The Poverty Trap: My Shawshank Sentence Without the Redemption

Being in the poverty trap is a bit like being locked up in Shawshank, imprisoned for something you didn’t do, digging for years, crawling through shit, only to never come out clean on the other side. And that’s what the poverty trap is. That’s where I am.

By Sean Ash

I’ve worked for others. I’ve done what was asked. I’ve shown up, gone the extra mile, stayed late, carried pressure. I’ve worked for big organisations, including the NHS, but the pay never gave me dignity. There was no real progression, no promotion that changed anything. I never had the moment where I thought, “I’ve made it.” Not once.

Even when I was working full-time, I had to use food banks. I still relied on Universal Credit just to keep the lights on, just to feed the kids, just to make it to the end of the week.

So I tried something different. I thought maybe the only way out of this trap is to make my own way. I started writing and self-publishing books. I put in 20-hour days pushing them online. Nothing. I released music. Nothing. I went on TikTok, built a following of over 12,000, and for a while, the gifts, the momentum, it felt like maybe this was it. Maybe this was the route out.

But it started to feel like begging. Sitting there live, fake battling strangers for attention, hoping for a few digital coins. And with the coins came the hate. Doxxing. Threats. Trolls. Endless drama. A toxic space. I reached a point where I had to step away from it. Not because I didn’t want to succeed, but because it was costing too much of my mental health, too much of my peace.

But this isn’t a story of someone who didn’t try. I’ve tried everything.

I’ve raised over £83,000 for the NHS. I’ve done more charity work than I can count. I’ve supported others through illness, grief, addiction, and struggle. I’ve been the helper, even when I needed help myself.

I’ve studied hard. I’ve got qualifications in politics and philosophy, business studies, communications, and core counselling skills. I’ve completed courses in diversity and equality, fire safety, anti-terrorism awareness through the Met Police. I’ve trained in managing diversity, completed care training, earned a Care Certificate, and been taught emergency life support by the London Ambulance Service. I’ve even trained in plumbing and know how to solder a pipe, although being in a wheelchair now makes manual labour quite difficult. But I do have a very smart, intelligent, and astute mind that is innovative and full of ideas, yet no one seems to take me seriously.

And I’ve worked. I’ve worked in schools, in secondary education, in pupil referral units with excluded children. I’ve worked in retail and held management roles. I’ve worked in care. I’ve worked in community support and in public services. I’ve had jobs across all kinds of industries, and in every single one, I’ve tried to progress. I’ve always pushed to grow, to earn more, to move up. But no matter how much skill or experience I brought, I always hit a dead end. Low pay. No future. No recognition. Just a pat on the back, a payslip that barely covered the basics, and a thank you if I was lucky.

Still poor.

Still unable to build anything that lasts.

I gave up alcohol. I gave up smoking. I gave up vaping. I did everything they say you’re supposed to do when you want to better your life. I rarely leave the house. But I show up every day. I do my best for my family. I try to grow something out of nothing. Still, it’s never enough.

Even after all the sacrifices, all the graft, all the self-improvement, there’s no growth. The cost of raising kids just keeps rising. School uniforms. Packed lunches. Birthday parties. Social pressure. You try to give your children a sense of normality, while you silently sink.

What makes it even harder now is being a wheelchair user. Being disabled. Being in pain every single day. It’s like there’s another layer of shit I’ve got to fight through, on top of everything else. The poverty trap is already exhausting, but try crawling through it when your body won't let you rest, when even simple things hurt, when the world isn’t built for you. That’s a whole different kind of isolation. It’s not just financial. It’s physical. It’s emotional. It wears you down in silence. 

There have been times where I had to choose between paying multi-billion pound energy companies or putting food on the table. And I chose my kids every time. I wasn’t going to let them go hungry so shareholders could get richer. And because of that, I’m probably around fifty thousand pounds in debt. And I’ve got nothing to show for it. Nothing. No fancy sofas. No nice beds. I’m on a mattress sleeping on the floor, awaiting an adaptation to be carried out so I can live in dignity. No decorated home. I’m in debt because I chose to feed my children, and occasionally give them a shitty weekend holiday away at Park Resorts or Pontins in Camber Sands. In a run-down bungalow or in a tired apartment that smelled of damp. We’ve never really seen the sun in Dubai or wherever everyone else seems to go. No nice hotels. No luxury. Just a caravan break, if we’re lucky. And even that usually means going without for weeks beforehand just to make it happen. That’s what debt looks like for people like us. Not splashing out. Not luxury. Just trying to give your kids a few days of feeling like the rest of the world.

And I see it everywhere. People working 60 hours a week, still scraping by. While someone says “hawk tuah” or “cash me outside” and becomes a millionaire. You start to question everything. What’s real. What’s rewarded. What the point of trying even is.

There have been days I wanted to give up. Days I thought, what’s the point. I’ve felt useless. I’ve felt broken. I’ve felt ashamed. And yet I kept going. For my kids. For the tiniest shred of hope that something might shift. That I might finally break through.

Because that’s what it feels like. Like being Andy Dufresne in The Shawshank Redemption. Digging through concrete with a spoon. Year after year. Into a tunnel. Into a sewer of shit. Crawling through it. Hoping there’s light at the end. Hoping there’s freedom. Hoping it was worth it.

But the truth is, I’ve been crawling for years. And I haven’t come out the other side.

And I’m tired.

So maybe that’s the real question.

How do we escape?

Because the poverty trap isn’t just a trap. It’s a prison.

And not everyone makes it out.