My New Adventure With Elk River Soap Company

This year has been crazy with things going on medically and financially. One of the best decisions I have made was starting a new adventure as an Elk River Soap Company Independent Affiliate. I started with Elk River Soap Company in February of 2017, when the affiliate program was only 3 months strong. We have grown considerably since then.

The reason I joined Elk River was because for the first time in forever I finally found products that I can use without causing bad reactions. Not only was being able to soak in a relaxing scented bath a reason but also the fact that Elk River strives to make everything handmade in small batches to make sure you are getting the best quality of product.

The products are never tested on animals and our non-toxic. (FYI my nephew ate a monkey farts lotion bar and lived without having to go to the hospital lol).

Another thing that drew me to them was the fact that they try to remain as natural as possible most of our products are 97%-100% natural. ERSC is a very small family owned business who employees 13 people. I know, crazy right! The owners are fully involved in every aspect of the company, including the affiliates program.

Oh and the honey that is in some of our products comes directly from the owners personal beehives :) How cool is that?!

If your interested in joining my team please feel free to email me at jdvonada@gmail.com or you can find me on Facebook at Messy Jessy's

You can also join or shop by going to: elkriversoapcompany.com/#jvonada

My Year in Review

So, it’s been forever since I actually sat down to write. I feel like it is much needed right now for me. A lot of things have happened this year; job loss, health problems with family, a new niece and just life.

In March my boss of 10 years started to merge with another company. He assured us for weeks that our jobs were safe. Then less than a week from close, he took us into his office, told us the office was no longer going to be local and that we were losing our jobs. Yeah, it was interesting. At first I was excited at the thought of a vacation.

Then a few months later the health of my grandparents started to decline. This resulted in doctors’ appointments and even several week hospital admissions. So in a twisted way the lay off from KCC was a blessing. I still take my grandparents to their appointments and help them as much as I can. Some days it is really stressful and brings me to tears. I know my Gramma wants me to find another job, and I do to. But, that leaves them without me to help and drive for them to appointments. They are too bull headed to realize they shouldn’t be driving.

Thanksgiving was a great time. My cousin who lives out of state came home for the holiday with his family. We had a lot of fun and he and his fiance were a big help with Gramma. It was like a week vacation for me, I know that sounds sad to say, but it’s true. I was sad to see them go, not because of the help they gave, but because of how much I miss them when they aren’t here.

This Christmas wasn’t what I am use to, for 31 years my mom’s family has always gotten together and celebrated on Christmas Eve but, this year my grandfather decided that he didn’t want to go. That resulted in my Aunt Dee and Aunt Bee’s families doing their own thing. Even though I am close to most of my family I still feel out of place, almost like I am intruding. Ever since mom died December 8^th, 2008 I feel like a third wheel, seems crazy and I know I am partially to blame for that. I still went to my grandfathers to see him Christmas Eve. It is, after all his day of the year for us.

Christmas Day was spent at my dad’s parents. I cooked a meal and invited my Uncle Kev to come. He even lived with my grandparents for a few years when he was a teenager and is like a brother to my Dad &Uncle D.

My year has been full of ups and downs, many tears have been shed and I am sure next year will be the same. My goal for the New Year is to find some balance in my life. I need to support myself, but I need to help my grandparents. Somehow, some way I will find a way to balance this all out.

Best of Luck,

J.D. Vonada

Betrayed and filled with Anger and Hurt

I am an observer by nature, if that makes sense. This means I observe things and put the pieces together. Well when I was staying with my aunt I was noticing all sorts of things. She is an addict, and is really bad to the point where my cousin’s disability check gets spent on her debt. She hasn’t even been paying her rent it’s that bad. I have dealt with friends having addictions to hard core drugs and it never had the effect on me that my family’s addictions do. Anyhow, one weekend I stayed with my Aunt and my other two Aunt’s showed up. They confronted my youngest aunt, mind you she is the one I am closest to and was here day after day with my mom when she was sick. Apparently, she took my deceased grandma’s mothers ring and wedding ring and pawned them off to get pills.

Now let’s rewind to November 17^th, 2013. I remember this day because it is the day that my Momma and I got baptized. Well on this day two of my Aunts were at my house; Aunt B and Aunt T. Both have reputations for stealing and lying. Well a bunch of my mom’s pain medicine for her cancer went missing. Aunt T blamed Aunt B, none of us questioned it. Until, Aunt B and Aunt D confronted Aunt T about pawning off those rings.

Well, it made me think back over the course of the past few years. My Aunt T had admitted one or two times to stealing my Moms pain medicine in the past. I put two and two together and come to the conclusion that my Aunt T waited for a day when one of my other Aunt’s was there to steal my Mom’s pills so she could blame it on someone else. It frustrates me to no end because if you have ever watched someone who is dependent on a pill or anything goes through withdrawal it’s not fun. Let alone it be your mother who was fighting cancer for years and in her last few weeks of life. Watching my mother sweat, puke, get the shakes on top of dying just goes right through me. I cannot for the life of me forget that. You feel so helpless and you know there is nothing you can do.

When my Gram passed in 2010 my Aunt T was given my Grams wedding and mothers ring. But she gave my Mom the mothers ring to keep. When my mom passed I decided to give her back the ring since it was willed to her. Then to find out she just pawned something so precious to our family off like that is beyond frustrating. I came home and discussed it with my dad and he told me that my Mom thought it was Aunt T but she didn’t want to say it because she wanted her around. I can understand that because I would have laid Aunt T out and she would have been crying because you don’t do that to you sister who is dying of cancer. In the mean time she blamed Aunt B and I believed her. I feel so rotten for threatening to call the cops on Aunt B.

Morale of the story Addiction sucks; don’t ever believe an addict no matter what because they lie. I have realized that everything she has told me is a lie. She was getting help on a program, my grandfather paid a lot for her to get started and she just gets the pills and sells them to pay off her debts to people. She can’t get ahead. Everyone else is practically paying for everything my little cousin has. It’s a sad situation and a lot of the reason I don’t go around her anymore is because I can’t get over this. All I keep picturing is my Mom going through withdrawal on top of dying. Sad part is my Mom only made it to see December 8th, 2013 and in the last few weeks she not only endured hospital stays, having a tube put in her lung to drain the cancerous fluid out 24/7; she also had to go through withdrawal. Just breaks my heart thinking the one person my Mom and I loved the most could do this. 

Amazing Holiday

On December 8th it was one year since my Momma passed. Although that day was hard and at times unbearable what took place after that day was amazing. I know in my heart that my Mother and God have blessed my family this month. 

There was some drama with my Aunt's ex in laws in the beginning of the month, it included down talking my family, trying to get my little cousin put into foster care, lying about what others were saying and trying to get my aunt kicked out of her home. Sounds awesome right? Yeah not so much but it's ok now. Our family has been overcome by addiction by several people. It's been years since we actually had a family event where everyone was sober or not talking about where they were getting their next fix. I know what a family huh? Well a few months ago one of my Aunts started a treatment plan to get clean. Yay!! After what happened this month with my other Aunts ex in laws and the threat of losing my cousin she is now starting treatment. Double Yay! Needless to say this was the quietest Christmas Eve or family event in years. That alone is just amazing and I didn't want to strangle people either. 

It's  been a tradition for the past few years that my cousin and his family come home for Christmas. They live in North Carolina which is about 10 hours from us. Well the week visit, just as years past, went way to fast. Although, it was truly amazing to be able to see how much his son has grown. The best part of Christmas day was the fact that my Uncle who hasn't really been apart of any family gatherings had taken me up on the offer of coming to visit us at my Gram and Pap's. You have no idea how much this meant to me and everyone in my family. I have always loved my uncle as well as my family. Things just happened and feelings got hurt; which is never easy for either side. I still get tears in my eyes thinking about how blessed god has made my families this year. 

So with my Christmas holiday being truly a blessing from God. Here is to a New Year full of Hope, Love and Family! 

Bad Friend

For the past several weeks I have noticed a change in my personality as well as my emotions. One of which resulted in me being a  bad friend. I am not who I use to be several years ago. It seems that at that time I was a social butterfly who loved hanging out with my friends and family. Now I would rather just stay home with my dad. 

For the past few weeks I have been without my cell phone because I just cant justify spending money on a cell when I pay for a home number. Well I had asked my best friend about hanging out with her for her birthday. She said she would let me know and she did but I didn't get the message until I was already home last night and didn't have the gas to go back to town. I feel so horrible and wished at that point I had my cell turned on so I could have gotten her message. It would have been so great to hang out with her on her birthday. Last year I wasn't able to due to my mom being sick with the cancer. I have other friends to that have taken a back seat with me. I am not sure what my plans are for New Years Eve but I think that as long as the weather is good I am going to make the trip to see my best friend aka Sister. I miss her so much!

Feeling Blah

Lately I been feeling down. I know a lot of it is coming from the fact that I haven't taken my medicine in almost 2+ Weeks. Kinda hard to do so when you run short on money after paying the bills and have just enough, if enough for gas to get back to work. So needless to say med's took a back seat. I don't make a lot of money where I work and I am in the process now of switching to a work from home job. So hopefully working from home will help with my mood and having more money because I will be making $.75 more an hour and also not paying for gas or parking tickets. Everyone is always saying how I need to park in the back parking lot at work and get a permit. Well yes that is a great idea! Except for the fact that I am unable to walk that far without feeling like I can't breath. I keep up with my tickets and send checks in every pay to take care of them so they don't go to magistrate. I come home and find that one slipped through the cracks. I had no idea and thought I took care of this. I don't know what else to do. I am always feeling like shit, feel like everyone is yelling at me, nothing I do is good enough. Guess that is life and I should just get over it. I would never kill myself but sometimes I just wish it would all end. You don't know what it's like to know that your always going to be the fat girl. Yes, if I eat right I could manage my insulin disorder better. However, everything healthy cost money. I gotta make sure the bills at home are taken care of before I can go out and spend whatever on healthy food. As I said before after bills and gas is taken care of I barely have enough for medicine so where the hell am I coming up with the money for healthy food. I just don't know what to do anymore. Just seems like I am in this on going hell where everything is fucked up and always will be. 

Whats on my mind..

I have had somethings on my mind recently. One of those being my friend Michelle who is dealing with Lupus. She gets these painful spots all over her body and some have even began to bleed. She is having such a heard time finding a treatment plan that works for her. Sometimes it has even made it worse. I have learnt a lot from her about Lupus. I have heard of it before but never understood what exactly it was. I still have so much to learn about lupus and hope that someday they are able to find a magic pill or treatment to help people suffering from lupus live normal lives. See Michelle has lost a lot due to this autoimmune disease. She is no longer able to live the life she use to such as enjoying the outdoors without being covered completely and is pretty much confined to her home. Any sunlight causes her to have bad reactions and break out in those painful sores. I honestly wish for this reason that marijuana was legal in our state so she could maybe have some sort of relief from the pain.

Then there is my handsome and daring nephew. This boy is so full of life. But recently his mom has come out and told us that one day on the bus he came home with marks from where a little girl had stabbed him with a pen. She has also threatened to kill him. He is only in grade school and has to deal with this. People need to raise their children right instead of sitting on Facebook all day and not taking time to interact with their children. Breaks my heart to know he is going through this. What has this world come to?

I have several friends who suffer chronic pain on a daily basis. Yes i know there are pain medicines out there but they do more damage to your body. I really think this state needs to approve medical marijuana. I guess what really is on my mind is not being able to help my friends to be comfortable. Ugh! So if you could please say a prayer for someone you know who is suffering from an internal battle, whether it be depression, chronic pain or a chronic illness.