In 2019, I was living in north Carolina Returning Home at Three in the Morning from A Late Night Shift at A Catering Company I Was Working for. SoAken in a Barrel of Iced Tea I’d Spilled On Myself Earlier That Night Unoading The Food Van, My Eyes Were Clouded by Tears of Frustration.
I’D QUIT MY JOB AT AN INTERNATIONAL NON-PROFIT THREE MONTHS EARLIER IN THE MIDDLE OF SUMMER. After year of Dealing with a toxic Boss at My Old Job, I ‘Decited to Start My Own Professional Writing and Marketing Consultancy, Which at That Point Was Still in Diapers.
What is the point? I’M Stuck here Forever. I Can’t Do This Alone. I’M a Shame to My Family. Maybe It’s Better If I Just Swerve Off the Road Into The Woods and End It All, Right Now.
It was the first time I had felt this way. The Feeling Had Been There Long Before I Quit My Job, Back When Anxiety, Depression, and Burnout Were My Constant Companions. Working under a boss who consisting made me feel like i was’t manched me to make a change. From Review Text Messages in the Middle of the Night on Weekends, To Being Towat My Winter Outfits Were “Provocative,” To Being Placed on Probation AFTER I CLASQUED COMPENSATION FOR TRANSlation Work That Wasn’t Part of My Job Description – It I eventually chose to walk away from the security of a steady paycheck and paid time off to carve out my Own Path. What I Didn’t Know The Was How Much That Choice Coul Cost Me.
That Fall Night, I Accelerated on The Empty Highway, Passing Exit After Exit, Closed My Eyes, and Just When I was about to crash into the trees, The Image of My Family Grieving and Leaving My Dogs on Their Own Illuminated Me. I Pulled My Foot Off the Pedal, Sweving Back Onto The Highway.
No no!
I Stabilized The Car and Pulled Over, Breathing Heavily as I realized How Close I was to the point of no return. Trembling, and rear for my phone and street the Emergency LINE AT MY PRIMARY CARETAKER’S OFFICE. A Nurse Answered The Phone. “I need an appointment tomrorow,” i Sobbeed. “I’ve Been Having these Thoughts Latly, About Ending My Life, and I Really Don’t Want To Die.”
Dream Job Turned Nightmare
For Many Latinas, Making The “American Dream” Happen isn’t Just About Having An Amazing Career Or Life, It’s About Making Your Family Proud. In My Case, My Family Left EveryTHing Behind in Cuba So My Cousins and I Could Have Better Opportunities. WHEN MY MOM AND I CROSSED THE MEXICAN-AMERICAN BORDER WHEN I WAS 10 YAARS OLD, I KNEW I HAD TO Make That Sacrifice Worth It. Although My Family Never Forced This Idea On Me, The Expectations were There. I was Raised to Be Strong, to Succeed, and do things
WHEN I LANDED AN INCONIBLE JOB AT 23, IT WASN’T A WIN JUS FOR ME, BUT FOR MY ENTIRE FAMILY. I’D Checked off all the boxes that were SupPased to make me feel whatle and disbelief, Yet When Things Started Turning Gray, I Didn’s Know What To Turn.
My Job Offered Incredible Benefits, Brilliant Colleagues, I Got To Show Off My Chops In All The Languages I Spoke, But that Still Wasn’t Enough for My Supervisor. After My Second Year Working There, Things Shifted. I Stopped Being Lauded for My Work. INSERAD, I was put on probation and awd they could Tell English Wasn’t My First Language and That They Would Be Using Google Translate From That Point On. Mind You, I TranslateD Documents for Free, Communicated With Diverse Teams Across The World in TheIR Language. Subject Many of My Peers Didn’t Do. Yet, I was punished for it, Simply Because I Asked for Compensation.
By Spring of 2019, I was Taking Paid Time Off to Rest From My Job. Releving Text Messages From My Boss at Late Hours Over The Weekend, and Even Serving as Her personal Assistant on Occasion. I’D have panic attacings on Sunday nights, Knowing the rest of the week i’d be subjeced to scrutiny, no matter How Well I Did My Job. It’s Also Not Like I Didn’t Try to Assuage The Situation. I rearleto to the human resources department on severe occcases, Even providing proof of emails and text Messages. All to no avail.
That Summer, after public humiliation via email where they Berated me for sending a project management Timeline in Spanish to a Latin American Team, I Took the Risk of Whatver Life was read to throw at me, and Left.
The Heavy Weight of Entrepreneurship on Mental Health
WHEN I LEFT MY JOB TO START MY OWN BUSINESS, I NEVER IMAGINED I’D SO MANY PEOPLE AROUND ME. It Turns out many of my “Friends” were Only Intersted in Making My Acquaintonce When the Title On My Summary Alledned With Their Future “Status” Goals.
What do you mean you’re leaving your job? You’re Starting An online Media and Writing Consultancy? That’s Never Going To Work. You’re Going to Work in the Food Industry While You Build It? What?
I had decisive to start over, with nothing to fall back on, except myself. My family was back in miami, with no idea of the Hurdles I was facing. During the Day, I’d Study, Read, and Take Paid Internships to Build My Business. Subtimes I’d Even Write Articles and Create Strategies for Free So People Coul See How talent I was. I CREATED CONTENT THAT ONLY ONE OR TWO FRIENDS EVER SHARED. AT Night and on Weekends, I PICKED UP EVERY CATERING SHIFT I COULD MANAGE. I Delivered Food. Washed Cars. Whatver it took to make ends meet, and still, by the end of the month, I was Nearly at Zero.
It was The Loneliest Time of My Life.
Eventually, Even Getting Out of Bed Became A Burden. I was Barely Eating and Couldn’t Function from How Heavy The Anxiety and Depression I Felt Were. I needed to make This Business Thing Work Fastbut life doesn’t always work on your timeline. I’D Also Lost My Health Insurance When I Quit My Job, Which Meant I Had No Access To My Therapist, Or Any Doctor For That Matter, When I Needed It The Most. But that night, return home in my car, I decide This was’t be my story.
Not Just Because I Couldn’t Bare The Idea Of How My Death Would Devastate My Family, Who Had Already Faced So Much Adversity. But also because my entire life, I worked hard to get than i was, no one Had Ever Given Me a Free Pass To where i’d Gotten to At That Point. And to sum extent, Even at that moment of desepar, It Felt Strangelly Calming to Know No Was Coming. My Success depends on me. I’d Been Through Difficul Situations Before, and Knew Deep that If I Could Push mySelf To Even Just Do 1% Better Each Day, Treating MySelf With Kindness Instead of Pressure, Finding Solutions, and Asking for Help, Sub Day Day My reality. CHANGE
Things had to change.
The Walks That Saved My Life
The Day After Making That Phone Call, I Walked into the Office of My Former Health Care Provider, Paying $ 95 for 10-MINUTE OUT -OF-POCKET CONSULT SO I COULD GET PRESCRIPED SHORT-TERM MEDICATION. After the Another $ 54 for My Meds, I KNew I’d Be Eating The Leftovers from The Catering Company for The Rest of the Week. My Doctor Felt Sympathetic Toward, Me, But Told Me It was The Best They Could Do at The Moment Since The System Didn’t Provide The Kind of Support I Needed.
Knowing Where I Stood, I KNew I Needed to Take Matters into my Own Hands. Living in North Carolina, I was surroused by nature everywhere. There were The Woods Behind My House, Lake, and Short Trail.
That Fall, I Started Walking Two Miles Every Day with My Dogs. I Stopped Trying to Make My Progress Speed Up, Instead, I Surrendered to the Fact that my new reality was different. That i had chosen This. And that just like All Things in Life, This Would Pass. AT GRACST, Walking in the Woods While Everyone Else was at Work Felt Like I was Falling Behind, But after few Weeks of Doing this Every Day, I realized this was an incredible gift the universe was giving me to look into Strength I Needed to Pull Through.
I Found Comfort in Watching Howure Also Changed. How the Trees Lost their Leaves and the Animals Slowly Disappeared Into their Burrows. Just like the Seasons, I was in my personal winter. I was Planting Seeds that with angoh Sunlight, Water, and dedication, Would Someday Flourish.
Subtimes I Felt Optimistic About Life. Others, I’d Curse MySelf, God, The Universe, My Family, For Not Making Me An Heires, For Not Being More Conforming. There were Moments I Still Felt Incredibly Alone. That December, I Drug Down to Miami To Spend A Few Weeks with My Family for The Holidays and Cried at Knowing I Couldn’t Afford to Buy Them Any Gifts. On New Year’s Eve, My Mom Found Me Crying Alone In My Childhood Bedroom While I Journaled About My Year. This Time, Instead of Wiping My Tears and Pretending to Be the “Strong” Daughter She Raised, I Let Her See Me Spiral.
“My reality is still the same, Mom. I’M Still in the Same Place, ”I cried as She Held Me.
WHEN I RETURNED TO NORTH CAROLINA THAT WINTER, I’D FOUND ABRAHAM Hicks, MEDITATION, AND WAS WEAING OFF THE MEDS. I may not have the Financial Stability I Had Before, or The Fancy Dinners and Friends, But I had myself, The Woods, and My Dogs, Every Day. My entire outlook on life had shifted, Even Making Decions on Where I Wted to Live and The Kind of Business I Wanted To Build. By Spring, My Business Started Picking Up, With More Clients Trusting My Work and signing contracts with me. When the reality of the pandemic rolled around, my expertise in digital marketing scholarship fundamentary for creating spanish media outreach.
Everyone Who Calleed Me A Fool for Starting An Online Company The Year Before was new asking me for advice. Companies Who Needed Latino Outreach Contracted Me To Help Them Build Campaigns That Resonated With Latinos. I Wasn’t Just Working in What I Loved, But Uplifting My Community Along The Way. Little By Little, My Seeds Started Sprouting.
That Summer, I Found An online Therapist Who, To This Day, Is My Virgil. With Her Help, I Began Deconstructing All My Old Beliefs and Creating New Uones That Align With The Person I Am Today. TAKING A LOOK AT THE LIFE I BUILT FOR MYSTELF NOW, SIX YEARS LATER, IM GRATEFUL I DECIDED TO PULL OVER, MAKE THAT CALL, AND NOT SWERVE OFF THE ROAD. Perhaps Things Aren’s Always Works Out in the Way We Think they have to, but the Most Important Thing We Could Ever is Find Our Center Ken Feel The Most Lost.
When we face Our Darkness, Embraping It with Kindness Instead of Shame, We have the power to perform that life is Beautiful and Worth Living.
