Lost my job due to illness.

Hello!

Let's see, where do I begin?

My name is Jessica Drummond and I'm 24.

To put it short, I've been dealing with extreme anxiety that has been holding me back. I generally dry heave or vomit when I leave my house to even go to the store. I've been put into a therapy program and am currently waiting on my medical EI claim - however, one employer is refusing to give me an ROE - which is extending the process by quite a lot. I've been laid off for six weeks currently.

For the last year I've dealt with bouts of dizziness which have caused me to fall and be hospitalized. I've lost feeling in my legs for days at a time multiple times since December. I lost a job in December due to my dizziness and being in the hospital, and once again became employed and worked through the dizziness and continued to have dizzy spells that would cause me to fall and be hospitalized. My doctors are unsure of whether or not the dizziness is caused by the anxiety, or vice versa. I have an MRI scheduled for September 14th.

Even when I start receiving my medical EI benefits, the most I can hope for is around 600$/month. Which needs to go to my therapy, groceries, housing, phone bill, Internet. Simply put, it is not enough.

I have always wanted to start up an Etsy shop and this seemed like the perfect time to start! If you would like to take a look at what I have so far, the shop is at https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/VICrafts

As you can see, I have quite a few items listed. In some categories I have coffee mugs, 'tattered' t-shirts, photography prints, and homemade journals.

I love photography and I've managed to snap a few amazing shots of Victoria BC that I'm offering both hard copies of prints in multiple sizes, as well as digital copies of downloads that can be printed either at home or professionally through third-party sources. I have already sold one print and received a glowing review, woo-hoo!

Luckily for this aspect of the shop I have a great camera, and am always adding new prints and photos available. These get many hits a day through my Twitter account, but not very many sales.

Another aspect of my shop is my 'tattered' t-shirts. I took sewing lessons for eight years during my youth and own two high-quality sewing machines. My tattered shirts always get so many questions when I wear them out. I used to work as a merchandise girl for a local band and when people bought their t-shirts I would cut and re-tie them for their size for an extra ten dollars, and everybody left very happy with their unique clothing. I would love to be able to continue with my 'tattered' t-shirt line and eventually expand to modifying vests with spiked studs and patches, etc. I purchase all of my band t-shirts through thrift stores for roughly five dollars apiece and spend the time to cut and refurbish them in my home to fit anybody's size and specifications.

I love the notebooks that I've created, but I haven't received much popularity regarding them, so I may save those to gift to friends.

I would love to extend my shop to many more 'island' themed crafts, as Victoria BC is very well known for its entrepreneurs and lovely scenery.

One way that I want to do this is to make homemade candles with pieces of beach glass in them. I have the beach glass, and jars for my candles to be created in. I would love to be able to purchase the raw wax, wicks, and essential oils to make these wonderful scented candles that are a little piece of Victoria.

I have been blessed enough to move into a beautiful suite with an ample sundeck to grow plants in. I want to purchase plants to harvest to make homemade teas for natural remedies to all sorts of common ailments - cramps, colds, headaches, ear infection remedies - I own many natural plant healing books and have not touched pharmaceutical medicine in years, but instead have relied only upon my at home remedies, which have worked absolute wonders. I am planning on writing an eBook soon with all of my home recipes for teas and ointments that I have created and discovered.

I mentioned I love clothing design, right? I found an amazing trick for creating handmade shirts - it works best with black, and bleach, and a spray bottle. I create the patterns with wax paper and spray the bleach and water solution around it, and it creates a galaxy-style spray pattern bleached around a stencil that I would need to print out and copy onto wax paper. I absolutely love this idea.

As you can see, I do have many ideas to get my business up and running, and at this point, I need something to keep me creatively channelled and motivated. 

Arts and crafts has always been a soothing escape for me. I have so many outlets - I write, I sew, I draw, I have done many paintings in oil and watercolor over the years, I sculpt with driftwood. I have so many possibilities and so many ideas, and I would love to be able to give this business the jump-start that it needs.

Thank you for taking the time to read all of this!