Few that know Mary Grothe today would guess that her childhood was traumatic. That she was raised by an alcoholic mother and abusive father in a filthy house, where tar dripped down the walls from the profusion of cigarette smoke. That at fourteen she watched her childhood auctioned off beneath a big top before fleeing town as a result of her parents’ criminal mistakes. Or that dance, her original love and ticket to freedom, would be taken from her in an instant. That four whole years of darkness followed. That she briefly married a man so toxic that she had to plot a secret escape to free herself.
What many people do know is that, in spite of all the above, she discovered, to her own astonishment and that of everyone around her, that she was something of a sales prodigy. That her success was meteoric. That her name was synonymous with number one.
Until now, most also don’t know that all of this “success” led her straight back down into the darkness. Into alcoholism, and from there into the front porch of her neighbors’ house, behind the wheel of one of her two cars. Or that years of healing, and grinding away in the trenches, would only bring her straight back to her knees. That finally, one fateful Christmas morning, from the pit of the bottom, she found Jesus. That again, she thought she’d forever changed her life, only to learn that doing so is easier said than done.
And that’s just the first half of this book.
But this isn’t an ordinary business book, or an ordinary autobiography. It’s not merely a rollercoaster, either, but an entire theme park full of them: of being a daughter, a partner, a wife, a mother, a Christian, a founder, and a CEO.