A long time ago, I fell in love with helping people. Years later, I realized through a mine field of good therapy that I had simply learned how to profit from my dysfunctional codependence. Whatever works. Two days ago, my boss asked me if I'd ever considered counseling (belly laughter) after I cried for about 4 hours straight the day after I sent my resignation letter. The day before that, my Mom had some side eye comment about how all jobs suck and that's why they pay you. The day before that, my guy looked at me with an amusing terror while simultaneously telling me that he was totally on board when I had a long talk with him about needing to quit my job. He hugged me and I imagined that while his face was out of view, he probably had the wide, gaping, fearful eyes of a man who just realized he'd coupled with someone who actually meant all those head-in-the-clouds, wander-lustful, Buddhist sorta things she says that made him sort of love her.
Three days ago, I officially put in my resignation notice on my career. It's not like this has never happened before. I've resigned. I've run off to Mexico to chase my dreams whilst losing my mind and finding myself. I've stayed home and raised kids and depended on someone else to make the money while I did whatever I did. But, I always knew I had my career in my back pocket. I always knew what I intended to be doing. I always knew that I'd return some day to the tumultuous, drama-filled, adrenaline rush of my career. It's addictive. I've always been well suited to it. It feels a bit ingrained in my me-ness. But, life throws some curve balls and I'm Babe Ruth reincarnate.
A few years ago, I got the diagnosis. I'd suspected the diagnosis for, sheesh, 12, 13, 15 years. I'd been afraid, no-- petrified, of the diagnosis since, well, as long as I can remember. But I got it. It became a reality. And somewhere in the back of my mind, I guess I've thought all this time that I was simply a fully crazed hypochondriac who had manifested these symptoms out of sheer projection and I was not, in fact, a sick girl. A crazy one, SURE, but not a sick one. And then, they gave me that damned test. Some marvel of modern medicine that keeps you from getting to pretend you're just nuts and instead, have to stare shit right in the face. Damn science. And that was that. I no longer got to pretend, I had to deal. And the doctors (plural. ugh) had a lot to tell me about how I couldn't fuck around anymore. Face sufficiently slapped once again by that asshole, reality. I hate that guy.
Sometime around the millennium, I was working in the basement of some insurance company where the CEO only knew me as "sweetie", and going home to a husband who liked to punch me in the face sometimes. I had two little babies and in hindsight, a horrifying lack of insight. I went to a psychotherapist and tried desperately to get him to tell me I was hopelessly mentally ill. He wouldn't do it. I think it frustrated him that I preferred having a diagnosis born of chemical imbalances or genetics instead of just a wretched string of circumstances that led me to feel like I did. You can just take a pill to deal with a clinical diagnosis. He was proposing that I had to, like, gain a bunch of awareness and work out my shit. Who the fuck wants to do that when your mind is fully occupied by your small children, your full time shitty, unsatisfying job, and a gem of a husband who thinks you are Mike--um...Mika Tyson. I preferred to be fully crazy in the clinical sense. So, I'd go to therapy. I'd get mad at him for saying I wasn't a giant fruit basket. And he'd get mad at me for saying I was. Probably the best therapy I ever had, for the record, and I've had a lot. (Have you thought about counseling. hahaha)
So, I did what any self respecting, barely 20something, screwed up gal would do. I divorced my therapist (not my husband) and decided to volunteer in a field that fights the very thing I came home to every day. I became a Court Appointed Special Advocate for abused and neglected children. Yes, I appreciate the irony of it now, and in a far less mature way, did then.
I fell in love. THIS was my calling. You just know when you find it; that THING that you're SUPPOSED to do. I wasted no time in stopping all that volunteer stuff, divorcing the asshole, and going back to school for the express purpose of becoming a Child Protective Services Investigator. There was no other goal. That was all the goal I had. 3 years later, I graduated. Two years after that, I finally got the job. Ironically, my husband (a different one) was in a mental hospital the day I started, but that's a story for another day.
I didn't quit that job the first time. I mean, I technically did, but I didn't want to. Life threw me more curve balls (Babe Ruth, baby) and it all just fell apart. I was pretty much forced out of the job by life, a bit of a mental breakdown, some hearty misunderstandings, a murder-suicide plot (I was the murder victim piece of that) and a trio of paranoid, bitchy bosses.
I did a lot of things in the interim, including running off to Mexico and getting that goddamned diagnosis, but I reapplied for the career I chose over and over again until finally, 8 months ago, I got the job again. And I was overjoyed. I truly was. I loved that job! I'd wanted it back for years. It was everything I liked about work. I'd have preferred to be back in Mexico sipping margaritas and not giving a shit about anything, but who wouldn't, right? But that wasn't the reality I was in.
Two months after I started my job, I missed a doctor's appointment. This may sound like nothing to most of the non-chronic-diseased world, but when you have that damned reality happening like I do, that's kind of a big deal. Because I missed that appointment, I ran out of medication. Because specialists in our lovely healthcare system are as they are, I couldn't get another appointment for almost 2 months.
Some PA I'd never seen before took mercy on me and gave me a few of my meds back because his wife had my particular diagnosis and he (and his polka dotted bow tie) were beautifully sympathetic. But I didn't get the important ones back. The ones that make you really sick when you start them and take 3 months to adjust to. I had to quit those. Cold turkey. That went pretty well for me. Two months later, I started them again. And so came the really sickness. Two months after that, I had to quit them again because I couldn't do my job. And I got sick from that, again. If you're keeping score, my 8 months is up. And I've spent 6 of it in health nightmare.
And then I took that damned test and had that damned Come to Jesus moment with my doctors (plural). And it all came crashing down, again. I was sucking at my job. I was sucking at my health. I was sucking at my happiness. All around, I was just sucking. And then the doctors (plural) tell me (in a nutshell) if I keep doing what I'm doing, I'm just going to die. Let's not mince words here. I will just fucking die. My disease will attack the important parts like those two flaps in your chest that make you breathe and that muscle that pumps your blood around with it's rhythmic thump thump thump. So, for all my denial, I mean strength (ahem), it was face slapping reality time. I had to give a shit. And I had to give a shit now.
So, I quit my job.
And the next day I went to my office and I was relieved and happy. Until about lunch. Then I cried for 4 hours. (Have you considered counseling. Bwhahaahaha).I didn't cry for the job, I guess. I mean, I hadn't particularly enjoyed it this time, given that I was doing it whilst feeling like I'd run a marathon, with the flu, after being run over by a truck, for 6 of 8 months.
I cried because I'd never had to quit a job because of this (far too many expletive pronouns) disease. I'd never had this dumb thing - a thing that I stayed in denial about, that sent me to Mexico, that made me throw my bucket list into high gear, that had caused more tears then all 47 or so of my failed marriages and abuses and traumas combined -- have any real effect on my career. What? My life, yeah. My relationships, fuck yes. My thought processes, uh huh. My ability to open a jar of pickles, damn skippy. My entire outlook on life, Oh yes sir. But my career, um. no. I guess I figured it wouldn't until it was straight up time to go on disability and rev up my electric, off-road, hybrid flotation device wheelchair. No, that didn't occur to me.
I never HAD to quit a job because I just couldn't DO IT. I had to leave my dive instructor course one day because I couldn't swim against the current towing a grown man in decent surf once. ONE DAY. Another day, I managed it. I had to take a leave of absence for a couple months once because life sucked too much. I've quit because I just didn't want to anymore. But I'd never had to quit a job so I didn't DIE. For fuck's sake, I'm 38 years old. I'm THIRTY EIGHT YEARS OLD.
And I am chronically broken and have to figure out how not to die.
And it was devastating. It IS devastating. This was my chosen career. This was my favorite job. This was my calling, my AHA job.
Not to brag or anything, but I'm the strongest bitch I know. What the fuck is happening?
Then I had to realize, it isn't just this job. I won't be able to do a lot of jobs in my profession. Stress is not allowed. Stress makes me sick. Stress will kill me. Wait. What? Stress is an integral part of my career. It's in the job description. It's like, the thing I like. I can't just not work as a CPS investigator, I can't work as a crisis counselor. I can't work as a case manager. I can't work as a social worker. I can't have a job that has my very favorite part of my career, DRAMA. I'm not allowed. Because I will fucking die. What the fuck?
What the hell do I do now? No, seriously, what do I do now?
In case anyone is wondering, travel the world and live on beans and rice in third world apartments has crossed my mind at least 374 times in the past 10 days or so. I'll let you know if I can work that out while maintaining my brand new car payment and raising the two kids I have left in the house. Somehow, I feel like maybe that time hasn't come yet. But, then again, I haven't had any Jack Daniels yet either.
(Maybe I should consider some counseling.)
