As I sit here typing this message, less than 6 hours away from being evicted from my home, I can’t do anything but reflect on how I got here. Being a full time business owner has been my pride and joy since the day I stepped out on faith and escaped the rough world of corporate. But today, it feels like the biggest mistake I’ve made in life. I feel like I’ve exhausted all my efforts and I honestly have no fight left in me. Once upon a time, leaving my full time corporate job felt like I finally had taken full control of my life and I felt nothing but pure joy to be making good money doing what I love!

But after a series of unfortunate events that I never had the chance to plan for (including surviving domestic violence, temporary homelessness, and navigating all the challenges of single parenting) I still managed to pull through and my business ended up growing in the process. Being in survival mode, I overlooked the importance of really understanding what my capacity was and my inner Superman kicked in. So I convinced myself that I had to help everyone that needed me. I was still doing pretty good overall managing the workload until my daughter got sick with the flu back to back over the course of a month. In order to prioritize being a mom, I moved client work around and took advantage of the “grace” my loyal clients offered by volunteering to have work completed at a later day. I was comforted endlessly with many “take your times” and “no rush honey’s” so it was a no brainer for me to shuffle things around to make sure I could do life things as needed.

Fast forward to the past couple of weeks when I realized my cash flow had almost completely halted, I sat down and mapped out what client work I had leftover and deadlines to have to completed by to ensure I was able to handle all the financial curve balls life kept throwing my way. That plan included finally completing some of that outstanding work from those kind hearted clients who promised me that the grace they offered was no big deal. I didn’t realize that the grace was being offered in exchange for me to relax on my invoice payment terms because that wasn’t ever in the discussion. While I take full accountability for not having my operation properly set up to run smoothly even while I tended to my sick child, I knew that I had short term goals to focus on setting my operation up to be a well oiled machine in the near future.

But as I sit here about 5 hours away from a court hearing where I will be evicted from my home due to not having the rent payment I thought I would surely have by now, I can’t help but be bitter, frustrated, and upset at the $6000 worth of open and unpaid invoices in my merchant account. Especially knowing that this is really the cash I need to have liquid to take care of life and not feel like a complete failure. I’ve never experienced this level of disappointment in my life and I can’t believe I’m here despite thinking I had overcome the biggest obstacles I once faced.

Am I crazy to throw in the towel and go back to corporate after everything I’ve overcame? I don’t know if I’m looking for words of encouragement, a reality check, or just someone who can relate. But I do know that burnout is real and I have never felt as mentally exhausted, helpless and drained as I do at this very moment.

At this point, I doubt invoice payments will come in time court, and I’ve stayed awake all night trying to find alternative solutions that can be utilized in a matter of hours and I’ve once again come up short. I even went as far as trying crowdfunding which hasn’t gotten me anywhere either.

Anyways, I hope to come back to this post and either be so encouraged that I miraculously discover the solution I need to avoid eviction and restore my faith in the possibility of making this work full time. Or if you are reading this and easily identifying all the ways in which I’m the problem, your feedback is greatly appreciated as well.