Every week, Naijaonpoint seeks to understand how people move the Naira in and out of their lives. Some stories will be struggle-ish, others will be bougie. All the time, it’ll be revealing.
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There were the typical memories of cash gifts from older relatives, which I gave to my mum. But the most profound memory was realising that we didn’t have money.
Our financial situation started becoming clear around the time I got into secondary school. I attended a church’s private school for my primary education, and I assumed I’d naturally progress to the private secondary schools my mates moved on to. But we couldn’t afford the fees.
I eventually went to a lesser-known school that my mum couldn’t afford either. At least once or twice every term, I was called out for owing school fees. In JSS 2, I had to move to the school where my mum taught.
On top of that, my mum was always asking our well-off relatives and her friends for money or taking things on credit from vendors. Going to my cousins’ houses became uncomfortable because we all knew that every visit meant my mum was about to beg for money.
Yes. My mum is a single parent. All I know is that my dad never wanted to be in the picture, so my mum raised my sister and me.
Beyond the school fees, things were so tight that we sometimes couldn’t feed ourselves. We would sit around the table waiting for a family friend or relative to answer my mum’s call so we could buy food. My heart would beat so fast whenever I was walking home from school because I wasn’t sure if there was food at home.
One day, a teacher at school asked me in front of the class if I was the poorest child in the school because my hair was undone and I didn’t have lunch. I was so embarrassed.
The annoying thing was that even though relatives often helped us, it hardly showed up in our lives. I know that my uncles sent around ₦500k or more several times to help, but the money would disappear within weeks. My mum was always coming up with vague business plans that never materialised. It was a constant cycle of getting money, losing it, and going right back to begging.
Maybe I’m being overly judgmental, but I still feel that she made too many bad decisions. I was always so angry like, “What are you even thinking? Why will you do things like this?”
Even the school she moved me to, she still couldn’t pay the fees. I was known for never paying school fees. School staff always looked at me somehow. Everyone knew that, “Small thing now, your mummy will come and beg.”
I was constantly embarrassed. In SS1, I finally told my mum to move me to a different school, or I’d run away. She moved me, but the whole situation had made me too scared to form close relationships or make deep connections with people. I constantly felt like I didn’t belong. It was really traumatic.
It also made me want to make my own money very early, and gave me a deep scarcity mindset at the same time. On the one hand, I desperately wanted money; on the other, I felt it wasn’t available to me. Like a “Can I even have money?” feeling.
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At 14. This was in 2018, and I’d just graduated from secondary school. I didn’t go straight to university — actually, I didn’t want to go. I was so exhausted from constantly being bullied in secondary school, and I just needed a break.
Also, my mum kept talking about “having faith” to send me to a private university. That’s another thing about her. She was very religious and never planned for things, only choosing to believe that things would “work out”. Of course, that meant begging people for money.
When she brought up the private uni matter, I wanted to scream. The same person who couldn’t afford secondary school was open to such a crazy idea.
Anyway, I got a job as a teaching assistant/minder at a school run by our church. I worked there for a year, earning ₦20k/month. For the first two months, I saved half of my salary to buy a cheap phone. Then, for most of the year I worked there, I saved the remaining half in my mum’s account. I didn’t have a bank account, and I was saving towards my university admission.
I saved about ₦80k in total, but at the end of the year, I found out the money was gone. I was supposed to pay acceptance fees and other expenses of about ₦100k+.
My mum had used it. When I asked her for it, she said, “I had to sort things out. I didn’t use it to buy clothes or shoes. It’s not my fault. Everything is expensive.”
Then she started making me feel guilty because, of course, I ate from the food she bought with it; I just didn’t know it was my money.
I couldn’t even process the anger. I just let it go. She later went behind my back to borrow money from a church member — which she never paid back — to cover the uni fees.
I gained admission in late 2019, but I was home for a while after the lockdown hit in 2020, followed by ASUU strikes.
I started writing online during the lockdown and became active on Facebook. Around this time, I saw a Facebook post from a movie director looking for script synopses. I sent in a story idea, expecting a quick payout. Instead, he asked me to develop the full script. I spent a whole year writing and developing it with him. He ended up paying me ₦70k.
I’m sure it was clear to the man that I was a novice. He was supposed to pay me ₦150k, but I didn’t complain or say anything when he paid me less than half of the amount. I was probably unwise, but also just excited for something I wrote to be developed and put onscreen. I was actively trying to become a script writer, so I didn’t mind. I even wrote comedy skit scripts for people online for free.
By 2022, my pastor paid for me to take a graphic design class, and someone gifted me a laptop. I started freelancing, making ₦1,500 to ₦2,000 per design.
Not really. I lacked the business sense, a trait I definitely inherited from my mum. I didn’t know how to market myself online or retain high-paying clients.
In early 2023, my laptop completely broke down. This matters because later that year, I tried ghostwriting web novels for someone online. So I wrote a nearly 100,000-word story on my phone. He paid me ₦6,000 for the initial outline, but after I delivered the final draft, he blocked me without paying my balance.
I was mostly surviving day-to-day. Pocket money wasn’t consistent, and I could go days without eating. Also, I don’t think I was as enterprising in school as I should have been. I wanted money, but I couldn’t make the moves to earn it. I often felt stuck, making excuses like “my laptop and phone are bad,” and I couldn’t do anything to change my situation.
A small ray of hope shone later that year. In 300 level, I won a government scholarship that was to pay me ₦250k per session. Tuition was ₦45k, so I could easily pay my fees and have extra.
However, government disbursements take forever. The money didn’t hit my account until April 2024. While waiting, I took a writing job in January 2024 that paid ₦60k/month. My job was to write two articles daily and post on social media. But my phone kept overheating and turning off mid-work. As a result, I often didn’t meet my deliverables.
As if that wasn’t stressful enough, my mum kept planning my salary before it even arrived. I wanted to use most of my salary to fix my laptop, but she’d constantly tell me to “relax” and wait for the scholarship money. Of course, she said that because she’d already planned my salary for household expenses.
Honestly, the whole thing was my fault. I didn’t take my destiny into my own hands. I should’ve said, “No. This is what I’ll do with my money. I’ll fix my laptop and do other things I want.”
But I didn’t.
I eventually had to quit the job after three months, because I had to manage the same phone for school, and it was affecting my studies. I didn’t want anything to affect my grades in any way, which is probably why I wasn’t money-minded then. I regret it now, sha.
When the scholarship money eventually came in, it went to rent and other household needs. That was the pattern for the rest of my time in uni. The scholarship covered my fees, and I helped out at home. There was one time my mum started borrowing from loan apps, and I had to step in. See, let me not even get into that.
I graduated in late 2025 and decided to stop treating content as a side hustle and take LinkedIn seriously. I started learning more about content and applying for jobs.
In January 2026, I got my first job as a content marketing associate at a tech startup. My salary was ₦180k/month. A few days later, I got another job as a social media manager for an individual professional for ₦80k/month. Both were remote jobs. For the latter, I had to go to my employer’s house and shoot content periodically. Technically, my salary was ₦50k, since I was paying someone ₦30k to help me edit the videos, as I didn’t really know how.
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