by guest blogger S.C., WSW client since 2013
I wanted to take a moment to share how much West Side Wellness has made a direct impact on my life. In 2015, the Supreme Court granted me and my beloved the legal right to marry, and in June of 2016, in a beautiful meadow in Vermont, surrounded by friends and family, I married my person.
But it was a long journey, and it would never have happened without the absolutely amazing team of massage magicians at West Side Wellness who made it possible.
At first, we considered eloping. My parents passed away years ago, and my person’s parents live in Puerto Rico. We knew it would be difficult to afford a wedding on our own. I have 8 siblings – and when our parents passed away, the two youngest were 9 and 10. We ended up adopting them as siblings and raising them together. We’re incredibly close, but they are scattered, with many on the West Coast – it’s incredibly rare for us all to be able to afford to travel to see each other.
We both decided it was worth the sacrifice to save for a wedding, so that we could see the faces of our beloved family and friends and spend precious time with them.
I ended up taking four jobs – one of which was driving for Uber on my off days. Almost immediately, I started experiencing intense pain from 10-12 hour driving shifts.
Here is where the magicians came in – every week, I made an appointment or two and every week, they relieved the pain enough to continue driving for one more week. More than once, my passenger changed the destination mid-ride, causing me to be late for my massage appointment, and every time the gloriously kind humans at West Side Wellness were flexible and thoughtful and just all around awesome human beings.
On the day of my wedding, it was such an incredibly beautiful moment to look out and see my siblings and chosen family and friends gazing back at me. We had three glorious days to bask in the love of this enormous cuddle puddle. One moment I will remember forever is the moment I saw one of my younger brothers – we hadn’t seen each other in 5 years; we simply ran towards each other crying, arms outstretched.
If it weren’t for the empathy and talent and incredible patience on the part of the team of massage therapists that worked on me, we wouldn’t have been able to afford the wedding, and I would have missed out on an experience I will cherish for the rest of my days on this planet.
THANK YOU so much for the gift you give to the community!
All the thanks in the world,
S.C.
west side wellness, LLC 