The sentence my ex-boyfriend left behind—"Women without money shouldn't talk about dreams"—stayed with me for eight whole years. Every time I opened my trading account, that sentence felt like a whisper in my ear.

In April 2022, when LUNA was still at its high of $119, I was holding onto my only 30,000 yuan and opened a short position at $100. That night, my account balance jumped to 800,000. I sat alone in front of my computer, crying my eyes out—I could finally tell myself that I wasn't that "unqualified because I'm broke" person anymore.

But human nature is scary. I didn't stop; instead, I went all in to catch the bottom.

When the system popped up with "Token value has dropped to zero," I threw my phone onto the sofa, feeling completely emptied out. For the next month, I locked myself in my rented apartment. The jasmine tea I brewed went from hot to cold, cold to hot again, and I never took a sip. Until one morning, I saw myself in the mirror—puffy eyes, makeup smudged—and suddenly had a realization: either I give up, or I get up and start over.

I sold the jade bangle my mom gave me and the limited-edition bag I’d saved up for two years to buy, finally scraping together 20,000.

This time, I didn’t dare to dream of overnight riches. When TRB was consolidating around $10, I kept rereading my four iron rules: weekly chart trend, trading volume, on-chain capital flows, and what the whales were doing. I only entered after double-checking everything.

And then it dropped 30%.

Every night after work, I stayed up watching the charts, hand-drawing K-line charts until I developed calluses on my fingers, but it never occurred to me to cut my losses. I just held on for 128 days.

When TRB soared to $100, my best friend messaged me on WeChat to say, "That's enough." I checked the chart; the whale money was still flowing in, so I didn’t rush. I held on until it hit $380, and only then did I calmly close my position—the number in my account finally allowed me to let go of that thorn from eight years ago.

I still keep those habits: eight hours of reviewing trades every day, hand-drawing K-lines while brewing floral tea, always keeping 30% of my portfolio in reserve, and reviewing my rules in my notebook before every trade.

During late-night reviews, I sometimes talk to the me from eight years ago, the one crying into her pillow: Thank you for not giving up. The things that almost broke you ended up becoming your armor.

I used to stumble in the dark, but now the light is in my own hands and it never goes out. Do you want to give it a try too?