Inspired By… Yvonne Mark
Yvonne and I met at a networking group, and although she was one of the quieter people in the room, I had a feeling that ‘still waters ran deep’ and wanted to get to know her more.
And boy I was not wrong! during our one-to-one chat she opened up much more about her life, and I knew that she was an ideal person to share her inspirational story with you.
She started off by saying that like many of us life hadn’t been free of anxiety or trauma, and she described life as a whirlwind. At that time, she was a driving instructor, it was after she had her baby in 2012 that this story begins.
Yvonne explained that she had always been small framed but after the baby she could not shift the weight. Many of you reading this might assume where the story is going, you will undoubtably be wrong so read on.
Like a lot of women she thought this was just normal, and it wasn’t until eleven years later while having dinner at a friend’s house that she mentioned still trying to lose weight, she blamed herself of overeating in lockdown or thought maybe she had developed an intolerance or allergy. At this point people who didn’t know assumed she was pregnant even asking when she was due!
Her friend reached out and touched Yvonne’s stomach and said, “that’s rock hard, you need to get that checked out, that’s not fat, fat is soft”.
Following her friend’s advice Yvonne saw her GP, had some blood tests and waited. The results showed her tumour markers just one mark above normal, which didn’t raise alarm bells, but the doctor decided to send her for a scan.
The scan showed up a big mass on one of her ovaries.
What followed was months of tests and scans before the team agreed to operate just after New Year, as Covid was still around this meant Yvonne having to isolate immediately.
The mass they removed (along with the fallopian tube) weighed 10kg and was 38 cm long, she was incredibly lucky to be alive.
Unfortunately, instead of taking time to heal at home, she began to worry about money, something many self-employed people will recognise, and she made the choice to go back to work just a few weeks after surgery. Working every hour to try and catch up with bills and this meant she again stopped looking after herself.
Eighteen months after the surgery, a fellow driving instructor who knew what she had been through asked her if she would be interested in learning about becoming a personal and business protection advisor, and knowing how it felt to not have any protection she jumped at the chance to help other people. She realised that had she had protection at the time she could have rested and had a much easier recovery.
The first step was to finally get her own policies organised so she would never be in that situation again. Then it was onto the training to become an insurance advisor.
Yvonne acknowledges that she is shy, which is a refreshing change that makes her noticeable in business environments – as it did to me. She told me that she hopes that as she grows her business, she’ll overcome this and be able to mentor new people coming into the business.
But shy does not mean lacking in confidence, Yvonne said “I know that I have the ability to be great at anything I put my mind to”.
And on that note, I will leave the last word to Yvonne “Nothing easy is worthwhile, nothing worthwhile is easy. Hard work always pays off, creating the life I wanted has not been easy by any means, but it has been full of nice moments, and shedding a lot of old beliefs, fighting battles nobody knows about… not to mention the lack of sleep! One morning I was so exhausted but needed to make breakfast for myself and my daughter that I poured milk into the peanut butter jar instead of the jug to froth for my morning coffee”. Something I am sure many parents and carers can identify with.
If you’d like to connect with Yvonne, you can do that here: