Ranavat Botanics is dedicated to going beyond skincare to create a community around empowerment. Just as we want to help instill confidence and promote self-care, we want to celebrate beauty that goes more than skin deep. One way we’re doing this is by sharing stories from incredible individuals who have faced adversity and turned their experiences into empowerment—what we call a “Claim Your Crown” moment.

At 31, Parul Somani had just given birth to her second daughter, recently started a new job, and was diagnosed with breast cancer. Genetic testing played an integral role in her early diagnosis and empowered her to become her own advocate. Somani is a testament to the value of genetic testing and today she’s actively helping to make it more accessible to everyone, making it her mission to educate others and remove barriers to access. Here, she shares with us her Claim Your Crown moment—how she demonstrated incredible strength during the most challenging time of her life and ultimately discovered a calling that would ignite a new passion and pave the way for her next journey.

"I’ve said this so many times, but I really really want my daughter to be able to admire someone else’s beauty without questioning her own. She can admire other people that are like her, or unlike her, and look to them for inspiration, but I never want that to make her question why she looks the way she is, why she’s a certain size, or why her skin color is the way it is. Beauty is very fleeting and I myself am creating a career off of my beauty, but in 10 years, I have to be comfortable with myself however I’m aging. You really have to have a beautiful soul and beautiful character or else none of it matters."