So, how did I get here? How did I get to being a mom and owning a small business?
Firstly, I never wanted my own business. Secondly, I never envisioned myself as a stay-at-home mom.
I know this doesn’t appear to make sense, but I bet a lot of you mompreneurs out there have the same story.
I had worked in the beauty and fragrance industry for nearly ten years by the time I was pregnant with my first child. For the majority of my pregnancy I worked at a start-up beauty company. I was learning a lot about building a company and building brands while working with amazing people that had vast beauty industry knowledge.
Baby arrived, which, if you’ve ever had one, you know that first experience is immense. About three weeks into maternity leave a co-worker visited. She wanted to meet the baby, but also, she came to tell me our start-up founder decided to close the doors, immediately. All but one of us had been let go, but we did all get severance.
Truthfully, I wasn’t too upset. The severance meant I had paid maternity leave (unlike when I had a job) and being laid off meant I didn’t have to make the hard choice about going back to work or not. It also meant I got to stay home with the baby for as long as we could afford.
So, surprisingly, I found myself at home with baby, and, being career driven, this was something I never imagined I would do. That said, I was grateful. Maybe this was because I was older, I had spent time in the workforce, and I had come to learn that getting the chance to be at home with my baby was a unique, impactful, and fleeting opportunity.
So, I dove headfirst into moming and household management, but within three months of full-time mom’n it, I was lonely… and I needed more.
Sound familiar?
Watch out for next week’s post to find out what happened next!
Ilsa
xx