Business With Chronic Illness: Women Entrepreneurs Navigating Burnout & Autoimmune Conditions

Hosted by Nikita Williams | Sustainable Sales & Business Restructuring Coach

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243

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Aug 2026

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About the show

Building a business as a woman entrepreneur with chronic illness comes with realities that most business advice never addresses — burnout, unpredictable energy, and the need to put health first while still wanting meaningful growth. Business With Chronic Illness is a globally ranked podcast featuring honest conversations with chronic illness entrepreneurs, founders, and CEOs navigating business growth while living with chronic illness and autoimmune conditions. Through real stories and practical insight, the show explores how people build businesses that are sustainable, simple, and aligned with their health, not at the expense of it. Each episode centers on conversations rooted in real experience, covering: - Health-First Business Growth: growing at a pace that honors your body - Burnout & Capacity: navigating energy, flare-ups, and rest without guilt - Simple & Sustainable Business: stripping away unnecessary complexity - Success Stories: real people redefining what success looks like with chronic illness This podcast is for entrepreneurs and founders who are: - Living with chronic illness or autoimmune disease - Burned out from hustle culture or one-size-fits-all business advice - Building, growing, or reimagining a business that must work with real life - Looking for stories and strategies that feel honest, grounding, and possible Expect thoughtful, grounded conversations, not hype. This is a space for nuance in strategies and execution, for reflection and learning through real stories, not for pressure or performative success. About the Host Hosted by Nikita Williams, a globally ranked podcast host, award-winning business coach, and speaker who has built a six-figure business while navigating endometriosis, Hashimoto's, fibromyalgia, and chronic pain. Nikita brings lived experience, deep listening, and a health-first perspective to conversations that are often missing from the business world. The show has featured respected founders and thought leaders such as Jasmine Star, Danielle Bayard Jackson, Nitika Chopra, Courtney Elmer, Natasha Samuel, and Kinsey Soderberg, alongside entrepreneurs navigating business with chronic illness in real time. This podcast doesn't offer one-size-fits-all strategies or hustle narratives. Instead, it creates space for lived experience and multiple ways of defining success when the priority is to put your health first now, not later. - Listen & Connect: Follow Business With Chronic Illness to hear new conversations each month, and join the extended community through reflections and discussions connected to the show.

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September 23, 202644 min

Is Your Marketing Growing Your Business or Just Giving You More Work?

If your marketing only works when you are actively showing up, posting, creating, and being visible, then every time your capacity changes, your marketing will slow down too. That is the reality for most women building businesses while living with chronic illness, navigating burnout, or simply trying to create space for the rest of their lives. And the answer is not to do more. The answer is to build a marketing system that keeps working even when you need to step back. In this episode, I am answering one question that will completely shift how you think about your podcast, your social media, and your entire marketing strategy: Is your podcast actually growing your business, or is it just giving you more content to make? And if you do not have a podcast yet, this question still applies to whatever platform you are using right now because the principle is the same. Are you building an asset that works for you, or are you feeding a system that demands you show up every single day? In this episode, I cover: Why most podcast growth advice is designed for people trying to grow a show, not a business, and why that distinction matters. The business problem my podcast was designed to solve and how that shaped every decision I made about content, format, and strategy. The difference between hiring your podcast to grow your audience and hiring it to grow your business, and why conflating the two will burn you out. What actually matters when your podcast exists to serve your business: not just downloads, but inquiries, referrals, conversions, and whether people understand what you actually help them do. Why long-form content works better for deep thinkers, deep feelers, and people whose work requires nuance, context, and trust, especially in a world where AI can spit out quick fixes. How to use your podcast as a leverage tool, not another platform that demands you perform every day, and what that looks like in practice. The real metrics you should be tracking if your podcast is a business asset: email list growth, DMs, sales calls, referrals, and whether your funnel is actually moving. This episode is for you if: You are using social media as your primary marketing platform, and you are exhausted by the constant demand to show up, pivot when the algorithm changes, and perform in two-minute increments. You have a podcast, but you are not sure if it is actually helping your business grow, or if it is just another content treadmill. You are a deep thinker or a service provider who works with complex problems, and you feel out of integrity trying to package your expertise into seven-second hacks. You live with chronic illness, changing capacity, or caregiving responsibilities, and you need a marketing system that works even when you cannot be visible. You are tired of podcast growth advice designed for people building a show as the business, not for people who already have a business and need the podcast to serve it. Share Your QA's or Thoughts and Join our Free Community Channel Here ! Subscribe HERE to join the Create Your Abundant Path Email Series. Learn how to build a business that keeps working long after you've closed your laptop. In this free email series, you'll discover how to create business assets, simplify your marketing, and build a sustainable business that fits your life, not the other way around. Leave us a Review and share this episode with a friend.

September 9, 20261 hr 2 min

Why "Just Show Up" Is Business Advice Your Nervous System Can't Follow | Anna Holtzman

You've heard it a hundred times. Post more. Get on video. Just show up. Nobody tells you what happens in your body when showing up feels physically unsafe, not just uncomfortable. Anna Holtzman spent five years helping people with chronic pain while hiding her own migraines. She thought that's what it meant to be professional. By the end of every day? Headache. The concealment itself was feeding the migraine pattern. In this episode, Anna and I talk about the mask we wear to look professional, what it costs us, and what becomes possible when we stop performing. Anna Holtzman is a therapist, coach, and founder of a practice built around helping people work with their nervous systems, not against them. She teaches visibility from a nervous system lens and specializes in supporting people navigating chronic symptoms, career reinvention, and the emotional experience of running a business. She got into this work through her own experience with chronic migraine and discovering that the tension of concealment was part of the pattern. In this episode, we cover: Why the tension of concealment drains your energy and feeds chronic symptoms How masking your vulnerability cuts you off from creativity and authentic expression Why performing the inhuman professional makes it harder to market your business What happens to your nervous system when you're twisting yourself into a pretzel to look regulated Why people don't trust the mask but do trust the moment when you say I see a therapist too How business is just a type of relationship and relationships require being human What becomes possible when you stop performing professionalism and let yourself be a full human being in your work This episode is for you if: You feel drained by the end of the day even when your workload wasn't that heavy You sit down to create content and think I don't know what to say You're hiding symptoms or struggles because you think that's what it means to be professional You wonder if being more visible would drain you or trigger a flare-up You're tired of performing a version of yourself that doesn't feel true 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

August 26, 202658 min

Rebuilding Your Capacity After Caregiving Burnout and Business Loss | Erika Coleman

What if the way you measure success is actually what's burning you out? Erika Coleman thought she had it figured out. Give your best, maybe a little more, and things work out. It worked for years, until it didn't. In 2022, her mom was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. And for the next 14 months, she watched her business sales and her mom's health drop in tandem. She gave more and more and more, following every rule, checking every box. But the results didn't go up. They went down. Her mom passed away. Two months later, she had to close her business. And then her body finally shut down. She was too tired to smile at her daughter's drawing. That's when she knew something had to change. Erika Coleman is a high-performance researcher, speaker, and founder of the Even Achieving method. After earning her master's degree from Harvard studying stress, well-being, and performance, she discovered what most of us get wrong about pacing. It's not about slowing down. It's not about protecting your energy. Pacing is an athletic endeavor. It's how you win your race without killing yourself in the process. In this episode, we cover: Why giving your all doesn't mean you're giving your best, and how to tell the difference The hidden cost of using effort to prove you care (and what to measure instead) How grief and business demand collide, and why pushing harder makes both worse What happens when your body finally shuts down after months of override The small moments that matter most when you're chasing big, Instagram-worthy memories How to pace yourself like an athlete, not a martyr Why high performance requires rest, not more hustle This episode is for you if: You've been giving everything you have and the results still aren't what you expected You're carrying grief, caregiving, or health challenges while trying to keep your business afloat You use busyness to prove you care, and you're burnout and exhausted You've hit a point where your body won't let you push anymore You want to learn how to give your best without giving your all Connect with Erika Coleman: https://www.erikacolemanspeaks.com 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room . ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

August 12, 202658 min

Rebuilding Your Business After Burnout Without Starting Over With Fibromyalgia | Dr. Alicia Newsome

Learn how to rebuild your business after burnout and create a more sustainable path to growth. Dr. Alicia Newsome shares her transformative journey navigating the challenges of Fibromyalgia while running a business. After pushing through a demanding schedule, including live webinars and sales calls, while seven months pregnant and battling COVID, she realized the unsustainable nature of her approach. In this episode, she opens up about the true cost of relentless hustle and how a fibromyalgia diagnosis prompted her to rebuild her business model for sustainability. Trusting her team became a crucial health strategy, allowing her to prioritize her well-being. If you're juggling burnout, autoimmune conditions, or chronic illness in your entrepreneurial journey, Alicia's insights will inspire you to embrace a more balanced and compassionate approach to business, one that honors your health and peace. In this episode, we cover: What burnout actually looks like beyond physical exhaustion — the mental looping, the disconnection, the collapse of clarity Why Dr. Alicia stopped doing sales calls entirely and how she rebuilt her intake process to be asynchronous What it cost her to mimic someone else's success and what it took to reconnect to what was true for her The difference between rest that restores and rest that's just survival How she built a business that's more profitable than ever without being tied to her desk What it means to hire coaches whose lives you actually want to mimic Why the standard online business model assumes unlimited capacity — and what to do when you don't have it This episode is for you if: You've been told you just need to push through, hire better, or fix your mindset — but the real problem is the model itself Your business requires you to be on all the time to make money, and you're exhausted You've followed all the right advice and still ended up burnt out You're rebuilding after burnout and don't know how to do it differently this time You're pregnant, postpartum, or navigating a health challenge while running a business 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

July 29, 202658 min

Why Motherhood Makes You Better at Business (Not Worse): Lessons on Burnout, Capacity & Building a Sustainable Life | Priya Rednam Waldo

The business advice you're following probably wasn't written for someone whose capacity changes with the seasons of motherhood. It wasn't written for someone navigating pregnancy, postpartum, chronic health challenges, or school pickup while trying to grow a business they love. In this conversation, licensed perinatal therapist, keynote speaker, CEO, and mother of four Priya Rednam Waldo shares why motherhood doesn't make you less capable—it can actually make you a stronger leader and business owner when you stop measuring success by constant productivity. Drawing from her own experience with military service, chronic health challenges, traumatic birth experiences, postpartum mental health, and building a thriving private practice, Priya shares what it really looks like to create a business that honors your values, your family, and your changing capacity. Whether you're raising children, navigating chronic illness, recovering from burnout, or simply trying to build a business that fits your real life, this episode offers a refreshing perspective on success that doesn't require sacrificing yourself to achieve it. In this episode, we discuss: Why motherhood can make you a better business owner—not a less capable one How chronic illness, burnout, and changing capacity reshape the way we work Building a business that supports your life instead of competing with it Letting go of perfectionism and redefining success on your own terms Creating a sustainable business model that doesn't require you to be available 24/7 Why building a support village is essential for both motherhood and entrepreneurship Protecting your energy, honoring your values, and making decisions without guilt How to lead with intention instead of constantly pushing through exhaustion This episode is for you if: You're building a business while raising children and wondering if it's possible to do both well. You're navigating pregnancy, postpartum, or the changing seasons of motherhood. You live with chronic illness, burnout, or fluctuating energy and need a more sustainable way to work. You're tired of business advice built around unlimited capacity and constant hustle. You want to build a successful business without sacrificing your health, your family, or yourself. 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Connect with Priya Rednam Waldo Website: https://priyarednamwaldo.com/ Instagram @priyarednamwaldo Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

July 15, 202646 min

How She Built a full-Time Income with 5-10 Hours a Week (No Ads, One Platform) | Tracy Beavers

You don't need to be on every platform to build a profitable business. You need one platform, a plan, and a list you actually own. Tracy Beavers is a business and sales coach who built her entire coaching business while working corporate full-time, raising teenagers who played every sport with a ball, and honoring a promise to her husband that she wouldn't touch their retirement until she had proof of concept. She had 5 to 10 hours a week. That's it. So she built a system that worked without her needing to be online 24/7. In this episode, we cover: Why visibility without strategy is just noise and noise doesn't pay the bills The Minimal Viable Option: the least amount of content you need to grow your list and make money How Tracy turned one weekly Facebook Live into a full-time income in 18 months Why your email list is the only asset you actually own and what happened when Tracy got locked out of Facebook DMs during a launch How to choose one platform and build a sustainable marketing system around your actual capacity What to do when you're too tired to show up but you promised yourself you would Why stepping down gradually from corporate allowed her income to grow instead of drop This episode is for you if: You've been told you need to be on every platform to grow and you're exhausted trying You're building a business with limited time, limited energy, or unpredictable capacity You're creating content that gets engagement but not sales and you don't know why You're scared that if you slow down or disappear for a week your business will collapse You want to know how to turn visibility into actual revenue without burning out or running ads 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Connect with Tracy Beavers at tracybeavers.com Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

July 1, 202657 min

How to Adapt Your Business Model When You're Living With Chronic Illness | Laura Reeves

If you've ever rebuilt your business from nothing after a diagnosis, a flare, or a crash you didn't see coming, you already know that "just push through" stops working at some point. The harder question is what you do instead. In this episode, Laura Reeves shares how she answered that question for herself, twice. After Crohn's disease cost her nearly every client she had in 1997, she built a 30-year career as a professional dog handler, one designed around her body instead of around what her industry expected. And when she knew that career couldn't last forever either, she didn't wait for a crisis to force the next move. She planned it. What you'll take from this conversation isn't really about dog shows. It's about what it looks like to build and rebuild a business that can actually hold the life you're living, instead of the one you wish you had the capacity for. In this episode, you'll learn: How to think about rebuilding a client base from scratch after a diagnosis takes everything you had A real-world framework for capping your workload to protect your health, without capping your income to zero Why planning your business's next chapter years in advance beats waiting for your body to make the decision for you How to tell the difference between the stress that's actually triggering your flares and the stress you've just learned to live with What it looks like to move from "acceptance" to "giving up", and how to tell which side of that line you're actually on This episode is for you if: You've had to rebuild your business after a diagnosis or a major flare, and you're tired of pretending that wasn't a big deal You're scared that slowing down will make everything you've built collapse You're managing chronic illness while caregiving for family members, and you're stretched in directions nobody talks about You feel stuck in a business model that requires you to be "on" every single day, with no version of you that gets to rest You want to plan for a transition before your body forces the decision, but you don't know where to start 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Connect with Laura Reeves https://puredogtalk.com/ Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram. Mentioned in this episode: Laura Reeves Intro

June 17, 202654 min

How to Build a Business Around Your Capacity (Not Market Demands) | Gwendolyn Young

What does it look like to build a business that works with your chronic illness instead of against it? This conversation with Gwendolyn Young will challenge everything you think you know about business design and capacity. Gwendolyn Young is the founder of Your Virtual Admin Expert, a multi-six figure agency that provides administrative solutions for business owners. After 15 years of advising corporate executives, she made the bold decision to leave and start her own company so she could manage her lupus diagnosis while still doing meaningful work. Her approach to building around capacity rather than market demands has created both sustainability and significant profit. In this episode, we cover: How cultural expectations as women of color make it harder to acknowledge capacity limits in business Why building your business around your needs isn't selfish — it's strategic The specific systems Gwendolyn put in place to protect her energy while scaling her agency How to transition from being the doer to being the CEO without losing your sense of identity What it really means to set non-negotiable boundaries with clients Why chronic illness can actually be a teacher in learning to design better business systems The mindset work required to trust your team and delegate effectively This episode is for you if: You're trying to build or scale a business while managing chronic illness You feel like standard business advice doesn't account for your reality You're the doer in your business and struggle to delegate or step back You want to create more sustainable systems that don't require your constant presence You're a woman of color navigating the intersection of health challenges and entrepreneurship 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Connect with Gwendolyn Young Website: yourvirtualadminexpert.com Instagram: @yourvirtualadminexpert Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

June 3, 202650 min

Why Decluttering Your Space Heals Your Business Decisions | Alison Kero

Your energy crashing during business conversations is not random. It is your body giving you crucial information about who and what belongs in your life. When you're managing chronic illness while building a business, learning to trust these signals can be the difference between sustainable growth and complete burnout. Alison Kero is a professional organizer who has spent over two decades helping people create calm, clarity, and balance in their lives. After being diagnosed with chronic Lyme disease in 2014, she had to completely rebuild her approach to work and life, ultimately discovering that organizing isn't just about physical spaces, it's about decluttering the guilt, shame, and emotional baggage that keeps us stuck in cycles that harm our health. In this episode, you will learn: How Alison's energy tanking during business calls became her decision-making system Why she kept guilt-inducing items for decades and what happened when she let them go The daily systems that help her show up for herself without burning out How decluttering physical space helps you recognize emotional patterns Why decision fatigue is especially dangerous when you're managing chronic illness The connection between boundaries and physical health Simple systems that make life easier instead of harder This episode is for you if: Your business falls apart every time your health does You ignore your body's signals because you think that's what success requires You're tired of trying to fit your capacity into business models designed for unlimited energy You want to understand how organization can be a tool for healing You're ready to build systems that protect your energy instead of drain it 🎧 Want to learn more about today’s guest? Connect with Alison Kero Website: https://www.fromcluttertoconfidence.com Visit our show, Business With Chronic Illness , for guest details, key takeaways, and extra links mentioned in this episode. 🌿 If you’re navigating entrepreneurship and chronic illness , or simply craving a more sustainable way to grow your business without sacrificing your health, energy, or self-care priorities. Join our community designed for women entrepreneurs, creatives, and women with chronic illness who want sustainable growth and burnout support while keeping life and wellness first. J oin Our Free Community, The Gathering Room of The Rooted & Profitable Collective. ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another CEO woman or creative entrepreneur growing a health-first, sustainable business. 📱 Stay connected: Follow me on Instagram.

May 13, 202640 min

How Your Caregiving Experience IS Business Training (Stop Undervaluing It) | Julie Cole

What would it look like to build a multi-million dollar business while raising six kids, advocating full-time for a child with autism, and navigating everything that nobody put in the business plan? That's exactly what Julie Cole did, and she didn't do it by following the standard playbook. Julie is the co-founder of Mabel's Labels, a brand she started almost 23 years ago with her sister and two college friends when her eldest son was diagnosed with autism at three years old. She left a career in law, started making labels in a basement at 2am, and built something real, not because the timing was perfect, but because she figured out what her actual capacity was and built around that. In this conversation, Julie and Nikita get into the conversation most business advice skips entirely: what actually has to shift when you're a mom, a caregiver, and an entrepreneur all at the same time, and why the skills you're already using at home are more valuable than you think. In This Episode, You'll Learn: Why capacity is the first conversation, not the last: before strategy, before offers, before anything else, you need to know what you can actually carry and Julie's story shows exactly what happens when you get honest about that first How the skills you're already using as a caregiver translate directly into business: advocacy, research, negotiation, flexibility under pressure — these aren't soft skills, they're the exact skills that build something sustainable Why entrepreneurship gets romanticized and what the real version looks like: Julie is direct about what those early years actually looked like, and it's not TED talks and wine nights How building a values-led company culture protects both your business and your life: From results-only work environments to neurodivergent hiring, Julie built a company that worked for real humans living real lives What the "care gap" actually means for women entrepreneurs: Whether or not you have kids, the invisible load is real, and building a business that pretends otherwise is building on a weak foundation Why visibility creates credibility, which creates loyalty: Showing up — even when life is heavy, even when the pace feels impossible — is not about hustle, it's about trust ⭐ Enjoyed this conversation? Leave a review and share it with another mom who's building something — she needs to hear this one. Leave us a Review and share this episode with a friend. Share Your QA's or Thoughts Products We Love + Special Guest Gifts → Want to support the show and treat yourself? We’ve created a quick-access list of products I personally use and love, exclusive savings from podcast guests, and other gems that can help you live well and do business with chronic illness. Explore our faves + savings here ! Join our Community Channel Here.