She tells other mums how easy it is to make money from home an how she does it. GIVING up your job to stay at home and look after your child/ children – it’s a prospect that would make many a working mum shudder but sometimes it is needed for balance..
At one time, Candice Brathwaite-Aboderin was no exception. Enjoying a successful career as a marketing executive in the field of publishing, the 28-year-old admits that giving up her job to become her daughter’s “personal butler” wasn’t a decision she made lightly.
However, when she began to struggle to achieve that all-important work-life balance, Brathwaite-Aboderin decided something had to give. She made the choice to quit her job and become a stay at home mum – and the decision couldn’t have been more fruitful.
Having launched her YouTube channel, Candies Corner in 2014, the mother-of-one, who
lives in Croydon with her partner and their three-year-old daughter Esme, was able to post videos more consistently after giving up her job earlier this year.
Using the platform to share videos on everything from the realities of being a stay at home mum, dealing with the death of her father when she was 21, and growing up as a dark skinned girl, Brathwaite-Aboderin has successfully used the world wide web to share her experiences and also inspire and empower her viewers.
Here, the popular vlogger talks to Life & Style about giving up a successful career and the significance of black women utilising YouTube to share their experiences.
Tell us about your experiences balancing motherhood with work and eventually giving up your job to become a stay-at home mum
Before my daughter was born, I was running my own cake business and temping at law firms. I didn’t really have a clear direction in terms of what I wanted to do, so when my daughter was born, I was at stay at home mum until she was two. Then, a competition popped up in my Twitter feed, offering the chance to win a job with Penguin Random House Publishing Group. I decided to give it a try and I got the job. So I threw myself not only back into work, but into a totally new field and I found that really hard. Even though publishing is 90 per cent female, the struggle of your child being ill and you having to leave them with a sitter, then go to work, then rush back to collect your child – I just couldn’t get the balance right. So I decided to resign.
What prompted you to apply for the job with Penguin Random House?
Honestly? Absolute sheer boredom. It is so mind-numbing to be in this routine with this little person, who can’t yet communicate what they want, leaving you to play guessing games for more than eight hours a day! I remember telling my partner that even though I was a mum, I felt so worthless. I really wanted to find out who I was, away from being my daughter’s personal butler. I’d become so wrapped up in her routine that I lost touch with the real world. I felt that go- ing back to work would rebuild my confidence and it absolutely did.
Were you not concerned that giving up your job might re- ignite the feeling of boredom you experienced when you were initially a stay at home mum?
I was petrified. But aside from getting to work with people and getting paid, one of the main reasons I took the job was to gain confidence. By the time I decided to resign, I had gained that confidence so I felt completely at peace with my deci- sion to leave. I had experienced both sides: the side where I had a boss, I had deadlines and my child almost had to come second – and the side where my child was my boss! Neither side is worse than the other. But I do feel that every mum – where possible – should be able to experience both sides, because only then can you make an informed decision.
Tell us about launching your YouTube channel, Candies Corner
I put up my first video two years ago, but I’ve been posting consistently since March of this year. Being consistent has totally upped my audiences and has put me in a position where companies have asked me to run paid adverts on my channel, which is amazing. This is another reason I would encourage stay at home mums to give vlogging a try – because the internet can provide a means for you to be financially independent. A big fear about leaving a job to become a stay at home mum is how you’d cope financially. You may not want to have to rely on your partner or the government for money. But there are now many ways to make money other than working in an office. The internet is one of them.
What initially drew you to YouTube?
I wanted to use YouTube because I felt that there weren’t enough black women utilising that platform. I don’t know if it’s because YouTube is so saturated with young, non-black vloggers that I didn’t get to see those black women, but nevertheless, I rarely saw them. I’d taught myself how to edit and I felt that I spoke well on camera, so I decided to give it a go. And now that I’m in the YouTube community, I’ve realised that there are a lot of black women utilis- ing YouTube, but because they don’t look like Kim Kardashian, they’re not getting the exposure they deserve.
So would you say that vlogging is also a means for you to inspire other women, particularly black women?
Absolutely. I put out three videos a week, regardless of my views or my retweets, because while the videos are for me, I also put them up for other women who look like me and perhaps feel like their voices aren’t worth much. I get so many comments from women who say they’d love to start a YouTube channel, but they don’t have the right look, the right camera, etc. I tell them that they need to set all of that side because – much like publishing – we’re really thin on the ground when it comes to seeing black women utilising this platform. And our voices do deserve to be heard.