Meet Coach Rosanne Leslie

LEAVE A COMMENT 2013 September 30

Rosanne Leslie

Age: 52

Are you married?

I’ve been divorced for 12 years. I was married for 13 years and have three children. My marriage taught me what love is and, most importantly, what love is not. Raising my three children alone showed me how our society views single women and mothers and gave me the freedom to stand autonomously outside of that paradigm. Recognizing the dysfunctional dynamics of my marriage I was able to (slowly) extricate myself from it.

What did your parents do?

My father was an engineer for an international company and my mother was a stay-at-home mom.

Why did you become a coach?

I became a life-coach as a result of coaching myself through several years of single parenting. I discovered some of the perennial answers to questions I believe we all have when faced with life challenges and changes. Who Am I? What is love? Why am I here? What is my purpose? How can I be happy?

Happiness is found at our core and so long as we have hope and dreams we can find joy in any day.

What kind of Fab over Fifty women can most benefit from your coaching?

Any woman can benefit from coaching if she is ready to make a change and is earnest. However, the woman who will most benefit from my style of coaching is one who would like to redefine herself and still believes that she has dreams left in her and that she possesses the power to make them come true. I work a great deal with women who have teen-aged children and parenting challenges. One of my greatest strengths is guiding women through the process of divorce, especially those involving domestic violence issues. These women have special needs and because I lived this kind of marriage, I understand them. My empathy and compassion runs very deep for them.

What is your mission?

My mission is manifold. We all suffer and complain too much. There is a certain camaraderie and “acceptance” in the conversations between women in their complaining and suffering and I would like to show them that they can be happy now, in this very moment. Happiness is not contingent upon anyone’s external world or life circumstances. Happiness is found at our core and so long as we have hope and dreams we can find joy in any day. My mission is to guide individuals to autonomy in a society that does not readily embrace that. My greatest mission is to show women how to love and be loved and to celebrate their femininity as a gift and not a weapon against men or themselves.

Tell us about your typical client.

I don’t have a typical client. Everyone is different and comes to me when they are either excited about changing their lives and careers or they are devastated and traumatized and don’t know where or how to begin their day.

What is the greatest piece of advice you can give women?

To recognize that they are alive and what alive really means. The pulse of our society and the world is extremely fast and prevents many from understanding and feeling that they are “here” and that being “here” is precious and a gift.

What woman do you admire most?

I don’t have a particular woman I admire. Perhaps it is she, the silent and nameless one, unrecognizable in the crowd and the world, that I admire most. She is not famous or rich by society’s standard, but she knows how to give and love selflessly. She silently struggles every day to get by and has boundless compassion, integrity and humility. I think she is in every woman. She is my hero and I look for her, every day.

What is your favorite quote?

“Imagination is more important than knowledge.”–Albert Einstein.

Meet Coach Nancy Kay

LEAVE A COMMENT 2013 August 22

Nancy Kay

Age: 50

Are you married?

I was married for 21 years, until the marriage ended in divorce in 2008. During the marriage, I supported my husband’s corporate career by relocating seven times all over the country every two to three years and handling the parenting duties since his job required that he travel three weeks each month the entire time we were married. I currently live in Columbus, Ohio.

Kids?

Three, ages 16, 21 and 26.

Where did you grow up and what did your parents do?

I grew up in Denver, Colorado. My mom was an at-home mom and my dad is an oil geologist who is still working at age 85!

What did you do before becoming a coach?

My first career was as a TV news reporter and writer. I then took on full-time parenting duties while also teaching preschool. During my divorce, I completed a law school paralegal program and then worked as a paralegal in family and bankruptcy law.

I want to empower women to take the steps they need to navigate through the storm of divorce with a greater understanding of how to work more effectively with their attorneys to get their best outcome.

Why did you become a coach?

I was blindsided by having to deal with divorce when I discovered that my husband of 20 years had a complicated secret life and was making plans to leave me and our children, with as little financial support as possible, while he pursued another woman.

I felt devastated. I had moved all over the United States for my husband to further his career and improve our family’s finances and then discovered the reason he insisted we start our own business that particular year was so he could claim his income wasn’t needed for my support.

During his corporate career, my husband had worked his way up to earning a six figure salary, with bonuses. Since he was planning to divorce me, but I didn’t know it yet, he refused to look for another corporate position when he was let go from his job.

He had severance pay for a year so during that time he insisted that we should take a large amount of cash out of our retirement to pay for the start-up costs for a water damage cleanup franchise in Columbus and that he and I would run it for the 20-year contract duration. We both signed the agreement, set up joint business checking accounts and visited the franchise headquarters in Florida.

He knew that by starting a business, his income would be minimal for spousal and child support calculations.

During my divorce I discovered just how much “Knowledge is Power” and spent a great deal of time researching and reading about infidelity, spousal support, custody factors and co-parenting while learning strategies about how to get the best possible outcome during the legal process.

Our attorneys said that I would have to continue to work with him every day in the franchise during our divorce or else sign papers to turn it all over to him, which is what I did. Continuing would have subjected me to more intense emotional and verbal abuse.

While working as a family law and bankruptcy paralegal, I saw first-hand just how much women can benefit from strategic guidance and support during such a challenging time when emotions can easily influence their ability to make sound decisions and negotiate from a position of strength.

What kind of FaboverFifty woman can most benefit from coaching?

A woman who is considering divorce or is currently going through separation or divorce and wants to put together a plan of action to start taking control of her life. I encourage a woman to realize that the decisions she makes right now during separation and divorce are truly critical to her future because divorce is the biggest business deal of her life.

Divorce is especially stressful to deal with because it cuts across every part of a woman’s life- her physical and emotional well-being, work life, family life, finances and spiritual life are all impacted by the changes that come along with the chaos.

What is your mission?

I want to empower women to take the steps they need to navigate through the storm of divorce with a greater understanding of how to work more effectively with their attorneys to get their best outcome.

I also want to enable women to set healthy boundaries to protect themselves as they deal with situations that involve infidelity, financial scheming, abusive behaviors and co-parenting disagreements.

I offer referrals to divorce professionals and one-on-one confidential coaching for women throughout the U.S. by phone or Skype.

Tell us about a typical client.

My clients are usually women in their 40s or beyond who realize that they are in an unhealthy marriage and not sure whether to leave their marriage or have decided to leave and need support and a plan of action to move forward with more focus and less fear and uncertainty.

Favorite quote?

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”–Soren Kierkegaard