One was homeless, the other a refugee. Now they’re business partners.

Diana Combs-Selman and Rattana Mao know firsthand that lives can be turned around.

Combs-Selman spent most of her 20s living on the streets, a rebellious youth who turned to alcohol and bounced from couch to couch. Mao came to the United States when she was a baby, part of a refugee family from Cambodia seeking the American dream.

Now the pair work together helping nonprofits raise money so that others who are struggling can get a second chance. Last year, they founded their own event-planning company, R&D Occasions, after working together as volunteers coordinating fundraisers for charities.

This week, their work will be on display at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, when the Salvation Army holds its annual Inspiring Hope fundraising luncheon featuring former Cowboys star Emmitt Smith as the speaker.

“Giving back is huge for me,” said Mao, 38, a vice president at Comerica Bank who has also served as president of the Botanical Society in Fort Worth. “I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing without this community and their love and what they did for my family when they came here.”

R&D handles all aspects of events to make sure they run smoothly, from creating the program to handling check-in, preparing slide shows, even lining up sponsors. Other organizations that have hired R&D include the Multicultural Arts Alliance, for an art exhibit at the George W. Bush Presidential Library; Valiant Hearts, a Southlake-based group that helps women escape the sex trade; and the Gary Patterson Foundation, run by the TCU football coach and his wife, Kelsey.

For Combs-Selman, 42, it’s a long way from where she was a decade ago.

“The women who surrounded me in recovery didn’t allow me to sit and feel sorry for myself,” she said. “They told me that I could do anything and be anything.”

Are you tired yet?

Combs-Selman remembers exactly where she was when her life began to turn around.

She was standing in a Dollar Tree store in Arlington, a recovering alcoholic down to her last three bucks shopping for toothpaste and toilet paper. Watching a man stock shelves, she asked if the store was hiring.

“He asked me what I could do, and I said I can count money,” Combs-Selman said. The store manager took a chance on her.

She said her home life had fallen apart in high school after her father was laid off from General Dynamics (now Lockheed Martin) and her mother’s business failed. She dropped out of Arlington Martin and by the time she was 20, she had a baby and was in a marriage that wasn’t working. After having a second child, her husband filed for divorce and took the kids. She ended up on the streets in Fort Worth and started drinking.

She drifted for years, finding work where she could, until an old friend reached out to her online and asked: Are you tired yet?

“I lost it because I was either going to kill myself or die from drinking,” she recalled. “I immediately sent him a message and said, ‘Yes, can you come over?’ He stayed the night and took me to my first meeting of recovery the next morning.”

She got the job at Dollar Tree and then it was a series of steps up. She earned a GED, enrolled at Tarrant County College, won a scholarship to Texas Christian University and landed a job as a graphic designer. One night, she attended a meeting for Bras for a Cause, a breast cancer fundraiser being organized by Mao, and the two began working together.

‘Always in me’

Mao has her own incredible story.

She arrived in the United States as a baby in the late 1970s when her parents fled the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia to a refugee camp in Thailand. With the help of Catholic Charities, the family was admitted to the United States and settled in River Oaks.

Her parents didn’t speak any English but a translator helped her father land a job as a mechanic. He eventually worked for Parker Hannifin, an aircraft components maker, while her mother cleaned rooms at Cook Children’s to give Mao and her three siblings a shot at a better life.

Mao attended Castleberry High, then Arizona State University, and earned an MBA in California at the University of Phoenix. After her father died of cancer, she threw herself into community work “to leave a legacy for my dad” and discovered that she had a knack for organizing events.

“In high school, I did the prom, and never thought anything about it,” she said. “I planned my dad’s funeral. It was always in me.”

When Combs-Selman offered to redo the artwork for the Bras for a Cause event (“They had a disco ball on it and a fireman and I thought, ‘This looks like an ad for LaBare,’ ”) Mao found a partner. She asked Combs-Selman to help on other community events, working for free as volunteers. Eventually, groups started asking if they could hire them and the pair decided to form R&D Occasions.

Accidental purpose

R&D’s first client was Valiant Hearts, which helps women break away from lives as strippers or in other sex trades. The group hoped to raise about $60,000 at its event last year, and with R&D’s help, reached $180,000.

Executive Director Carrie Gurley said that what sets the two apart is their commitment to connect with the heart of a nonprofit, which she believes stems from their backgrounds.

“They take the time to understand what you are as an organization and what you’re trying to accomplish,” she said. “They could resonate with the plight of the women we serve.”

Combs-Selman calls it “an accidental purpose” that a lot of their work helps women in need. After telling her story at a Leadership Fort Worth gathering on homelessness, Combs-Selman was asked to join the board of the Center for Transforming Lives in Fort Worth, which helps women and children move out of poverty.

“She is a very effective board member,” said Carol Klocek, the organization’s chief executive officer. “She really brings an authentic voice to the boardroom.”

R&D will handle about 10 events in 2017. Combs-Selman now teaches part-time at TCU when she’s not working on an event. Mao has kept her job at Comerica, where she runs the Camp Bowie branch, as they get their business going.

Last year, Mao returned with her mother to the village in Cambodia where her parents fled. “I got to see firsthand the poverty, what my parents went through. It made me realize what my parents did for us kids.”

She believes the U.S. should continue to admit refugee families.

“We should vet them,” she said. “They vetted us; there was a process we went through. If you do it properly, you’ve got some great refugee families that are willing to give and do the stuff not a lot of people want to do and contribute to society.”

This story was originally published April 30, 2017 at 5:52 PM with the headline "One was homeless, the other a refugee. Now they’re business partners.."