All right, you know what Someare better than others and you
want to know.
What's so funny is I just gotsworn in as president to our HOA
.
Oh Lord, I'm like wait a minute.
How did that just happen?
And I was like okay, as apresident, I expect the vice
president to take all my work up.
There you go.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
It's easy.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
It is a thankless job .
It is a thankless job, I know.
I mean, we have like, where welive there's an HOA and I just
feel so bad.
The homeowners yes, rightly so.
There's certain things that youknow that you can gripe about,
but, gosh, some of these peopleget really mean.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I'm like there's two things that I've learned over
life that you don't mess withright Three things actually
Family, money and their homes,because it's all very, very
personal to me Sure that's true,absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
So we're in Minnesota still.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
And we're still building the business.
How did you so?
Did you come to California?
I mean, how did you get back?
Because we know you from Shea,coming from the Coachella Valley
, you know Coachella Valleysuperstar that runs all these
nonprofits.
How did that?
How did you go from Minnesotato kind of transferring your
life out here?
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Yeah, so, like I said , I mean I've been kind of back
and forth from the CoachellaValley ever since I was
literally eight months old, kindof back and forth from the
Coachella Valley ever since Iwas literally eight months old,
so it really was a naturalprogression.
After I was done with college Imoved right here to the valley.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Really.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Wouldn't you get sick of the snow?
Or did you love it?
I?
Speaker 3 (15:19):
don't know.
I don't like the ice, I likethe snow, and besides, you can
layer, you can look cute, youcan have a boot Cute little.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, rock that baby.
Come on now.
Come on, we need to go, we needto go.
Okay, let's go, I don't know,but you have to go to the
bathroom.
Oh my God, bobby hates the snow, yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
I'm a California kid.
No thanks, no thanks.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
I mean, right after college, I called my
grandparents and I said, hey, Iwant to move there.
I have, like you know, probably$300 to my name.
I'm going to pack up my Saturn,I'm going to have everything
with me, and can I just, can youguys help me out for a few
months?
And my grandparents were very,very strict, very strict.
They said three months, you canlive with us rent-free for
three months.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
And after that and then get it together, girl
You're out.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
So you have to find a job.
So I came to the CoachellaValley.
I literally startedinterviewing right away for jobs
and I started with a fitnesscompany.
Really, yeah.
It was a fitness, it was asales, like you know, selling
memberships.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Oh, you were in sales , back in sales With that
beautiful smile.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
It was like do you remember Hoots, hoots, palm
Desert?
It used to be Palm DesertAthletic Club.
I think that I remember and allof that Also, alessandro, and
it was.
So it wasn't very far away frommy grandparents' house so I
could literally walk if I neededto or anything, and I would see
people coming in and out allthe time there was.
You know what are the?
(16:51):
I don't even know what it'scalled.
It's not pickleball, but what'sthe other ones?
Or?
Speaker 2 (16:54):
tennis Inside a room Ping pong Ping pong.
It's like faster the tinylittle ball, racquetball,
racquetball.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
So they had racquetball carts, they had a
gym, they had I think they had aswimming pool in the back even.
But it was crazy and it wasthis traveling company that went
around selling as manymemberships as you can and very
easy for me to do.
(17:25):
I mean, I was like just whippingthrough memberships and then I
would catch people and I'd belike, oh, these people are
sneaking in every night.
They definitely don't have agym membership.
So I went up to two of the guysand I said, hey, how's it going
?
And I'm like I don't think youchecked in at the front desk and
I wasn't even a front deskperson.
I remember I was just there tosell memberships.
And they're like, oh, I musthave forgot my pass or whatever.
(17:45):
I'm like, oh, can I get yourdriver's license?
And they're like okay, youbusted us.
We don't have one.
We've been doing this for liketwo years.
I was like, oh, okay, well, ifyou don't want me to tell, then
you're going to sign up, and allyour friends are going to sign
up tonight.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
And so that's what happened, and of course, I sold
them.
The largest package there wasbecause I was stupid.
We've got to make up.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
We've got to make up for that time.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And the guy was like so fun.
It was like, hey, you're kindof like sassy, so you should
come work with us, we're working.
And I was like, oh, what isthat?
And and they're like, oh, theyellow pages.
And.
I was like really, what is thisall about?
And I think he had like a checkin his wallet or something.
He showed me a check at thattime for $23,000.
(18:32):
And it was for two weeks Shutup.
No, and I was like blown away.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Let's bring it back Really.
This is pre-Google, obviously.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Way pre-Google.
It was like pre-interneteverything right and I'm like,
oh my God, I'm like you reallymade that much money in two
weeks.
It's like, oh yeah, newbusiness, blah, blah, blah, blah
.
And I was like, well, how doesthe yellow pages make money?
Like I had no idea, it was theads that were in there, sure,
sure, right.
And then I was like, oh my God,so I think I had it this time.
(19:03):
I mean again, poor collegestudent living with your
grandparents trying to make aliving, right.
And of course, I was still likehanging out at night with
friends that I met in the valleyright away and I think I had
like 200 bucks left to my nameor maybe 150.
Oh my gosh.
And I went and I got a suit andhad an interview with this
(19:25):
place that they had worked for,which at that time was called
the Desert Pages.
I don't know if you guysremember that.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
I think I remember that.
I think I do remember that itwas in a white book with the
mountains in the back orsomething.
Yeah, it was like mountains.
There was a mountain on.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
There was a flower on it at one time.
There was a golf course guyVerizon at the time you know,
and I walked in and I waswaiting for that interview and
of course they were like oh,we're sorry, we're not going to
(19:56):
be able to see you or anything.
So I had to go buy a new suit,of course with like two bucks to
my name.
Came back like a week later,they interviewed me and they
hired me on the spot.
But it was telephone sales.
I hated telephone sales.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Oh, that's the worst.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
So I figured out every single way to get on the
phone, figure out how to getpeople to like me within
literally less than a minute,yeah, and then get them to
invite me to their business, andonce I got in front of them, it
was a done deal.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
It was a done deal.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
And I sold 21 new sales a day.
Oh, my God, and that's how Iearned a ton of money to stick
back into my real estate companyto continue to invest and buy
properties.
Oh my God, while everyone elsewas partying, I was just like
investing at that time in stockmarkets and all of that and the
rest is kind of history.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Let me tell you a fun fact, I owned my first home at
23.
Love it.
Of course you did, and so didyou, scorpio, I know, I know
Can't help it.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
That's Scorpio power right here.
I didn't own anything at 23.
I didn't even own the shirt onmy back at 23 probably.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
But at 24, you owned my heart.
Oh, that's right.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Then my life changed for the better.
Here I go Well.
Valentine's Day is coming up,that's true, there you go, there
you go.
But enough about us.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I love that.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
So 23, you're back in the real estate game.
Selling, selling.
What are you selling?
Ads, or are you selling?
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yeah, I'm selling advertising and doing
advertising and marketinghelping people grow their
businesses, Because at that timeand this being an area where it
was a highly used tool to helpbusinesses, people, you know,
people come from all over theworld here and they're so
transient, you know, the onlything they had was really the
yellow pages to look up plumbersto look up attorneys and
(21:46):
everybody's A+, yeah, a+,everything's A A.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
A, a, and that was a good marketing strategy.
If you're broke, just name yourbusiness with an A and it'll be
at the top of the pages.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Did you ever deal with the lady or the person or
company that was selling ads ontables?
No, no, okay, that was a wholeracket.
I know at some point yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
Okay, whatever.
I don't know who that is, Idon't either.
Okay.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So, okay, let's jump into some stuff here.
Okay, Is that how you met yourhusband?
How did you meet your husband?
Like because how did you guys?
Speaker 3 (22:19):
meet.
We met back in Minnesota.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Oh, okay, okay.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Oh, so he's a transplant too, you brought him
out here, Okay okay, I see howyou were doing I follow you,
there you go.
So how did you get the realestate thing going again?
So you said you startedinvesting.
Were you buying properties atthat point?
Speaker 3 (22:38):
Yeah, buying properties, renting those
properties out, propertiesrenting those properties out.
And then we were being startedto ask at that time can you rent
out other people's propertiesas well?
Speaker 1 (22:51):
So you're doing the same thing you were doing in
Minnesota.
Basically right, you alreadyhad the blueprint.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Yep, I already had the blueprint and everything
here, so you have propertieshere.
I did.
Yeah, I only have one propertynow here, but at the time we had
three properties here.
Got it.
It's just the biggest thing.
If anyone has ever done rentalshere in California.
The laws are so different.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
They're so for the tenant right, Aren't they?
For the tenant?
Speaker 1 (23:18):
I plead the fifth, on that we don't want to make it a
political show.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
They're so challenging and Minnesota is
really challenging too but sinceI had the bulk of my business
there, I kept investing in thatarea Absolutely so smart.
It really is.
It's another.
Just like the Coachella Valley,it's a golden nugget of the
world because there are so manyFortune 500 companies there and
everything like that?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
What the hell you need to take me there.
We need to go.
Yes, okay, open a store outthere.
Oh shit, seattle.
Everybody tells me to go out toSeattle.
I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
It rains too much.
It rains too much in Seattle.
You'd be depressed, I would be.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, maybe I'd bring the sunshine Right.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
So we're entrepreneurs now, how long till
you kind of quit your job anddo that full time Was?
Speaker 3 (24:09):
there like a reflection point where you're
like I'm going to do this bymyself.
I was at the top of my game inadvertising, sales and marketing
and in 2000, right around 2007or 2000, you know the markets
were starting to change right.
Remember when that bubble hitthe first time?
Remember when that bubble hitthe first time, but I was really
in 2007,.
I was already selling as muchas I could because I knew I was
(24:30):
going to quit in 2008 when thatbubble was going to burst, did
you?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
kind of see that coming.
Yeah, I guess I'm a trendreader.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
I don't know, like you know, I just I have hunches
right and I'm not trained inanything.
I just really instinctivelyhave this hunch that things are
going to happen Intuition baby.
And the intuition was that ifeveryone lost their homes, sadly
because those mortgages burst,they were going to need a home
because we're talking, manyfamilies and all of that and I
(25:00):
was going to rent them a homebecause we're talking, many
families and all of that, and Iwas going to rent them a home.
And that's exactly what endedup happening.
And then our business just kindof took off and I put
everything online before thewhole COVID thing happened, and
so everything was able so that Icould come back and forth from
the Coachella Valley, because Iwas already living in the
(25:21):
Coachella Valley in 2008,.
Right, you know, I was livinghere.
So it was great.
I mean, right after college Imoved out here, so I would go
back and forth from Minnesota,back and forth from Minnesota
check on the properties youstill do and I still do.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
I was like you still do, okay, take me on one of
those times, okay, but well then, there came a big turning point
, right?
Yes, 2016,.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
You know, life was going great and grand and
everything was fine.
And then, all of a sudden, Ifound a lump in my right breast
and didn't think anything of it.
I had just had a physical frommy you know doctor and when I
called to ask them, like, hey, Ithink I found a lump and
they're like oh, don't worryabout it, you're fine, you're
too young for breast cancer.
(26:12):
How old were you?
38.
Oh wow, I was 38 at the time.
And so I never had a mammogramor anything like that, really.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Well, yeah, because you don't get them until a
certain age, right?
Speaker 3 (26:23):
Yeah, at that time the age was 45 that you didn't
get them.
So it wasn't until just thispast year that they lowered the
age limit to age 40.
So it took me another month toget in to that doctor and she
found the lump and I had to showher that and she's like
interesting, we'll get you in,but I'm sure it's nothing, it's
(26:45):
probably just a cyst, like againshoving it off.
And I get that.
You know they don't want toworry you or anything like that,
right.
And then the first time I everhad a mammogram done, the lady
looked at me and she's like, doyou have kids?
And I was like, yeah, I have a12-year-old.
And she's like, doctor willtake good care of you.
And I knew right away.
I'm like, okay, they seesomething.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Oh my God, Because they're not supposed to say shit
, right, they're not supposed to.
Oh, I'd slap her.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Needless to say I didn't stay with those doctors,
yeah, yeah, which we won't gointo.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
You know cancer happens and then it was a year
of.
It was one of the mostaggressive cancers for women
under 40 that hit me.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
I was at stage three already, and I had yeah.
Oh my gosh, that's going to bescary, because that's like
always the first question right,like what stage are you at?
Yeah, kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
I mean it took like a month and a half to figure all
that stuff out, because you haveto do scans and biopsies and
blood work and more scans andit's a very, very, very
overwhelming process.
For anyone who's never gonethrough cancer.
It's just, you are like a deerin headlights, it's just like
overwhelming and everybody iscoming to you asking you you
have to have doctor'sappointments.
And it's scary because, ofcourse, when you know that you
have cancer have doctor'sappointments.
And it's scary because, ofcourse, when you know that you
have cancer, you don't knowwhere it's at.
(28:04):
You don't know if it's spread.
Are you gonna live, are yougonna die?
Speaker 2 (28:07):
I mean yeah, it's like a whole new world that
you're exposed to that you don'twant to be right.
It's like, oh my god, okay, didit run in your family?
Speaker 3 (28:17):
um.
Both of my aunts, on each sideof the family, had breast cancer
but, the thing about cancer is,unless you have the BRCA gene,
it's doesn't matter really.
There there's still no studiesthat it's not hereditary that
way.
Um, so, like both of my aunts,they had different types of
(28:39):
cancer than I did, so thenthere's still studies out there
on why that happens, right?
Speaker 2 (28:49):
So one of the things and I do want to hear more I'm
always preaching about 23andMe.
I swear to God I should be oneof their sponsors.
I love that thing because Imean it tells me you hate
cilantro and I hate cilantro,but it also tells me you do not
have the BRCA gene.
You are going to be, you know,likelihood to get diabetes.
Is this and like I mean it islike super detailed, so I mean
(29:13):
that might help somebody.
I don't know if I just thoughtthat could help so many people
like get on, like okay, I havethis gene.
I got to really pay attention.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
So, yeah, I mean, I think 23andMe is a good tool.
There's a lot of other tools Iget out there to to be useful,
especially if you have, you know, any type of cancer, any type
of disease within your familythat you think you don't want to
have.
But it's good to be able toknow all your cards.
(29:44):
You know what you're playingwith.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
So then they say hey, and so you're here.
And then they said okay, hey,here's kind of the plan, right,
and then that was getting chemo,and that I mean what do you do
when that happens?
Because you had a job right.
So it's like what happens tothat and you know, how do you?
How do you keep surviving ifyou know you're trying to work?
Speaker 3 (30:10):
Yeah, well, the first thing is is I had I had a Zoom
call with, like my team and itwas.
It was just like, hey, I'mgoing to take some time away
right now.
My business partner at the timetook on a lot in the majority
of my work.
I still was able to workbecause, again, I had set
everything up remotely so thatit was a lot easier for me.
(30:34):
So I still did the marketing,the advertising, the connections
a lot of the answers of theemails, the connections, a lot
of the answers of the emails.
But I could not know.
I could no longer fly back andforth for over a year because my
, my therapy or my chemotherapywas weekly.
So I would sit for anywherefrom, you know, anywhere from
(30:55):
three to five hours, and then Iwas just wiped for about three
days and obviously my daughterwas still in school.
So I was driving her to schooland picking her up and I had an
amazing community here in theValley.
My daughter went to Sacred Heartat the time, so it was like all
the mamas wrapped us up andjust helped with whatever we
(31:17):
needed.
If I couldn't go somewhere, Iwould have a friend drop her off
, pick her up.
Um, you know, she was, and shewas actively in sports and dance
and volleyball and the wholenine yards like I.
Whatever it was.
I didn't want what was going onwith me to affect her life in
any way.
I wanted to be as normal aspossible and, um, there was a
(31:37):
time where she didn't want anyof her friends to know that mom
had cancer either.
So I had a custom wig that wasmade for me so it looked just
like my own hair.
But every week for 20 weeks Idid like I said three to five
hours of chemotherapy.
It was called the Red DevilCocktail to be honest.
You know, think about that.
You have this and this is where, like the education behind the
(32:01):
words on cancer is like who theheck wants to rub a devil going
through your veins?
You know like come on, let'schange that terminology
somewhere out there.
And then, after that was done,I had surgery.
And then, after that was done,I had 38 rounds of radiation.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Wait a minute.
So the chemo didn't like killany of it, it does, but the
doctor, yeah, the chemo didn'tlike kill any of it, it does,
but the doctor Like it shrinksit.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
Yeah, the chemo is meant to like, shrink the tumor
as much as possible, and for meit did shrink it, okay.
And so I was like, yay, I'mdone.
And then the doctor said, yeah,but you need to do radiation
because of the severity of whatyou had and if your triple
negative comes back, there mightnot be a new cure, like we
(32:45):
can't do the same thing againbecause you can only have so
much of this chemo cocktail.
And I was like, oh, but I don'twant to do radiation, because
radiation was scarier to me thanthe chemo was.
I mean, I was 100% certain Iwas going to die from one or the
other.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
That's just how it was Well, yeah, I mean, that's
where your mind goes, and thenyour body's just.
You're like how much more canmy body take?
Speaker 3 (33:13):
right, exactly, exactly, and it you know, they
give you boosters at the end,and it's just at the end and
it's just, it's.
It's nasty for me, luckily, Iate a very, very clean diet.
Um, I continue to do meditation, I continue to do yoga.
Um, I continue to even jump ona spin bike every now and then.
(33:33):
Um, so for me, it was all thisjourney of really making sure
that I was trying to keep mylife as normal as possible, and
but I had to rest, because whenyou are going through something
like that and you are sleeping,your body is shut down.
The drugs and everything thatthey give you, that's working
(33:54):
over time, you know, it'sworking over time in your
kidneys, in your liver, it'sworking to get any of the cancer
cells out of your body and youdon't know where those cells are
going.
Right, I mean, it could be inyour hand, it could be in your
foot.
So the chemo cocktail they gaveme was, on purpose, very
aggressive, to kill whatever wasin my body.
(34:14):
And then the doctor said, yeah,you have to do radiation, and I
was like, but why, how long didthat last 38 rounds?
Speaker 2 (34:21):
So yeah, and I was like but why, how long did that
last 38 rounds?
Speaker 3 (34:21):
So yeah, so is it like weekly, every single day,
for?
Speaker 1 (34:25):
and it was the most annoying thing.
Speaker 3 (34:27):
It wasn't too far away from here actually, but
every single day, um, they wouldradiate through the breast and
underneath the arm in in theareas where the tumors were
found, and it was to killanything that was around where
possibly the chemo didn't get to.
Because you can have withtriple negative, they have, I
(34:48):
guess, these like cancer cellsthat will hide behind another
cell, or like a good cell.
So, yeah, wow that's hard.
Every single day.
They would zap you for 10minutes and then it was over and
it was just the most annoyingand crazy thing.
And you had to do it five daysa week.
So you got the weekend off, butby the end I had third-degree
(35:11):
burns underneath my right armand throughout my breast.
Oh my gosh, yeah, it was redderthan these tops.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yeah, your skin was like stop it.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
It was.
I had to take a break becauseit was so bad.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
So then they say come back in like what a year.
How do you?
Speaker 3 (35:33):
So, after it's all done, they do your pathology
again.
They check to see if there'sany cancer cells or anything
like that, and they give youclear margins or they don't give
you clear margins.
If you don't have clear margins, you have to have more chemo,
more radiation, to get clearmargins.
Luckily for me, I had the mostamazing surgeon and when I
walked in he was actuallylooking at my paper I'll never
(35:55):
forget.
And he had tears in his eyesand he's like kid, I have no
idea what this is, but youshouldn't have this.
And I was thinking, oh my God,oh my God, like I'm going to die
, like it didn't work.
And he's like you have an angelsitting on your shoulder
because your cancer is gone.
Wow, and doctors usually don'tsay that, right, yeah.
And he's like get in there,I'll talk to you more, you know,
(36:16):
after this.
But he's like you're, you'regood to go, and now we will see
you.
And I think at that time theysaw me every three weeks for or
maybe they saw me every week forblood work still and then it
got to be three months, and thenthree months got to be six
months, and then six months.
Now we're at just every year Isee them and of course I still
(36:36):
go in for my mammogram, and youknow all of that stuff, but you
you know.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
So after your cancer, because that's what Shays
Warriors is all about, right, soit's the after-cancer journey,
because you found what or whatwasn't out there.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yeah.
So I was really looking forother women that had young
families like I did, to connectwith, because what I found is
that everyone is celebrating andhelping you through the journey
of going through the treatments, Right.
And then you say, hey, I'mcancer free.
And then it's like a stop sign,a dead stop, and there is not a
(37:15):
lot of support because everyonegoes back to their lives, which
rightfully they should.
Sure, you know they've gottento you to this point.
Then they've been thischeerleader for you the whole
time.
And then you're sitting therewith third degree scars and
burns and a half a breast or nobreasts right, that's an
(37:35):
amputation.
You no longer know what it'slike to have this downtime and
go out without constantlyworrying in your head all the
time is this cancer going tocome back?
Because the probability of mycancer coming back and a lot of
other women's cancer coming backwithin the first year is huge
and if it does come back, it'sgoing through this whole process
(37:58):
again and in my case, if itcame back, the probability of me
living was like next to none atthat time because they didn't
have extra drugs and everything.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Because every year, more and more studies are coming
out More and more advancedmedicines are coming out to help
people, right?
Speaker 3 (38:17):
So yeah, it was this mindset of like I have a
headache now and that's braincancer.
I have a bone ache and now it'sbone cancer.
Oh yeah, I just couldn't getover the fact that you also are
in this tunnel for the year thatyou're going through cancer,
and then all of a sudden it'slike you lived on adrenaline for
(38:37):
a year and now it's done.
You don't know how to kind ofget back to normal.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
Cause you can't just forget you just want to do this.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
It's like PTSD and trauma and you know your
relationships change with yourfriends and with your family and
it's like you see the worldliterally differently and the
things that matter to you at onepoint in time don't matter
anymore Sure.
Yeah, Like there is so muchmore than that.
Yeah, it's a hard journey toget back into life.
(39:09):
You can't, you don't.
You're no longer who you oncewere.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
It's hard.
So you found yourself saying,okay, I got to do something
about this, right.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
Well and I looked in town and there were lots of
support for people going throughcancer.
And then all of a sudden it'slike where is?
The stuff for life after cancerand that's what our blog had
started every Thursday when Iwas going through cancer and
finally, that lot I would youknow write every.
Thursday morning and then,finally, I put life after cancer
(39:39):
this sucks and just went intowriting that way.
And then people were reallylike thousands of people were
connecting and saying I feelthis way too.
I was a cancer survivor.
I feel this way too.
And I was like, wow, I didn'tknow.
Everyone is out there.
I'm like, well, if no one'sdoing this here in the Valley,
why don't I bring it here?
Because when I did find things,it was on the East Coast.
(40:01):
You know there are servicesthere, but it was like a lot of
online stuff and nobody wants tobe online.
They need a connecting person,and there used to be something
called Gilda's Club out here.
But I mean they, yeah, they'regone.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
They're not in the area anymore and I think there's
only maybe four or five in theentire world now.
It's really hard to keep anonprofit going right.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Yeah, I mean, nonprofits are just like running
a business, right.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
Yeah, with a lot more red tape and a lot more
restrictions, yes, and it costsa lot of money to continue to
run and start a nonprofit.
And that's kind of where Italked to my friend, eileen
Alvarez, who also was a breastcancer survivor, and she was the
one who kind of helped methrough the whole process.
(40:46):
And I went to a yoga retreatprocess and I went to a yoga
retreat and for that whole weekI journaled and thought about
okay, what is my life going tolook like now?
I can't go back to thisproperty management and just get
back into the job and you knoweverything's good and go out and
party with friends.
It's like life is so differentand I need to find a way to heal
(41:10):
and get back to the new Sheabecause it's different.
Speaker 2 (41:14):
Yeah, I see things differently.
Speaker 3 (41:16):
And I called her on the I-10 and I said, hey, I know
what we're going to do.
And she's like, okay, what arewe going to do?
I was like you're going to bemy co -founder?
And she's like, okay, and she'slike laughing.
I said we're going to start anonprofit and that nonprofit is
going to be all about life aftercancer and we're going to build
support.
We're going to do a retreat forwomen at the time it was just
(41:39):
women who have gone throughbreast cancer because we need
this and it's going to be fullypaid for.
And she's like, oh my God,that's going to be expensive.
I go, yeah, I know, but I cando it, we can do it.
And she's like, okay, BecauseI'm like are you in?
And she's like, yes, I'm in.
And that's how it started.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
What year was this that was?
Speaker 3 (41:59):
in 2017.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
Okay, so you were just coming out, I was just
coming out of my process.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
But for me and the person that I've always been, I
work through a lot of healingand trauma and things and it's
what makes me thrive to figureout the pieces of the puzzle and
that's the entrepreneurial mindI guess you would say.
I would say, and you know italso, I noticed that when I
(42:31):
connected with other people andEileen connected with other
people, we were really able toall heal each other together.
We were stronger and there'snothing like that.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
We are building a community of thrivers.
Yeah, you have that whole bond.
I mean it's great because a lotof I know a lot of people that
are involved in your communityand your, your charity, so I
think that's I mean it'sfantastic and you do work so
hard to keep it going and keeppeople, your name out there and
things like that and but at thesame time, like think about how
(43:06):
much good you've done.
You know what I mean.
So you're definitely going toheaven.
It's not anytime soon, but youknow what I mean.
But seriously, I mean we well Ishouldn't say we run a
nonprofit, but Bobby and I areon the board for our son's
tackle football team and ittakes a ton of money to run that
thing.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
It's a lot of work, A lot of work yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:27):
So how did you end up up?
Because I know you did yoga andI think you did that at
Sunnyland.
So, like you ended up gettingsome big sponsors, I would
imagine that that kind of helpedyou get it going.
Speaker 3 (43:41):
Or how did?
How did that all kind of cometogether?
I started teaching yoga forEisenhower in 2008, early 2018.
Got it, Eisenhower, in 2008,early 2018.
Got it.
We decided to start writinggrants for the nonprofit right
away and our first grant that wewere given was by Bighorn BAM,
(44:02):
Bighorn Cares, oh yeah, andSelby Dunham, who was the
founder of that.
She's the one who gave us ourfirst $5,000 grant and it was
amazing because we're like, wow,someone really believed in us,
you know, and they understandthis walk and this process as
well, because her story ifyou've ever followed on her
(44:23):
story, I mean, she was anamazing woman that we lost a few
years back.
But you know, her story wasvery similar.
It's like there's not enough ofequipment at Eisenhower to do
this, so she started that withBighorn to be able to find some
of that equipment and that stuff.
And that's very similar to whatwe did, but we just did it in a
(44:48):
different way because we wantto help and make sure that
people understand they're notalone through the mind-body
connection, Because after thatcancer journey you don't want to
keep going back to the doctorall the time and doing that, and
there are amazing therapiststhat are out there.
There's nothing like having acommunity of peers that
understand the walk of yourjourney and the PTSD and what's
(45:09):
scaring, and because we all havethe same of your journey and
the PTSD and what's scary,Because we all have the same
thing in common and that it's wewant to live a long and
wonderful life, want to see ourkids and our grandkids and we
want to be the old people thatyou know one day.
Just go to sleep and that's ityou know.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
So then the retreats were planned like way in advance
, right?
So what did those look like toyou then, and what did they look
like now?
Speaker 3 (45:36):
Yeah, so their retreat is very similar now as
it was then, it's just gotten alittle larger.
We did a full buyout of theIngleside Inn for our very first
retreat.
We went to them over there andthey were were Yvonne is her
name and she was amazing.
We said like, hey, we want todo this cancer survivor retreat
(45:57):
for 25 women and this is whatwe're looking at.
We want to do some movement.
We want to do, we want to allowthe survivors to be able to
relax and reset and renewthemselves and we don't want
them to pay for anything.
Um, we'll take care of some ofthose sponsorships and that was
(46:20):
through the grants.
And then we went and gotsponsors and I think you
might've even sponsored us onour very first retreat to being
as tileded and it was.
It was great because this was away to bring people together in
almost.
Um, it was like on steroids,right, like three days and two
(46:41):
nights back then, and there'snothing like people that when
you walk through a door, theyalready understand your
connection.
Speaker 2 (46:50):
Oh yeah, it's something you guys all have in
common, and it's a bondinstantaneously.
Speaker 3 (46:54):
And then we wrote.
I wrote content with a coupleof other people that we
literally went through theentire time of what this cancer
journey is and what it does, andwe made sure that there's
actually like a workbook andeverything.
Speaker 2 (47:10):
So yeah, so you do.
Since you used to do themarketing for other things in
your life, I'm assuming you dothe marketing for this or is
that?
What's going on with that?
Speaker 3 (47:23):
I definitely have a lot of drive in the marketing of
Shays Warriors, but we hire anoutside marketing firm.
My daughter actually helps withsome of that.
Yeah, but we hire an outsidemarketing firm.
My daughter actually helps withsome of that.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Yeah, she's awesome.
Speaker 3 (47:32):
And then we have another social media gal named
Alex who helps a lot with that,because I am in the day-to-day
in-dated, the partnerships, theoutreach that you know we do,
and then I also have my own jobstill.
So you know it's a lot, it'sdefinitely a full-time job.
It is a lot of time, it's a lotof energy and a lot of efforts,
(47:56):
but the rewards are nothingthat I've ever felt in my life
for working for anything.
If I was paid to do this, Iwould be paid to do this because
it's amazing to get somebody'stestimonial back and say,
literally you saved my life.
I mean that is so humbling and Iunderstand it so much because
(48:21):
of the retreat that I went onand had a chance to kind of
decompress from everything,because I did live it on
adrenaline, and then I was like,oh my God, who the heck am I
now?
I mean those weren't my words,but I was like you know, we need
this and women need this, andthere are men that need this too
.
It's a different scenario whenit comes to guys, because
(48:45):
they're not going to sit at aretreat and kumbaya or anything
like that, Right, and that's notwhat the ladies do either.
But it's just a differentmindset and we've built both
programs for for survivors thatway, Wow.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
So you've opened it up to men now.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
We did yeah, and it's called the yo bro, I'm brave
too.
Because men are brave and goingthrough stuff like cancer is
something that men generally arenot going to want to talk about
in an open setting and they'renot going to talk about it to
their wives because men are bredto, you know, grow up and
(49:18):
protect the home and do all thisstuff and not have that.
But men are just as brave to gothrough cancer and sometimes
that little bit of vulnerability, if you're among a group of men
that you're just talking aboutbaseball or you're talking about
sports or whatever.
You know that they have thatsame commonality.
(49:38):
Um, so every eight weeks themen get together and our
non-profit pays for them to gettogether and have that community
.
And then the month of June,which is National Cancer
Survivors Month.
This year we'll do our first.
It's an all-day male experience.
Speaker 2 (49:55):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (49:57):
That's interesting and their bro, their bro.
We don't pay for the bro.
They have to pray forthemselves, but they can bring a
friend with, because it's aboutconnection, it's about
community, it's about supportand it's all about education too
, because you don't know whatyou don't know.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Well, you just schooled me on something I
thought I guess it's breastcancer awareness is in October,
so June is National CancerSurvivors.
Month, so like no matter whatkind of cancer you had and where
it happened.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
So where would you guys, what's your big event, if
somebody was listening to thispodcast and they're like, hey,
you know, that sounds like aworthy cause.
Let me see what I can do tohelp contribute.
Do you have like a big eventthat you do a majority of your
fundraising, or do you havefundraisers throughout the year?
Kind of walk us through thatprocess.
Speaker 3 (50:42):
Yeah.
So I would say our biggestevent right now is coming up in
May it's actually Saturday, may10th, it's Mother's Day weekend
this year and it is at Wally's,desert Turtle.
And that event comes from thevision of Maddie and Malia, who
are the daughters of NicoleBotello and Michael Botello, who
(51:06):
owned Wally's and Maddie is nowthe owner of.
Wally's, and they lost their momto breast cancer and when we
had a chance we had mutualfriends, that kind of set us up
together.
We had a chance to talk aboutthis.
It was something that,unbeknownst to me, their mom
talked about doing before shehad passed away.
(51:26):
Oh, wow.
And they both have said I wishmy mom had had these programs
and these services and thiscommunity when she was going
through her cancer.
And so this Mother's Day tea isamazing.
There's only 200 tickets and itfully funds almost half of the
(51:47):
retreat itself and of courseit's beautiful, there's a lot of
stories, it's a lot ofconnection and it comes from too
.
The other thing is women, womensupport women, mothers
supporting mothers, the Tree ofLife.
I mean, it's all about that.
It's not that men can't come tothe tea, but it is just
(52:09):
something that Maddie is justvery proud about and we're very
honored to be able to host thetea there.
And I know you came, I guess, acouple years ago and I loved
the shopping, loved the shopping.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
Definitely built for women right.
Speaker 2 (52:23):
Shopping and tea.
She told me she's like youbetter come to this this year.
And I'm like, no, I'm coming.
She goes bring your kids.
I'm like my boys probably won'twant to go, but my girls will
probably want to go.
Speaker 1 (52:32):
Right, they would like to.
Speaker 3 (52:33):
It's a celebration of life, it's a celebration of
motherhood and it's acelebration of Nicole, who you
know for these beautiful youngladies that are also business
owners here in town.
I know Just flourishing.
Speaker 2 (52:49):
We should get them on the show because they are like
young, super young, yeah,maddie's super young and they're
just awesome and, man, sheknows how to run that business
right, yeah, well, she grew upin it.
Speaker 3 (53:00):
Yeah that's true.
Yeah, we're very proud of herand she sits on our board and
they both are a loving family.
We couldn't ask for anythingmore.
They both are loving family.
We couldn't ask for anythingmore.
And then, also this year, we'llbe honoring Aileen Alvarez, who
is my co-founder that we lostthis year in October, and her
(53:21):
daughters and her mom At the TAt the T as well.
Awesome and that was Maddie andMalia's thought for it and they
want to do that for her becauseEileen was such a huge part of
Shae's.
I always say that she was theheart of Shae's and I had the
vision and the other stuff.
I was the day to day, but shewould take care of the things
behind the scenes in a morecalming and politically correct
(53:44):
way.
So you know she's very muchmissed and I miss her every day,
especially when we have events.
Oh yeah, you know, but she'swith us still, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
So what advice would you give to somebody that's
maybe thinking about starting anonprofit or, you know, has this
burning desire to help theircommunity?
You know, where would you, whatwould your advice to?
Even where, even to start tokind of do that?
Speaker 3 (54:11):
Yeah, so don't go into a nonprofit if you think
people are just going to handyou money.
Speaker 1 (54:17):
That's the biggest thing.
Speaker 3 (54:18):
It's a lot of work right it is a lot of work and
there's a lot of legal red tapebehind it.
Get yourself a really, reallygood nonprofit attorney to put
bylaws together Very similar toan HOA board.
You have to have all of thatstuff.
The other thing is is put abusiness plan together.
(54:38):
A nonprofit is a business, likeI said in the beginning.
It just has a lot more red tapeand you're dealing with people
that are giving you money, donordollars, and so if they're
giving you lots and lots ofmoney, or if you're accepting
state funding or federal funding, there are differences between
that and there are restrictedfunds and there's non-restricted
(54:59):
funds.
You need to understand that andif you think you're going to
pay yourself for a whileprobably not going to happen.
And be ready, that people beready for putting some of your
own money up front for that.
I mean, I think when we startedit, I put up $30,000 of my own
money right away because Ibelieved in what we were going
(55:22):
to do.
And there are licensings, thereare bylaws.
Like I said, you have to meetwith an attorney who knows what
they're doing and make sureeverything is good to go.
Oh my gosh, so put thatbusiness plan together.
Speaker 1 (55:39):
It sounds like it.
I mean you're running it justlike a business.
The only difference is the taxreturn right, and then you can
accept donations, but other thanthat, you still need to bring
income to pay your bills and paypeople to work.
You know, it's the same kind ofthing.
So word to the wise on that one, guys.
Where can people find you ifthey're looking, If you hear
this podcast, Shays Warriors anawesome, awesome charity.
(56:01):
Where can they go to find youand find out about your events
and all that?
Speaker 3 (56:06):
Yeah, go to wwwshayswarriorsorg,
wwwshayswarriorsorg, and it'sS-H-A-Y and then warriorsorg,
that's where you can find us.
We've got the programs, we'vegot the events.
The retreat is on there.
Our nominations are opening up.
On Thursday you can nominate awarrior for the retreat.
(56:28):
The retreat is four days andthree nights.
Now Nobody knows this yet, soI'll tell you, guys.
First.
Speaker 1 (56:34):
Breaking news.
Speaker 3 (56:35):
Breaking news we have partnered with the Ritz-Carlton
for the next few years.
Speaker 2 (56:41):
That's a beautiful property.
Speaker 3 (56:45):
Our retreat is made to fully fund these survivors
for those four days and threenights.
They don't pay anything.
Are you?
Speaker 2 (56:52):
still doing 25 women, 25 to 30 women, 25 to 30.
Speaker 3 (56:55):
Yeah, it all depends on funding.
Yeah, that's true, that's true,and we watch that, of course,
and we work hard to make ithappen Well.
Speaker 2 (57:03):
I'm very proud that you're one of my good friends
and I'm sure the whole communityis just so thankful for you and
Shays Warriors and everybodythat is involved with Shays
Warriors, because it is a ton ofwork and you know.
But I've always tried to tellmy kids it's always better to
give than to receive, right, soit does.
It just fills your little heart.
Speaker 3 (57:23):
We have an amazing board of directors, we have
amazing advisory council and ourvolunteers are the best.
Amazing advisory council andour volunteers are the best, and
a lot of those volunteers arewomen or men that have been a
warrior themselves and they'vegone to the retreats or they've
come to the events and theythat's their way of giving back.
It's a full ripple effect.
It's amazing and we could notdo this without people like you
(57:47):
helping us get the word out.
And then also sponsors I mean,mean, that's you again.
You've sponsored us before andyou've been amazing and and I
will continue to.
So it's great yeah absolutely,and I'm so thankful you're my
friend, because me too yeah,love you, thank you well, we
want to thank you for coming inand kind of sharing your story
with us.
Speaker 1 (58:05):
It was amazing.
So everybody out there, shay'swarriors, great, non great
nonprofit here in the CoachellaValley.
If you found any value to thisconversation, you know the
routine like subscribe and share, and we'll see you guys next
time, thank you.
What is going on?
Everyone, I'm Robert Mraz.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
And I'm Fina Mraz.
And this is.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
CV Hustle, the podcast dedicated to supporting
entrepreneurship here in theCoachella Valley, and today
we've got a special guest.
We're going to kind of take aU-turn and talk a little bit
today about nonprofits.
Now you may say, well,nonprofits is not a business.
But actually, if you thinkabout it, nonprofits fill gaps
where businesses and governmentcan't really feed the need of
(00:25):
the people.
That's where the nonprofitsstep in.
So today we have a real specialguest.
She not only runs a nonprofitShays Warriors but she also runs
her own business as well HOAToolkit.
And that guest today is ShayMarenka.
Thank you for coming in, thankyou for having me Good to see
you.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
I'm so happy that you came and are going to hang out
with us, because I feel likeyou've got a lot to teach me
right?
Well, I hope so.
No, I'm just kidding, no youwill.
You will.
So I want to know because Shayand I met.
I don't know if you rememberthis, but Shay and I met through
a mutual client that I have,and one day she walked into my
(01:04):
showroom and we just hit it offRight, and we just sat there and
like, talked and talked andtalked and I'm like, oh shit, I
got to go back to work.
But it was just sister love fromthe beginning.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
It was like this energy that just kind of blew up
.
I'm like, oh my gosh, this isdefinitely my sister from
another mister and she's aScorpio too, literally a day
apart A day apart that explainsit 18.
Speaker 2 (01:30):
Yeah, exactly.
But so when I met you, I knowyou were, you know you had been
the owner of Shays Warriorsright, or the founder for a long
time.
But I want to delve into.
Well, let's take it back alittle bit, not too far back,
but you grew up where, wherewere you born and how did you
(01:51):
get into the business part?
Let's talk about that first,because I think that's what came
first.
Speaker 3 (01:58):
I think that's one thing that most people don't
know about me, or they assume,is that I grew up in the Midwest
, which I did partly.
But if we take it back to whereI was born, I was born in
Ventura, california, so not toofar up the coast.
We lived in that area until Iwas about 10 years old and then
my mom and dad decided to up uskids and move to a small farm
(02:23):
town in central Wisconsin.
The thing is is about thevalley.
I've been in the valley since Iwas under a year old.
My grandparents came down herein the early 70s.
They built their homes for mygreat grandmothers and us, and I
spent almost every summer andevery holiday of my life out
here with my family.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Well, I mean, Palm Springs has the perfect pools
during summertime, right it?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
does, or Palm Desert, yeah so, and went to church in
Indio like forever and I mean Iremember actually Fred Waring,
where my family's homes were.
Literally it was a dirt roadwhen I was a kid.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Oh my gosh, yeah, that's how far it went, I love
it.
I remember La Quinta, when youknow I grew up Jehovah's
Witnesses Right, we had to goknock on doors, or my parents,
my mom did and we had to drivefrom one house to the next
because there was just dirt.
So that you know it's kind offunny.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
I know it's weird, because, like I remember being
the kid and in my grandparents'pool in the backyard, 7, 7.30 at
night, I'd be laying there intheir lounge chair or whatever
and there would be two planesthat always went to the airport
and that is consistent from whenI was a kid, even to today,
like it must have been, like Ithink it was like American
(03:37):
Airlines or something.
I looked it up one day because Iremember being that kid and
being like someday I'm going tolive here, someday I'm going to
raise my family here, like thewhole nine yards and of course,
here we are.
Speaker 2 (03:47):
So you went over back east when you were small and is
it because your parents had ajob?
So you grew up there, you wentto high school there and then
what happened?
Speaker 3 (03:57):
I guess.
Yeah, my dad's family owned alarge heating and air
conditioning company in Chicagoand we were in Chicago for like
a split second.
But he didn't want us kidsgrowing up in Chicago.
It was pretty rough in the areaand just the traffic and
everything.
Chicago's a great town, don'tget me wrong.
(04:17):
Oh, believe me, but my dad hadseven brothers and two sisters,
so it was a whole familybusiness and, again,
entrepreneurs, right.
And he just said you know, Iwant my kids to grow up on a
farm, where I did.
And they grew up on this farmbecause when they were small a
lot of the brothers would getinto brawls and everything in
(04:38):
the early 40s and 50s.
And so my grandfather, like,sent them up to the farm and
they worked, and so mygrandfather, like, sent them up
to the farm and they worked youknow, and did all that I did not
work a farm.
Luckily, we were in the minicity.
Riding a tractor is pretty cool, but my love for real estate
and homes and everything camefrom my dad, because my brother
(05:01):
was.
My brother is 11 years youngerthan I am, so I was the eldest.
I had a hammer and tools for aslong as I can remember and a
dirt bike.
I was very much a tomboy and mydad would take me around and he
would show me how to fix thingseverything from tiling to
flooring to showers, plumbingand heating and air conditioning
(05:24):
.
He literally showed me that,from the time that you know, I
was seven years old talking howto cook Like I owe everything to
my dad and I grew up in an old,1800th, old Victorian home.
So I was like the kid that wasin the round room with the
little you know, I felt likeCinderella in there and it was
(05:44):
great.
Like the kid that was in theround room with the little you
know, I felt like Cinderella inthere and it was great.
Yeah, it was just again.
It was in this very old,historic town of about 630
people.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
So everybody, knew everybody.
You could have started a handywoman business.
I could have.
I would have been way ahead ofmy time back then.
Speaker 3 (06:00):
Yeah, right, so that's.
But yeah, I went to high schoolthere.
It was great.
I hated the town while I wasthere because, again, when
you're talking about 600 people,it was very small.
Everybody was up in yourbusiness.
And the other thing is, I wasthis kid from California.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
So You're kind of always an outsider.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
I was always the outsider, and we're talking
generations on, generations offarmers and farmers' kids that
wanted to be there.
So I always felt a little outof place because during the time
where they're getting togetherwith their families, we're
flying out here to be with mymom's side of the family and
everything, and you know we'regoing to Chicago to be with my
dad's side of the family.
(06:40):
So it was a little hard growingup but again I was a tomboy.
So you know like I literallyhad some five of my best friends
still to this day from highschool are all guys and we've
been in each other's weddingsand saw each other's.
You know children grow up andit's, you know, it's been great.
And now I appreciate it when Igo back there because it's very
(07:03):
serene and the farm country it'slike different than a city.
But I'm definitely a city girlbecause then, when I graduated
high school, I moved toMinneapolis-St Paul.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
I still haven't gone there.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I heard it's like freaking awesome.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
You know what she should go in the winter?
Because then you can go to Mallof America, because everything
is there and there's no salestax on clothes or shoes, by the
way.
Oh, we should go.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
Well, I have a lot of clients that are from there.
Yeah, yeah.
So you know who's from there,good old Wicca.
Speaker 1 (07:36):
Right Minnesota, love right there.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
Yeah, so yeah, minnesota is great and it's an
awesome city.
I always call it one of themost perfect cities in the
United States because it's nottoo big, not too small.
It has all of these, like youknow, sub-cities that are all
around the larger cities, andit's very similar to the
Coachella Valley because, as weknow, in the Coachella Valley,
like if you live on the Indio orPalm Desert side, you don't go
(08:02):
to Palm Springs and vice versa.
Well, minneapolis-st Paul issimilar to that.
If you live on Minneapolis side, you rarely go to St Paul, and
vice versa, but the old moneyand the old homes, historic
homes, are really in St Paul,and then the newer money and the
newer homes and track homes andall of that is in Minneapolis.
So it's really it's very, verysimilar to being here in the
(08:27):
Valley.
Speaker 2 (08:27):
Do they have the mountains?
No, and what about traffic?
See, that's why I like, I don'tknow that I could ever move to
a big place, right?
Speaker 1 (08:36):
Yeah, you don't do well with traffic.
Speaker 2 (08:38):
No, because I'm such a psycho Like, let's go.
Speaker 3 (08:40):
I would say that personally, because I drive all
the time and I did while I wasthere as well.
Traffic is worse here than itis in the cities and because you
get to know when the rush hoursare Sure and there are so many
more side roads that you can godown to get to home, versus just
(09:03):
the freeways or anything likethat.
So, yeah, traffic's not bad,but it's bad if you are during
those times and of course theyhave, like you know, they have
the whiz through the little.
You know what are they called?
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Express lanes, express lanes and everything.
Yeah, got to have the expresslanes.
So what did you?
Go to school?
Speaker 3 (09:29):
So what school did you go to and did you study to
be like I want to open my ownbusiness?
How did that?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
kind of yeah, how what?
Speaker 3 (09:31):
was the evolution on the evolution of me wanting to
have my own business actuallygoes way back to third grade.
Oh, wow, yeah.
So, and it actually was at myhigh school graduation that my
third grade teacher pulled thispiece of paper out that said,
like do you realize that that'sall you wanted to do?
And it was.
I used to make these littlemagnets for you know like you
pop them in your oven and youmake them for your family, and
so I would sell them three for abuck or whatever, because I
(09:55):
wanted to earn money to pay forthe Christmas gifts for my
little brother and my parents.
So I put all of these postersup around the school and I was
like three for a dollar or, youknow, five for five bucks oh my
God, I love that.
Speaker 2 (10:08):
You know, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (10:10):
It's crazy, right.
And basically like I got caughtby the school, like my
teacher's like what are youdoing?
You can't do this, you can't belike hustling kids at school.
And I was like, yeah, but it'sfor the fair.
And they're like, well, no, youoptimize on the fair itself.
And I was like, well, so that'swhere I came.
(10:31):
I was a junior in college andmy friend at the time.
We decided that we did not wantto live in a dormitory, so we
invested in a condo and in thatcondo, decided to fix it up and
once we were done with school,we went to the next condo.
He actually moved out and movedinto another condo in the same
(10:54):
building.
We invested in that and wedecided to rent the condo that I
was living in.
Yeah and go from there, andthat's kind of how it started.
Then people started asking usto rent their properties and to
manage the HOAs, and this allcame before 2008.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
And to get to your question, because I realize I
skipped over that.
So I went to the University ofMinnesota Twin Cities.
I am a proud Golden Gopher.
Thank you, I was a theatercommunications major, so with a
background of also a minor inart, pr, marketing
communications, but I worked inthe theater department building
(11:31):
set designs.
I originally thought that I wasgoing to go on Broadway and
build and paint sets, but thatdidn't happen.
I mean it did for like threemonths when I was in Hollywood,
and then I was like, yeah, thisisn't for me, and so it fell
back onto that managementProperty management.
Yeah, Because my dad alwaystold me save your money for a
(11:51):
rainy day and the best way toinvest is always through real
estate.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
That's true, that's our family motto too right.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Do you have your real estate license?
No, I just got mine last year,and it's, I mean, I'm like we're
going to be buying and sellingreal estate till we die, yeah,
right so, and it's, and we, Imean we're also trying to, like
you know, have our kids notsaying like we're trying to set
them up for them, you know,forever, but they'll learn from
us, right so?
Speaker 1 (12:20):
That's the hope.
At least, that's the hope.
So you're what at this point?
When you started the business,how old were you?
Speaker 3 (12:27):
23.
23.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
So you're already in the real estate game, fixing up
houses.
At 23 years old, I mean that'spretty impressive.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
It was before all those shows came out on TV, it
made it look like yeah, it wasjust this.
Everything just happened thisquick.
Speaker 3 (12:41):
It really came naturally to me.
This and everything justhappened this quick.
It really came naturally to meand you know, when I was doing
the theater tech design and allof that and the set stuff, it
really kind of was some of thesame things, because you think
about, if you're doing aShakespeare set, right, you're
finding furniture, you'rebuilding something, a set, that
is to that era, and the nichethat we had in St Paul is the
(13:07):
old Victorian homes, hence,which I grew up in and my dad
taught me how to kind ofre-varnish different things and
strip things and bring it backto life.
And in the theater department wealways had this motto that you
know bring something back tolife to make it beautiful again
or leave it better than what itcame with.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
So yeah, okay, so we are familiar with HOAs, yep, and
do you have any advice?
Let me no.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
There is no advice, I'm just saying out of that All
right.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
You know what Some are better than others.
There is no advice, I'm justsaying out of that.
All right, you know what Someare better than others and you
want to know.
What's so funny is I just gotsworn in as president to our HOA
.
Oh Lord, I'm like wait a minute.
How did that just happen?
And I was like okay, as apresident, I expect the vice
president to take all my work up.
There you go.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
It's easy.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
It is a thankless job .
It is a thankless job, I know.
I mean, we have like, where welive there's an HOA and I just
feel so bad.
The homeowners yes, rightly so.
There's certain things that youknow that you can gripe about,
but, gosh, some of these peopleget really mean.
Speaker 3 (14:20):
I'm like there's two things that I've learned over
life that you don't mess withright Three things actually
Family, money and their homes,because it's all very, very
personal to me Sure that's true,absolutely.
Speaker 1 (14:37):
So we're in Minnesota still.
Speaker 2 (14:39):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
And we're still building the business.
How did you so?
Did you come to California?
I mean, how did you get back?
Because we know you from Shea,coming from the Coachella Valley
, you know Coachella Valleysuperstar that runs all these
nonprofits.
How did that?
How did you go from Minnesotato kind of transferring your
life out here?
Speaker 3 (14:57):
Yeah, so, like I said , I mean I've been kind of back
and forth from the CoachellaValley ever since I was
literally eight months old, kindof back and forth from the
Coachella Valley ever since Iwas literally eight months old,
so it really was a naturalprogression.
After I was done with college Imoved right here to the valley.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Really.
Speaker 2 (15:15):
Wouldn't you get sick of the snow?
Or did you love it?
I?
Speaker 3 (15:19):
don't know.
I don't like the ice, I likethe snow, and besides, you can
layer, you can look cute, youcan have a boot Cute little.
Speaker 2 (15:27):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, rock that baby.
Come on now.
Come on, we need to go, we needto go.
Okay, let's go, I don't know,but you have to go to the
bathroom.
Oh my God, bobby hates the snow, yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:42):
I'm a California kid.
No thanks, no thanks.
Speaker 3 (15:49):
I mean, right after college, I called my
grandparents and I said, hey, Iwant to move there.
I have, like you know, probably$300 to my name.
I'm going to pack up my Saturn,I'm going to have everything
with me, and can I just, can youguys help me out for a few
months?
And my grandparents were very,very strict, very strict.
They said three months, you canlive with us rent-free for
three months.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
And after that and then get it together, girl
You're out.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
So you have to find a job.
So I came to the CoachellaValley.
I literally startedinterviewing right away for jobs
and I started with a fitnesscompany.
Really, yeah.
It was a fitness, it was asales, like you know, selling
memberships.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Oh, you were in sales , back in sales With that
beautiful smile.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
It was like do you remember Hoots, hoots, palm
Desert?
It used to be Palm DesertAthletic Club.
I think that I remember and allof that Also, alessandro, and
it was.
So it wasn't very far away frommy grandparents' house so I
could literally walk if I neededto or anything, and I would see
people coming in and out allthe time there was.
You know what are the?
(16:51):
I don't even know what it'scalled.
It's not pickleball, but what'sthe other ones?
Or?
Speaker 2 (16:54):
tennis Inside a room Ping pong Ping pong.
It's like faster the tinylittle ball, racquetball,
racquetball.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
So they had racquetball carts, they had a
gym, they had I think they had aswimming pool in the back even.
But it was crazy and it wasthis traveling company that went
around selling as manymemberships as you can and very
easy for me to do.
(17:25):
I mean, I was like just whippingthrough memberships and then I
would catch people and I'd belike, oh, these people are
sneaking in every night.
They definitely don't have agym membership.
So I went up to two of the guysand I said, hey, how's it going
?
And I'm like I don't think youchecked in at the front desk and
I wasn't even a front deskperson.
I remember I was just there tosell memberships.
And they're like, oh, I musthave forgot my pass or whatever.
(17:45):
I'm like, oh, can I get yourdriver's license?
And they're like okay, youbusted us.
We don't have one.
We've been doing this for liketwo years.
I was like, oh, okay, well, ifyou don't want me to tell, then
you're going to sign up, and allyour friends are going to sign
up tonight.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Nice.
Speaker 3 (18:02):
And so that's what happened, and of course, I sold
them.
The largest package there wasbecause I was stupid.
We've got to make up.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
We've got to make up for that time.
Speaker 3 (18:09):
And the guy was like so fun.
It was like, hey, you're kindof like sassy, so you should
come work with us, we're working.
And I was like, oh, what isthat?
And and they're like, oh, theyellow pages.
And.
I was like really, what is thisall about?
And I think he had like a checkin his wallet or something.
He showed me a check at thattime for $23,000.
(18:32):
And it was for two weeks Shutup.
No, and I was like blown away.
Speaker 1 (18:37):
Let's bring it back Really.
This is pre-Google, obviously.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Way pre-Google.
It was like pre-interneteverything right and I'm like,
oh my God, I'm like you reallymade that much money in two
weeks.
It's like, oh yeah, newbusiness, blah, blah, blah, blah
.
And I was like, well, how doesthe yellow pages make money?
Like I had no idea, it was theads that were in there, sure,
sure, right.
And then I was like, oh my God,so I think I had it this time.
(19:03):
I mean again, poor collegestudent living with your
grandparents trying to make aliving, right.
And of course, I was still likehanging out at night with
friends that I met in the valleyright away and I think I had
like 200 bucks left to my nameor maybe 150.
Oh my gosh.
And I went and I got a suit andhad an interview with this
(19:25):
place that they had worked for,which at that time was called
the Desert Pages.
I don't know if you guysremember that.
Speaker 2 (19:29):
I think I remember that.
I think I do remember that itwas in a white book with the
mountains in the back orsomething.
Yeah, it was like mountains.
There was a mountain on.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
There was a flower on it at one time.
There was a golf course guyVerizon at the time you know,
and I walked in and I waswaiting for that interview and
of course they were like oh,we're sorry, we're not going to
(19:56):
be able to see you or anything.
So I had to go buy a new suit,of course with like two bucks to
my name.
Came back like a week later,they interviewed me and they
hired me on the spot.
But it was telephone sales.
I hated telephone sales.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
Oh, that's the worst.
Speaker 3 (20:10):
So I figured out every single way to get on the
phone, figure out how to getpeople to like me within
literally less than a minute,yeah, and then get them to
invite me to their business, andonce I got in front of them, it
was a done deal.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
It was a done deal.
Speaker 3 (20:27):
And I sold 21 new sales a day.
Oh, my God, and that's how Iearned a ton of money to stick
back into my real estate companyto continue to invest and buy
properties.
Oh my God, while everyone elsewas partying, I was just like
investing at that time in stockmarkets and all of that and the
rest is kind of history.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Let me tell you a fun fact, I owned my first home at
23.
Love it.
Of course you did, and so didyou, scorpio, I know, I know
Can't help it.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
That's Scorpio power right here.
I didn't own anything at 23.
I didn't even own the shirt onmy back at 23 probably.
Speaker 2 (21:04):
But at 24, you owned my heart.
Oh, that's right.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Then my life changed for the better.
Here I go Well.
Valentine's Day is coming up,that's true, there you go, there
you go.
But enough about us.
Speaker 3 (21:14):
I love that.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
So 23, you're back in the real estate game.
Selling, selling.
What are you selling?
Ads, or are you selling?
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yeah, I'm selling advertising and doing
advertising and marketinghelping people grow their
businesses, Because at that timeand this being an area where it
was a highly used tool to helpbusinesses, people, you know,
people come from all over theworld here and they're so
transient, you know, the onlything they had was really the
yellow pages to look up plumbersto look up attorneys and
(21:46):
everybody's A+, yeah, a+,everything's A A.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
A, a, and that was a good marketing strategy.
If you're broke, just name yourbusiness with an A and it'll be
at the top of the pages.
Speaker 2 (21:57):
Did you ever deal with the lady or the person or
company that was selling ads ontables?
No, no, okay, that was a wholeracket.
I know at some point yeah.
Speaker 3 (22:07):
Okay, whatever.
I don't know who that is, Idon't either.
Okay.
Speaker 2 (22:10):
So, okay, let's jump into some stuff here.
Okay, Is that how you met yourhusband?
How did you meet your husband?
Like because how did you guys?
Speaker 3 (22:19):
meet.
We met back in Minnesota.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Oh, okay, okay.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Oh, so he's a transplant too, you brought him
out here, Okay okay, I see howyou were doing I follow you,
there you go.
So how did you get the realestate thing going again?
So you said you startedinvesting.
Were you buying properties atthat point?
Speaker 3 (22:38):
Yeah, buying properties, renting those
properties out, propertiesrenting those properties out.
And then we were being startedto ask at that time can you rent
out other people's propertiesas well?
Speaker 1 (22:51):
So you're doing the same thing you were doing in
Minnesota.
Basically right, you alreadyhad the blueprint.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
Yep, I already had the blueprint and everything
here, so you have propertieshere.
I did.
Yeah, I only have one propertynow here, but at the time we had
three properties here.
Got it.
It's just the biggest thing.
If anyone has ever done rentalshere in California.
The laws are so different.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
They're so for the tenant right, Aren't they?
For the tenant?
Speaker 1 (23:18):
I plead the fifth, on that we don't want to make it a
political show.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
They're so challenging and Minnesota is
really challenging too but sinceI had the bulk of my business
there, I kept investing in thatarea Absolutely so smart.
It really is.
It's another.
Just like the Coachella Valley,it's a golden nugget of the
world because there are so manyFortune 500 companies there and
everything like that?
Speaker 2 (23:42):
What the hell you need to take me there.
We need to go.
Yes, okay, open a store outthere.
Oh shit, seattle.
Everybody tells me to go out toSeattle.
I don't know why.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
It rains too much.
It rains too much in Seattle.
You'd be depressed, I would be.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
Yeah, maybe I'd bring the sunshine Right.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
So we're entrepreneurs now, how long till
you kind of quit your job anddo that full time Was?
Speaker 3 (24:09):
there like a reflection point where you're
like I'm going to do this bymyself.
I was at the top of my game inadvertising, sales and marketing
and in 2000, right around 2007or 2000, you know the markets
were starting to change right.
Remember when that bubble hitthe first time?
Remember when that bubble hitthe first time, but I was really
in 2007,.
I was already selling as muchas I could because I knew I was
(24:30):
going to quit in 2008 when thatbubble was going to burst, did
you?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
kind of see that coming.
Yeah, I guess I'm a trendreader.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
I don't know, like you know, I just I have hunches
right and I'm not trained inanything.
I just really instinctivelyhave this hunch that things are
going to happen Intuition baby.
And the intuition was that ifeveryone lost their homes, sadly
because those mortgages burst,they were going to need a home
because we're talking, manyfamilies and all of that and I
(25:00):
was going to rent them a homebecause we're talking, many
families and all of that, and Iwas going to rent them a home.
And that's exactly what endedup happening.
And then our business just kindof took off and I put
everything online before thewhole COVID thing happened, and
so everything was able so that Icould come back and forth from
the Coachella Valley, because Iwas already living in the
(25:21):
Coachella Valley in 2008,.
Right, you know, I was livinghere.
So it was great.
I mean, right after college Imoved out here, so I would go
back and forth from Minnesota,back and forth from Minnesota
check on the properties youstill do and I still do.
Speaker 2 (25:35):
I was like you still do, okay, take me on one of
those times, okay, but well then, there came a big turning point
, right?
Yes, 2016,.
Speaker 3 (25:51):
You know, life was going great and grand and
everything was fine.
And then, all of a sudden, Ifound a lump in my right breast
and didn't think anything of it.
I had just had a physical frommy you know doctor and when I
called to ask them, like, hey, Ithink I found a lump and
they're like oh, don't worryabout it, you're fine, you're
too young for breast cancer.
(26:12):
How old were you?
38.
Oh wow, I was 38 at the time.
And so I never had a mammogramor anything like that, really.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Well, yeah, because you don't get them until a
certain age, right?
Speaker 3 (26:23):
Yeah, at that time the age was 45 that you didn't
get them.
So it wasn't until just thispast year that they lowered the
age limit to age 40.
So it took me another month toget in to that doctor and she
found the lump and I had to showher that and she's like
interesting, we'll get you in,but I'm sure it's nothing, it's
(26:45):
probably just a cyst, like againshoving it off.
And I get that.
You know they don't want toworry you or anything like that,
right.
And then the first time I everhad a mammogram done, the lady
looked at me and she's like, doyou have kids?
And I was like, yeah, I have a12-year-old.
And she's like, doctor willtake good care of you.
And I knew right away.
I'm like, okay, they seesomething.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
Oh my God, Because they're not supposed to say shit
, right, they're not supposed to.
Oh, I'd slap her.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Needless to say I didn't stay with those doctors,
yeah, yeah, which we won't gointo.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
You know cancer happens and then it was a year
of.
It was one of the mostaggressive cancers for women
under 40 that hit me.
Speaker 2 (27:27):
I was at stage three already, and I had yeah.
Oh my gosh, that's going to bescary, because that's like
always the first question right,like what stage are you at?
Yeah, kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (27:44):
I mean it took like a month and a half to figure all
that stuff out, because you haveto do scans and biopsies and
blood work and more scans andit's a very, very, very
overwhelming process.
For anyone who's never gonethrough cancer.
It's just, you are like a deerin headlights, it's just like
overwhelming and everybody iscoming to you asking you you
have to have doctor'sappointments.
And it's scary because, ofcourse, when you know that you
have cancer have doctor'sappointments.
And it's scary because, ofcourse, when you know that you
have cancer, you don't knowwhere it's at.
(28:04):
You don't know if it's spread.
Are you gonna live, are yougonna die?
Speaker 2 (28:07):
I mean yeah, it's like a whole new world that
you're exposed to that you don'twant to be right.
It's like, oh my god, okay, didit run in your family?
Speaker 3 (28:17):
um.
Both of my aunts, on each sideof the family, had breast cancer
but, the thing about cancer is,unless you have the BRCA gene,
it's doesn't matter really.
There there's still no studiesthat it's not hereditary that
way.
Um, so, like both of my aunts,they had different types of
(28:39):
cancer than I did, so thenthere's still studies out there
on why that happens, right?
Speaker 2 (28:49):
So one of the things and I do want to hear more I'm
always preaching about 23andMe.
I swear to God I should be oneof their sponsors.
I love that thing because Imean it tells me you hate
cilantro and I hate cilantro,but it also tells me you do not
have the BRCA gene.
You are going to be, you know,likelihood to get diabetes.
Is this and like I mean it islike super detailed, so I mean
(29:13):
that might help somebody.
I don't know if I just thoughtthat could help so many people
like get on, like okay, I havethis gene.
I got to really pay attention.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
So, yeah, I mean, I think 23andMe is a good tool.
There's a lot of other tools Iget out there to to be useful,
especially if you have, you know, any type of cancer, any type
of disease within your familythat you think you don't want to
have.
But it's good to be able toknow all your cards.
(29:44):
You know what you're playingwith.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
So then they say hey, and so you're here.
And then they said okay, hey,here's kind of the plan, right,
and then that was getting chemo,and that I mean what do you do
when that happens?
Because you had a job right.
So it's like what happens tothat and you know, how do you?
How do you keep surviving ifyou know you're trying to work?
Speaker 3 (30:10):
Yeah, well, the first thing is is I had I had a Zoom
call with, like my team and itwas.
It was just like, hey, I'mgoing to take some time away
right now.
My business partner at the timetook on a lot in the majority
of my work.
I still was able to workbecause, again, I had set
everything up remotely so thatit was a lot easier for me.
(30:34):
So I still did the marketing,the advertising, the connections
a lot of the answers of theemails, the connections, a lot
of the answers of the emails.
But I could not know.
I could no longer fly back andforth for over a year because my
, my therapy or my chemotherapywas weekly.
So I would sit for anywherefrom, you know, anywhere from
(30:55):
three to five hours, and then Iwas just wiped for about three
days and obviously my daughterwas still in school.
So I was driving her to schooland picking her up and I had an
amazing community here in theValley.
My daughter went to Sacred Heartat the time, so it was like all
the mamas wrapped us up andjust helped with whatever we
(31:17):
needed.
If I couldn't go somewhere, Iwould have a friend drop her off
, pick her up.
Um, you know, she was, and shewas actively in sports and dance
and volleyball and the wholenine yards like I.
Whatever it was.
I didn't want what was going onwith me to affect her life in
any way.
I wanted to be as normal aspossible and, um, there was a
(31:37):
time where she didn't want anyof her friends to know that mom
had cancer either.
So I had a custom wig that wasmade for me so it looked just
like my own hair.
But every week for 20 weeks Idid like I said three to five
hours of chemotherapy.
It was called the Red DevilCocktail to be honest.
You know, think about that.
You have this and this is where, like the education behind the
(32:01):
words on cancer is like who theheck wants to rub a devil going
through your veins?
You know like come on, let'schange that terminology
somewhere out there.
And then, after that was done,I had surgery.
And then, after that was done,I had 38 rounds of radiation.
Speaker 2 (32:15):
Wait a minute.
So the chemo didn't like killany of it, it does, but the
doctor, yeah, the chemo didn'tlike kill any of it, it does,
but the doctor Like it shrinksit.
Speaker 3 (32:22):
Yeah, the chemo is meant to like, shrink the tumor
as much as possible, and for meit did shrink it, okay.
And so I was like, yay, I'mdone.
And then the doctor said, yeah,but you need to do radiation
because of the severity of whatyou had and if your triple
negative comes back, there mightnot be a new cure, like we
(32:45):
can't do the same thing againbecause you can only have so
much of this chemo cocktail.
And I was like, oh, but I don'twant to do radiation, because
radiation was scarier to me thanthe chemo was.
I mean, I was 100% certain Iwas going to die from one or the
other.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
That's just how it was Well, yeah, I mean, that's
where your mind goes, and thenyour body's just.
You're like how much more canmy body take?
Speaker 3 (33:13):
right, exactly, exactly, and it you know, they
give you boosters at the end,and it's just at the end and
it's just, it's.
It's nasty for me, luckily, Iate a very, very clean diet.
Um, I continue to do meditation, I continue to do yoga.
Um, I continue to even jump ona spin bike every now and then.
(33:33):
Um, so for me, it was all thisjourney of really making sure
that I was trying to keep mylife as normal as possible, and
but I had to rest, because whenyou are going through something
like that and you are sleeping,your body is shut down.
The drugs and everything thatthey give you, that's working
(33:54):
over time, you know, it'sworking over time in your
kidneys, in your liver, it'sworking to get any of the cancer
cells out of your body and youdon't know where those cells are
going.
Right, I mean, it could be inyour hand, it could be in your
foot.
So the chemo cocktail they gaveme was, on purpose, very
aggressive, to kill whatever wasin my body.
(34:14):
And then the doctor said, yeah,you have to do radiation, and I
was like, but why, how long didthat last 38 rounds?
Speaker 2 (34:21):
So yeah, and I was like but why, how long did that
last 38 rounds?
Speaker 3 (34:21):
So yeah, so is it like weekly, every single day,
for?
Speaker 1 (34:25):
and it was the most annoying thing.
Speaker 3 (34:27):
It wasn't too far away from here actually, but
every single day, um, they wouldradiate through the breast and
underneath the arm in in theareas where the tumors were
found, and it was to killanything that was around where
possibly the chemo didn't get to.
Because you can have withtriple negative, they have, I
(34:48):
guess, these like cancer cellsthat will hide behind another
cell, or like a good cell.
So, yeah, wow that's hard.
Every single day.
They would zap you for 10minutes and then it was over and
it was just the most annoyingand crazy thing.
And you had to do it five daysa week.
So you got the weekend off, butby the end I had third-degree
(35:11):
burns underneath my right armand throughout my breast.
Oh my gosh, yeah, it was redderthan these tops.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Yeah, your skin was like stop it.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
It was.
I had to take a break becauseit was so bad.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
So then they say come back in like what a year.
How do you?
Speaker 3 (35:33):
So, after it's all done, they do your pathology
again.
They check to see if there'sany cancer cells or anything
like that, and they give youclear margins or they don't give
you clear margins.
If you don't have clear margins, you have to have more chemo,
more radiation, to get clearmargins.
Luckily for me, I had the mostamazing surgeon and when I
walked in he was actuallylooking at my paper I'll never
(35:55):
forget.
And he had tears in his eyesand he's like kid, I have no
idea what this is, but youshouldn't have this.
And I was thinking, oh my God,oh my God, like I'm going to die
, like it didn't work.
And he's like you have an angelsitting on your shoulder
because your cancer is gone.
Wow, and doctors usually don'tsay that, right, yeah.
And he's like get in there,I'll talk to you more, you know,
(36:16):
after this.
But he's like you're, you'regood to go, and now we will see
you.
And I think at that time theysaw me every three weeks for or
maybe they saw me every week forblood work still and then it
got to be three months, and thenthree months got to be six
months, and then six months.
Now we're at just every year Isee them and of course I still
(36:36):
go in for my mammogram, and youknow all of that stuff, but you
you know.
Speaker 2 (36:41):
So after your cancer, because that's what Shays
Warriors is all about, right, soit's the after-cancer journey,
because you found what or whatwasn't out there.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yeah.
So I was really looking forother women that had young
families like I did, to connectwith, because what I found is
that everyone is celebrating andhelping you through the journey
of going through the treatments, Right.
And then you say, hey, I'mcancer free.
And then it's like a stop sign,a dead stop, and there is not a
(37:15):
lot of support because everyonegoes back to their lives, which
rightfully they should.
Sure, you know they've gottento you to this point.
Then they've been thischeerleader for you the whole
time.
And then you're sitting therewith third degree scars and
burns and a half a breast or nobreasts right, that's an
(37:35):
amputation.
You no longer know what it'slike to have this downtime and
go out without constantlyworrying in your head all the
time is this cancer going tocome back?
Because the probability of mycancer coming back and a lot of
other women's cancer coming backwithin the first year is huge
and if it does come back, it'sgoing through this whole process
(37:58):
again and in my case, if itcame back, the probability of me
living was like next to none atthat time because they didn't
have extra drugs and everything.
Speaker 1 (38:08):
Because every year, more and more studies are coming
out More and more advancedmedicines are coming out to help
people, right?
Speaker 3 (38:17):
So yeah, it was this mindset of like I have a
headache now and that's braincancer.
I have a bone ache and now it'sbone cancer.
Oh yeah, I just couldn't getover the fact that you also are
in this tunnel for the year thatyou're going through cancer,
and then all of a sudden it'slike you lived on adrenaline for
(38:37):
a year and now it's done.
You don't know how to kind ofget back to normal.
Speaker 2 (38:43):
Cause you can't just forget you just want to do this.
Speaker 3 (38:45):
It's like PTSD and trauma and you know your
relationships change with yourfriends and with your family and
it's like you see the worldliterally differently and the
things that matter to you at onepoint in time don't matter
anymore Sure.
Yeah, Like there is so muchmore than that.
Yeah, it's a hard journey toget back into life.
(39:09):
You can't, you don't.
You're no longer who you oncewere.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
It's hard.
So you found yourself saying,okay, I got to do something
about this, right.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
Well and I looked in town and there were lots of
support for people going throughcancer.
And then all of a sudden it'slike where is?
The stuff for life after cancerand that's what our blog had
started every Thursday when Iwas going through cancer and
finally, that lot I would youknow write every.
Thursday morning and then,finally, I put life after cancer
(39:39):
this sucks and just went intowriting that way.
And then people were reallylike thousands of people were
connecting and saying I feelthis way too.
I was a cancer survivor.
I feel this way too.
And I was like, wow, I didn'tknow.
Everyone is out there.
I'm like, well, if no one'sdoing this here in the Valley,
why don't I bring it here?
Because when I did find things,it was on the East Coast.
(40:01):
You know there are servicesthere, but it was like a lot of
online stuff and nobody wants tobe online.
They need a connecting person,and there used to be something
called Gilda's Club out here.
But I mean they, yeah, they'regone.
Speaker 2 (40:19):
They're not in the area anymore and I think there's
only maybe four or five in theentire world now.
It's really hard to keep anonprofit going right.
Speaker 1 (40:22):
Yeah, I mean, nonprofits are just like running
a business, right.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
Yeah, with a lot more red tape and a lot more
restrictions, yes, and it costsa lot of money to continue to
run and start a nonprofit.
And that's kind of where Italked to my friend, eileen
Alvarez, who also was a breastcancer survivor, and she was the
one who kind of helped methrough the whole process.
(40:46):
And I went to a yoga retreatprocess and I went to a yoga
retreat and for that whole weekI journaled and thought about
okay, what is my life going tolook like now?
I can't go back to thisproperty management and just get
back into the job and you knoweverything's good and go out and
party with friends.
It's like life is so differentand I need to find a way to heal
(41:10):
and get back to the new Sheabecause it's different.
Speaker 2 (41:14):
Yeah, I see things differently.
Speaker 3 (41:16):
And I called her on the I-10 and I said, hey, I know
what we're going to do.
And she's like, okay, what arewe going to do?
I was like you're going to bemy co -founder?
And she's like, okay, and she'slike laughing.
I said we're going to start anonprofit and that nonprofit is
going to be all about life aftercancer and we're going to build
support.
We're going to do a retreat forwomen at the time it was just
(41:39):
women who have gone throughbreast cancer because we need
this and it's going to be fullypaid for.
And she's like, oh my God,that's going to be expensive.
I go, yeah, I know, but I cando it, we can do it.
And she's like, okay, BecauseI'm like are you in?
And she's like, yes, I'm in.
And that's how it started.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
What year was this that was?
Speaker 3 (41:59):
in 2017.
Speaker 1 (42:02):
Okay, so you were just coming out, I was just
coming out of my process.
Speaker 3 (42:08):
But for me and the person that I've always been, I
work through a lot of healingand trauma and things and it's
what makes me thrive to figureout the pieces of the puzzle and
that's the entrepreneurial mindI guess you would say.
I would say, and you know italso, I noticed that when I
(42:31):
connected with other people andEileen connected with other
people, we were really able toall heal each other together.
We were stronger and there'snothing like that.
Speaker 2 (42:44):
We are building a community of thrivers.
Yeah, you have that whole bond.
I mean it's great because a lotof I know a lot of people that
are involved in your communityand your, your charity, so I
think that's I mean it'sfantastic and you do work so
hard to keep it going and keeppeople, your name out there and
things like that and but at thesame time, like think about how
(43:06):
much good you've done.
You know what I mean.
So you're definitely going toheaven.
It's not anytime soon, but youknow what I mean.
But seriously, I mean we well Ishouldn't say we run a
nonprofit, but Bobby and I areon the board for our son's
tackle football team and ittakes a ton of money to run that
thing.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
It's a lot of work, A lot of work yeah.
Speaker 2 (43:27):
So how did you end up up?
Because I know you did yoga andI think you did that at
Sunnyland.
So, like you ended up gettingsome big sponsors, I would
imagine that that kind of helpedyou get it going.
Speaker 3 (43:41):
Or how did?
How did that all kind of cometogether?
I started teaching yoga forEisenhower in 2008, early 2018.
Got it, Eisenhower, in 2008,early 2018.
Got it.
We decided to start writinggrants for the nonprofit right
away and our first grant that wewere given was by Bighorn BAM,
(44:02):
Bighorn Cares, oh yeah, andSelby Dunham, who was the
founder of that.
She's the one who gave us ourfirst $5,000 grant and it was
amazing because we're like, wow,someone really believed in us,
you know, and they understandthis walk and this process as
well, because her story ifyou've ever followed on her
(44:23):
story, I mean, she was anamazing woman that we lost a few
years back.
But you know, her story wasvery similar.
It's like there's not enough ofequipment at Eisenhower to do
this, so she started that withBighorn to be able to find some
of that equipment and that stuff.
And that's very similar to whatwe did, but we just did it in a
(44:48):
different way because we wantto help and make sure that
people understand they're notalone through the mind-body
connection, Because after thatcancer journey you don't want to
keep going back to the doctorall the time and doing that, and
there are amazing therapiststhat are out there.
There's nothing like having acommunity of peers that
understand the walk of yourjourney and the PTSD and what's
(45:09):
scaring, and because we all havethe same of your journey and
the PTSD and what's scary,Because we all have the same
thing in common and that it's wewant to live a long and
wonderful life, want to see ourkids and our grandkids and we
want to be the old people thatyou know one day.
Just go to sleep and that's ityou know.
Speaker 2 (45:27):
So then the retreats were planned like way in advance
, right?
So what did those look like toyou then, and what did they look
like now?
Speaker 3 (45:36):
Yeah, so their retreat is very similar now as
it was then, it's just gotten alittle larger.
We did a full buyout of theIngleside Inn for our very first
retreat.
We went to them over there andthey were were Yvonne is her
name and she was amazing.
We said like, hey, we want todo this cancer survivor retreat
(45:57):
for 25 women and this is whatwe're looking at.
We want to do some movement.
We want to do, we want to allowthe survivors to be able to
relax and reset and renewthemselves and we don't want
them to pay for anything.
Um, we'll take care of some ofthose sponsorships and that was
(46:20):
through the grants.
And then we went and gotsponsors and I think you
might've even sponsored us onour very first retreat to being
as tileded and it was.
It was great because this was away to bring people together in
almost.
Um, it was like on steroids,right, like three days and two
(46:41):
nights back then, and there'snothing like people that when
you walk through a door, theyalready understand your
connection.
Speaker 2 (46:50):
Oh yeah, it's something you guys all have in
common, and it's a bondinstantaneously.
Speaker 3 (46:54):
And then we wrote.
I wrote content with a coupleof other people that we
literally went through theentire time of what this cancer
journey is and what it does, andwe made sure that there's
actually like a workbook andeverything.
Speaker 2 (47:10):
So yeah, so you do.
Since you used to do themarketing for other things in
your life, I'm assuming you dothe marketing for this or is
that?
What's going on with that?
Speaker 3 (47:23):
I definitely have a lot of drive in the marketing of
Shays Warriors, but we hire anoutside marketing firm.
My daughter actually helps withsome of that.
Yeah, but we hire an outsidemarketing firm.
My daughter actually helps withsome of that.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Yeah, she's awesome.
Speaker 3 (47:32):
And then we have another social media gal named
Alex who helps a lot with that,because I am in the day-to-day
in-dated, the partnerships, theoutreach that you know we do,
and then I also have my own jobstill.
So you know it's a lot, it'sdefinitely a full-time job.
It is a lot of time, it's a lotof energy and a lot of efforts,
(47:56):
but the rewards are nothingthat I've ever felt in my life
for working for anything.
If I was paid to do this, Iwould be paid to do this because
it's amazing to get somebody'stestimonial back and say,
literally you saved my life.
I mean that is so humbling and Iunderstand it so much because
(48:21):
of the retreat that I went onand had a chance to kind of
decompress from everything,because I did live it on
adrenaline, and then I was like,oh my God, who the heck am I
now?
I mean those weren't my words,but I was like you know, we need
this and women need this, andthere are men that need this too
.
It's a different scenario whenit comes to guys, because
(48:45):
they're not going to sit at aretreat and kumbaya or anything
like that, Right, and that's notwhat the ladies do either.
But it's just a differentmindset and we've built both
programs for for survivors thatway, Wow.
Speaker 1 (48:57):
So you've opened it up to men now.
Speaker 3 (48:58):
We did yeah, and it's called the yo bro, I'm brave
too.
Because men are brave and goingthrough stuff like cancer is
something that men generally arenot going to want to talk about
in an open setting and they'renot going to talk about it to
their wives because men are bredto, you know, grow up and
(49:18):
protect the home and do all thisstuff and not have that.
But men are just as brave to gothrough cancer and sometimes
that little bit of vulnerability, if you're among a group of men
that you're just talking aboutbaseball or you're talking about
sports or whatever.
You know that they have thatsame commonality.
(49:38):
Um, so every eight weeks themen get together and our
non-profit pays for them to gettogether and have that community
.
And then the month of June,which is National Cancer
Survivors Month.
This year we'll do our first.
It's an all-day male experience.
Speaker 2 (49:55):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (49:57):
That's interesting and their bro, their bro.
We don't pay for the bro.
They have to pray forthemselves, but they can bring a
friend with, because it's aboutconnection, it's about
community, it's about supportand it's all about education too
, because you don't know whatyou don't know.
Speaker 2 (50:11):
Well, you just schooled me on something I
thought I guess it's breastcancer awareness is in October,
so June is National CancerSurvivors.
Month, so like no matter whatkind of cancer you had and where
it happened.
Speaker 1 (50:26):
So where would you guys, what's your big event, if
somebody was listening to thispodcast and they're like, hey,
you know, that sounds like aworthy cause.
Let me see what I can do tohelp contribute.
Do you have like a big eventthat you do a majority of your
fundraising, or do you havefundraisers throughout the year?
Kind of walk us through thatprocess.
Speaker 3 (50:42):
Yeah.
So I would say our biggestevent right now is coming up in
May it's actually Saturday, may10th, it's Mother's Day weekend
this year and it is at Wally's,desert Turtle.
And that event comes from thevision of Maddie and Malia, who
are the daughters of NicoleBotello and Michael Botello, who
(51:06):
owned Wally's and Maddie is nowthe owner of.
Wally's, and they lost their momto breast cancer and when we
had a chance we had mutualfriends, that kind of set us up
together.
We had a chance to talk aboutthis.
It was something that,unbeknownst to me, their mom
talked about doing before shehad passed away.
(51:26):
Oh, wow.
And they both have said I wishmy mom had had these programs
and these services and thiscommunity when she was going
through her cancer.
And so this Mother's Day tea isamazing.
There's only 200 tickets and itfully funds almost half of the
(51:47):
retreat itself and of courseit's beautiful, there's a lot of
stories, it's a lot ofconnection and it comes from too
.
The other thing is women, womensupport women, mothers
supporting mothers, the Tree ofLife.
I mean, it's all about that.
It's not that men can't come tothe tea, but it is just
(52:09):
something that Maddie is justvery proud about and we're very
honored to be able to host thetea there.
And I know you came, I guess, acouple years ago and I loved
the shopping, loved the shopping.
Speaker 1 (52:22):
Definitely built for women right.
Speaker 2 (52:23):
Shopping and tea.
She told me she's like youbetter come to this this year.
And I'm like, no, I'm coming.
She goes bring your kids.
I'm like my boys probably won'twant to go, but my girls will
probably want to go.
Speaker 1 (52:32):
Right, they would like to.
Speaker 3 (52:33):
It's a celebration of life, it's a celebration of
motherhood and it's acelebration of Nicole, who you
know for these beautiful youngladies that are also business
owners here in town.
I know Just flourishing.
Speaker 2 (52:49):
We should get them on the show because they are like
young, super young, yeah,maddie's super young and they're
just awesome and, man, sheknows how to run that business
right, yeah, well, she grew upin it.
Speaker 3 (53:00):
Yeah that's true.
Yeah, we're very proud of herand she sits on our board and
they both are a loving family.
We couldn't ask for anythingmore.
They both are loving family.
We couldn't ask for anythingmore.
And then, also this year, we'llbe honoring Aileen Alvarez, who
is my co-founder that we lostthis year in October, and her
(53:21):
daughters and her mom At the TAt the T as well.
Awesome and that was Maddie andMalia's thought for it and they
want to do that for her becauseEileen was such a huge part of
Shae's.
I always say that she was theheart of Shae's and I had the
vision and the other stuff.
I was the day to day, but shewould take care of the things
behind the scenes in a morecalming and politically correct
(53:44):
way.
So you know she's very muchmissed and I miss her every day,
especially when we have events.
Oh yeah, you know, but she'swith us still, absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1 (53:58):
So what advice would you give to somebody that's
maybe thinking about starting anonprofit or, you know, has this
burning desire to help theircommunity?
You know, where would you, whatwould your advice to?
Even where, even to start tokind of do that?
Speaker 3 (54:11):
Yeah, so don't go into a nonprofit if you think
people are just going to handyou money.
Speaker 1 (54:17):
That's the biggest thing.
Speaker 3 (54:18):
It's a lot of work right it is a lot of work and
there's a lot of legal red tapebehind it.
Get yourself a really, reallygood nonprofit attorney to put
bylaws together Very similar toan HOA board.
You have to have all of thatstuff.
The other thing is is put abusiness plan together.
(54:38):
A nonprofit is a business, likeI said in the beginning.
It just has a lot more red tapeand you're dealing with people
that are giving you money, donordollars, and so if they're
giving you lots and lots ofmoney, or if you're accepting
state funding or federal funding, there are differences between
that and there are restrictedfunds and there's non-restricted
(54:59):
funds.
You need to understand that andif you think you're going to
pay yourself for a whileprobably not going to happen.
And be ready, that people beready for putting some of your
own money up front for that.
I mean, I think when we startedit, I put up $30,000 of my own
money right away because Ibelieved in what we were going
(55:22):
to do.
And there are licensings, thereare bylaws.
Like I said, you have to meetwith an attorney who knows what
they're doing and make sureeverything is good to go.
Oh my gosh, so put thatbusiness plan together.
Speaker 1 (55:39):
It sounds like it.
I mean you're running it justlike a business.
The only difference is the taxreturn right, and then you can
accept donations, but other thanthat, you still need to bring
income to pay your bills and paypeople to work.
You know, it's the same kind ofthing.
So word to the wise on that one, guys.
Where can people find you ifthey're looking, If you hear
this podcast, Shays Warriors anawesome, awesome charity.
(56:01):
Where can they go to find youand find out about your events
and all that?
Speaker 3 (56:06):
Yeah, go to wwwshayswarriorsorg,
wwwshayswarriorsorg, and it'sS-H-A-Y and then warriorsorg,
that's where you can find us.
We've got the programs, we'vegot the events.
The retreat is on there.
Our nominations are opening up.
On Thursday you can nominate awarrior for the retreat.
(56:28):
The retreat is four days andthree nights.
Now Nobody knows this yet, soI'll tell you, guys.
First.
Speaker 1 (56:34):
Breaking news.
Speaker 3 (56:35):
Breaking news we have partnered with the Ritz-Carlton
for the next few years.
Speaker 2 (56:41):
That's a beautiful property.
Speaker 3 (56:45):
Our retreat is made to fully fund these survivors
for those four days and threenights.
They don't pay anything.
Are you?
Speaker 2 (56:52):
still doing 25 women, 25 to 30 women, 25 to 30.
Speaker 3 (56:55):
Yeah, it all depends on funding.
Yeah, that's true, that's true,and we watch that, of course,
and we work hard to make ithappen Well.
Speaker 2 (57:03):
I'm very proud that you're one of my good friends
and I'm sure the whole communityis just so thankful for you and
Shays Warriors and everybodythat is involved with Shays
Warriors, because it is a ton ofwork and you know.
But I've always tried to tellmy kids it's always better to
give than to receive, right, soit does.
It just fills your little heart.
Speaker 3 (57:23):
We have an amazing board of directors, we have
amazing advisory council and ourvolunteers are the best.
Amazing advisory council andour volunteers are the best, and
a lot of those volunteers arewomen or men that have been a
warrior themselves and they'vegone to the retreats or they've
come to the events and theythat's their way of giving back.
It's a full ripple effect.
It's amazing and we could notdo this without people like you
(57:47):
helping us get the word out.
And then also sponsors I mean,mean, that's you again.
You've sponsored us before andyou've been amazing and and I
will continue to.
So it's great yeah absolutely,and I'm so thankful you're my
friend, because me too yeah,love you, thank you well, we
want to thank you for coming inand kind of sharing your story
with us.
Speaker 1 (58:05):
It was amazing.
So everybody out there, shay'swarriors, great, non great
nonprofit here in the CoachellaValley.
If you found any value to thisconversation, you know the
routine like subscribe and share, and we'll see you guys next
time, thank you.
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