Pediatrician-Statistician-Radio Host-Professional Organizer

I loved notebooks growing up. Particularly the ones with lines. I loved to make folded columns for my math assignments, and I loved labs in science. Whether it was dissecting an animal or pouring solutions into flasks to create chemical reactions, I was all in. The terrible smell of the formaldehyde or working on words problems did not deter me, I loved math and science. So, what does a kid that loves math and science want to do? If you guessed become a doctor then you guess right.

Ever since I can remember I wanted to help people. One of the best ways I thought of doing that would be to become a doctor, more specifically a pediatrician. As a pre-teen, I would write all over my notebooks Dr. Carolina Cedeno (my maiden name). It became my life goal. Academically I was strong but had to work for every single “A”. I earned some “B” s too. I had a middle school language arts teacher that taught me how to study so that the information would stick. You study a little every night of the new material and review the previous material covered and the night before a test you aren’t cramming. Writing it down and reading it out loud was what he said and keep practicing it. It worked, for the first time, I was able to remember what I was taught weeks and months later.

My desire when I left high school for college was to major in chemistry as it is like another math and while I loved science, math was my first love but getting into medical school I thought you needed to major in science. I loved chemistry in high school so I figured I would love it in college too. I went to Boston University, which was a great school, but it was huge. Our chemistry 101 class had like 300+ students in it. I then took organic chemistry and while I enjoyed making the molecular structures and figuring out how the carbon compounds reacted with one another, yes, I am geeking out some and reminiscing about those college days, what I discovered was that it wasn’t the path I ultimately wanted to take. As I researched, I saw that I would need to be in school for at least another 11 years, 4 years for undergrad, 4 years for medical school, and 3 years for residency and I wanted to have a family and not be in debt until I was 60 years old. So, I pivoted.

What could I do with my current 1.5 years of education and what profession could it serve me well in? I chose statistical mathematics, back to my first love, math. I remember when I was a freshman in high school I did statistics for the varsity boys soccer team. I had so much fun doing it and thought about it as a profession. Could I be a professional sports statistician? Yes, so that was my new path. I remember reading statistics on sports cards and being fascinated with how they calculated players’ batting averages and ERAs. I love how sports commentators compare statistics from games for the last 25 years, from the longest touchdowns to the winningest streak in ice hockey. It was so interesting to me. As I researched this career, I realized I was out of money and couldn’t graduate college, I had about 20 credits left to graduate and couldn’t afford the last semester and a half. There was no way for me to keep going.

Back to New York City I went and started working at a premier sporting goods store in Union Square on 18^th street called Paragon. I wasn’t there long but just long enough to meet my future husband who worked in the shoe department next to the clothing department where I worked. A year and a half later we got married in the Bronx Supreme Court house and talked about starting a family. While we didn’t want to start right away, we ended up moving back to Massachusetts for work. Both of us were in retail with some neat opportunities but me not doing what I wanted to do as a statistician.  While we were back in MA, I thought about finishing school, but the cost was still too great.

Another pivot 2 years later as we moved to Pennsylvania to be closer to a special family who are like parents to us and now grandparents to our kids. We weren’t here long before we started a family, and motherhood began for me. As a mama, it was important for us to have me be home for our kids. We considered my return to work, in what was now banking, but if we were going to be short of money with me working a job we might as well be short, and I stayed home with our 1^st born boy. Then 3 years later came the 2^nd boy. I love being a mama. I just wanted to do more to help our family financially.

It was the middle of 2007, and I wanted to work for myself so I could control how many hours I worked. I loved being organized and I remember in my middle school days when I was at Milton Hershey School, a boarding school, I had adults in my life that always encouraged my organization. I would fix my drawers so that items were like with like and neatly folded. When I was in 5^th grade, I had a 6^th grader play a prank on me. She was my roommate at the time and placed a note in each drawer in place of my clothing that I had so meticulously folded and stacked. She dumped it all out of my dresser drawers and put it on the other side of my bed. I was crushed and hurt but picked up all my stuff and put it away again, item by item, and drawer by drawer. I loved cleaning and organizing and wanted to go back to my desire to serve people when I thought about becoming a doctor.

Being a professional organizer was a newer profession. While it started in the 1970s, it didn’t really pick up until the early 2000’s. My desire to serve my community and use my gifts of organizing together birthed my business in 2007 but I couldn’t start until I had a name. One of my dear friends called me early one morning and shared that she woke up in the middle of the night and wrote down a few names for potential business names. On that list was “Cure the Clutter”. I loved it and was off and running.

Now, nearly 18 years later, I get to do something that serves people, uses my gifts of organizing and project management and blesses my family. I don’t see myself doing anything else. From wanting to be a pediatrician to a professional statistician, for a second thinking I wanted to be a radio talk show host (still a dream that could come true) to find my passion in professional organizing, I wouldn’t want it any other way. My path was an unusual one and many times difficult but one that I do not regret walking.

Thankful to be a professional organizer.

Thankful to serve my clients every day.

Thankful to do what I love.