Nicky Peddle on Navigating a Health Crisis, Leaving the Corporate Grind & Redefining Success

Women Who Inspire Me: Nicky Peddle

This is a story where pivots are not a failure, but an opportunity to find more alignment. Where unexpected circumstances force us to make different lifestyle choices. And where being yourself is celebrated.

Nicky and I met at Trailblazer Live, an amazing women in business conference hosted by Selena Gray in Edmonton, Alberta. Nicky shares her journey of motherhood and entrepreneurship, and the challenges that have shaped the way she lives her life today. From navigating the switch from the corporate world to creating a new life for herself after facing a health crisis she never saw coming and running her own business the entire time.

My hope as you read this next story is to see that there is not just one path forward, or one way to live your life. We are in a time where we get to choose what life looks like, to define what success means to us and to surround ourselves by a community of women doing the same.

This is where I would like to introduce Nicky Peddle. A singer, songwriter and social media strategist who specializes in working alongside mom entrepreneurs to create a social media strategy that fits her life. 

This is Nicky’s story. 

Can you share a bit about your journey, the path that led you to where you are today, and the moment that really changed things for you?

It was nearly the end of 2019, right before COVID hit. At that time, nobody really knew about it, and I was working in a corporate role. 

My days were long. I was basically leaving the house at 7 a.m. to drop my daughter off at daycare, going to work, and then picking her up at 6 p.m. that night. 

My days really had no flexibility at all. 

I still remember pulling up to the daycare at 6 p.m with the lady waiting outside the daycare, impatiently tapping her finger against her wristwatch, waiting for me to pick up my daughter. 

At that time, my daughter was three, and my son was six. My daughter was at daycare, and my son would go to out-of-school care after school. After doing that for so long, day after day, I felt this shift happening within me. Where I remember thinking to myself, “I don't like doing this anymore”. 

It was hard to admit that I wanted a change because I had spent so many years building my career. I was climbing the corporate ladder as we’re taught to do. I did all the “right” things. I grew up in the UK and decided to go to university in Scotland. I got the job, and I worked my way up to a position of authority at work. 

But there were a couple of situations when my daughter was sick, and my boss wouldn't let me leave to go pick her up and take care of her. 

I still remember this one time when I wasn’t able to step away from work to pick up my daughter when she was sick. I remember calling my husband, who was downtown in meetings, to ask him to step out of his meeting to go get her.

I enjoyed my job, but when I think back to the role, it was more the social aspect and the people that I enjoyed. I found that what I was doing wasn't lighting me up anymore. 

So, I made the decision to start my own business, and I let my work know that I was leaving. They had a little get-together for me, and I left on good terms.

That's when I started my journey as a virtual assistant. I basically went and started talking about what I was doing. I got all the social platforms set up, and then I just started to get jobs here and there doing what I could do. 

I enjoyed it, but it was really tough at times. The thing that kept me going was that it allowed me to stay home with my kids. 

In the beginning, I wasn't able to pick the clients I worked with as much because I took whatever I could, but it gave me the experience of working with so many different people. 

That was five years ago now, and it's been a journey because in 2021, I had a health crisis that really hit me. It was out of the blue, and nobody knew what it was. 

In the span of four days, my vision started going, I started getting dizzy, and then my throat muscles shut down. It got to the point where I couldn't swallow. I nearly had to call an ambulance one day, and my son still remembers it because I almost choked while I was eating a croissant. 

One weekend, we were getting ready for my daughter's birthday. I was driving to the lake, even though at the time I shouldn't have been driving. 

But I made sure everything was all good for the day, because you know what it’s like for a kid’s birthday. It’s their special day, and you don’t want to let them down. 

I wasn't feeling great, and I hadn’t eaten because my throat muscles were just not working properly and I didn't know why. 

We celebrated my daughter's birthday, and when Sunday rolled around, I asked my husband to take me to the hospital, because I knew that something was seriously wrong. 

And then that was it. I was in the hospital for six weeks, basically paralyzed on a breathing machine. 

It was August 2021, right before they ran out of breathing machines, a timing thing, which was crazy looking back. They didn't know what was happening with my body. The doctors ran all the tests: MS, cancer, all the tests that you could do. 

Eventually they found out it was this myasthenia gravis, MG. Basically what happened was it was shutting down all the muscle receptors throughout my body. 

Thankfully, they found a medicine that I could take, but they had to take everything out of my body: my blood, my plasma, everything. 

Looking back at the photos, I get kind of upset about it. Because at the time I couldn't speak, and I was texting on a phone to communicate with the people around me.

I couldn't swallow a single drop of water. My fingers didn't work. It was a really odd sensation. 

When I was in the hospital, I didn't see my kids often. They would visit me outside because it was during COVID. This one visit, I remember I was in a wheelchair, and I had tubes coming out of my nose. But for the most part, during that time, I was all alone. 

It was a huge, huge thing that happened, and I can't even like just shrug it off. 

That was a turning point for me, where I thought, “Wow, there's more to life”. 

Up to that point, I've never been afraid of anything. I'm always the optimist, the one who believes that we can do anything. I remember thinking, “Why did it hit me? I'm eating well, I exercise.”

I was a fitness freak, and now my body's like, nope, you can't do that anymore, and that was a big shift for me. I can still exercise today to a point, but I have to watch my body and energy carefully now. 

But I remember while I was recovering at home and adjusting to my new normal, I was working from my bed for those first two days. That's how committed I was. I was doing social media engagement for a client in Winnipeg when she messaged me and was like, “What are you doing? You just got out of the hospital.” 

I had to get a wheelchair when I came home. My mother-in-law had to move in with me for five and a half months to help me because I couldn't wash my hair, I couldn't lift my arms up, couldn't walk down the stairs, things like that. The first year was physically tough. 

In year two, I was coming off the steroids and the medications that I was on. It was a huge mental shift for me where I got this huge boost of motivation to build my business in a way that worked for me. That prioritized my health and the flexibility that I wanted to be there for my kids. 

I started shifting who I was working with. I prioritized working with clients who understood the energy levels of being a mom and the schedule of being a hockey mom. 

I managed to replace my income working 25 hours a week, and I was working with people who made me feel happy, who were more aligned.

At that same time, as I was coming off meds, I went through a bit of a depression. I had to go see a doctor to help me. A lot of it was because I was on steroids, and I had the whole moon face happening. 

A bit of backstory to my journey is that I've always been a creative. I’m a singer and a songwriter. I've got songs out on Apple Music, and I've done live performances. Being a performer and a singer, and then for the first thing to shut down to be my throat. It's taken me a long time to be confident in front of the camera again because I look completely different. 

So that obviously tied in with everything when I was building my business at home, because I am on Zoom calls, speaking with people, and all they can see of me is my face, and I looked completely different than I had before.

In year three, in 2024, I felt more alive and more like myself. That's when I went to the Trailblazer event, and when I met Selena. It just opened up doors for me.

What’s something you’ve learned along the way that you wish every woman knew, or a mindset, tool, or practice that’s helped you step into your full potential?

I wish every woman knew that you're allowed to feel things and you're allowed to be present in the moment of the journey. Because I kind of look back and think of all the times that I felt like I was failing or all the doubts I had. 

But I've learned to just enjoy the journey more. 

Katie Eberman: Just listening to your story, what speaks to me the most out of everything you said is how you have designed your life around supporting your health and building a flexible life for you and your family. So often we have it in our minds that to live a good life it has to be full of sacrifice.

It really kind of speaks to the idea of, and I don't know if this idea comes from Trailblazer, but if it's in your heart, it's there for a reason. Through all of the things that you've had to navigate, you're still working in your business, still working on yourself, expanding and growing.

Nicky Peddle: Yeah, and it's fitting for me. I think of the advice that's out there, especially for people who are just starting out. Where you are told to do all the things and follow specific actions to be successful, but it’s not like that.

I've made my business fit me, my life, and my kids. I work around that, not the other way around. 

It's a journey because we're not taught those things, and we're not taught to think like that.

One of my clients actually was a coach, and I've learned a lot through her. The biggest piece for me was my mindset. Of reframing the employee mindset I was so used to into that of an entrepreneur who chose to make new habits daily and who chose to build my life for myself.

I had to flip the switch in my mind and create new habits that supported me now. Because I always was the one to jump out of bed at five to go work out. Now I can't do that, and that has been the hardest for me. 

One thing I did this past year was to get out and perform. I was an anthem singer twice. I did two shows, one in Spruce Grove and Stony Plain, and performed at another festival. 

I was proud of myself, and I would just encourage myself to do it more to gain back my confidence with both being in front of people and with my vocal ability.

Katie Eberman: How did things shift for you once you started working on your mindset and you started building your business around your life and your family?

Nicky Peddle: I've found out what I like and what I don't like. So I've basically said no to certain things because they didn't light me up. I do like variety in my work, but the thing I love most is the creative strategy and the storytelling through content. 

Also, people might just look and say, you just do social media, but I don't. I kind of look at where somebody is and then ask them a lot about where they are in their life first, and then bring it back to their strategy because a lot of people get confused, or they think they should be doing things a certain way.

You're allowed to do things in your own way. If you feel that you want to do something that's completely not part of what you're “supposed” to be doing, then go that way. There's only one you. So if you have something different to offer, let that be part of your branding, and that's part of what you offer and kind of realign it that way. 

Katie Eberman: What has been the biggest lesson in your entrepreneurial journey so far? 

Nicky Peddle: The lesson that I've learned is around pivots. That’s it’s ok to give yourself permission to pivot. It's allowed, and it's not a failure.

If you want the flexibility, if you want to bring something in that might light you up, that's an opportunity to make it part of your story, and it can become something only you can offer to your clients.

Something that I’ve had to overcome is measuring myself against what everyone else is doing, especially when it came down to my own timeline, or what other people think I should be doing.

Because of my health crisis, I have to breathe more. I don't have to be accomplishing X, Y, and Z overnight. I’m on my own journey, and I get to go at my own pace, and I have to set boundaries.

Personal boundaries, especially. 

Because it’s hard when family members just don't get what we're doing.

Katie Eberman: Right, and I feel like our generation is redefining two important things. We're redefining what it means to be a woman in business or a career woman, and then we're also redefining what it means to be a working mom. 

So the perception and reality for so many of us is that we should struggle and grind, do the 7 a.m. drop-offs, 6 p.m. pickups, and balance everything in between. But we are redefining that, and it's hard for other people to understand, because they just don't know, or maybe they're not pulled to entrepreneurship, or maybe they're projecting their own fears on us. It's a lot to navigate and to hold space for our own dreams.

Nicky Peddle: I have had to set boundaries with family for my own wellbeing and energy levels.

I have found and cherish spaces like Trailblazer, because it's so important to have other women in our lives that understand what it’s like to navigate entrepreneurship and motherhood, and to have spaces where we can come together and support each other. 

Katie Eberman: I completely agree. I know for me, attending Trailblazer has completely changed my trajectory. I left that room wanting to hear and share other women's stories because there is so much wisdom in those stories.

Nicky Peddle: And we’re made to think that you can't share any of that online, and I've really had a hard time separating how much of it I share. I think to myself now I need to share more of my story, because a lot of people don't know about my journey unless they know me personally.

Katie Eberman: You are not alone in that either. I think a lot of us struggle to know how much to share online. That’s why I wanted to create this space, where you have the opportunity to share more, to give a little context behind your journey, about how you approach life. I think a lot of women need to hear that it's okay to have a different schedule. That you don't have to struggle and work eight plus hours a day every single day to be valuable. 

As women, we are delicately balancing finding our own way and showing up for our families in meaningful ways to us. Underneath it all, we have this desire, this need to contribute to our households and make money. 

Nicky Peddle: I have that same desire, and I've always had that desire. So when I wasn't making money, I felt like there was something wrong with me. Well, the truth was, there wasn't. I think the secret is doing it in a way where we are not always sacrificing ourselves, our health or our time. 

For me, I have no problem getting up early on a weekend to do an extra hour here and there. I enjoy it. It's quiet, and everyone is doing their own thing.

I'm enjoying what I'm doing. I'm also really enjoying helping the other women. I love the fact that they're moms in business because they just get it.

For me, being a hockey mom is a huge part of my life. My boy is in Triple A hockey school. That's what he wants to do, and it wouldn't have happened if I wasn't able to have my flexibility and drop him off at his training at two o'clock, three o'clock.

When women read your story, what do you hope they walk away feeling or believing about themselves?

I wanted to say, when women read about my story, I hope they walk away feeling empowered, with a sense of permission to redefine success for themselves, no matter what they're facing at that present time, but also to remember they are unique and have something to offer someone out there, even if it doesn't feel like it at the time.

I want them to believe that you don’t have to choose between being present mothers, creative humans, and successful business owners. Your needs, your health, and your passions are not inconveniences. They’re signals guiding you toward a more sustainable, joyful life and the one that was meant for you all along.

If someone reads my story and thinks, “Maybe I can build a business on my own terms, something that fits my life and my passions, even if I do have this autoimmune disease, and not squeeze myself into something that doesn’t,” then that’s the legacy I care about.

Here’s how you can connect with Nicky:

Website |Facebook |Instagram | Music

If you haven’t yet read the other stories of women who inspire me. I encourage you to read through each woman’s story because there is such power in the telling and listening of our stories. I just think back to being a child and sitting for hours as my grandparents told me the tales of what their lives were like growing up, and how their biggest milestones - graduating high school, getting married, and having children came about. Life now feels isolating and sometimes lonely, but we can change that by surrounding ourselves with a community of women, men and children who support and love us.

Read inspiring stories from women like you: Women Who Inspire Me

I believe every woman’s journey holds a piece of wisdom the world needs to hear. If you are a woman entrepreneur building a life and business you love, join the Simply by Katie community. A space for women to create authentic and meaningful friendships, witness the courage it takes to go after your dreams in alignment and without sacrifice and learn how to grow your business with a website that replaces unanswered emails and countless sent DMs.

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