The Biggest Threat To Women Today... Multi Level Marketing

This is a really tough post to write but it has to be done because if it reaches just one woman who is about to make a big mistake, it is worth it. I have been MIA from blogging for a few years for a few reasons. The first is that I have been busy taking care of my wild and crazy beautiful daughter Hope, who is now 4 :). The second reason is I have gone back to school to pursue a nursing career. The third is... I got involved in an MLM one that sells skincare and is relatively new and popular. Has to do with dermatologists? You may have guessed which one.... This is my story and my thoughts on getting involved in MLM's...

It was Spring of 2014 and money was tight, as it is for most of us these days lets face it. I was seeing a girl I knew through mutual friends posting about this company and how it was these famous doctors new skin care line that you can personally "invest" in. It caught my attention immediately because I am an esthetician who can't really work out of the house due to being a stay at home mom and student. She messaged me one day on FB and I remember it so clearly. The moment I saw the alert I didn't open it because I knew she would see that I read it. Thanks "seen" note FB messenger lol... But then curiosity got the best of me. I opened the message and agreed to a phone chat which then led to a "3 way" phone chat and the rest is history. Even though my husband was saying "you are being sold...." I wanted to prove him wrong and I pulled out my credit card and ordered a kit that ended up costing me $750 after taxes and it wasnt even the most expensive one. I truly believed all the success stories spilled to me on the phone, and it was going to be me too... I just knew it would be if I "worked" hard enough...

I got my stuff and I immediately really liked the product. Looking back now of course I would have. I didnt use any skin care when I was pregnant, and then when I had Hope I didnt really use much due to just being tired. This skin care line I got involved with is chemically heavy so it is fast results for many. This is not to knock the skin cares effectiveness at all or even the company actually. Technically this mlm is not responsible for how upline leaders train their downlines. Anyway, so because of the product working well, that gave me a genuineness when I was spreading the word about this. I truly believed I was doing a good thing. "Working" in this kind of business is essentially bugging the people you know, or just meet, via FB message or texts... I plugged into all the FB pages and training's. I did what the leaders said because I trusted them, and that eventually led to me signing 7 consultants under me and even had 30+  customers. I was getting my monthly paycheck deposited into my account each month usually between 300-500 bucks on average which I saw as our cushion money. I thought I was soo successful or at least right on the verge of it. Then in late September of this year I had a reality check... 

I added up all my checks for the year, and added all my expenses, and only made about 300 in profit... That wasn't even with my mail expenses for mailing samples. I made NO money. How could this be??!! I had these checks deposited into my account every month! I looked back and in addition to paying 25 a month for my websites and paying around 112 after tax and shipping for my personal use product to be "commissionable", I had numerous little extra charges of me placing orders through my "ghost" account to buy the products I needed, and for gifts/promotions etc... We are encouraged to do this from leaders because when you do that, it benefits your sales number for the month which also ends up benefiting your upline... It is all very confusing but this is how almost ALL MLM's work I have come to find out. 

I lived and breathed this company. It was all I could think about sometimes. It was my life for a year and a half. I really truly believed I was doing something for women, and for myself and my family. In reality though,  I have lost a LOT of money doing this. I have put my family in debt. Why? Because of the FB groups created by uplines waving all these success stories in your face. It seems so attainable, so and so earned her Lexus after all! In reality these are people you dont know and never would know if it werent for being added to this group... Oh and if you are not getting there, its because you have negative energy in your way, "dont give up!" The sad fact is when you aren't "giving up" you just keep going into debt month after month blaming yourself for your lack of success. If you look at all income discolsures for MLM's, only .01 percent make the big bucks. 99% are in debt and/or not making much money. This is how the business model is designed. Everyone CAN'T be successful with this, it just isn't possible. If it were, then the older MLM companies would have VERY high percentages of those at the top and they dont.. In fact they are almost worst!

I know this is long and if you made it this far I am so grateful, thank you. I want to leave you with this... When you see your sweet FB friend has joined a MLM company and is posting non stop, instead of rolling your eyes at her, or ignoring her messages, pray for her or if your not into that kind of thing, SAY something to her. This truly is a modern day cyber cult movement and even if they are not receptive, seeds will be planted... 

Hope is 10 months old! Update on her reflux and background from that time.

Miss Hope is 10 months young :)! She will be 10 and a half months tomorrow actually! Which means... We only have a month and a half until her first birthday!! So exciting!!!

I will start off with an update of her reflux issues. I have not noticed any more Sandifers episodes in over two weeks now. The zantac has very much helped but I have noticed she is gulping a lot again in these past few days. I have been introducing more table foods and I think something is bothering her... Her pediatrician said to continue offering everything (excluding dairy for now) and I have been so its hard to keep track. Until I notice any more Sandifers episodes I will continue her on her dose before I call her pediatrician. She has been spitting up a little the past few days too... Poor baby. The good news is she WILL grow out of this the question is when...

Last month was a very stressful month. I was offered an opportunity to work at my old spa for two weeks with lots of hours for early August. I am a stay at home mom and have been since I was pregnant ;)... I thought it would be a great opportunity to get out and make a little money while getting back into my old profession. My mom was going to watch Hope all of the two weeks. Being that I breastfeed Hope and she is still to this day not super crazy about solids I was stressed out about bottles. I used to be a mass milk producer when she was a newborn but around 6 months I was lucky to pump 4 extra ounces in 24 hours. I decided I needed to start working with her on taking at least one bottle of formula at least once a day while I was gone. I have absolutely NO freezer stash of breastmilk. There were other reasons this sounded good to me. I was feeling overwhelmed to put it frankly. Normally when a baby reaches 6-7 months of age they are taking in a good amount of solids and only nursing like 4-5 times a day. Well with miss Hope I have to force feed her solids which is only successful once a day and she still nurses 7-10 times a day! So yes giving her at least one bottle a day sounded like a good idea at the time.

I tried giving her a bottle of organic similac formula and she gave me the funniest look. She would not take it and started arching, screaming and literally threw the bottle across the room... My frustration set in. This was not going to go well. I tried mixing it in discreetly with a bottle of breastmilk but she was not fooled. This resulted in wasting the last of the breastmilk in the freezer and wasting the formula. I became very worried. What would we do while I work? She wont take bottles of formula and there is no way I can pump that much breastmilk to sustain her... The struggle lasted two days then I decided to just quit the bottle thing and sure enough the next day the sandifers spasms started. So with the dairy of yogurt and formula that was introduced to her her doctor concluded this would be the culprit. I felt and STILL feel awful about all of it. I was stressed out and just trying to do the right thing for when I was going to leave her for those two weeks. God works in mysterious ways though. JP and I decided it is not the time for me to go back to work for any amount of time. Hope nurses A LOT for a reason. Now that I know she has reflux it all makes sense. Reflux babies dont drink or eat large amounts at a time. They eat very small frequent meals in the day.

This only strengthened my passion for breastfeeding. Breastmilk has been her one and only safe food in her diet. She has no reactions to it whatsoever and it is the healthiest thing on Earth a baby and toddler can have. So needless to say breastfeeding is still going strong and will continue Im sure through her toddler years. It is very much a part of our routine and yes there are days that breastfeeding 8 times in a day is less than convenient especially with a curious 10 month old. Did I mention my 10 month old is walking now?! I just once again want to thank everyone who kept Hope in their prayers about all the spasms. Our prayer now is for her to heal and grow out of this reflux now!

Good News!!

Hope had her EEG on Tuesday the 3rd of July. It was scary but JP and I were confident this would just show our little one is perfect and healthy. She had quite the meltdown having these probes taped to her head and she absolutely had every right to feel that way. They had to scrub her head with an exfoliant and attach like 50 wires! It was looking like they may have to sedate her or reschedule the test but I just nursed her and her daddy put on her favorite song (letter sounds by Barbara Milne) and we got through it.  They did this crazy light in front of her eyes for like 5 minutes and she actually liked that part lol.

I got a call from her pediatrician this morning after 3 days of waiting and her results came back perfect and normal NO seizure activity. He is confident in these results and he is diagnosing her officially with reflux and posturing from the reflux. We are continuing her on the Zantac because it is working well for her. If we miss a dose and she eats a large breakfast then we see minor episodes. They don't bother her but we are sticking to a strict every 8 hour dose. She is eating solids SO well now! And the gulping has stopped! Woo hoo! It is such a relief to have confirmation that she is healthy but just has that annoying reflux. Its treatable and she will grow out of it. Thanks everybody for your prayers and good thoughts! Love you all!

Update on Hope

I just wanted to update everyone on Hope so far. We had her GI test on Thursday morning which showed her upper GI is functioning normally. This does not rule out reflux this was to make sure there are no abnormalities. There are none thank goodness.

Her doctor is pretty confident this is all reflux related and we are working on getting her reflux under control. She is on Zantac right now but I think we may need something stronger. She is still spitting up about once a day and having very minor episodes (2 on average mainly when she is tired). We have never had a day like the first day thank goodness so that means there is progress. If this is reflux triggered by a milk allergy then it could take 2-3 weeks to get the milk protein out of her system.

We are still doing the EEG which is a test to monitor her brain activity and look for seizures. I am extremely confident these are not seizures but as her doctor said we just need to cover all the bases. After the EEG we will probably also meet with a neurologist to show him the video of her movements. I'm not looking forward to these but I am confident all will come back normal.

Hope has been so much happier since starting the Zantac. She is content playing with her toys for longer periods of time and the gulping noise has subsided tremendously. She is also eating far more solids than ever before. About 8 ounces of baby food in a day. This is not a lot for most babies but for a reflux baby its definitely progress.

I will keep everyone updated.

Rough Patch...

This is not blog post I really want to write but I know it will help me feel better. I'm just so confused...

Hope has had some reflux issues from the beginning. Issues that I thought and was told are normal for infants to go through so I never thought much of it. I noticed around 3/4 months Hope was spitting up A LOT. She would projectile and it would just go everywhere. Being that she was so small and not keeping much of her food in it concerned me. It was suggested it could be a milk intolerance to the dairy in my milk which I was consuming a large amount of dairy products in these days. When I took the dairy out of my diet within a few days massive improvement. She would spit up maybe once a day a little bit instead of large amounts after every single feeding.

Infant reflux is supposed to improve especially when they start solids around 6 months. She seemed fine. She has always been a high needs baby and I would assume she just gets bored easily. At 9 months I was told anything except whole milk and honey is good to go. So I introduced yogurt to her and she loved it. Hope is a picky eater so I was ecstatic! Yogurt is full of probiotics, protein, healthy fat and calcium. I figured this is perfect since she doesnt eat much. I started giving it to her sometimes daily if not every other day. About a week after this (last week) I noticed her doing a strange swallowing noise. She would cry and do it but also be happy playing and do it. The best I could describe it as is a gulping noise. I thought maybe she had a sore throat.I called her pediatrician and he said yeah sounds like a little reflux. Nothing to be alarmed about. So I continued doing what we were doing. Giving her lots of new table foods, yogurt anything I can get in this picky monkeys mouth.

Last Thursday after giving Hope a yogurt and fruit meal I put her in her playpen after and visited with JP. She just started crying out of nowhere and I looked at her and she was doing this strange movement. I picked her up and she immediately stopped. I thought that was weird... I nursed her to sleep and she didnt do it anymore. The whole weekend I never fed her yogurt we were actually pretty busy and just doing regular baby food jars or the frozen food ive made her. Then Monday morning I got us back in our routine. I made her a BIG, baby bowl big, breakfast of rice cereal, two dollops of a fresh carton of whole fat yogurt and some fruit puree. She ate the whole thing. In my head I knew she was over eating but again she is picky and tiny I didnt feel right stopping her either. I picked her up and put her in her pack n play. I looked over at her about 20 minutes later and she was in the corner doing that strange movement again. I called her name and she snapped out of it and started crying for me..

I only saw it in the corner of my eye and missed it fully so I thought maybe its a weird thing she has discovered her body does. About three hours later I was feeding her sweet potatoes for lunch and she was fussing and then bent over and I then saw it up front. She did it again and something was not right. I immediately picked her up and I looked at the clock to call her pediatrician and of course it was 10 after noon... They lunch from 12 - 1:30! I took her upstairs to watch her play and I got this video of her doing it. This was the biggest one of them all.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pl2g2oPxYU

Due to her increasing reflux issues and the fact that she is so developmentally advanced and is present and can be brought out of these spasms if I interfere I was pointed in the direction of Sandifer Syndrome. This is a syndrome that affects 1% of babies with GERD (acid reflux). Basically its where the acid is so bad that it actually stimulates the vagus nerve. Her doctor thinks its a contender too when I bought that up. I just had to explain to him her symptoms and that she does in fact have reflux issues more than we both may have thought. So we are seeing a GI specialist tomorrow and Hope will have to fast all night and in the morning. They will give her a barium swallow to watch what it does. We will also be doing an EEG to rule out anything neurological for sure.

Please keep Hope in your prayers that this is just reflux because this can be controlled with the proper meds. She has continued having reflux symptoms despite giving her zantac prescribed by her doctor but she does seem a little better and happier. She has not had an episode in about 24 hours which is a good sign... I will keep you all updated.

Hope is 9 months!!

Our little Hope Leticia is 9 months old! I walked into Carters childrens store today and I was looking at the corner we used to shop in there and those days are long gone... Adorable newborn baby girl clothes.... The cutest little frilly dresses for an 8 pound human being. The teeny tiny onesies...I just cant believe my baby is growing up so fast.

Well even though my munchkin is growing up that doesn't mean she is a big girl... ha! She is far from being a big baby even at 9 months. We went to her well baby check up today and they weighed her in at 14lbs 12ounces. She is now 26.5 inches long. So 5th percentile for weight and 25th for height. She is such a munchkin! Her pediatrician was so amazed at how full of personality and energy she is. He said there is absolutely no sign of developmental delays and  she has zero red flags for autism or other neurological issues. She is extremely bright and curious. They had to do a toe prick to check her iron levels and her numbers came back perfect, yay! She didnt even flinch she was fascinated by the process. Future doctor?

Miss Hope decided to start working on those first steps last week. She will stand there for a few seconds and take a step and just plop to the floor. She wants so bad to take off running but shes just working on her balance right now. She cruises all around her room grabbing onto the wall, dressers, her crib and just walks all around. She also said mama! She only says it when she is crying for me though. She just cries mama mama mama! Its adorable.

She is pretty much over purees now and moving onto table food. I wish I could keep her on purees because choking risk scares me but she would rather munch on food herself. Aside from still nursing and cosleeping the rest is a new adventure! Sometimes I have no clue what im doing honestly lol! Soon my baby will be running all over this house and eating big kid food! Next phase is onto the planning of her first birthday party!! Stay tuned!

Things I wish I had known before baby....

In the last month before I had Hope I had all these expectations if you will. I had her co-sleeper set up and just knew that she would sleep in there. I had all her clothes for her size washed (or size I thought she would be) and imagined putting her in so many of the outfits her first week. I thought breastfeeding would be painless and amazing. I thought regardless of what people said that it would be easy.

Here's the top ten realities of having a newborn were for me:

10.) That we should have had some preemie clothes on hand because she was so teeny. She wouldn't fit in any of her clothes for at least a month.

9.) That because breastfeeding can be an excruciating experience for some mothers; you should have a nipple shield on hand. I believe if I had one on hand, it would have saved us a very expensive visit to a lactation consultant.

8.) Breast pumps are not only for moms who go back to work. Having one when baby arrives is extremely helpful in pumping for engorgement, having someone feed a bottle of expressed milk so you can take a nap and if you add a couple pumpings on top of feedings you will establish a very plentiful supply.

7.) That your baby may not sleep in a crib or bassinet. This was my biggest shock becoming a mother. Every time (and to this day) I would lay Hope down when she was asleep she would wake up kicking screaming and punching out of her swaddle. If I had educated myself on safe cosleeping in our bed before she came, then I would have been a much happier and rested mama the first week.

6.) Having formula in the house as a "just in case" could have been breastfeeding sabotage. I harmlessly kept a sample can of formula that was mailed by a formula company and I was literally (this close) to using it when I had my breastfeeding issues. When a mother is hormonal, tired and frustrated this is a sure way to sabotage a breastfeeding relationship. If it weren't for my husband and close friends, who knows what would have happened with breastfeeding for us.

5.) I wish I had done cloth diaper research before having her. We spent a lot of money on disposables the first few months even with having many boxes from our baby shower. Newborns go through about 12 diapers a day. That is about 360 in just the first month. That is about $100 on disposable diapers in just the first month when you can get quite a large stash of cloth diapers that will last you forever.

4.) That you may have a rashy baby... Hope has very sensitive skin and she gets diaper rashes very easily and she has mild eczema. I used aquaphor, desitin, A&D, coconut oil, breastmilk, Caldesene (yikes dont use that) and even vaseline... Finally after her awful rash would NOT clear up I saw my lanolin nipple cream lying there. I thought "If that stuff could heal and soothe my blistered, raw and bleeding nips why wouldn't it help this?" BEST discovery I ever made. I have never used anything else for her rash it works EVERY single time. Plus a lot of the products above use petroleum which is a known potential cancer causing ingredient :(. Wish I had known that before. 

3.) That your baby can be allergic to milk in YOUR milk... Hope has always been quite the spitter upper but around 3 to 4 months it got really bad. Like projectile. Naturally, spitting up does peak around this time but something wasn't right. There was a little blood in her dirty diaper and it was greenish and her spit up was so aggressive. I was told to analyze my diet and if I had added something new. I had started having a bowl of cereal with milk every morning and JP and I had gotten into a bad ice cream habit at night. So it was determined she was having an allergy to the dairy in my milk (very common). I switched to almond milk, stopped the ice cream (good idea for me) and her spitting up decreased significantly over night. WISH I had known...

 2.) That there is such a thing as a small healthy baby. Hope was born at about the 25th percentile. She has continued to drop from this percentile gradually and was in the 2nd percentile at 6 months. She has never lost weight since her first week of birth but she just does not gain quick at all. I would say about a pound a month or so, sometimes less. Thankfully I don't have a pediatrician for her that is fixated on "fattening" her up. She is healthy and small and this is possible and normal. Phew....

1.) That they are only teeny babies for a few months... For some reason looking at all our newborn stuff in her room before her arrival I thought she would be using and in these things for months or for a year! Boy was I shown wrong. They grow so fast. My 8 month old is almost walking!


I just wanted to share some of the things ive learned for our family. I have my own parenting style than others. I am passionate about certain things and other moms are passionate about other things or maybe even the same things. I guess thats the journey of parenting though. You dont know what kind of parent you are going to be until little one gets here. I wish I had known those things as it would have made things easier but no matter what Im here regardless. Just educate yourself on every possible thing you can and you will do great. The real prize is that baby burrito in your arms! Oh boy mama is getting baby fever again... :-P