'I lost everything in COVID. 6 months later, I was earning 6 figures. Here's how.'

I remember that day like it was yesterday - my mum was down from Canberra, my 20-month-old daughter was in the bath and they closed the Australian borders.  

I looked at my inbox and the emails came flooding in - people were cancelling holidays left, right, and centre.  

Being an independent travel agent was my job. 

Within 24 hours I had lost over $35k worth of income.  

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I sat in a slump on the floor with my mum and cried. How would I pay the mortgage, my car repayments - food?  

Mum comforted me and told me it would be ok - but I knew it wouldn’t be. With borders closed - COVID-19 had just started to spread here - the unknown was scary.  

Then Melbourne went into their first lockdown and no one was going anywhere.  

There’s no annual leave when you have your own business. 

I called the banks - froze my mortgage, my car repayments, my insurance payments, then when job keeper was announced I received that.  

Even though it was less than my earnings - it helped pay for food.  

I even started selling things we weren’t using anymore, baby clothes, my pram, anything I could find in the garage.  

We eventually even sold my car.  

As someone who has always loved fitness and already had qualifications in the nutrition space- I continue to move my body and eat as well as I could.  

I went for runs and, in those first few weeks, did home workouts.  

It really helped my mental health, it kept me sane, focused and driven to do something.   

I saw so many women online, in my community in such a bad place. Struggling with lockdowns, struggling with home schooling, feeling sluggish and depressed, not moving, eating junk food all day because what else was there to do?

It sparked an idea. I was doing these workouts at home anyway — why not jump on Instagram and do them live - get women involved to move?

So I did my first live online workout.  

The turnout was amazing — women from all over Australia worked out with me.

I continued to do this four days a week — helping women stay active and look after their mental health while we all stayed at home.  

I engaged the help of a business coach, paid for it on my credit card and we worked together.   

She encouraged me to do health consultations - to help women eat better to make them feel better mentally, to get them out of this rut.  

So I did.  

This then turned into me coaching women privately. Over the following three months I wrote and developed my own group coaching program.  

My online workouts were going so well - I decided to move them over to a subscription based program. 

As other cities went into lockdown more women were joining and I created a community where we worked out together live, supported each other and pumped each other on.  

I called it - The Figure Babes. 

In that first six months of turning my little Instagram page into a business, I hit six figures.  

Not only that, but I had helped hundreds of women move their bodies, look after their mental health, eat better, feel better and had grown my following as well.

I continued my studies in the fitness and nutrition space, becoming a Master Female Trainer.  

While also in lockdown, my partner and I were struggling with fertility issues. 

We had our daughter, and we desperately wanted to give her a sibling.  

All year we tried and nothing - each month hoping there would be a light amongst the COVID darkness.  

Every monthwe were disappointed.  

By October we engaged the help of a fertility specialist and after going through ovulation induction, fell pregnant with twins. The shock was immense; we were elated but scared.

After such a roller coaster of a year financially and mentally, we were now going to have to buy a new house and new car.  

While pregnant I filmed my pregnancy workouts and launched my pregnancy and postpartum program Fit by the Figure, encouraging women to continue to stay fit and healthy during and after pregnancy. The end of the financial year saw the business hit over $200k worth of income. I couldn’t believe it!

Our twins were born on August, 18 2021. Beau delivered vaginally however little Harlow was an emergency caesarean. They spent two weeks in special care with Harlow being only 1.8kg.  

Image: Supplied.

2022 has been another rollercoaster - we have lost family members and on January 29 our little boy Beau was taken to the Royal Children’s Hospital by ambulance with COVID for five nights.  

I continued to find strength in moving my body and by eating well, encouraging my clients that you can overcome anything.  

I have now coached more than 1000 women, helped women run when they thought it wasn’t possible, helped women move their bodies, fill their cups, start their businesses, leave jobs that weren’t serving them, and improve their confidence and their relationships.

I offer free content on my website for those who can’t afford it right now - running plans, meal plans, workouts, recipes and more. And there is a huge subscription offering too.

To me this was a dream - a dream that I am now living every day: to help women feel better.  

COVID-19 may have been horrible but for me, without it, I would never have been able to do what I am doing now. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel.

You can find out more about Fit by the Figure here. You can follow Danni here and here.

Feature Image: Supplied.