Last year, I lost two jobs in five months. It’s seriously the worst feeling ever, especially when that particular career is your whole life. I knew I wanted a character to struggle heavily with depression, but I needed some kind of catalyst other than Ingrid and Victor’s relationship crumbling. I knew right away that she worked with kids. Originally, she was a teacher, but I changed her job to be an aide for the special needs students. With the way the economy is, it also made sense for her to lose those jobs so easily; all schools keep making more and more budget cuts, and usually those cuts are staffing. The different schools my kid brother-in-law went to in the last few years barely had enough aides for their special needs children.

I needed to take something that Ingrid loved dearly and rip it away. Sometimes, being a writer is more like being a villain (and kind of fun, to be honest). You’ll see how she continues to cope with it in future issues, but in #3… Well, you’ll just have to read it and find out.

Have you ever lost a job? How did you cope with it?