{ IN HER OWN WORDS }
MY JOURNEY Boy Has It Been A Hell Of A Ride! BY KAREN PALOTTO I PHOTOS BY MARISA NICODEMUS
I am completely humbled and honored to have been asked to share my story in this powerful woman’s magazine. I’ve struggled with writing this article, because while I have been through some very difficult times in life, I never have viewed my struggles as something that would be article worthy. There are so many women facing much harder circumstances and challenges. Incredible women. I’ve come to realize in the last few years is that we can all inspire one another. By being vulnerable enough to expose the realness about ourselves, that’s where we find the most strength. It’s also where we can remind others, everything’s going to be ok, and see, I’m not alone! Statements we all need to hear and have felt, often! So many people, most often without even knowing, have pulled me from very dark places simply by sharing their story and being vulnerable.
you both to the moon and back a billion trillion times. You are the best parts of me. Through everything I did wrong in life, and believe me there’s been some hick ups, I take one look at you both, and realize I’ve done 2 things right. My kids! ~ Mom ~ My story starts with my very first love, music! I have done theatre and sang for most of my life, starting at age 5. I’ll never forget it. I was standing on a chair, in the middle of a busy restaurant singing at the top of my lungs. I kid you not. Talk about not having a care in the world. When I was done everyone started
Thank you for that. Thank you so very much! I honor you. I respect you. I encourage everyone to share. And most of all, I hope by sharing my story I will inspire someone in the same way I have been inspired by others. My journey! Man, it’s been a hell of a ride!!! I want to preface my story with my biggest and most rewarding accomplishment, my sons! God knows without them my journey would have been much different. These young men have been my very reason for keeping my eyes forward! I knew they needed a strong woman that could lead and teach. I had no choice. To my oldest son Anthony, age 27 & my youngest Joey, age 25 - Thank you. Thank you for giving me strength as a mom, friend and person. Thank you for loving me through it all. Thank you for becoming the amazing men you are today! You both make me so proud. You are what have kept me strong in every single challenge I’ve faced, and still do to this very day! I love 28
ROCHESTER WOMAN ONLINE :: FEBRUARY 2018
clapping and cheering and I started crying, it scared me! What in the heck are these people doing? I mean after all, I was just singing. (smile) Those tears soon turned into curtsies and gratitude in the years to follow and many, many proud moments. Thirty-five years singing professionally, seems like a blink of an eye really. I retired in 2014 at the age of 49. Music and being on stage was my “normal”. It was how I expressed myself. It was my outlet and my safe place. My place of peace and confidence. The bigger the audience, the better I liked it! It was a way of life for me that allowed me to experience so many different things, cities, states and people. It was also my livelihood later in
life for many of those years! I sang through everything -love, hurt, happiness, death, pain, joys, pregnancies, divorce, falling, getting up and everything in between! The minute my foot hit the stage, it was like a light switch turned on into another place where I knew regardless of what was going on, I’d be ok. It was an escape. It made me happy! It was my passion and my very being. It still is. It doesn’t ever leave you. I just choose to use it differently now. Fitness, in many ways, has become that very same thing. While I was always active as a kid and even a young mother, teaching step aerobics, lifting and whatever else I could get my hands on back then, I kicked it up a notch or 12 in 2009. I had been struggling with my weight and reached out for help to a trainer. I’ll never forget it, it was November. I started training, HARD, like never before! Completely changing my eating habits and following super strict meal plans. I remember I had offered to sing the national anthem for a body building show. They said “sure, but the only stipulation Karen is you need to compete!” Me; Um.. no.. Not happening, I’m not getting up there. Have you seen me? I can’t do that!! Like what are you thinking?? HOLY DEER IN THE HEAD LIGHTS BAT MAN! Who me?? Like how?? Like what?? No way!!! Two months later, I’m going to do the Anthem - in a posting suit! Five months later, I stepped on stage in a bikini the size of a band aid next to girls half my age, shaking in fear, feeling like a million bucks, AND WON!!! Months of dieting to extremes, training twice a day, endless amounts of chicken and tons cardio and no cheat food! Talk about testing my will power. And this was all while singing, working 3 or 4 jobs and being a Mom! It was hard. Very, very hard. It was also one of the