Who am I

My therapist thinks I should start writing again. She thinks that I know deep down that I'm a talented writer and that I shouldn't pin my opinion of my own writing on accolades and rewards and sponsorships and book deals. She thinks I have something to say that's worth saying, that people will want to hear.

Errm. Hi.

My 13 year old (YES SHE IS) thinks we should all wear pins with our pronouns and with other distinguishing features about us. She thinks this would make life so much easier for all of us. My pin would say:

She/her
CisHet
Ally
Liberal
Mom
Teacher

I'm not sure what else it would say. My therapist asked me today what feelings I had about myself and not about the things that surround me. She asked me what my goals were for myself to make myself happy. Am I supposed to have those?

I feel tired. I feel discouraged. I feel overwhelmed and bored at the same time. I feel like these are a lot of the same things I felt when I had babies even though now I have a tween and a teen. 

Is it me? Is it them? Is it the world?

My therapist seems to think there's still a me in here somewhere, separate from everything I do. A being not a doing. A self. She wants to know who that is.

So do I, friends. So do I.

Self care

 I went for a walk today. 

Every session, my therapist asks me, "Did you get to any self care since I last saw you?"

"Wellll."

Yesterday I went to my endocrinologist. I have Graves Disease, have I mentioned that? It means that I have an autoimmune condition that makes my thyroid VERY CONFUSED and so it spits out too much thyroid hormones all the time unless I take medication. If I'm high, it can make me jittery and anxious and can also give me a lot of extra energy and productivity. And make me lose weight.

"Your thyroid is a little high."

WHAT THE HECK BODY? WHERE HAVE MY BENEFITS BEEN? I've spent the past month barely able to get off the couch.

Thanks for nothing, thyroid.

Anyway.

I went to my endocrinologist yesterday and he said my thyroid was high, and he increased my medication but he also asked my how my stress was.

Hahahahaha.

So today seemed like a good day to Do The Self Care.

I went on my group chat of local mom friends and said "Does anyone want to go for a walk to ignore our meaningless lives for a while. I mean, my life is meaningless. I'm not saying your lives are meaningless. I'm just. I'm gonna go."

And I laced up my shoes and went for a walk with my own self, Glennon in my ears, the (okay I didn't know it would be THIS strong) wind in my hair.

45 minutes later I thought to myself, Self, that was a good walk. I walked a lot of the demons out and I feel better and now I sure am spent.

I was about a mile away from home.

20 minutes after that, I stumbled through my front door, plugged in my now dead phone, and rooted around my room until I finally found a marble notebook because if we're doing this, we're doing it.  Coffee in hand I plopped on the couch, flipped the notebook to the front cover,

And it had biggest girl's name on the front. Son of a.

Back up to my room I practically crawled, dug around some more, and found another notebook. I grabbed it and the pen next to it and sat down on my bed, my hand moving across the page in a was it somehow apparently did still know how to do.

And then I went downstairs to get another pen because the one I'd been trying to use was completely dead .

How's self care going for you, friend?

Behind

I am sitting on my couch with my feet to on my ottoman. There is a pain running up the side of my shin. I took over 10,000 steps today. I was a substitute intermediate school librarian, which you wouldn't think would result in a lot of walking or A lot of shin splints but here we are.

Today was better. It was better because I was busy, because I was serving, because I was with children, because I didn't have time to be in my head.

Yesterday my school district, where my kids go, where I sub, called every family in the district urging everyone to come in and interview for teaching jobs. Teaching jobs I don't think I actually want, that I'm not sure I'd be able to handle, but that I deeply resent other people leapfrogging me to get. That I am afraid of missing out on, afraid of losing. Afraid of getting. Afraid of not getting.

I am doubting all the life choices that led me here, the years of mothering that left me behind, left me with no resume, no confidence, no marketable skills. I'm sad and I'm scared and I'm angry and I'm resentful and I'm filled with regret. 

I really shouldn't wait until 11 to write these

 It is 11:00 at night. I'm curled up in a corner of my couch. YouTube comedy videos are playing on my TV but I'm not entirely watching them. I have to be up at 6:00 am to get my kids off to school. My coffee pot is already set up. I should probably be in bed already. But I'm not.

I have been spending the past few days looking at writing jobs and online teaching jobs and curriculum design jobs. I tried to learn more about freelance writing and copywriting and content marketing and virtual assistanting (I'm not sure that last one is a verb, but PARALLEL STRUCTURE) I made a few things for my teachers pay teachers store and tried to promote them. 

And I've come to the conclusion that everything sucks and I hate it all. I don't want to do anything. I'm not already good at anything and I don't want to be bad at everything. 

I've never been anything but a teacher and a mom, and I am afraid I'm too old to learn to be anything else. I'm afraid I'll never be able to choose anything or commit to anything. I'm afraid I'll just be rejected at everything and it will SUCK SO HARD and I DON'T THINK I CAN HANDLE IT. 

I don't know anymore. It's 11:20 at night and I should already be in bed but when I wake up I don't know what I will do. Well. I know I'll put my kids on the bus, but beyond that I really just don't know.

I'm not sure this went anywhere or that I said anything but it's 11:20 at night, and this is what you get.

10 things my gremlins say at 11:43 at night

1. You didn't do anything that matters today.
2. You will never create anything that anyone cares about.
3. Everyone but you had something better to do today.
4. No one would notice or care if you just disappeared.
5. You don't have anything to say, anything to write, anything worth adding to the world.
6. No one wants to talk to you and they're relieved when you don't reach out.
7. All your best work is behind you.
8. You quit everything you start and honestly it's just as well.
9. You disappoint people.
10. You'll never be enough. 

Substitute

 I am sitting in someone else's chair, at someone else's desk, in someone else's classroom. In 4 minutes, her 3rd graders will come back from gym and I will teach them compound sentences with her slides and her lesson plans. 

In front of me on my desk - her desk - is my green travel mug of coffee from this morning. In the bottom of this cup, there are only a few drips of cold, stale coffee I made at home 7 hours ago. Still, in these last 4 minutes of my prep - HER prep - I repeatedly raise this cup to my lips, letting the bitter drops fall into my mouth. 

And in these last few minutes, I scribble in my notebook. I scribble about how my 12 year old daughter is writing 50,000 words this month and I can't. I write about diagramming sentences. And as I grasp at the last few bitter drops of creativity  still in my brain, I realize that none of that can substitute for making something that's mine.

More

 Both of my kids are in school. In school in person. Not here with me. Not doing reflex math in my lap. Away.

I have time to myself. Time to do whatever it is I want to do with my life. I just don't know what the heck that is.

I know it's not laundry. I know it's not decluttering. I know it's not watching Schitts Creek for 6 hours a day.

I don't know what it is that I want.  All I know is that I want more.