Happy New Year 2024 !!

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I am wishing you all a Happy New Year 🎊🎊🍾🍾

2023 was a stressful year, full of hurt, disappointment, illness, death, struggle, and ineffectiveness. Despite all of it, I am grateful that I overcame it all.

Being a caregiver to my Mother, who now has cancer for the forth time, has been soul shattering. I felt trapped and unappreciated. My mother was experiencing a type of dementia due to the meds she had to take. A few months ago, the meds stopped working ! Her oncologist immediately changed protocols. The new protocol is working on shrinking the two tumors in her liver and destroyed the nodule in her lungs.

I am embracing 2024 as my year of triump. I am focused on winning and will NOT allow anything nor anyone to distract me.

My daughter is now 7. She is the most amazing gift 🎁. She is thriving and so intelligent. This child is so much different than we were as kids. She is almost like a little adult, the way she processes things. She is very compassionate and sensitive.

I look forward to exploring the world 🌎 with her this year. We are researching and trying to select a country to expat. I am over the US. I need a change and I am determined to ensure that my child cultured and educated. She loves learning and exploring. She has more stamps in her passport that most adults. She loves going on ‘Holiday’…

I am looking forward to preparing for a move and being able to spend half the year abroad every year and prepare to purchase a home in another country.

2024 is going to be epic !

It has already delivered bad news. We arrived at the beach and got settled into the condo and went down the hall to let CGB’s honorary Grandparents know that we arrived safely and learned that her Grandmother passed away unexpectedly two days before Christmas ! We would have expected for her Grandfather to pass, as he too has cancer, but it’s on his nose. He is 101 years old. It was heartbreaking 💔. He didn’t even recognize us. A nurse /caregiver opened the door, which was strange because we were expecting Rose Marie to open the door. She fell a fee months ago and broke her shoulder. She didn’t tell us about that and we knew that Armand had fallen. She got a UTI and bed sores in the facility she was in so her brothers hired a private duty nurse and had her moved back to their condo. The nurse told me that she was skin and bones, although she was always tiny, she was withering away. The nurse was fattening her up, and she seemed to be improving and was doing a lot better. Two days before Christmas, she took ill and was hospitalized and passed away 18 hrs later with Armand and the nurse by her side. My daughter was hurt and could not understand why Armand didn’t know her

I brought them so Lemoncello that I made, which they Love. He smiled when the nurse told him that we brought Lemoncello. She told me that he had had a very bad day was way off, which was unusual for him. He is normally very sharp and aware. A few weeks ago, he and Rose Marie were super excited that we were coming to visit and staying for at least a month. I was looking forward to cooking some of their favorites and spoiling them.

Despite this sad news, I refuse to get sidetracked. I am determined to be productive and make this happen for my family.

I pray that you all have a productive, successful, healthy, and abundant new year.

Until next time,

V

Happy New Year 2023 ! – The 411

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This year, I thought would be a new beginning and a departure from so much pain, destruction, and death all around us. Since just before Christmas, it seems life just hit the gas instead of the brakes !

I lost a social media friend, who was a popular comedian, to a senseless random shooting a few hours after he landed in Nola from LA for his upcoming show. On NYE, a childhood friend and his wife were killed in a mva, being hit head-on by someone veering into their lane as they were entering our hometown in NC.

Anita Pointer passed away. Judge Lynn Toller’s husband passed away unexpectedly. Several people across my social media have been posting death notices of family and friends. Jeremy Renner was run over by his Snowcat while trying to help a stranded motorist…

So many terrible things are already happening and we are just six days in ! I am mentally exhausted already.

The only good thing is that my mother’s cancer scare turned out to be just a scare. She found a knot in her breast that she has had cancer in 3xs already. Turned out to be just fat and scar tissue, a biopsy revealed. We are really thankful that it was not cancer. My mom is suffering from anxiety and depression and she has no idea how heavy a burden it is to live with someone or be around someone who has a cloud over them all them all of the time. Especially when my baby girl begins to comment that Grandmom is tired all the time and sad. I do not want my child feeling responsible for the mood of an adult and I worry that she may internalize my mom’s issues. PTSD has taken a toll on her. She has every reason to be happy and she would rather whine about her back and hip pain or lie in bed for days without getting up. When it is not that, she walks around talking about food and is consumed with what we are eating. I become resentful because that puts the burden on me to cook because she is eating the extras I prep to avoid having to cook multiple times a day.

I have decided that we will be traveling as often as we can this year. We are getting out of the house and on a plane or cruise ship and seeing the world. I am blessed that I can do my work from anywhere.

I am finally launching some of my projects that were developed prepandemic. My podcast will launch in a few weeks and we will tape episodes of my cooking show. I am working on two film scripts that I am really excited about as well.

I am manifesting some things for my life that I am believing God for. I will update when those things come to pass.

I am wishing you all health, wealth and peace this year.

Update…The 411

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Hi All !

Life is a whirlwind and we sometimes lose time by being so busy with other things.

This past year has been challenging. My brother in law and several friends passed away unexpectedly. My grandmother passed away at the age of 90 a few months ago.

I decided to take Salsa dance classes and brought covid to our doorstep and although my mom and I bounced back in 2 days, my baby and her teacher got really sick with horrid symptoms for over a week. A few weeks after recovery, my baby girl started struggling with fluency issues. The ER doctor tried to shoo it away as nothing but viral response but I know my child. A week later, she started full out stuttering while we were in San Francisco with the whole family. When we returned, I found a speech pathologist and had an evaluation done and we started her therapy sessions. I wasn’t aware that covid related fluency disorder was a thing until I talked to my sister, who is a Pediatric RN. We are very blessed that the disorder is improving as quickly as it appeared. We will still do the weekly speech therapy, as it can hurt, but I am so relieved that it started reversing on its own.

My mother’s health is still seemingly declining. The geriatric depression doesn’t help matters. She is resigned to being old and embracing all the accoutrements therein. I push her to push past how she feels, get up and move and build muscles and stamina. If it were up to her, she would like to sit on an electric scooter or wheelchair and allow her muscles to atrophy. It is completely mentally exhausting being around someone who wants to act like they are 90 with one foot in the grave, when you know they are not. The mental decline. The physical decline… watching your parents morph into old age is not fun. It’s draining. It’s all encompassing.

My daughter is doing really well with school. We hired a private teacher who comes to our home and baby girl completed Kindergarten in 5 months and quickly moved to the 1st grade. She is self paced and is moving a remarkable speed. She is making all A’s and loves learning. She loves science and math and anything STEAM/STEM.

Our family is excited for my nephew who just graduated from college and signed a contract to play professional basketball in the Euro League. It is bittersweet that his father passed away and didn’t get to see all their hard work come to fruition.

Tomorrow, we are traveling to NC for his going away dinner. My baby girl is excited to go visit her cousins. They FaceTime almost daily.

I have given serious thought to adopting a biracial infant or toddler or starting a search once again for a surrogate, but it is difficult as a single woman to adopt. We looked at foster care but for the most part, they are interested in sending the children back to their families and I don’t want that heartbreak for my daughter or self. Looks like it will be just the two of us and I could not have been given a more perfect little one ❤️.

Mommy Make Over – The 411

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It has been a whirlwind past few months. Thanksgiving week was spent in Naples, Florida with our family supporting my nephew and his basketball team’s tournament. We drove back to our lakehouse the night before Thanksgiving and I got up at 6am and prepped a full Thanksgiving meal, although I was not supposed to be doing anything but recovering from surgery. My sister and niece drove back up to spend the day with us before departing on an evening flight back home.

I spent the weeks leading up to Christmas relaxing and recuperating. My whole family was supposed to fly in for Christmas, but two of my nephews failed their covid test the day before departure and tested positive for covid. It was heartbreaking because their Dad passed away in September, unexpectedly, and they spent the holiday alone.

New Years was quiet for us, as we spent it at the lakehouse and cooked dinner and chilled in pajamas. I hired Glitzy Christmas to decorate the lakehouse, since I could not, and we put up six Christmas trees throughout the lakehouse. Three of the trees are still up and we light them up at dusk lol. I might not take them down !

I am currently almost 16 weeks post op. I am healing up and for the most part happy with the results. My surgeon did a fat transfer to fill in my hips and to me it looks like love handles. I am going to have them lipo that area with plasma to make the skin shrink to correct it. I also have a little scarring around my navel and I will see a dermatologist to have something done to flatten it out.

Here is a pic of my progress thus far:

I am looking for a trainer so I can whip my body into shape by Summer. I will post pics and updates of my progress.

Mommy Makeover – The 411

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Hi Readers !

So…. I did a thing….. On October 18th, I hopped on a plane to Miami and embarked on a long lived dream of repairing and restoring my body, post partum.

I relaxed for a day, went to my pre-op appointment the next morning and had surgery on the 21st. I got an extended tummy tuck, muscle repair )to fix the diastis recti I got from being pregnant), lipo in 12 areas (including inner thighs since I had no back fat), and a Brazilian Butt Lift (fat transfer).

After my surgery, I spent a week in a lovely recovery house, Flawless Recovery, and I had a few post op appointments at Xiluet Plastic Surgery with my surgeon, Dr. Benjamin Liliav. I got daily lymphatic drainage massages, which I am still getting three times a week.

The recovery has not been too bad, thanks to the exparel injection I got at surgery, and the aide of CBD Gummies. Although I am super swollen, my body looks great. It is amazing looking in the mirror and seeing an hour glass shape looking back at you.

The hardest part about being away was not being with my daughter for a whole week. She had meltdowns almost daily. When I returned, you would think it was Christmas and Santa arriving at our house lol. I missed her so much and that is the longest I have ever been away from her. Now she is my shadow lol.

Today, I am 19 days post op and feeling pretty good. I have no pain, just tightness and a little soreness. I have to keep on a faja (compression girdle) 23 hours a day. I can take it off to shower and then use a blow dryer to dry my surgical tape. I must bathe in antibacterial soap.

Just before surgery

Flying first class back home a week after surgery.

I will update with pictures of my journey soon…

Happy Birthday – The 411

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Hi Fellow Bloggers and Readers !

This past week, we celebrated my mother’s 70th birthday and also my 28th birthday (again). My entire family flew in from their respective cities and we traveled to Tampa Bay /Clearwater Florida and spent a week on family vacation.

We hired an event planner, Bougie Events Co. to do a picnic on the beach for our mom, chartered dinner yacht the next day and after a day lounging in cabanas and riding jetskis, I hosted a dinner party with my family and friends at Bascom’s Chophouse. We had an amazing time. We spent a day at Busch Gardens Africa and a day at the Florida Aquarium.

My mother is still speechless. On the beach day, my sisters arranged for a four hour spa treatment for her at the Hilton’s spa. She thoroughly enjoyed herself and we made sure she felt appreciated and special.

Here are a few pics:

Blessings Upon Blessings Amid Sorrow – The 411

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Yesterday, I was driving down I-4 and got a call that a close friend and former choir member had passed away due to complications of Covid. I almost ran off the interstate…. I do not even remember the rest of the drive to pick up my mom from the cancer center. My heart shattered again in to a million pieces. Last week Cicely Tyson, my idol and acquaintance passed away with no warning. There have been so many people I know who have died recently. My cousin and personal stylist passed away a few days before Christmas and had been dead five days in his NY apartment before anyone knew. I had just spoken to him a few days prior.

With all that has been going on, I started to question where was God in all this. Well, He answered big time ! In spite of all that is going on, God has truly reminded me of His favor.

I was interviewed about my career and the article was published today on NBC, CBS AND Fox affiliates ! Check out the article here:

https://www.wboc.com/story/43360934/multihyphenate-renaissance-woman-valerie-renee-is-inspiring-the-masses-with-her-powerful-story-of-success

As if that was not enough, I was personally hand picked by Bon Appetit Magazine for the opportunity to compete for Fav Chef 2021 !! There is a grand prize of $20,000, a feature in Bon Appetit Magazine and title of Favorite Chef 2021!

https://favchef.com/2021/valerie-ren-e

Please vote daily for me ! You can also purchase votes for which funds will be donated to Feeding America !

I am soooooooo excited for this opportunity. In the midst of sorrow, God is STILL God ! ❤

I hope that you are all well and thriving xoxoxo