More Than A Side Hustle
More Than A Side Hustle
Life's Rollercoaster: Navigating Loss, New Beginnings, and Resilience
Life threw us a whirlwind of experiences recently, and we're here to share the rollercoaster ride with you.
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What's going on, guys? Welcome to another or one of the episodes of the more than a silo podcast, where we help non-offers create more impact, income and influence outside their jobs. If you guys haven't been here, my name is Anthony.
Speaker 1:And I am Janoka and we are back, we are back. I'm just thinking of a TikTok sound. What sound is that we should do it actually the content to show us being back. Anyway, we should actually. Yeah, we can do it after. Anyway, we are back from a break. I think the last podcast Last time we sat down here was like May.
Speaker 1:Maybe three, four months, I did one, maybe three, four months it's been since we last sat down here and this episode we are going to provide All the life updates that's been happening in our lives and did we quit the podcast.
Speaker 2:Did we quit the show? Did we quit the show? Did we quit the content? We did not quit, we just took a necessary and needed break and the problem with a break is-?
Speaker 1:Did we do two years, two and a half years straight, or was?
Speaker 2:it we did two and a half years straight of episodes and the problem with the break is that we didn't tell you, guys, we were taking a break, so number one. I want to apologize on behalf of.
Speaker 2:I was saying thank you for sticking around If you did, but some people did we lost a lot of views because we weren't keeping up with the content, and the problem was is that we didn't tell you guys that we were going to take a break and, honestly, we didn't know, we didn't know we were going to take a break every week.
Speaker 1:You're like, well, we don't get back in there.
Speaker 2:I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like one of those things when life happens it just keeps going and then it doesn't become a priority for you. But we do appreciate you guys who stuck around. The viewership has dropped tremendously, but anybody who's been listening and tuning in we definitely appreciate you.
Speaker 1:But listen, it's quarter four. We're getting ready for the new year. We're ending the year with a bang. Come back here we are back to continue to show up. So we started our podcast around this time. We did start our podcast in december, last week, in november, about three years ago. Yeah, why would we be starting in the holiday season and being pregnant and buying a house, I don't know, and changing jobs? No idea. But whatever it works, it works so we didn't quit.
Speaker 2:We are here. We were taking a necessary break and listen, and life continued to happen. As you guys know, your lives continue to happen. We know whether we were in it, whether we were not in it when you guys were consuming the content. Life continued to happen, especially for us, and this episode is going to be about those life happenings, because a lot has changed in the last three months, I would say yes, what this, the changes, has taught us is that life doesn't stop for anybody.
Speaker 1:Yes, you know that, obviously, but when things happen that feel like knocks you out of breath or knocks you down and you're like I still got to show up in my business, or I still got to show up at my job, I still got to show up as a parent, as a spouse, all these things. Life does not wait for anybody, and I guess that can be a good thing, but sometimes it feels like I need it to slow down.
Speaker 2:Yo life don't care and people don't care. Honestly, yes, you guys was like listen, we still. We don't care what's going on in your lives. We still want our emails, we still want our content, we still want our social media.
Speaker 1:We still going gonna ask you guys questions and that's totally fine.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you have to be, okay with knowing that. You know whatever happens in your life. You know people really don't care and that's totally fine. You gotta be okay with people not caring, because once they don't care you realize that you gotta keep this stuff going yeah, so let's start off with some of the the major things that I'm talking.
Speaker 1:These, the things that just happened in our life, which we're gonna get into right now, is the biggest things that can happen in your life. All happen within really like a two-month span or less, but that's that. So we'll start with one um. We lost um Tony's younger brother, around July 4th, holiday season. That was a week after we had a baby shower down here in Dallas, celebrating with family and friends. Less than a week days later, we found out that his brother passed away.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man. So that was a very tragic incident. A lot of people was asking questions about you. Know where were you closed, so was this like a far?
Speaker 2:away, brother, he was like no, this is my youngest brother, my baby, so I lost him um to a, an accident that happened in new york and it was a freak accident. You know it was a. It was an incident at a pool party. You know situations happen and I think one of the biggest. You know I'm the type of person like all right, I've lost, like I lost my father growing up, so I've experienced the closest people that you could lose your best friend and my best friend.
Speaker 2:So I lost my father when I was what 13 or so and I found him, you know, passed away. So I've I've experienced death at a very young age and the way I process it might not be the same way other people probably the whole episode's not gonna be about this. So if you guys like, oh, it's a gloomy episode and it's not, we talk about life and we talk about death. So let's say this episode might have been condolences and congratulations yeah, exactly that's what we wrote down.
Speaker 2:I had to check that because a lot of people were saying condolences and congratulations at the same time and, um, as I was saying, like I experienced death at a young age, so, um, the way I process it might not be the same as most people, because I'm the I'm of the mindset, like I understand life goes on. Because I had to experience it at a young age, like when my father, father passed. I was like all right, you know, you can't stay out of school.
Speaker 2:You got to go back to school, like that's like you got to get back to school, you got to get back to work and things like that. So when my youngest brother passed, I was on a. I literally had a zoom call. I went to the gym the day he passed, Like I got the news and I was like yo, I got you gotta process and you gotta think through things. And I understand that. But for me I don't. Most people don't want to just sit in that type of stuff right, they want to be able to get their lives going.
Speaker 1:So it's not that you don't care, it's just that it's hard to just sit, sit in it, sit in that silence and just think about it so I have my moments.
Speaker 2:You know I'll be watching the tv show and it's like damn, and it's sometimes don't even feel real right, we was watching the tv show.
Speaker 1:I'm like yo, this is too close to home and that's the biggest thing that you've said that it doesn't feel real yeah, and that's a part of grieving right you had that, uh, what's it called?
Speaker 2:denial denial and I'm I'm in denial. Sometimes I'm also in the like yeah, this is, this has happened, like I understand it doesn't make sense, so it's not like I'm completely oblivious of it happening, but I'm like it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 2:And then it's like, well, it did happen and it did make sense because I went through the whole investigation and everything so.
Speaker 2:But the thing that I was saying was that kind of relates to it, life doesn't stop.
Speaker 2:Because I had a coaching call with somebody that same day or the day after and they were telling me how you know, shout out to them for showing for that call as well because, like I said, we all process things differently. And they were saying that I almost didn't show up to this call because I had someone in my family try to commit suicide. And I said I commend you for even showing up to this call because I can understand how difficult that could be. But I was like on the bright side, they tried to commit suicide and they're still here. And I was like I'm not going to give you the inner workings of my life, but I literally just lost my younger brother and I'm still here and I'm able to share this story with you and your life is still able to go on with yourself and your family, your family member that tried to commit suicide. So, at the end of the day, life doesn't stop for anyone. So that was a huge, huge, huge life update that happened throughout this time.
Speaker 2:Unexpected of course, and I posted on social media. I said yo, if y'all comment condolences, Y'all going to get the mini chat automation that sends you to my webinar and I still been doing my live workshops go to cleaningbusinessmasterclasscom. That's been happening every single week. That's another thing that's been going on. So business.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that was that, that um happened and we kind of was like wait and that, what?
Speaker 1:and that didn't just happen to me, it happened to you as well, so well yeah, yeah, but at the same time it's like one I am weeks away from delivering, maybe maybe two weeks away from delivering. So you don't want to get too worked up because you don't want to stress yourself, have an early delivery, things like that. Then Anthony had to fly back home to kind of be with his family. So I was here alone, pregnant, very pregnant, with Alani, and so we utilized our community here and babysitters and friends and family stuff like that to assist if I needed anything. So that was just a process within itself, because then two weeks later, july 18th, our baby girl came, our baby girl Amaya Hartzog.
Speaker 2:Second kid came two weeks after the death of my younger brother.
Speaker 1:Yeah, she's now three months, so we really haven't sat down here. She's now a little over three months. She came and a week after that we had to fly back to New York to bury him and do his services and everything like that. So that was a whirlwind of like being sad and happy at the same time.
Speaker 2:That's why Anthony said that people were saying like condolences and congratulations at the same time.
Speaker 1:That's why Anthony said that people were saying like condolences and congratulations at the same time in the same sentence at the funeral.
Speaker 1:They're saying it. You're like, you know, and it was a whole thing of obviously we don't want to travel with our kid. All of that, we don't want to within days me traveling, you could get bloke, all these things, but we had to um show up and be there during that time. Thankfully, we we all were safe and healthy and came back home and were well, but we lost someone. Two weeks later, we delivered a baby girl.
Speaker 1:A week later, we had to go back to new york to kind of close out, if you will, um the losing of his brother and then come back so that really, you think you have tough times in life and then, when things like this happen, it's like, okay, all right, lord, you ever seen when people say like I don't want to be your strongest soldier anymore, take me off that 2025 list. That's kind of what it felt like during this time and it didn't let me be clear, it didn't end there, but that's what we were dealing with July essentially Just grieving with that, trying to be happy and then also showing up for your other child, because it's not just one, now there's two of them showing up for our other child.
Speaker 2:And that's the importance of community as well, because, like Janoka said, our friends and family showed up for us crazy.
Speaker 1:They're talking about just bringing us food, making sure we're good. Checking in.
Speaker 2:When I was unavailable or I was out of town, our family down here, our friends that became family down here, made sure Chinooka was good. So having a community is super important outside of this like social media thing, like having real people around you who could support you, who could step in in times of need, is so important, especially in this day and age.
Speaker 1:So that is condolences and congratulations at the same damn time, at the same time, and then in the midst of that, we had our pair come and we're going to do a whole episode on what is our pair. But it's really a culture exchange program where someone comes from another country and they live with you for a year or two years in exchange for the culture exchange and also they are taking care of your children. Um, they, they do live with you and so there's a whole process. I know you're probably like what the hell? It's a whole background process that we'll get into another episode. But we had our peer come. Um, she came from columbia and that's an adjustment too, right. You have a new baby, you're dealing with grief and now you have to get someone comfortable living in your home and you have to get comfortable with someone living in your home. The rules, cultural differences, personalities, all of that we dealt with during that time also.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's been a huge adjustment for because I'm of the mindset. I'm not of the mindset, I'm a typical person. I like my personal space, yeah, yeah. So it was very, very different for me to be able to say you know, we're gonna have somebody live with us and, yeah, you know, she's been living with us for three months now.
Speaker 1:That's been three months has?
Speaker 2:she came two months after maya, yeah so we have somebody living with us three months and now we got to do an episode on that because there's been a lot of questions. We've learned a lot about the process, but everyone has been asking questions about what is it. So I think that's going to be just like we had our doula on and she told us what the doula process is. I think this could help a lot of people who may not know what this process is and what it entails. And the availability of it?
Speaker 1:yeah, and things that happen that you could. You could actually this is attainable for anyone to do, so yes, we'll do. We'll get to catch you guys up on that one. So that's been, that's been a help. That's been a help, as you know, like you. Like we said, we've had, we had it with alani. We had a nanny for two years and so, um, now we have someone living with us for a year that helps with both of the children, and that was that I. We didn't even touch on this was an adjustment, but Alani has been adjusting well to baby sister.
Speaker 1:We should kind of say that because I know a lot of people ask like how she's doing. She's pretty obsessed with her right now. People always say when the baby starts moving and kind of taking toys and stuff, maybe that's when things will change. But I don't want y'all negative stuff on my family but she's been doing well.
Speaker 2:I don't want y'all N-word stuff on no negative, Negative Whoa she's doing well.
Speaker 1:Once in a while she may pop a bow off her head or take a pacifier, but other than that she's adjusting well and very excited about her baby sister.
Speaker 2:Alani's been doing pretty good in school too.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:She's been doing pretty good in school Getting her Spanish up. Habla, that's been good.
Speaker 1:Inglés, she's been doing pretty good in school Getting her Spanish up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's been good. Habla ingles. Yo no se Mañana Como te llama. What the hell? You already know the vibes.
Speaker 1:Anyway, you sound like a typical New Yorker, you already know the vibes. Anyway so that's that.
Speaker 2:So we had our RPR come.
Speaker 1:Because New York is going to the World Series. Yes and the.
Speaker 2:Liberty.
Speaker 1:Just one. I mean, new York is up. New York is always up, but congratulations to New York. So our pair came. Next up in our list of life changes was three weeks. So a week after our pair came I got a call and I was laid off from my job Nine years you just have to laugh at things like that. Nine years at this company. There was a reduction in force, which just means that there's multiple layoffs, which was the second one in less than a year. The first one was last year October and they eliminated my position and that was kind of it. They told me they gave me a month to kind of really stay on. So it wasn't like an immediate thing. I was on for a month and then now I just have like a package with them that I'm kind of getting paid till January, but I am going through the unemployment process, things like that, and that was another bomb.
Speaker 1:Now you may say you guys have spoken about this, blah, blah, blah, and yes, we have spoken about this. I think the biggest thing was I don't know if it's going to be a separate episode, but the biggest thing was the season and the timing, of course, all those things that we just explained. We just went through to now have this happen. It's like, okay, I don't know how much more we can take. However, I'm not that upset. I think there would be like there was like a 20 of me. That was like damn, after nine years, that's it. Your job does and career does become your identity, so it kind of feels like what, what next? Um, but 80 of me says like all right, now we can go all in on some of these things that we said we were going to do.
Speaker 2:Y'all might get more content on the podcast. We'll see, but that leaves us. Well, I don't know, do you want to do a whole episode on that one?
Speaker 1:I don't know if it's a whole episode worthy of thing. You think you got a whole episode on that. I don't know, maybe 10 minutes you got to let us know.
Speaker 2:So yes, we did an episode on when you will leave your job and we were always talking about you know, when you leave your job. I think it can be an episode, and the scariness about it and I think one of those things is that you will never be ready, like you will never be ready. Even when I left my job I was not ready. I was scared. It was like, okay, we're going to do it, we're going to do it, we finally doing it, say, oh my god, am I ready?
Speaker 1:and you still have that uneasiness. So I know some of you guys are saying like well, you guys got this, you guys got that it makes it easier.
Speaker 2:No, it doesn't make it easier. No, because I would have done it before. Yeah, it allows you to say okay, I'm at. I feel a little bit more at ease about it, but it doesn't make it easier to do it. Yes, so sometimes you got to rip off that band-aid, which is what they did. And another lesson is that I don't care how much tenure you think you think you got at your nine to five, they can come in and get rid of you the next day yeah, absolutely I worked in my job for just about the same amount of time as you did, but I had the ability to leave my job.
Speaker 2:If I would have kept going, I might have gotten the boot as well. Eventually might be like you know, and you don't want to be here. So I don't want you guys to think that you got all the security in the world I don't care how much money you make, I don't care how long you've been here. There is, if you do not own it, they can come and take it from you. So that that's the lesson that anybody could take from having a job. Is that, yes, we never tell you that. We never, never on this show we say you guys should quit your job. No, never on our, never on our. If you can find it, you let me know and we'll delete it. We'll remove it. Never on our social media platforms. We said you should quit your job. We said you should have other sources of income so that when this day comes, you will be prepared and, even though it won't make it easy, it will make you feel more at ease when it does come, or if it does come.
Speaker 1:Because the day could come three weeks into maternity leave. Okay.
Speaker 2:That's when they did that. They fired you three weeks into maternity leave, but hey, I fired someone right after they gave they, right after they dropped their baby yeah, but she, we spoke about that yeah but I'm still still you had the baby and all right, cool, I had to fire you, like yeah, it is what it is, the baby's just another.
Speaker 2:It is what it was like that was the nature of my role as an anthony. You can't keep giving this person these chances and, like I, only control so much. So I know your boss only controls so much, yep, and at the end of the day it's just a job to them. They're like you know what. We're gonna replace you with somebody else, so your job is replaceable.
Speaker 1:You are replaceable yeah, so that that also happened. That took us, uh, by a shocker and, um, did it really?
Speaker 2:that's why I'm like this could be a whole other episode, because I wasn't shocked by it. It was kind of like there was some there was some writing on the wall where they had. It was kind of like there was some there wasn't writing on the wall where they had.
Speaker 1:It was a shocker and that didn't expect it. But when you look at it it's like okay, yeah, it makes sense. Yeah, there was some writing on the wall that was happening I was.
Speaker 2:I was pointing some things out like oh, they want you to write this down and write this, okay, yeah the excuse could have been because you're going on maternity leave, but these other suits could have been because they were looking to document okay, they were looking, which I did.
Speaker 1:know that before I left that we were. The company was probably going into another reduction in force. I was aware of that. A riff, a riff, as they like to call it.
Speaker 2:I learned about that. I didn't know what that was.
Speaker 1:I didn't know either, and I did and I had let someone go last October and I'm like huh, that's why we talk about having that second stream of income having something else thing.
Speaker 2:so if you guys want to learn more about that, you could check out cleaning business masterclasscom, where we teach you how to start and scale a cleaning business, which we still have to this, so we could make another episode as well.
Speaker 1:I agree, because we can speak about like our dynamics now that I'm not at work. That's okay. Okay, you guys like it. You guys like it you know comment it.
Speaker 2:Yo we back baby, we in here.
Speaker 1:So now we can have another one. Hopefully I'm not jinxing. It. And another thing is oh all right, jinxing us showing up.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we'll leave it at that. So that was another, that was another. We're talking about strongest soldiers.
Speaker 1:That was another situation. Yeah, that was another situation. Now, that was another situation. Now, the last situation and I pray to God that is the last for a long time was that Anthony had to have back surgery. Yep, so you want to speak about that?
Speaker 2:I had back surgery as recent as a week ago. So two years ago you had. Yeah, so two years ago I had a hernia. I think I did an episode on this Two years ago. I had a herniated disc and I had to have a disectomy, which is essentially them, removing a part of your disc and your and your spine. So I felt better, I felt relief, and then I ran. As you guys know, I ran a half marathon in April, april.
Speaker 1:So that was like one of my big goals for the year.
Speaker 2:I wanted to get back out there and get running, so that could have started this process all over again. But essentially April, may. But essentially April May, june, june I had an MRI because my back was hurting again and then July I started like really feeling this pain and then, August was like, when it was like all right, I can't even move.
Speaker 2:It's been six weeks if you're not working out or something like that. Yeah, I was like I can't move. So I went to get the MRIs. I went to get the x-rays, pts and the doctor she showed my disc and essentially it looked like a big balloon in my back. So I essentially had surgery about a week ago and they removed the balloon and I'm starting to feel relief again. So I learned a lot about. I'm going to specifically do an episode on that. It might just be an audio-only episode Because I learned a lot about what happened over these last two years and things that I could have until I did something about it, because I could have did something back in June. June I had the MRI. It wasn't as bad, but I waited until it was so severe so I think I'm gonna do an episode on that, but that I had surgery and I'm I'm moving again.
Speaker 2:I can't even sit down in this chair, for I was in the bed.
Speaker 1:That was another reason why we there was a few weeks back. We're like we're ready, but you couldn't sit down, so we weren't ready. We couldn't.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that was uh, but I'm recovering. Now I'm moving again. As you guys can see, I'm sitting up. I'm a little uncomfortable here, but I'm showing up, guys, like we still showing up at the end of the day now that I'm listening to all these things, I'm like was there some type of juju on us?
Speaker 1:you ever hear people say that?
Speaker 2:hopefully y'all don't think about us like if y'all no, no, no, no, no, when you hear all these stuff.
Speaker 1:It's kind of like whoa, what was happening in that household? But either way, we have come out on the other side of it. We wanted to let our audience know as we're very transparent as possible what has been going on. We didn't just stop because we just stopped, but we just wanted to let everyone know what life has looked like. But our businesses have not stopped because it can't. We got people, we got to pay. We got money, we got to make, we got students, we got communities.
Speaker 2:We got to show up for Things like that. I was taking my community calls in the bed, like laying down camera off. Like yo, I'm still showing up, we can still show up through all of this stuff.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so with the loss of my job and the question happens like what's next for us? And I think we both realize, especially me, that we want to continue to show up online, but not just the cleaning business. And that's been a hard kind of conversation of how do we transition our audience? Does our audience even want to hear that? Do we have to do something separate? All of that those questions kind of come up of I don't only want to talk about the cleaning business, but are they going to listen or should we just focus on this? So that's something that we're also figuring out. As you know, this podcast has always been, yes, business, but personal things. We speak about things that we find that can be helpful for our audience. We talk about it. I have personally started my own TikTok page outside of the heart, trimony she started her own content.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm doing my own content of um the heart trimony. She started her own content. Yeah, I'm doing my own content.
Speaker 1:We'll put that link in the bio somewhere. Yeah, that's exciting link in bio, so follow me, uh, you can follow my personal page on instagram too. But just it's funny because the week before page about see, I'm trying to figure it out.
Speaker 1:So that's the thing, what you've been doing so far. Let me tell you a week before, or the week up shut up the week of um, the week we had our baby I had, uh, posted a video on heart trimony, just saying like I want to do things outside of Anthony, which he has always encouraged. But I just was like ain't nobody want to hear nothing. So I just said I want to do more and, um, people gave a lot of feedback, which thank you, and I'm using some of that as well. But I decided to finally like just start my own TikTok page to just come out with information. So what am I talking about on there?
Speaker 1:I've spoken about my fertility journey. I've spoken about the loss of my job. I spoke about working out, um, going out as husband and wife, getting back to that, dating each other just a plethora of things. I don't really have a niche yet. I'm just putting it all out there and seeing what sticks and I'm enjoying yeah, I'm enjoying making the content, um, I had a challenge. So all those things I've been doing on my personal page, more on TikTok, but I've been bringing some of it to Instagram as well. So that's the season that I'm in, just figuring out. Yes, still doing cleaning business, stuff. That's not going to change, but that's not all I want to do. I want to do more. So that's part of what we as a unit yes, it's a me thing, but it impacts both of us of how we both show up and what we do together.
Speaker 1:So this podcast will continue, I consider doing my own podcast, so it's a lot happening. It's a lot happening here, so we'll see what it turns into.
Speaker 2:Definitely go check her out. Tiktokcom slash Janoka.
Speaker 1:Okay, we'll put the link in the bio. Where's Jan? I think it's Janoka. We'll see. We don't know.
Speaker 2:We'll make sure they go check it out. But yeah, man, so we still, we're going to keep this thing going. So to make sure you guys just got caught up before we dove into topics and segments and all of that stuff. So yes, life is still going on, we still continue, we are still here and those who stuck around appreciate it. Everyone who is brand new, that's still that's starting to tune in. Welcome, welcome, welcome welcome.
Speaker 1:Go back and bend some of our stuff.
Speaker 2:We have a lot of information yes, so we keep these episodes going now again, it might not be every week we still got to figure out the cadence of what it looks like but we want to show up in a way that is not forced. I think when you have to show up every single week it kind of makes it forced.
Speaker 2:We got something to talk about, we'll come and talk about it. If we don't, we might not, but we've done over two years of just consistency. But we also didn't want to just leave y'all hanging. So We'll drop some episodes, because we're not saying we're quitting the show. But it might not be as weekly, right, it might be every other week. It might be a new update, it might be a quick Five minute segment. It might be Janoka's segment, like her motherhood segment. Might be about entrepreneurship. Might be about cleaning business. Might be a guest. So we're doing it all.
Speaker 2:Listen, we've always done it all, yeah, we're gonna Thank you guys for just tapping in, tuning in, dropping comments, and let's keep this thing going.
Speaker 1:Bye-bye, leave us a review. Y'all, it's been a little bit yo. Oh, I should go check to see have we got any new reviews. I don't know, but probably because it's been a bit Y'all like, I ain't leaving no review because they ain't seeing it.
Speaker 2:And they ain't shouting me out. Listen, if y' there might be some new ones there. It might not be, but we like to read the reviews on the episodes, so make sure you guys go check them out. And Janoka's still trying to figure it out. You think she understood this by now.
Speaker 1:No, I do, but I just can't say it. All right, y'all, if y'all have to do it, we should be the next one.
Speaker 2:We'll see you guys next time and thank you for tuning in in. Bye, bye, peace.