Time Enough for Me

I've spent the last 4 months as voluntarily unemployed person. At the urging of Husband, who had watched helpless as I faded away over 9 months of joyless work at a meaningless job, I resigned and walked away just two days before Christmas.

On my last day, I floated home on a wave of relief and for the first few jobless weeks I was living in a sort of warm euphoria. I spent time with family and friends for the first time in ages. Instead of curling into a ball every morning, I got up, I stretched, I walked the dog. My time was my own again. I could fill it with all of the things that made me ME. 

Which is when crippling anxiety gripped me tight and demanded I answer, just who did I think I was, then?

I used to be a lot of things, a writer, an artist, a gardener, a surfer, an educational assistant. My hobbies had slowly tapered off as we moved and they became harder and harder to access in each new place. Being an EA was something of which I was very proud, but with no schools hiring here, it was time to consider other options.

Can a woman have a midlife crisis? Was I suddenly going to become one of those women who go aggressively Girl Power, buy an organic bicycle and become a Life Coach? *gasp* Was I going to take up running?

Nope.

What I did was freeze. It turns out  there is something worse than having endless, repetitive monotony fill your days, to the point where the only thoughts you have are so awful that even the drudgery of a call center is preferred. It is the deafening echo you hear when you quit and ask yourself what's next? A few months ago, when I wrote about that very question, it was with a different and more hopeful tone.

When I quit, I thought I had a plan. I was going to get healthy and fit, so I scheduled 3 weeks for that. Then I was going to redefine myself with a degree and a new career. Easy-peasey. And for dessert, I'd paint the house that I had lived in so lightly for the past year that I barely recognized it.

After staring blankly into this new abyss for about a month, I finally did what I should have done ages ago, when anxiety first started to creep into my every day, because living next to crazy for 3 years rubs off and makes you a little jumpy at the doorbell or the phone, and slightly phobic of weedy little men with dirty beards, and hoodies pulled up no matter what the weather, who watch everything and smile with too many teeth.

I called a counsellor.

The first question she asked was "How are you today?" and I cried for nearly our whole hour. It was lovely.

Since then, things have been much better. I've started writing a book I can't wait to read, which is a good sign. I drew up a plan for my front garden (I have a front garden!) and I actually think I might do it this summer. I go for walks, I take a yoga class once a week and I read. Best of all I laugh now. With my sweet silly man who is endlessly patient and who loves me despite the fact that I am barely recognizable as the woman he married. I am on my way back and he's grateful for that, too.

I admit that I waited too long to ask for help but there is no shame is needing it. I see my counselor once a month. She's very smart, and her peppermint selection is excellent. It's helpful to have someone ask the big questions like, "Why don't you just take a few guilt-free weeks to be sad about leaving a province you love and a job that delighted you? About your dog dying? Why can't you write a novel? Where is it written that you have to be happy all the time, and that you're a failure if you're not?"

She's right, of course, and naturally I found myself a lot happier once I thought about all of these things, in a Starbucks, with a latte. Because that's what white women do after a good cry with their counsellor. Live your truth. Life Coaching for the win.

I have lots of work left to do, but it's a to-do list that I finally like the look of:

• walk every day, maybe even run soon
• write every day
• talk with my mom and dad more
• find out who developed the Keto Diet and force feed them a Belgian Waffle
• only accept a job offer that I will be proud to put on my resume
• take a risk
• go vegan

(Just kidding. I'll go vegan when they genetically engineer a bacon flavoured eggplant and not a moment before.)

"If you know someone who is depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn't a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather. Try to understand the blackness, lethargy, hopelessness, and loneliness they are going through. Be there for them when they come out the other side. It's hard to be a friend to someone who is depressed but it is one of  the kindest, noblest, and best things you will ever do." 

 -Stephen Fry, President of MIND (formerly The National Association for Mental Health) and a seriously funny man.