Feetish Spa Parlor was dominating. The sole-proprietor foot spa, run by cheerful goth Andrea Lipomi, was a success by virtually every measure. “I’d perfected [a signature] pedicure technique,” she says. “I was able to get Feetish at the top of the list for highly rated pedicure joints in Vegas, attracting tourist traffic like you wouldn’t believe.”

Then, as it did all health-and-beauty businesses, the pandemic shut down Feetish for an extended period. While confined to her home, Lipomi reconsidered her profession.

“Even before the pandemic hit, my focus had shifted away from aesthetics and more toward the wellness benefits of the services I provided,” Lipomi says. “So, when nonessential businesses were forced to close their doors in Nevada, that’s when I first got the idea that maybe I should look into a new career in healthcare and nursing.”

She took online courses in nursing during the shutdown, though some old doubts nagged at her. “I went to school for various things in the spa world, but I never got an official two-year degree. So, I was a little bit nervous that I would, you know, fail math,” she laughs, “because failing math was a fear that kept me away from formal education for a long time. But then when I did these online college courses, I was like, ‘OK, these are definitely challenging, but they’re not as scary as I was building them up to be in my head.’”

When Feetish was allowed to reopen, Lipomi applied what she was learning to the latest CDC recommendations. As a result, the spa’s safety practices were exceptional. Lipomi got tested for COVID weekly—sometimes even twice-weekly—and wore as much PPE as healthcare professionals working in hospitals.

“I was obsessively reading up on what was the strictest guidance I could find, and that’s what I chose to employ at Feetish,” she says. “It would have been a nightmare if someone who had trusted me—as an important part of their wellness team, as I believe spa services are—had gotten sick on my watch. I didn’t want that to happen, so I took my sanitation, air filtration and the amount of time between booked appointments as far toward the extreme as was possible, while still operating a business successfully.”

Meanwhile, Lipomi continued her schooling, enrolling at CSN. She’s now a certified nursing assistant and intends to get into the licensed practical nurse program.

“I’ll get my registered nurse [RN] license after that,” she says. “I’m doing it step-by-step, because that’s the way I want to do it. Initially I was like, ‘OK, I can do this. I can get a two-year degree and be an RN.’ But I like what I’m learning so much, that now I’m thinking I might just go on to get my master’s, and become a mental health nurse practitioner.”

Earlier this year, Lipomi sold Feetish—both its equipment and its proprietary technique—to a new business, Beauté de Luxe. (And she notes that its proprietor, Heather Love, is also studying nursing.) It was a tough decision to let go of something she’d built up over nine years, but the excitement of taking on a new career takes some of the sting away, she says.

“I guess I conquered the challenge of successfully reopening a small business during a pandemic. And once you can check that off your list, where do you go from there? You’re kind of a little stagnant,” she says. “I needed to do something with more measurable results."

“My mom went back to school for her master’s degree in library science when she was in her 60s,” Lipomi continues. “[And] I’m in my late 40s while I’m going for my master’s degree. So I think I can do it. And I think a lot of people who doubt themselves can do it, too.”

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