That’s So Crypto: Crypto Gave Me The Financial Flexibility I Needed for My Disability

-Dhee

My name is Dhee Sylvester. I'm a part-time writer and a full-time Graphic Designer. I'm based in Lagos, and I'm passionate about how technology can make life more comfortable for people with disability.

In 2019, a friend introduced me to a social media platform called Steemit. It was supposed to be a platform where you earn crypto when people react to or comment on your posts.

They had a weekly amount that could be withdrawn into a wallet attached to the account. I never got enough engagement on my posts because I didn't have enough followers, which meant my earnings didn't really increase. After some months, I lost interest and abandoned the account. The account had a string passcode, which I have since forgotten.

My next crypto experience was equally disappointing. I saw a post about a smart contract for Tron. The entering amount was ₦40k. The idea was that after we paid that amount, we would be added to a THX smart contract on an app called Tron Force. The ₦40k was to serve as our capital. The more people joined, the more our capital would grow and increase. The problem was that we'd earn more if people signed up through our referral link.

I paid the ₦40k and downloaded the app, but I didn't get any increase on my dashboard. I couldn't withdraw the amount. I contacted the person in charge of the smart contract, and she told me the money couldn't be withdrawn and that I could only withdraw the "interest gained".

She later blocked me and removed me from the WhatsApp group when I called her a fraud for not explaining the process better. I never got my money because it was more like a crypto Ponzi scheme.

Crypto was supposed to give me the kind of control and ownership a Nigerian financial institution couldn't give me at the time. Plus, due to the fact I had a disability and couldn't go to the bank, I felt I needed a means to earn and save money that wouldn't require me to have a NIN or BVN (because I didn't have both at the time).

My bank account was an Ecobank Express account I opened online. It had a daily limit of 50k and an account limit of 500k. On the other hand, a crypto wallet had no such restrictions, plus I could receive payments from anywhere in the world.

So, I downloaded two wallets and signed up. I made some P2P purchases of Bitcoin and Ethereum (I was close to exceeding my Ecobank Xpress account limit). I kept the money for over a year until I needed it to purchase a new laptop in 2021.

Don't underestimate the importance of research. That would be my advice. My experience with losing money to Tron and gaining nothing on Steemit made me cynical about airdrops, pump-and-dump tokens, and NFTs.

The problem with crypto is that many people approach it as a get-rich scheme, and I was guilty of that as well at the beginning. The moment I decided to start seeing it as an alternative to traditional banking, I stopped falling victim to any scams because my orientation had changed.