Well, the TL;DR is that The Rising Tide Society really pulled through for me.

Shortly after this post, I connected to an artist named Kit Gray. What I knew from the start was that she was an artist just starting her business in Colorado. We quickly found out we had a lot of similarities in our life experiences. While she has lupus and I have MG, we both became ill during young-adulthood (I was 10, she was 12), left careers and hopes and dreams behind as our health worsened, and discovered art as a way to find a sense of purpose. We overlapped in the types of treatments we’ve been on. We both love rescue dogs. We even realized our wedding anniversaries are a day apart.

It was a relief to talk to another sick business owner and not have to explain what the IVIG flu is, why I sometimes wore an eye patch while I painted, and why measuring the success of my business against someone who is healthy would always leave me feeling depressed. It never felt weird. It never felt forced. It felt like I belonged. And as our friendship solidified, we realized what an empty vast space there was of nothing-ness for creative entrepreneurs who are managing chronic illnesses.

Meeting someone like Kit who is absurdly talented made me realize just how resilient, tenacious, and creative sick people are. We have no other choice but to find a way to make it through, above, around, and beyond the obstacles in our way. It's a very handy trait to have as a business owner.

In February 2016, I wrote an email to one of the co-founders of Rising Tide with Kit’s encouragement.

“Hey y’all. A few of us on RTS have chatted about the possibility of starting a virtual TuesdaysTogether for creative business owners who are also managing long term illness/disability and are not able to regularly attend their local gatherings due to their health. Would this be a possibility? I envision it as a closed Facebook group where we can support each other through the unique challenges that being a disabled business owner presents, and once a month use Google Hangout to virtually get together and discuss that month’s meeting topic.”

Spoiler alert: THEY SAID YES. 

While Rising Tide has traditionally always focused on in-person gatherings, TuesdaysTogether Creative and Chronically Ill became the first online chapter. Over the years we’ve grown to be a community of over 700 creatives from around the world. The common thread is that we are all also balancing some type of chronic illness or disability. It’s our safe haven and one of my favorite corners of the internet.

I think this is also around the time when I stopped differentiating between “in person friends” and “online friends”. Kit and I have talked nearly every day for 4.5 years. We’ve never met in person. 

Over the years we’ve both grown alongside each other as artists and leaders. Her art business has thrived and she’s explored and mastered new mediums. We’ve commiserated over text and video calls about work, life, health insurance, and ruined paint brushes. I like to call Kit my side-hustle business bestie work wife, but in actuality she is a dear friend who I admire greatly. My life would have a little less color and a lot less support if we had not connected through Rising Tide or formed TTCCI. We wouldn’t have this community of creatives by our sides. 

She's helped shift my mindset and understanding of the power of community. That has made an incredible impact on me and I think it was a big influence in the last few years of my life. This is about the time when the story of “me” becomes the story of community. 

More on that next time.