Before I quit my job and moved back to Sweden, I made a list – savings, startup ideas, plans to study further, even a new workout routine. I also believed that my experience and skills would make the transition easier. I thought it would be a period of flexibility, balance and more time for me and my family. But you never really know what’s waiting for you.

A higher unemployment rate, a competitive job market, mental health preparation and the Swedish system – none of that was on my list. And slowly, my preparation started feeling useless. My confidence didn’t disappear all at once. It just got worn down, gradually, until I found myself in a place I recognised from before – lost.

What Starting Over actually felt like

The first thing I noticed was how difficult it is to stay productive when nobody gives you structure anymore.

When you work full time, your days move automatically. You wake up at 6 AM, get to work by 8, jump from meetings to fika to deadlines, and suddenly the day is over. Even when work is stressful, there is structure holding everything together quietly in the background.

Now you are the one responsible for creating the structure yourself every single day. And surprisingly, that turned out to be one of the hardest parts for me.

Some mornings I would wake up with a proper plan: update my CV, apply for jobs, network, study, work on ideas, maybe exercise. Then somehow the day would disappear, and by evening I would feel like I had accomplished almost nothing.

Flexibility is not as easy as it sounds. Corporation has taught me so well how to accomplish specific tasks within a specific timeline, now when I have the full ownership of my time, I struggle to manage it. No to-do list, no deadline, no location. It is me that drives my calendar, my day and it is also me who will evaluate my tasks. That is when I started struggling.

Job searching also became much tougher emotionally than I expected. Every application carries hope with it, especially the positions where you genuinely believe you are a strong match. So when rejection emails arrive, they hit harder than you imagine.

There were days when I stayed under a blanket almost the entire day after receiving rejections from jobs I had high expectations for. Not dramatic crying or emotional breakdowns. Just disappointment, exhaustion, and this quiet feeling of becoming less confident little by little.

That part surprised me the most. Job searching has a very quiet way of making you doubt yourself. After enough rejections, your inner voice slowly changes tone. You begin questioning decisions that once felt completely right.

Then there were the practical surprises. Because I’d been abroad for more than six months, I no longer qualified for support from either Försäkringskassan or Akassan when I came back. Although I had savings, it was still a shock. After eight years of working and paying into A-kassan, I discovered that when I actually needed the support, I wasn’t eligible for it because I had lived outside the EU and had not been employed by a Swedish company for more than six months.

The loss of that financial safety net hit me hard. If you’re planning to move abroad from Sweden and think you might return one day, make sure you carefully consider your backup plan in case you become unemployed. Understanding how time spent abroad may affect your eligibility for unemployment benefits is important before making the move.

Lessons I have learned from job searching and re-settling down

Lession 1 – choose a goal alongside your job search

The biggest lesson from this period is that your feelings become the hardest thing to manage, not the practical problems. You apply again, rewrite the CV, adjust plans, or try another direction. But emotionally, it is much harder to stay steady when your confidence keeps getting tested repeatedly.

I underestimated how much routine affects mental health. When you no longer need to wake up early, go to work, you suddenly realise how much external structure was helping you function. Without it, even simple tasks require discipline and energy.

That is why I started trying to create smaller goals for myself again.

One thing that helped was working toward getting my driving license. It sounds small, but having something concrete with deadlines, lessons, progress, and clear results made me feel functional again. It forced me to leave the apartment, focus on something practical, and when I passed the theory test, I felt genuinely happy for the first time in a while.

Not because it solved my life, but because it reminded me I was still moving forward somehow.

Lession 2 – Things usually work out, even when you can’t see how

I often compare my feelings now at 38 with how I felt at 27 after finishing my Master’s degree and trying to get a job to stay in Sweden. Back then, life also felt uncertain. I remember those cloudy days when I did not know where life was going or whether things would work out. The difference now is that I have already lived through uncertainty before.

At 27, uncertainty felt terrifying because I had no proof things would eventually work out. At 38, even though I still feel lost sometimes, a part of me knows that life somehow moves forward anyway. Not always according to plan, but forward.

So now I try to worry less. I tell myself that even though I do not know how or when, things will eventually be okay.

And maybe this period is not only about rebuilding a career. Maybe it is also a rare opportunity to rethink what I actually want, learn things I never had time for before, and finally do some of the things I kept postponing while life was busy.

Maybe that is what starting over at 38 actually looks like.

Not a beautiful reinvention story with instant clarity, but standing up again with a slightly more mature head every time life knocks you down. Slowly rebuilding confidence while continuing forward even when things still feel uncertain.