It’s when your back’s against the wall that life-changing decisions are made.
That’s the lesson Louise Bedford learned on her journey from demoralising ill health to overwhelming career success as a share trader, author and co-founder of The Trading Game.
Before becoming a successful trader, educator and mentor to thousands of other traders, Bedford lived the corporate life, which is a long way from who she is today.
Working 60-hour weeks as a national manager for a US multinational and juggling a family with two children, Bedford was doing what she loved and thriving. But just a few years later, everything changed when she started suffering from an unexplained illness.
“I had a little situation with my hands. I had a twinge in my hand and over the next few days, it spread up my right arm and down my left arm,” Bedford recalls.
“In a couple of weeks I was left without movement in my arms. I’ve given birth twice without drugs and would do it again because nothing compares to the absolute agony I was in. I thought I’d had some sort of stroke.”
Unable to move her arms, Bedford wasn’t able to dress herself or open doors, let alone continue with the job that she loved.
“I had to do a conference call from home and got locked in my own bathroom because I couldn’t open the door, so I couldn’t get to the conference call. To say that I was frustrated! I got on the floor and just cried and cried,” she says.
“That was a real turning point for me. Physically, I was no longer able to do my job. I had my back to the wall, but often when you have your back to the wall, you make the best decisions.”
The decision Bedford made after that point would change her life.
Unsure whether she’d ever work again, Bedford set up a computer in her home to monitor the share markets and used a pen in her mouth to type and call her broker, who she had on speed dial. Having attended a seminar on the share market when she was still working in the corporate world, Bedford had already been trading alongside her job for years, as a hobby.
“I loved my job – and I had the ego to match. But my illness knocked me down to size. I’d lost my identity,” she says.
“Thank goodness I’d learnt trading in the meantime.”
A few years later and Bedford was making more money than she ever imagined.
“I wasn’t quick with trading at all. It took me three years to break even, but I was learning,” she says, referring to her female mentor and fellow trader who gave her the motivation to get serious about trading.
“I could see the hallmarks of her success and I thought, ‘Now this is what I want’ and decided this would be my business.”
While it took her a while to make money, Bedford credits her illness and the rehabilitation she went through for her resilience and success.
“The other people I did physiotherapy with inspired me. We inspired each other to move forward and to not make excuses,” she says, adding that she surrounded herself with positive people as much as possible.
“It took me two years to move again and I still have relapses, so trading is it for me. I had to make this work.”
Describing her illness as a springboard to success and one the corporate world would never have provided her with, Bedford relishes being her own boss and being in control.
“After you can no longer provide a service in the corporate world, they don’t want you. I was appalled at how quickly the tables turned,” she says, noting how her view of the corporate completely changed once she got sick.
“Trading has given me the emotional freedom to make choices; the ability to say no. I have no boss and I have my own deadlines. I’m more empathetic than when I had my glorified sales role. I wasn’t as nice. I was self-centred.”
Now a mentor herself, Bedford says her decision to help others was motivated by a personal goal she established when she was a teenager as well as the inspiration she received during her physiotherapy days.
“My personal mission statement, which I wrote when I was 19, was to inspire others by leading by example,” she says.
“Trading can be an empty role and I wanted to fulfil my mission statement.”