I did uncheck persistent notification. Does it have to be all the time on my notification? is that causing it?
Yes that's causing it. Please accept that this isn't my choice, it's Google's. Due to Android restrictions, an app can not run in the background permanently without a notification.
Can I help you with something else? You might want to uncheck "Pin to top", so that you won't see an icon in your statusbar. But the notification has to be there.