Even The Queen Makes Mistakes

‘Click, click, click, click.’

Because that’s what long-term unemployment does to you. It makes you question your worth and puts you exactly where you belong. Once the savings run out and you seriously consider delivering pizzas to cover your credit card bill, any illusions of your own grandiosity magically disappear.

For those who have been unemployed for a long time, I have a question. How do you do it?

Where do you — forgive me for asking — get the money? How do you go out and buy new sneakers, pay endless bills and that scam they call Council Tax, order groceries from Ocado, and keep your Apple TV+ subscription?

How do you survive when you don’t have an income or, at the very least, a credit card from some significant other (read: dad)?

It amazes me how many online advice articles and videos exist about finding a job. It took me several months to finally give up and install Threads, and suddenly, my entire feed was filled with 30-somethings lamenting how hard it is to get a job in tech these days. But nobody — and I mean nobody — talks about the reality of being unemployed for longer than two days.

“That’s what savings are for!” I can hear my happily employed readers say with a satisfied grin. “Saving for a rainy day keeps bankruptcy away!”

I agree; saving money is one of the main skills in Adulting. But as anyone unemployed for several months can tell you, when you have the same expenditures and no income, that bank account dwindles pretty fucking quickly.