After finding support through Westminster Employment Service, Amalia retrained as a nurse in her mid-20s. Growing up locally in foster care, this move was driven by a desire to give back to those who helped her along the way during her upbringing. Amalia’s story is a powerful testament to second chances and the courage to rewrite your future.
For more stories about resilience, identity and finding purpose, explore how Sola uses representation to expand what young people believe is possible, how Rashida turned the challenges of new motherhood into strength at work, or how Sue found belonging through community and song. Revisit the full Voices from the Piazza collection for more local experiences.
I’m twenty-two and exhausted. Not the kind of tired sleep can fix, the kind that settles deep in your bones. I’d been drifting between jobs, half-finished plans, and days that blurred together. Depression wasn’t just in my head, it lived in my chest, like a stone pressing down every time I breathed.
Growing up in foster care taught me to survive, not to dream. You learn early that people leave, so you stop expecting anything steady. You start believing instability is just part of who you are. For years I carried that noise, the fear, the feeling that life was something that happened only to other people.
That night, on the bench, I honestly didn’t know if I wanted to keep going. I felt empty, like my life had narrowed without me noticing. But somewhere between the hum of the river and the orange lights reflecting off the water, something inside me shifted. A small, quiet thought: what if it doesn’t have to stay like this? What if there’s more for you than this bench, this night, this feeling?
I decided right there that I wasn’t going to let my story end in that silence. I was going to rewrite it. I didn’t have money or a clear plan, just a choice. To stop surviving and start living. To return to education. To become someone who could help others climb out of the same darkness I’d known.
When I walked into that classroom for the first time, it felt like stepping into a world I wasn’t sure I was allowed to enter. My adrenaline spiked, my heart raced, and every thought in my head felt too loud. I compared myself to everyone around me, they looked confident, prepared, like they already belonged. Meanwhile, I was fighting the old instinct to run. But beneath the fear, there was something else too: hope. A feeling that maybe this time, I was building a life instead of escaping one.
And that’s why nursing found me at exactly the right moment. I didn’t want a career that was just a job. I wanted to be part of someone else’s healing, the way I wished someone had been part of mine. I wanted to sit with people in their worst moments, not as a saviour, but as a steady presence, someone who helps them breathe easier, think clearer, feel human again. To be part of helping someone get better feels like the most meaningful thing I could give back to the world.
At first, it was hard. I questioned everything. am I good enough? what if I fail? Every assignment, every class pulled up those old insecurities. But slowly, something shifted again. I started collecting small wins, a grade I didn’t expect, a concept I finally understood, a moment where I felt like I belonged. Progress built into belief and that belief built into purpose.
Today, I wake up with direction. I’m studying to become a nurse, a role built on empathy, strength, and care, all of which resemble who I am becoming. Every time I step into a classroom, I remember that night at Battersea and the choice that saved my life. I’m no longer surviving my story. I’m writing it.