How did the idea of becoming a wedding designer come to you?
I went through personal life challenges and professional burnout, and one morning it led me to tell myself that life was too short to be lived only halfway. I wanted to feel fully fulfilled in my work and prove to myself that, if I decided to, I could be the master of my own destiny.
Tell us about your background before getting started
I always wanted to work in the medical field, so I naturally turned toward nursing, a profession I have practiced for ten years with passion and dedication. It is a profession that suits me because it highlights my people skills, rigor and organization, but over the years it no longer fulfilled me completely, because the human side gradually gave way to administrative tasks and the constant race against time. That is why I turned toward a career change.
What difficulties did you face before getting started and how did you overcome them?
The first difficulty was believing in myself and in my abilities. Changing fields completely was not easy. Going back into training in an area I did not know frightened me at first. Then there was the organizational side. I had to manage my work, training periods and family life at the same time, as I am also the mother of a seven-year-old daughter. The hardest part was financial. Without state support, I had to manage on my own to pay for my training, and I would never have done it without my partner’s help. He supported me fully in this crazy project from the beginning.
Tell us about your agency
For the moment, and for the past several months, I have opened a micro-business in wedding planning and decoration, as well as symbolic ceremony officiating. For now, I practice this profession alongside my work as a nurse so that I can meet my family’s needs, but in a few years I hope to be able to make a full living from it and turn it into my main profession.
My biggest day-to-day difficulty and how I deal with it
Combining the two professions, and therefore managing time. Organizing my days off so that I can fit in my digital communication, client meetings and project preparation. In the end, it is all a matter of organization and motivation.
What the IWI program brought me
Of course it brought me knowledge and skills. But it also gave me a contact book of other wedding designers from all over France who, for some of us, have become far more than colleagues. Thanks to IWI, I regained confidence in myself and in my abilities, and I shared real moments of joy and tears with people as human as those you rarely meet in life.