A WOMAN has told how her life changed after she ended up in a youth care institution at the age of six.
Emily Abraham, 45, co-owns luxury second-hand fashion boutique Love Luxury, which resells luxury goods for hundreds of thousands of pounds.
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However, the entrepreneur and mother of three children did not have the best start in life.
From the age of five, Emily was regularly placed in foster care because her mother, who was a drug addict, was often missing.
When Emily was six, her mother died and she was placed permanently in foster care.
When she arrived at the foster home, Emily told us she was dirty and full of nits, and that she didn’t even know how to use a knife and fork.
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However, her life began to change thanks to the positive influence of her family.
“It was very positive for me to be with them because they normal people and a normal family,” she told Femail.
“I had a mother and a father, and they each had their own three children.”
When she was 13, Emily went to live with her grandmother, but she still keeps in touch with her foster parents and says she can’t thank them enough for the life they gave her.
Emily said she has always had an eye for luxury items, a love that dates back to watching her grandfather buy gold.
After meeting her husband Adam, they founded Love Luxury together. Today, they sell items from brands such as Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Cartier.
In 2023, Emily, Adam and their children moved to Dubai to expand their business.
They also have a TikTok account, which has given their business a flying start and now has over 1.9 million followers.
Emily shares how her time in foster care helped her become the woman she is today: “For years I was on a destructive path and I think as a child in foster care I learned that I wasn’t good enough.
How to start your own business?
Dragon’s Den star Theo Paphitis revealed his tips for budding entrepreneurs:
- One of the biggest barriers that aspiring entrepreneurs and business owners face is a lack of self-confidence. You have to believe in your idea — and more than that, be the one to bore your friends to death with it.
- Never be afraid to make decisions. Once you have an idea, the confidence to make decisions is crucial to starting and maintaining a business.
- If you don’t take calculated risks, you’re standing still. If a decision turns out to be wrong, identify it quickly and act on it if you can. If you can’t, find someone else who can.
- It’s okay not to get it right the first time. My experience of making bad decisions has helped build my confidence and made me who I am today.
- Never underestimate the power of social media and remember that the internet is an equal opportunity for small businesses.
- Don’t forget to dream. A machine can’t do that!
“Nobody wanted me and even though that wasn’t entirely true, that’s how it felt.
“When I realized that this was actually the furthest thing from the truth, it helped me see everyone and everything in a new light. That gave me resilience.”
And Emily makes sure her children have everything she never had as a child, especially her youngest, 11-year-old Moo, who is known as the “billionaire’s daughter.”
She previously told Fabulous: “My daughter’s favourite item of clothing is her Yeezy 350 trainers.
“She has a special collection of designer bags and fine jewelry, most of which are family heirlooms.
“She loves handbags and knows so much about them that she only really understands them when she is in the store.
“She loves being involved in the business and is now very interested in designer fashion.”
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