CORNING, N.Y.(WENY)-- Applying for unemployment can be a hassle in it self, especially during a global pandemic. WENY News spoke with the owner of New Beginnings Wellness Center, who told us the difficulty of not only being unemployed during COVID-19, but how it can be even harder when you're the business owner. 

"I haven’t been working since March 16th, that’s when we officially shut down. I’ve never been unemployed before, I’ve been working since I was pretty much 16," says Darcie Hughes, Owner of New Beginnings Wellness Center. 

Darcie has owned New Beginnings Wellness Center for about 13 years and has been a licensed massage therapist for 23 years. 

She did attempt to apply for unemployment, but then she was told she actually had to apply for pandemic unemployment assistance, better known as a PUA because she is self employed as a massage therapist.

"I think self employed people have to wait a little bit longer, the process was a little bit different but thankfully we did have to get a hold of assemblymen, I had to get a hold of a bunch of different people just to move the process along quicker."

Even though the nation was in the middle of a pandemic, Darice said she still had to worry about being able to pay her bills on time so she wouldn't fall behind. 

"It was a little stressful because I did have rent and my bills to pay. I wanted to keep up on that, I didn't want to have to owe anything afterwords so thankfully when everything did get approved, we were able to get back pay and I was able to keep up on my bills and and rent and everything so that was great."

Once everything was said and done and she received her assistance, Darcie got right to work on making her wellness center an even more welcoming and extra clean place. 

"I've been lucky with the back pay from the unemployment that I wanted to surprise my clients but I used my unemployment money to redo the whole inside of my business to surprise them and get it all nice and clean. I want my clients when they come in to feel safe and comfortable coming in to get their massage."

Darcie told WENY News she plans on opening her shop officially on June 22nd.