For a long time, I thought the real flex was taking down the patriarchy.  There was a fire in my soul screaming “no more of this craziness.”  I was enraged with all the statistics about gender gaps, pay gaps, minority gaps, and additional obstacles that women face when it comes to creating successful businesses.  

Here are just a few facts that created the mission to burn it all down: 

Pay gap: US women working full-time earn 81 cents for every dollar men earn — and the gap has widened for two straight years for the first time since the late 1990s. Census Bureau data show women dropped from 84 cents in 2022 to 83 in 2023 to 81 cents in 2024. Over a career, the average woman loses over $530,000 to the wage gap — nearly $800,000 for college-educated women. 

Funding gap: Of $289 billion in global VC funding in 2024, all-female founding teams received just 2.3% ($6.7 billion), while all-male teams took 83.6%. Even 2025's "record" $73.6B headline number is misleading — strip out...

“Courage starts with showing up and letting ourselves be seen”~Brene Brown

So many of my years were spent being the person I thought I “should” be. I am the first born, which means I am an over-achiever and strive for perfectionism. Some of my younger memories include being yelled at for my first “B”, going to weight watchers at ten years old, and being made fun of for the clothes I wore and the hairstyle I chose. Before that, I was a fun loving, free spirited, vibrant, live-out-loud kind of girl. Early in my years, just like most of us, I was taught what was acceptable. I was taught how good little Catholic girls were supposed to act. I was taught that achievement was of the upmost importance. I was taught how wives and mothers were supposed to behave. I was taught what was, and was not, acceptable within a marriage and a family.

I am grateful for all of these lessons and experiences, for it has made me the per...