We recently connected with Barby Ingle and have shared our conversation below.

Barby, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how you came up with the name of your brand?

I have been able to name multiple companies over the past 30 years. My first was called the Western Cheerleading Association. Why did I pick this name, it was because I worked for a company on the east coast called Eastern Cheerleaders Association and wanted to do something similar to what I helped build and was a part of for years on the other Coast. It worked. It grew, and a few years in, we had a different vision and purpose. We had grown out of our West Coast roots and had teams calling from the Midwest and Canada. I was driving around looking for inspiration and went by a tech company and thought, What we do is technical cheer and dance training I decided to rebrand to Cheertec Inc. and use a DBA for Dancetec as it was not a primary focus but a budding portion of our business.

In 2006, my family started a nonprofit. Getting to this point in life was a difficult road as I and multiple family members were now, including myself, living with rare and chronic diseases. We decided on the name Power of Pain Foundation because we all changed our life trajectory due to the pain of living with these diseases and how we had to become self-advocates to get access to proper and timely care. We wanted to do this for others in a service setting. As we grew we realized that we were now a National and then International Nonprofit helping people throughout the world. We ended up rebranding again. This time, we returned to a geographical description after avoiding it for many years based on what happened with WCA to Cheertec. We found that in this instance, we no longer had to explain what the Power of Pain meant, we got straight into talking about our programs and resources with our new name: International Pain Foundation. We also chose this because of the abbreviation we would now have: iPain. This rebranding has been fantastic, and we are thriving with a company name perfect for explaining what we do.

There have been other companies over the years, as well as projects. Each has a unique name and we show the importance of the company or project through the word. These include Taylored Lawns, KB Companies LLC, iPainPop, iPain Living Magazine, and my favorite, the NERVEmber project. Taylored Lawns is a play on my husband’s last name. It was an artificial lawn company he ran with his brother. KB Companies LLC is an umbrella company to which we can add new DBAs as we create new company projects and ideas. NERVEmber is International Nerve Pain Awareness Month (including RSD, CRPS, Diabetes, Neuropathy, and more). Each day during #NERVEmber, you can #GoOrange to help bring awareness to a condition with neurological symptoms.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am a reality television personality, chronic pain educator, and immediate-past president of the International Pain Foundation. I am also a motivational speaker, columnist for Pain News Network, and best-selling author on pain, health, and rare disease topics. Thank you for this opportunity to share some of my personal journey. I was born in Bangkok, Thailand, along with my sister. I have two brothers as well, one older. We moved to the United States when I was about 4 years old. Although I do not remember much of my time in Thailand anymore, my parents often reminded us of where we were born and what life was like there. I currently serve as the 2024 Elite Ms. Universal Petite – Thailand and will compete at the international pageant in the Bahamas in June 2024.

Growing up, I participated in soccer, track, dance, cheerleading, choir, gymnastics, Girl Scouts (from brownie to cadet), student government class representative, modeling, and beauty pageants. We were always quite busy, with each of us doing activities together and some special activities on our own.

Another thing that made my childhood unique was that I was diagnosed in 1st grade with a severe learning disability. My parents sued the school district in court and gave me and other children at our school access to special education. My elementary school principal told me I would never graduate high school. It turned out that I graduated college in 4 years, something neither of my older siblings could do. I was able to use the extra help and individualized learning experiences to excel as a student. Although I did not receive my first A in school until the 4th grade despite giving all my best efforts, I finished my last semester of college with 21 credit hours of classes and a 4.0. A theme that continued in my life: I did not give up or give in. I kept going, and success was there for me to achieve. I use that same drive with the challenges of living with rare diseases and medical disabilities.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

I provide hope to those challenged with a chronic care condition. Specifically, I encourage and build resources for those with chronic pain and our families, caregivers, healthcare professionals, and the public. The World Health Organization estimates that 1.5 billion people globally are affected by a condition that causes pain, which is bound to affect you or someone you know. Until you feel the pain, it isn’t easy to understand all the challenges it brings. Pain (physical, mental, emotional, spiritual) can and will consume you. Please don’t allow it!

As a patient, I know we must choose to begin the healing process! I hope my books will inspire an eventual transformation filled with HOPE and motivation while providing better access to care and options. I have authored nine books and am working on four more. I always think I am done, but continuing life with a rare disease and chronic pain, so much information has come to me, and more books are warranted. I believe the most significant impacts socially are from 2 of my books — From Wheels to Heals and Aunt Barby’s Invisible, Endless Owie. From Wheels To Heals is about my journey of developing a rare disease, using a wheelchair, and overcoming the challenges this brings into our lives as patients and caregivers.

I have had professors use my books as class materials in medical school classes and support group leaders buying copies for all of their members. I wish we were all taught how to navigate the health system earlier in life so that when someone we know develops a chronic condition, we can get help faster and access the treatments we need. The healthcare system is only sometimes what we are led to believe.

Unfortunately, so many other patients experience my story. I now share my knowledge of overcoming challenges with our daily activities. I had to learn the hard way, and now I pass on my ability to give hope and answers to all patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals. I hope that speaking out about my journey stops it from happening to anyone else. My social impact with Aunt Barby’s Invisible Endless Owie was on youth. I cannot have children, but I have seven nephews and a niece. The older four are great, but our relationship is not. All they were taught of me was not to touch Aunt Barby and to be quiet around her.

They were afraid of me. With the youngest four, I could use the book to set expectations from a very early age, and we are all very close. The book is a tool for families around the world to help them understand that just because someone is disabled does not mean that they have no abilities. We want to be social and interact to impact the lives of those in our lives and around the world. We have much to offer.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

First, Create A Strong Brand. Your brand includes a logo, colors, font, and graphic formats. You want people to think of you whenever they see your color, brand, logo, graphic, etc. Stay consistent and announce updates and changes as needed. If you change your whole logo, keep the colors or a portion of it the same to be recognizable for your network.

Only jump on some social channels to build your network. As you analyze and set up your business plan, you must do the same for marketing. Marketing successfully takes an investment to make. Having built a network for myself and our nonprofit, iPain, reaching over 100k people, others ask how I did it. It took years. I have cleared it out a few times through the years and rebuilt it, driving more engagement and updating our brand, style, and look to be fresh and inviting for participation. Could you do this and use the platforms that make sense for your business, product, or personal growth? Analyze, have clear goals, stay on brand messaging, and repost messages; consistency matters, as this all plays a part.

Finally, consider using social media options to engage your audience. Resources built in, such as polls on Twitter, reels on Instagram, or questions on Facebook, are all great for engagement. Hosting contests where you boost your followers and give small gifts like an easy-to-send digital gift card for participation are all opportunities to find new followers and reward long-term network connections. Let your network build and be authentic in your engagement.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.barbyingle.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/barbyingleofficial
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/barbyingleofficial
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barbyingle
• Twitter: www.x.com/BarbyIngle
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/user/barbyallyn
• Other: iPain’s Social Media Blog – https://internationalpain.org/pop-blog/ Facebook – International Pain Foundation Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/internationalpainfoundation Twitter – www.twitter.com/iPainOfficial Website – www.internationalpain.org