I went to Therapy

 I'd been thinking about it for a while.

All the small issues that had been piling up over the years, all the little things that seemed to circulate in my head over and over again, and the beliefs and issues that hadn't worked themselves out.

I'm fine, I told myself, constantly. This is fine. Your life is good. Be thankful for your life. 

And I am thankful for my life. And I am also unhappy with many aspects of it. It was time to reach out. So I finally found someone that I thought might work for me. I emailed, set up an appointment, signed a counseling agreement, and then spent a week talking myself out of and back into going.

How dare you complain about your life? Who are you to take the time to complain about your privileged issues? Those questions plagued me all week. But I decided to just suck it up and go. The fact that I made the appointment was a good enough sign that I needed it.

I had never been in therapy before. I had never sat and talked about intimate details of my life and how I feel about it with a stranger. Those thoughts were regulated to my husband and best friend. I didn't think I would be able to open up about my struggles.

But then after some small chit chat, she just stared at me. Waiting for me to open up. So I did. I opened up so much more than I thought I would. 

I cried. Of course. Can I get through tough conversations without crying? Throughout my entire session, my voice was in that whiny snivelly state it gets in when you're on the edge of crying. I had a tissue in my hand that dabbed at my eyes every few minutes. I talked with my hands. 

It felt a bit like a weight had been lifted off of me and at the same time, I felt drained and emotional. 

Life in the military community has been incredibly hard on me. It's hit my self-esteem, my desire for control and stability, and my ability to form deep attachments. It has really done a number on me. And year after year, I just keep telling myself that it will get better. And it does, but not because the situation is better, but because I become more resilient. 

Something she said that stuck with me was, 

"Are  you really okay, or are you just really good at coping?"

Am I okay, or am I just really good at coping? Am I okay, or am I just really good at coping?

I think I've come to the point where I've just managed to push down and ignore so many of my own issues that I'm coping at a surface level. I'm just coping. And I want to be truly okay.

The Vanishing Half

Who would have thought that after all of my book club drama earlier in the year, I would find myself in the perfect book club of two? All of our book choices have been so interesting, gripping, and great for discussion, and it has given me the opportunity to grow a friendship with someone that I might not have if we had continued as a larger group. I can't recommend doing partner reads instead of book clubs more. The conversations are more intimate, the book choices better, and there is so much less stress about scheduling, choosing books, handling opinions, and waiting for everyone to respond. It just gets to be a conversation about books between friends.

And I love that.

The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett is a book that made me want to stay up all night just to finish it. I haven't experienced that in a novel in a long time. It ignited my passion for reading again. That's not to say I haven't read good books this year, but this one pulled me in and I didn't want it to stop. 

The premise is simple: two twin girls who are Black but white-passing grow up and choose completely different lives. One marries the darkest man she can find while the other marries a white man, abandons her family, and reinvents herself. Their stories twisting through the stories of their daughters until it all comes together. 

So much of this novel focuses on race, identity, racism, colorism, the choices we make, the roles we choose to perform, and how they impact others. 

I loved how this novel explores how we create our own identity, and even though there might be consequences to that choice, they aren't always as dramatic or as dire as some fictional stories make them out to be.

This story felt so realistic in the way Stella's choice impacted herself and her daughter. They both had to reckon with their identity and it created a wedge between them because of the lies, but in the end, there were no real consequences. Stella remained married to her husband, a professor, living out her life as white. She found her way back to her mother, sister, and hometown, but she still chose the life she created in the end. The author could have villanized Stella. She chose being white, she chose to use racism to protect herself, and she chose to lie to her husband, daughter, and friends. The author could have chosen to create consequences for Stella where she is found out, a fraud, and abandoned and alone. But sometimes the choices we make are hard to live with but don't end with dramatic consequences, or even learning this huge moral lesson. Stella made her way back to her family, but she still chose herself and the identity she created over them. Stella could have been a character that Bennett made us hate. She could have been used as a foil for Desiree, showing how being inauthentic and lying causes disastrous consequences. But she wasn't. She lived the privileged if ultimately, less happy life. But even with all the horrible choices, Stella makes to protect herself, we, the reader, can still empathize with her. We can understand why she chose to become something else in order to live a better life. We can also empathize with Desiree's desire to shed the shadow of colorism that she had grown up with to create a new life. We can see how one life experience can impact people in two completely different ways, even when it seems like they are two sides of the same coin. 

This story felt so realistic in the way Stella's and Desiree's choices impacted themselves and their daughters. They all had to reckon with the choices their mothers made, the lies that were told, and their identities because of those choices. Desiree's desire to shed the shadow of colorism that she had grown up with and marry the darkest man she could find, impacted her daughter's life when she brought her back to that town that is so focused on lightness. Stella's desire to live a life of ease that led to her lies created a wedge between herself and her daughter. We can empathize with both twins, even though it would have been easy for the author to villanize Stella. Ultimately, both of their choices had consequences but none of them were dire or dramatic. Sometimes the choices we make are hard to live with but they don't end with lives being ruined. It felt so poignant that all of these women continued down their own path, living with their choices, and forging their own roles and identity from the choices the generation before them made. 

This was such an interesting and gripping novel and I can't recommend it enough. 

Motherhood or Otherhood

I've spent the last five years dodging questions about babies or telling people outright that I don't want motherhood, to please stop harassing me about choosing that life. That I absolutely 100% do not want to be a mother.

I even wrote a post on this blog about being childfree by choice. I pointed out the many talking points about not asking women about having children. Which are all true. You shouldn't ask questions about motherhood unprompted. It's rude and presumptuous.

I tell people I don't want to have children because it makes it easier. It makes it easier to just let them think that the decision has been made so that they leave me alone about it. So that I don't get this external pressure from family (or less of it) and I can figure out what I want on my own. 

But, honestly, not having external pressure hasn't helped. I am still so confused about choosing motherhood. 

I sit directly on the fence between motherhood and otherhood, seeing the realities of both choices.

A choice that can't be taken back once chosen. This decision creates a fork in your life like no other. You have to choose one.

I have these conversations with friends but most of them have adamantly and whole-heartedly chosen to be childfree. They don't feel the conflict that I feel. Does that mean that I want to have a baby if I can't one hundred percent commit to being childfree? If I'm afraid of regrets or if I sometimes feel pulled that way...

I see the childfree life with my husband. Money, travels, free time, less fighting, less hard decisions, less worrying, our dream home... I see a very full life that I think I could be happy with. I'm mostly happy with my childfree life now... Why can't that continue?

But then I see a parent with their child and I see the joy, the love, the experience of nurturing someone into their best self. I think of the bonding experience of creating a little person with the person you love. I think about the relationship that I will have with my child that will be unlike my relationship with anyone else. I also see the guilt, the messy houses, the worry, fear, financial strain, sleepless nights, having to choose someone else over yourself constantly.

I'm at that age where I'm standing at that fork in my life. I'm paralyzed by fear and indecision. What if I make the wrong decision? What if I'm hopelessly unhappy once I've made it?

All the women in my family were mothers by the time they were my age. Most of them much earlier.

I don't have a grown role model who chose a childfree life. Who lived their life on their terms and didn't regret it. 

I try to give myself little scenario exercises to see how I feel.

I recently had a bit of a scare and when I saw that negative test, I felt just as relieved as I was sad.

How can that be? How can I feel equally sad and relieved? 

I ask myself if I would go through infertility treatments if I couldn't conceive naturally... I don't think I would. Does that mean that I don't really want motherhood?

I ask myself if I would leave my husband if I wanted one and he didn't and neither of us was willing to budge. I don't think I would. Does that mean that I don't really want motherhood?

Sometimes I think about just leaving it to chance. If it happens, then it happens and if it doesn't, it doesn't. But I hate not making an intentional decision about such a big life-altering choice. I know a lot of people have children this way. I just don't think it's what I want.

I am still sitting on this fence, looking both ways, and feeling the weight of both choices, with no clue as to what I actually want. 

I think there will be regrets either way. I think if I choose childfree then I'll always think of the child that could have been. I think that if I choose motherhood then I will always think of the ease and joys of my life before becoming a mother.

I guess the question really is, which choice will I regret more?

August

It's August.

Today, I looked at the date realized we were already several days into August. 

August. The month I decided I would give up on finding a teaching position for this school year and apply to grad school.

That was my deadline. School is supposed to start in a few weeks and I haven't had an interview since May. 

I know things are different because of the pandemic and so many school districts have no idea what they are doing or what school is going to look like this year.

I know many teachers on social media have discussed quitting and not coming back for this school year because they don't feel safe and heard in the back-to-school plans.

Some would love to be able to financially afford not to go back. Some would be envious of my position.

And yet, I'm envious of theirs. I'm envious of their bitmoji classrooms and virtual learning plans. I'm even envious of the ones who are going back in person with all of the fear and masks and ridiculous plans. I know I would be stressed if it were me but it seems better than spending another year not being able to do what I love.

Last year it was because the military left me to rot in Missouri all Summer and I thought, next year I'll be setting my classroom up, I'll be greeting my students, planning lessons, and sharing my love of learning with a wonderful group of kids.

But here is next year. And I am not doing any of those things. I am left wondering if I will ever be able to do this thing I love. It seems so simple. And yet I can't do it. 

I'm glad for the opportunity to go to grad school. I have realized that I would like to work with older kids and I'm going to transition to secondary school through my Master's. 

But that doesn't mean that I don't want the experience of my own classroom this year. I want it desperately. It fucks with my self-esteem that I can't get a job in my field.

I know that this is the reality for a lot of Americans right now. I know that the pandemic hasn't just affected education. I know that I am lucky to have the chance to go back to school and to be financially secure. 

But I've been putting off applying and starting. I keep hoping that they're waiting until the last minute to hire teachers. I keep thinking that if I put off grad school then by some miracle, I'll have a job. I can't keep putting it off for long. I have to use this time off productively. I have to improve and do something with my life. I'm excited about going back to school and learning.

I just wish it didn't come with this cost of not getting to teach.