A kitchen table, a phone screen, kids asleep upstairs.
Starting over with nothing
The rebuilding stories that get shared publicly are usually the tidy ones, told backwards from a point of success. The version people write when nobody is watching is different and considerably more useful.
It is smaller than you would think. Work done at strange hours because those are the only hours available. Skills taught to yourself at three in the morning with a baby asleep on your chest. A business, or a job, or simply a functioning week, assembled out of whatever was to hand.
It also comes with a particular kind of anger, which is worth naming. People who rebuild from nothing are frequently described afterwards as resilient, by people who were nowhere to be seen at the time. Resilient is a compliment that quietly excuses everyone who watched.
The practical truth in most of these accounts is unglamorous. It was not strength. It was that there was no one else, so it got done.
What people said
The word 'resilient' is used to stop people fixing the things that break us.
fury
Someone described me as 'resilient' and I wanted to scream. I'm not resilient. I'm just out of options.
fury
I built four businesses while he built excuses. But sure, tell me again how women aren't ambitious.
fury
I rebuilt my life from nothing. Phone screen. Kitchen table. Kids asleep. Don't tell me about hard work.
fury
They called me a single mum like it was a diagnosis. It's a superpower and they know it.
fury
I built a website at 2am while the baby slept. Then I built another one. Then I built a business.
wonder
My kid learned to tie his shoes today. I taught him that. Me. Just me.
wonder
I built an entire business from a phone screen while my ex told everyone I was lazy.
fury
I taught myself to code at 3am while a baby slept on my chest. Don’t tell me about hustle culture.
fury
If you are at the kitchen table stage right now, that is not the prologue to the story. That is the story.
You can put something down here without giving your name.
Write it down