That pretty much sums up how I feel right now. Why? Let me tell you my story, (I’ll try to keep it short).

In the early nineties (yep, last cent…, no, MILLENNIUM) going to school in Sweden involved hardly any lessons in or on computers. As part of our exam, we were to finish a certain assignment and write that on a computer. For this reason the students had to go to our Headmaster and ask for some tutoring, as we had no idea what to do.   I often think about that when I pick up my 5-year-old daughter from daycare, and find her sitting with a tablet.

Anyway, I was interested in learning more about how to handle this interesting piece of machinery called “computer”, and a year later (1995), I was back in school this time enrolled in a fulltime course in computer and communications. The curriculum consisted of: Word, Excel, PowerPoint, how to type fast without looking at the keys, and, the internet.  I made my first website! It was green, that’s about all I remember. Don’t even remember HOW I made it, either with Frontpage or code, but I DO remember that I enjoyed it so much that I wanted to learn more. Sadly, at that time it was very difficult finding education here in Sweden that offered website design, I only found one possible option, but it was $600/week and I had to committ to at least 20 weeks for the course.  This was way outside my budget, so I put my dream on a shelf high up and kind of forgot about it.

For the next 15 years, I went on with my life, liking my jobs but without any real goal for my carreer, I only knew I wanted to work with people, offer a service and my tools of choice were the computer and a phone.  In April 2013 I hit a wall. I found myself in a situation at my job at the time that really brought me down, so I went to see the company’s doctor who sent me home that very day.

Thank heavens…!

This was the beginning of the journey I just have started, from a low in Spring of 2013, to how happy I am now, just 24 months later.

After going deeper into depression the first period of sickleave, I started to wake up to life again, feeling almost like a bear that wakes up in the spring. I started to look at my life – what did I have, and what did I want, and what made me feel good?  Tough questions for most to answer even on their best days.

I had found WordPress in 2009 and had been using my spare time to build sites for myself and friends when suddenly it occurred to me – now was the time!!!

Time to dust of my 20 year old dream and actually make it happen!

This time around it was much, much easier to find whichever kind of course you wanted to take, coding, CMS, webdesign, and the prices were reasonable, a lot can be found for FREE!

And here is where my ”20 years behind” comes in.

On March 27th I turned 40 years old. Kind of a milestone, but not scary for me.  I am pretty much exactly where I want to be, and are extremely happy to be; I have a loving husband, two adorable kids (5 and 7 years old), we live in a cozy little village on the Swedish countryside, with most of my family and friends within an hour’s drive, so that’s good.

Carreerwise; yes, ”20 years behind”!!!

I read and follow a lot of discussions in many groups on facebook, both Swedish and English, and see that in one way I really can’t compete with these (you) people that have all that experience that I could never even dream of collecting.

But then I think again, does that really matter?

We are all needed, and all our different types of services are all needed also!

That is why I stand tall and claim my spot on the market.  My natural curiosity and love of learning has me using time to dive into courses in coding, Photoshop, SEO and just simple plain web design, I feel more and more confident that I do belong!

And I’m truly happy and grateful of being part of the new communities, groups and coherencies I now find myself in!

Each week I learn more and I find that I am able to jump into threads on forums and answer questions, with people from all over the world, which brings me a great deal of joy.

Thank you for reading this first post of mine.   My next post will be about how I look at building a website with WordPress – with a small Swedish twist!

Take care y’all! <3

Photo: Me celebrating 40 years old, in a crowded community center on the Swedish countryside just outside of Gothenburg.

Veronika Berg