Jobs you thought would be fabulous but actually weren't?

[GardenDreams]

I was a full time fine artist for 30 years (traditional painting, mixed media and pattern design) worked with book publishing, freelance, galleries, online print sales, various large companies and a few partnerships with celebs. Not as exciting as it sounds though, lol.

Throughout this period, many people looked at me with awe after asking what I did, mostly in surprise that I could earn enough to live on (it came close, at times). I do get the impression that many people think that this is a very thrilling and freeing way to live, but the reality was quite stressful and scary, at least financially, at times. It was a good long slog, with some tricky customers and another full time job dealing with social media. And the work never, ever stopped - there was no clocking off or guilt free holidays. Aside from the online glamour of how it looks, it eventually becomes less about self expression and more like a production line. At times I was completely, visually exhausted.

There are tons of newly proclaimed artists of a certain age on insta, and now more than ever before are offering art courses (after only 6 months in to being self taught), so it's very much a competitive kind of 'grind' culture which has multiplied in the past 6 years.. It is 'sold' as an alternative, lucrative side hustle, but is actually far from the oh so relaxing vibe these insta accounts make out in their posts.

I am still creating but have moved over into a new field that I love, and only now can I see how utterly draining and hard it was when I look back on it. But I am sure so many people still think the idea is quite romantic and liberating.

Anyone else with a similar story? I am cure there are tons of careers that sound wonderful to me, that might be really soul destroying or at least stressful in reality. My fantasy job would have been an archivist, but I took such a different path at ui that I dare say that boat sailed a long time ago!

Sorry but that made me laugh! (The first two paragraphs, anyway). Maybe you could make some money writing about your experiences.

Hairdressing. Absolute load of pants. Rubbish pay, rubbish hours, rubbish clients (sometimes) more good clients than bad.. but I would never reccomend a young person to train as a hairdresser. People want your Blood sweat and tears aswell as discount and hair done with a days notice, black to blonde in half an hour, just rubbish. I’ve recently gone self employed and that is a much better fit for me, after working for money grabbers for years. So after years of it being absolutely shit.. it’s now just shit ha ha ha

😂🙌

You do a marvellous job and I am in awe of you.

Former holiday rep.
I've been spat at, had a luggage trolley thrown at me, mauled by hoteliers and coach drivers. Was treated like scum by many, many awful tourists.
All for a pittance salary.

I did it for 8 years, god help me.

I offer up sideline sports physio aka first aider/ relationship advisor/parent 😅 Premier league it is not (very low step level sport)

Oh what a glamorous sideline I thought it would be. Everyone thinks it's rubbing muscles but the Majority of the time it's cold and wet, working long days on a saturday or evenings (on top of the day job) plus the endless calls during the week between matches. It is frequently muddy and smelly in very unglamorous changing rooms in the middle of nowhere with a constant weekend aroma of deep heat on my hands.

And did I mention cold. Very cold.

Most of the lads are brilliant, some need a counsellor more than massage and occasionally there's ego management required. I've learnt to be more vocal and won't now have my judgement on a player over ridden.

Saying that though it can be tremendous fun, we do a lot of drinking and ive met some lovely people along the way. And I could give a good pre and post match team talk if required.

Please tell us where this was? Taj Mahal? Alhambra?

Ha ha! No it was a major UK cathedral.

I don't imagine anyone would have thought of it as a dream career and for that reason it doesn't quite fit this thread, but I'll talk about expectation v reality of stripping.

I loved my days as a stripper for the most part. It was fun. The humour of most of the women was amazing. I met (believe it or not) some great customers, several of whom I am still friends with today and many more whom I have very fond memories with. Who wouldn't like getting paid for drinking (often free as customers would buy it) fizz and being admired, looking your best and hanging out with other women who were mostly hilarious? It has its good points. I guess if I spoke of what expectations MIGHT be, it might be lounging around in a pretty dress/bikini/lingerie, sipping champagne with a rich business man and going home with ££££ in your pocket.

I am currently writing a book about my some 15 years in the industry.

But the difference for me to a lot of women, which I saw then and more so now with hindsight, is that I was an intelligent, middle class woman. I could get out if I wanted. I had qualifications and other experience. I was privileged-and I was far from the only one don't get me wrong-some women choose the path for whatever reason. It fits a lot of lifestyles e.g. single parenting-kids at their Dad's, why not spend the weekend getting drunk and earning money instead of finding a boring, low paid job in a shop or such?

Wanting to save up for something while working another job-why not?

Studying while living at home? Or saving up to move out-it can make sense.

For a lot of the dancers however I look at their backgrounds and feel that there is a divide. A lot of them were quite vulnerable. Transient. Children in care featured a fair bit. I'll clarify that this did depend a lot on the clubs I worked in, impoverished old mining towns saw more of this that Spearmint Rhino.

I was asked more than once at each club, to check on dancer's mental health, or to check that they had somewhere to wash as they smelled. Check that nobody was doing drugs in the lavvy. A lot of them sofa surfed. Had slight learning disabilities or difficulties. Had no education. Very poor backgrounds or abusive families. Addiction problems. Abusive boyfriends. Or had just lost their way somewhere.

As there was a divide amongst the industry it is easy to miss these things. The women I became closer friends with similar to me in a lot of ways, perhaps not the background but a higher intelligence level, a driving license, good families and connections. But I saw a lot of what I describe above too.

It's a hard hustle unless you 'catch a whale' i.e. a customer comes in who wants to drop ££ on you, or a reliable regular (more than one required usually).

Things I experienced personally were some customers being awful. They'd try to shame you for what you did (I managed to cut them down for the most part, luckily) or your looks. Tried to start fights between strippers. I remember one man saying to me 'she's the star in here, you're all amateurs' (of the girl who was on stage at the time, she was indeed a fantastic pole dancer and stunningly beautiful) however I knew she was selling sex, addicted to cocaine and lived in a customer's loft room. Being told I 'must be' jealous of (insert girl over there who has a 'better' body or a prettier face).

Threatening to punch a guy who was being abusive to a very small woman who was dancing for him.

ACTUALLY punching a guy who tried to assault me while I had my back to him.

Anyway I won't write the rest of my book here. Just thought some might find it interesting.

Totally.

You're everything that's wrong with the world.
I made over a £10K loss a few years ago, a tenant had TOTALLY trashed my house, and it needed a new kitchen. A different tenant did too-I had to keep my promises to her so that's two new kitchens in one year plus all the other finances required to fix the house. She'd not paid her rent in months, 'because I hadn't done jobs'. Reality was, she wouldn't let me in to do them (and they were very minor, a new window key for example).

Constantly something needs doing. I had to take that tenant to court to get her out-she now has a CCJ and I need to take her back to get a money order at some point. Luckily the court went in my favour but it was pot luck as far as I were concerned. She started fires and left rubbish and dirty nappies in the garden-the neighbours hated her, and hated me.

I only have 3 BTLs. It's enough.

I trained as a counsellor. I thought it would be really fulfilling, helping people, getting to the bottom of their problems, having that job satisfaction.

The college I studied at were HORRENDOUS. A few of us actually decided to take them to task for how bad they'd been, there were confidentiality breaches all over the place, people getting sent the wrong work back, months and months of chasing the tutors who never got back to us-sometimes we didn't have a tutor for (what I worked out as) at least 20% of the lessons we were meant to have. We had about 5 different tutors in all because they kept leaving. We were all frazzled and struggling with our own MH by the time we finished and that's those of us who didn't drop out.

I did get half my money back. Then it was finding work. It's a flooded market and my dreams of running a private practice quickly melted into thin air.

I ended up working for EAPs. Rubbish pay-some perks, easy work and no pressure but felt like a call centre agent. Some time later I got 'lucky' and landed a job teaching it at an organisation that taught up to level 5 counsellors. I taught Level 5. Loved it, and then the company went bust two months later.

I took on freelance teaching-NIGHTMARE again. So much work, no support from management, inconsistencies-it drove me nuts. I once got told nearly 2/3 of the way through the course that there was something the students should've been doing all the way through, which I hadn't been aware of. I was chastised for this-but nobody had bloody told me!

I am now in EAP work again. I am not fulfilled, I have a good brain that isn't getting used. At least It's easy enough I suppose. And I have a Master's degree and a counselling qualification, and I'm on £32K a year. Doesn't feel great.

@PeatrixBotter I'll read your book when it comes out. Sounds fascinating!

@ilovesushi I am glad to have a willing customer as it doesn't look that I will make much £ out of it (I am doing it from a sociological perspective rather than biographical but hopefully it will be interesting enough).

@PeatrixBotter maybe develop a film script? Could be more money in it???

I'm intrigued!

I used to work in PR and events. Genuinely adored it. No 2 days the same. Loads of variety and challenges.

But whenever I had to escort a product or client to a TV studio, my heart sank. The most tedious way to spend a day. People stood about with things on sticks recording every sound and motion from every angle. A whole day gone for a 3 minute segment on TV if you were lucky. More often than not it wouldn't be shown at all because something more newsworthy cropped up.

@spirit20 how do you know if my work is more or less valuable to society than what a doctor does? The invention of the helmet, for example, saves more lives than a single doctor in a lifetime. Pharmaceutical innovations; medical technology, a single signature on a peace accord can all save millions of lives.

Heelworkhero I am a dog boarder & I feel your pain.

One hundred per cent relate to this! I did a similar role but in the PR team. The only bit that was fun was the crisis comms element. People finding foreign bodies in their pavlova etc. This is such a great thread!

On the opposite side, my DH has done three jobs and all of them are utterly hated on here. He started as an army officer - loved it but it wasn’t conducive to family life so he left back in 2004. Went into investment banking. Enjoyed the technical side of it and the business side of it and the money! Moved into business banking and from there into the real estate industry as a COO of a franchise group.
None of them are “exciting” or glamorous but they pay really well allowing us to travel, fly business class, send two kids to private school, and have paid off our mortgage by early 40s.

Our children are now in their teens and if they ever ask for advice I would say to do something as well paid as possible that you don’t hate.

Agree - I run my own business and it means you never fully switch off and as ours is a sales and manufacturing business I worry about orders all the time, even though it’s generally fine! But I always have the fear that suddenly all my customers will stop buying.
There used to be some perks to investing your own money, time, risk etc in terms of things you could write off, but now there is no real advantage over being an employee. I would never set up a business in the U.K. again.

Having said that, I like the flexibility. I can work around the school hours and can work from anywhere. Today I’m by the side of the local pool as it’s school holidays. Plus there is a sense of huge pride and pleasure that people buy OUR stuff.

I've been thinking about this quite a bit recently. I remember working to get my degree and then doing work placements for no pay to get a job in the design industry (have worked in greetings, fashion and marketing) thinking it would be well paid and fulfilling. The reality is that most jobs are paid minimum wage unless you go up to management level and then you don't get to do the work you enjoy.
I took time out to have a family and coming back the pay is less or the same as 10 years ago and the expectation is much high, ie, you're expected to be able to do multiple roles in one job.

As a student I worked in retail and coffee shops and looking back these were definitely the nicest environments. You're with a team, you get time to chat, you get to move around, your job role is very clearer and you don't have to take work home with you. It might be minimum wage but you know what you're getting and you know what the expectations are. You don't have to fork out for continuous professional development in your own time and bigger retail companies usually have proper HR and structure. Private companies just wing it and make things up as they go!

Also into the mix is that I worked alone as a SAHP and house runner for 10 years and could be blissfully organised. I really struggle with the lack of organisation, clarity and half arsedness out there in the real world now!! 🤣

Agree Ozgirl and don’t think i could go back to someone telling me how many days holiday I was “allowed” or that I had to be at my desk at a certain time like a child. No thanks!

What do you think has changed in terms of business regulations?

The flexibility is certainly a plus.

Absolutely agree. I refuse to take commissions for knitting, because it turns the hobby into a job and makes you beholden to other people's whims and demands. Sod that, there isn't enough money to make it worth spoiling the pleasure.

I've done all sorts of jobs and they've mostly been fairly dull, but better that than the one or two that were complicated and stressful. I'm just not that interested in work.

And I know without doing it I would loathe being a librarian!