Tag: mourning

A Desperate Plea to Future Mental Health Professionals from an Adult-Diagnosed Autistic

There is a tsunami of adult autistic trauma out there. We need your help.

I was just diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) in December of 2022, a few weeks before my 58th birthday. I wrote about what caused me to seek this diagnosis here. I’m rather new at this stuff, and I’ll be blogging quite a bit about various aspects of it as I go along, reading and learning and wondering what this means for me, as I suspect that quite a few other people are experiencing a similar thing.

Check out my autism category for a list of relevant blog posts, and never forget that 1) I’m just one person, writing about my personal experiences with a thing I only just learned I had. 2) No two people on the spectrum are alike. 3) I am not a medical or mental health professional. 4) I’m not attempting to write a one size fits all autism advice column.

Recently discovering that I have been walking around for nearly 6 decades with autism has given me a completely different perspective on my past, present and future. At first, my ASD diagnosis had me feeling euphoric. Finally! Answers! Vindication!

But the more I learn about my condition, the more reality is setting in for me. I don’t think I realized how profoundly everything in my life would be impacted by this new understanding. I wish I had more support, but services for adult autistics are very thin on the ground.

That really surprises me, because there are an estimated 5.4 million autistic adults in America alone. Despite searching online for hours, I couldn’t find a breakdown as to how many of those were diagnosed as children, how many were diagnosed as an adult, how many suspect but aren’t pursuing a diagnosis, and how many of us are wandering around feeling broken and confused and clueless about autism, like I was a month ago.

Naturally, I feel for that last group the most. Not understanding the why of things can be really isolating and upsetting. Having answers is such a relief, but it’s a bit of a double-edged sword. The majority of us who have managed to fly under the radar this long are most likely highly intelligent and relatively functional, so it would be easy for mental health professionals to assume we don’t need help. But I’m here to tell you that I really, really need help. Here are some of the issues that I’m dealing with.

I’m finding the acceptance process to be similar to that of mourning. I have good days and bad days. There is anger and depression for sure. I haven’t exactly experienced denial or bargaining, but I have no idea how I’m going to feel from one moment to the next.

Sometimes I feel joy because I’m finally finding my tribe, and the more I read about autism, the more I understand about myself. Other times I feel the harsh reality of the prejudices people have about autism, and how those prejudices affect me on a daily basis. One loved one no longer speaks to me, and I’m guessing that’s because she is not willing to discard the drama queen lens through which she has always viewed me. It’s a shame, because she’s the only person left who might be able to give me answers about things that I’m wondering about from my childhood. So in that way, it really does feel like I’m mourning someone I love.

It also feels like I’m meeting myself for the first time. I’m not sure who my authentic self is anymore. After a lifetime of masking my symptoms in an unconscious attempt to fit in, I’m no longer sure what is real. All of that is a lot to unpack, and I am mostly having to do it all alone.

Dear Husband has been extremely supportive and willing to listen, though. In that I’m extremely lucky. He has read quite a bit on the subject, too. But this is essentially one of those you-had-to-be-there scenarios, and I’m happy to say that he’s never had to be there before. I’m having to deal with a lot of guilt because of the extra burden this places on him, too, although he’s never said so. He’s willing to go there with me, but I’m sure it wasn’t in his original 5 year plan.

Looking back at my childhood through the lens of autism is clearing up a lot of confusion for me. The extreme effort my mother put into trying to get me to make friends felt like torture to me at the time, and ultimately it didn’t work, but I can understand why a mother would want her daughter to be more “normal”. To be clear, she never made me feel like I was weird. Society needed no assistance on that score. I just wish she had been able to talk to me honestly about how atypical I was, because then the “what’s wrong with me” battle that raged within me wouldn’t have felt quite as lonely, and maybe I wouldn’t have felt like such a failure at life. But little was known about autism back then, and I’m sure she did the best she could.

Services for autistic adults are, as I said, practically non-existent. I was on a waiting list for 6 months before I was finally evaluated, and now I’m on yet another waiting list to get help from the University of Washington’s Adult Autism Clinic. They told me it would probably take a year. Meanwhile, I’m barely sleeping because wave upon wave of new perspectives about my past keep crashing over me, and I feel like I’m having to tread water.

The need for these services are not going to go away. As autistic children “age out” of the services they now receive, what then? Do they get to fall into this crack with the rest of us? And the more adults get diagnosed, the more they’ll talk to others, many of whom will attempt to seek a diagnosis as well. You might say that adult autism is a growth industry.

From a capitalist perspective, it stuns me that there is such a potentially lucrative unmet need out there, and no one appears to be making an effort to fill it. Hence my desperate plea to future mental health professionals. We need you so badly.

I’ve seen so many therapists who did not spot my autism and sent me on wild goose chases that did not result in any healing or answers. I am trying to find a counselor who takes my insurance and has experience with autism. But so far they’re either not accepting new patients, or they don’t take insurance and want to charge anywhere from $150 to $250 per session, which makes them well out of reach to the majority of us. I’ve also looked for support groups, and they are, indeed, out there. For an equally high fee.

I know I’ll get hooked into the system, however flimsy it may be, eventually. But I’m struggling right now, and crashing into brick walls at every turn. Advocating for myself is stressful and exhausting. I cannot imagine how someone who is even less functional would be able to handle it. I’m sure many give up in despair.

There is a tsunami of adult autistic trauma out there. If you don’t believe me, check out this YouTube video by Orion Kelly about Autism and Self Hatred. It’s heartbreaking to hear this man suffering so profoundly. He does videos about autism on a regular basis, and they’re raw and vulnerable and honest and enlightening. But this one, in particular, is gut-wrenching.

Even if you don’t have time to watch his video, I urge you to scroll down on its page and read some of the 1,442 comments that it has garnered at the time of this writing. Being autistic can come with a lot of baggage. Spending so much time trying to be something you’re not while trying so hard not to be a burden is stressful and exhausting. That in turn causes health issues.

So much pain and loneliness, frustration and anger, confusion and depression is out there. We as a society shouldn’t be wait-listing all this trauma. If we want our communities to be mentally healthy, we need to meet these needs.

Speaking only for myself, I wouldn’t want to be cured even if I could be (and by the way, I can’t). What I want is coping skills and support. I want to feel less alone and more capable. I believe I can achieve that and still be me. But I need help.

I have this fantasy that someday there will be a clinic without a waiting list. This clinic will provide counseling, even to those who are self-diagnosed, and especially to those who cannot afford it. This clinic would provide prompt evaluations and teach life skills to those who need them. It would provide and/or host support groups, and, since we’re dreaming, here, it would even have a quiet, warmly lit café/library to hang out in when you’re feeling misunderstood and overwhelmed. Perhaps it should be called an adult autism community center, which leaves room for all sorts of services and opportunities.

Those of us who find ourselves in the lost generation of adult autistics have been neglected our entire lives. On the whole, this neglect was unintentional. Nevertheless, it happened. Imagine how devastating it is to discover that, even after a diagnosis, that neglect will continue.

We need you. Please don’t forget us yet again. We still have a lot of living to do. Most people, whether they’re on the spectrum or not, just want to live their best lives.

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Arlo Guthrie as a Yardstick

Arlo and I are both rounding out our lives with love and happiness.

One of the very first concerts I saw as a teenager was Arlo Guthrie. My older sister took me. I enjoyed it so much that we got all his albums back when vinyl was the thing. I’ve been going to his concerts ever since. I lost count around number eighteen. He was the beginning of my life-long love affair with folk music, storytelling, and writing.

It’s safe to say that I’m a fan. I’ve even blogged about him here and here. I’ve gotten his autograph a few times. I’ve also spoken to him, but he’s not as outgoing off stage as he is onstage, so mostly he has responded with a blank stare. Of course, I’d always get all flustered when I got close to him, so I’d usually say something inane, like, “I was born the same year Alice’s Restaurant came out!” or, “I think it’s wonderful that you have your kids performing with you now.” or, “I’ve seen you in concert 18 times!”

But the most mortifying encounter was at the Florida Folk Festival in 2004. He was set up under an awning in a field, and the crowd was surrounding him on all 4 sides. We got a patch of grass right behind him. We were so close that I could have slapped him upside the head if the spirit moved me. (Of course, it didn’t.) But before Arlo started performing, my boyfriend at the time gushed, “She’s your number one fan!”

Omigod. Stalk much? The poor man kept glancing nervously over his shoulder at me during the rest of his set. I wanted to crawl under a rock. (But not so much so that I was willing to leave.)

Back in 2012, I lived in Vero Beach, not that far from the home that he lived in when in Sebastian, Florida. No, I didn’t go knock on his door. That would be creepy. But I did keep my eyes open when running errands in town. It would have been cool to bump into him at the hardware store or something. No such luck.

When his wife passed away, I was still living right down the coast from him, and my heart was broken for him. They had been married for 43 years. A year and a half later, my guy also abruptly passed away. We had only been together for 4 years, and I was devastated, so I couldn’t begin to imagine what Arlo was going through after losing a relationship that had lasted ten times as long. I thought about that a lot over the next few months. Both of us in Florida, gazing out at the same ocean, both experiencing waves of crashingly painful emotions.

I’m not going to lie. I have had a bit of a crush on him over the years. He’s a good looking, talented man, and I love his storytelling abilities and his politics and his sense of humor. But I also knew he was happily married, is 17 years older than I am, and way, way cooler than I would ever be. Also, I wouldn’t cope well with the constant touring, and while his Florida home may have been called the CrabShack, Zillow currently places its value at nearly 3 million dollars. I’m not someone who would fit into a million dollar home. And, let’s face it, I really and truly know nothing about the real man. But it was a nice fantasy that made me smile during my darkest hours.

Over the years, I’ve watched his TV appearances, too. I try to watch Alice’s Restaurant every Thanksgiving. I caught him on the Muppet Show when I was really young, and looking at the footage now, I realize he was barely grown himself.

And I watched the show The Byrds of Paradise religiously during its short-lived run in 1994, simply because Arlo had a part in it. If you want a total hoot, check out Arlo rapping and dancing in this clip from that show. He has always charmed me.

Fast forward to February, 2022, when I happened upon this article in the New York Times that hit me with three things I didn’t know, all at once. First, Arlo has had several strokes. Second, because of those strokes, he can’t perform up to his standards and doesn’t walk as well, so he has retired from performing. Third, since 2016 he has been living with someone he loves very much, and they got married officially in December, 2021. They now live together in a much more modest home in that same area of Florida.

I also found out that he told his new wife, “I’m going to take care of you like a man should.” Omigod, crush validated. Having said that, though, I am truly happy for him. He’s 74, and deserves to have love in his life just like I do. (And I’d pick Dear Husband over Arlo every day of the week, now that I’ve I finally found him and have convinced him he needed to find me, too.)

But it did take me several days to absorb all that Arlo news. I couldn’t really understand why it rattled me so much. And then it dawned on me. First of all, I would never see him perform live ever again, and his concerts have been major mileposts throughout my life. Second, one day he’s going to die, and I’ll read about it and probably fall to pieces. I can’t imagine a world without an Arlo Guthrie in it. Third, half the time I was fantasizing about him, he was in love and shacked up, which is further evidence that my inner world is entirely fictional. Fourth, time is going by way too quickly, and therefore feels increasingly poignant to me.

You might say that Arlo has been one of many yardsticks by which I’ve measured my life. It’s a bit unsettling to be hit all at once with the fragility of that yardstick. Things fall apart. The center cannot hold.

But I’m glad that both of us are rounding out our lives with love and happiness. I am exactly where I’m supposed to be, finally. I suspect that that’s the case for Arlo, too. He and his wife garden together. That makes me smile.

Thinking of Arlo as a yardstick and also as a gardener makes me want to leave you with one of my favorite Arlo songs. “Inch by inch…”  Despite the poor quality of the video, I hope you’ll watch it all. It will show you what an amazing performer and storyteller he has always been. It brings happy tears to my eyes. There will never be anyone like him again.

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Feeling Relief Instead of Grief?

You are not alone in this.

I was talking to a friend about her mixed emotions after the death of one of her relatives. This guy had made her life a living hell when he was alive. He was an abusive alcoholic who created nothing but drama in the family. He left financial devastation in his wake, and he was quite adept at dishing out emotional abuse. The man was toxic. I found him to be a horrible human being.

Since his passing, my friend’s life has improved substantially. Her stress levels have decreased and her health has increased. She gets more sleep. Her self-confidence is much more evident now. I’m really happy for her.

Sadly, she feels a little guilty for being relieved that the guy is finally gone. He was, after all, a relative, and she did love him to a certain extent. But she doesn’t miss him at all.

I can totally relate to this. When my stepfather died, I wanted to throw a party. But of course I didn’t. People would have been horrified. They would have thought I was callous. They have no idea what the man had put me through. The world is a much better place without him in it.

Relationships are complicated, and therefore the subsequent grief is bound to be complicated. There are many scenarios in which it would be quite understandable to feel relief and/or a complex mix of emotions at someone’s passing. You would definitely not be alone in this.

For example, if your loved one had been suffering for years, it’s natural to be relieved that that suffering is over. And if you were the primary caregiver for that person for what feels like an eternity, and that care has left you exhausted and depleted and stressed out, it’s okay to be relieved to have your life back again. If you have lost someone due to an easily preventable death, or due to suicide, you may have a lot of anger and/or guilt to process.

I’ve had several people broach this subject with me over the years. They tend to speak in hushed tones and look over their shoulders to make sure no one is listening. It’s as if they’ve committed a crime. I seem to be one of those people who silently signal that if you feel the need to confess this particular offense, then guuuurl… come sit by me.

Our culture causes us to have really strange ideas about what grief is supposed to look like and feel like. It’s supposed to be pure, sincere, and it should last for a year. (Longer than that, and people lose patience. Shorter than that, and something is wrong with you.) And if other family members are experiencing what looks like a more wholesome form of grief for the person you are thrilled to be rid of, then you are expected to suppress your feelings so as not to ruffle feathers. But make no mistake: you are grieving, too, in your own way.

Grief can’t be pigeonholed. Each person’s experience is different. In fact, your grief experience will most likely change over time, and it will be different for each person you grieve. Grief can manifest as depression or sadness or anger or numbness or an inability to concentrate, and yes, it can also include relief and even joy and a sense of freedom and release.

It’s not uncommon to encounter insensitive people as you work to process and adapt to this monumental change in your life. They often don’t realize they’re passing judgment by showing their confusion, impatience, or shock at the way you are feeling or behaving. Please remember that they don’t get to decide if you’re getting it right. There is no “right” way to grieve.

At the same time, it’s important to remember that not passing judgment should be a two way street. It does you no good at all to try to force your brand of grief down the throats of those around you, who may, in fact, not be feeling grief at all, or may be so devastated that they struggle to function. You can erect a shrine, but you shouldn’t expect others to worship at it. You can throw your own party, but no one should be forced to attend. You can wear all black for the rest of your life, or cover yourself in bright, shiny colors, but please don’t dictate anyone else’s physical or emotional wardrobe.

Another thing to consider is that you’re not only grieving a person. You are also grieving change. You may be grieving the life you never had because of the life you were forced to live while you were in a toxic person’s orbit. You may be grieving the fact that you were unable to improve your relationship with that person while he or she was still alive. You may be experiencing confusion and/or resentment and/or excitement because now you have to figure out what your life will look like moving forward.

A good rule of thumb is this: you do you. Feel what you feel and allow others to feel what they feel. Give yourself and others that gift.

And if you wish to support someone who is grieving, ask that person what they want or need. Don’t assume you know. Some people, like my friend, want nothing more than someone to listen to them express their relief without criticism. I’m glad she came and sat by me.

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Reverse Engineering Your Life

Three cheers for utter devastation!

They say that the top five stressors in life are:

  • Death of a loved one
  • Divorce
  • Moving
  • Major illness or injury
  • Job loss

Thanks to this freakin’ pandemic, along with life in general, many of us are experiencing several of these stressors at once. It can be devastating. It’s a fragile time, and an all-time low. Under the circumstances, you can’t be blamed for feeling like a starfish that has been washed up onto dry land.

If the hits just keep on coming for you, it’s important for you to understand that you’re quite likely in a state of mourning. You are grieving the life you once had that has been ripped out of your hands. It’s perfectly natural to be upset, depressed, overwhelmed, angry, and afraid, by turns, or all at once.

Be gentle with yourself. Treat yourself as though you’ve just come out of major surgery. Give yourself time to heal and breathe. Let yourself feel all the different emotions. There’s no shame in that. It will take time to regain your bearings.

But once your feet are back up under you and you have a renewed sense of the compass points of your life, dare I say it? You have a unique opportunity. Yeah, I know. Hard to believe. But hear me out.

Your life has been stripped down in such a way that you are practically reborn, and yet you’re no baby. You are a capable, imaginative, creative creature who has just been stripped of its shell and perhaps everything that you’ve held dear up to this point. You are naked and vulnerable in the world, but you still have your brain and your character and your life experience. No one can take that away from you.

That vulnerable state also means you have more options than you ever have had in your life. And options equal opportunity! Even though you might be feeling like you’re at the bottom of a blast crater, you can now rebuild your life any way you want. You are at the foundation. You can build something amazing out of that crater. The land has already been cleared for you.

Believe me, I speak from experience. In 2014, I had hit rock bottom. Someone I loved more than life itself died quite unexpectedly. I also had just gotten my third college degree and was realizing that, like the other two, it was completely worthless in terms of starting me on a career path. I had a job that I knew would not be able to sustain me financially moving forward, and I had been kicked out of my apartment and had no idea where to go. The few days I experienced homelessness was enough to make me understand how I didn’t want my life to be. I had nothing left but the ringing in my ears after the explosion that was my life.

But that’s when I had an epiphany. (Don’t you just love a good epiphany?)

If ever I was to have the life I wanted, I needed to start now. Rather than scrambling through life, desperately clutching at whatever handholds came my way to get me out of this pit, I needed to reverse engineer everything, and I mean everything, about the way I chose to live.

I needed to think deeply about what it is that I truly wanted out of life, and then position myself to achieve those goals. I thought about where I wanted to live. (A liberal place, definitely not Florida). I thought about what I wanted to do. (Be in a stable, healthy relationship and build a solid home base from which to travel. I thought about what that would look like in detail.)

Your goals might be very different from mine, but one of my major realizations was that my job should not be my life. My job should be what allows me to live my life. I didn’t want a job that made me so miserable that that feeling bled into my off hours. If I was miserable, how would I be attractive to a healthy and positive life partner? I wanted a job that sustained me financially, but I also wanted one that I didn’t have to bring home with me. I wanted time to explore and have adventures and read books and focus on the people I love. I wanted time to write. I wanted to be able to turn off my phone whenever desired, without consequences.

I needed to do several things. First of all, I had to stop settling for the crap jobs that continued to put me in the waiting room of life. Waiting for change and not being the change was getting me nowhere.

I also needed to break free of toxic people. If I wanted to have a good life, I needed to be surrounded by good people, and those people would never present themselves if they had to swim through a sea of poisonous drama to get to me. I needed to put myself in places where I was most likely to meet the kind of good people I want in my life. That process was an emotional spring cleaning of sorts, and it wasn’t easy, but it was necessary.

But most of all, I had to take chances. I needed to have a clear vision of what I wanted, and I needed to say no to negative things and break old destructive habits, and say yes to opportunities. I needed to move. And now was my chance, because I basically had nothing and no one. While traveling through life without baggage can be scary, it can also be liberating.

If you’re at ground zero, down there amongst the smoke and rubble, there’s nowhere to go but up. This may seem counterintuitive, but I’m telling you to stay in that crater for a bit. Take some time to carefully plot out your course so that when you reach the rim of that crater, what you’re looking out at is exactly what you want to see.

I’m not saying that my path from 2014 was easy, but it was carefully plotted out. I now live in liberal Seattle, have a job I love that I don’t have to think about after the shift is over, I’m happily married, and life is good. For the first time in my life I feel as though I’m exactly where I need to be, and it took total effing devastation to get me there.

I never thought I’d say this, but three cheers for devastation, and a hearty thank you.

It can be done. Don’t just let life happen to you. Make it happen. There will be better days. But take some time to figure out what a better day would look like for you, and only then go there, step by step.

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On Losing Friends

You have a right to put your foot down.

There are very few things on earth that make you feel more lonely than having to say goodbye to a beloved friend. I’ve had to do that twice in the midst of this already isolating pandemic, and not a day goes by when I don’t have tears in my eyes at some point because of it.

What? Oh, no, they didn’t die. That would be infinitely more tragic. But they both broke my heart, making me feel like I was dying. Either way, it’s a mourning process, and one I barely have the strength for.

There just comes a point when you have to stop tolerating bad behavior from the people you love. You have a right to set boundaries. You have a right to put your foot down. You have a right to say, “No, you don’t get to do this.”

You should always be your own best friend. You need to put a stop to things that hurt your heart, even when they come from people with whom you have had decades of happy memories as well as a mountain of emotional investment. If you’ve tried to communicate and/or work things out and gotten no results, you have to say, “This far and no further.”

So for future reference, here are a few boundaries that I have set:

  • You don’t get to insult people you don’t even know on my Facebook page. Respect me, respect my friends. You don’t have to agree with them, but you don’t get to attack them.
  • If you espouse hate speech or try to encourage violent behavior, I don’t want you in my universe.
  • If you’re going to stand me up, blow me off, or take advantage of me, you better have a stellar excuse. And if you never return my calls and then accuse me of not being a good enough friend, you’ve made my choice for me.
  • If you make promises and then don’t keep them, I will lose trust in you. It’s hard to maintain a friendship under those circumstances.
  • You don’t get to exaggerate other dear friend’s behavior to the point of damaging their reputation, simply so you can win an argument. If you tell me that a friend I have known for decades, who has a reputation of never saying an unkind word to anyone, has suddenly verbally attacked you without any discernible motivation and with no proof whatsoever provided by you, I have to call foul. Not only are you insulting my friend, but you’re insulting my judgment.
  • You don’t have to like all the things I like, but if something is extremely important to me, the least you can do is be supportive of that thing. My blog, for example, is me on a page. When you continually reject my invites to my Facebook group, that’s painful enough. But when I offer to send you a link to one of my blog posts and you say, essentially, “Please don’t,” that’s like a rejection of me. How hard would it be to just say thanks and fake it?
  • If you know you’ve been hurtful, set aside your pride and apologize. If you choose your pride over our friendship, then the friendship must never have had much value to you in the first place.

For what it’s worth, I tried to salvage the wreckage of one of these friendships. I tried really hard. He just bent the truth more and more to prop up his stance, until finally I was the one who felt broken.

And in the other situation, it suddenly occurred to me that this person has made me feel bad more than once, and never has apologized, not once, in all the decades I’ve known him. I’m tired of begging to be treated decently. I shouldn’t have to ask for an apology. It should be a natural process once you know you’ve hurt someone. I realized that if I just swallowed my pain yet again and accepted my second class status in his world one more time, it would rot away my soul. This person could still apologize, and we could move on, but I’m pretty sure he never will. I suspect he is sorry, but I don’t think I’ve ever meant enough to him to merit an apology. And that crushes me.

That all of this is happening during a pandemic is bad enough, but then add on top of it the fact that I moved to the Pacific Northwest 6 years ago, and, with one or two wonderful exceptions, I’m struggling to make friends out here like I made the other 5 decades of my life.

It’s hard to make new friends after a certain age. Older adults have well established lives and obligations, so the opportunity to bond is just not there as much. That, and people are a lot more standoffish out here than I’m used to. I’m pretty sure I’ll never quite fit in. I can’t remember the last time someone took the initiative to do anything with me. Out here, I do all the asking, with very mixed sucess.

Oh, and I just remembered that one woman out here accused me of killing my cat and making a joke out of it, and called me a sick, sick person. When I pointed out that I haven’t owned a cat in nearly 40 years, and that I didn’t know what the heck she was talking about, she stopped talking to me. Who could even think that I could do something like that? So yeah, another boundary I’ve set is that I can only take so much crazy.

What I’m finding is that as my self-confidence and self-awareness grows, I’m less willing to put up with bad behavior. But the humiliating truth is that, my whole adult life, no one has ever called me their best friend. What does that say? I don’t know. But it hurts like hell, and it makes it hard for me to remember that quality is more important than quantity.

So, if you see me enforcing boundaries, or speaking my truth (not yours) don’t assume I’m being insecure. Instead, congratulate me for my own agency. Cheer me on for standing my ground. Think of me as strong, not defensive or paranoid. View me as healing, not broken. Is that too much to ask?

It’s just… I’m just really sad and lonely today. I’m struggling. (For what it’s worth, I wrote this more than a week ago, so I’m probably doing much better now.)

I know I can’t be the only one who feels this way. Thank GOD I have a wonderful husband and awesome dogs. It’s amazing how couch snuggles can make you feel that everything is right with the world.

Bleh. Thanks for listening. I need a hug.

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When You Reach Your Goal

Now what?

I am a very goal-oriented person. That’s part of the reason that I started working at age 10, and I’ve been to 22 countries. I prioritize savings for my objectives over instant gratification or fancy electronics or a nice car or the latest smart phone. I never started smoking, not only because it’s a disgusting, life-threatening habit, but also because I had other plans for my life and my money.

And there is nothing, nothing at all, like the high you get when you achieve a goal that you’ve shed blood, sweat, and tears for, over an unbelievably long period of time. It’s better than winning the lottery, because it’s your sacrifices that make it happen. It’s like standing on a mountaintop, enjoying the view, after having crawled up there inch by inch, month by month, all on your own. There is no more beautiful view than that. Excelsior!

Recently, I achieved a goal that I had all but given up hope on. My little free library was made into a pokestop on the Pokemon Go app. This might seem trivial to many of you, but after having achieved the goal of having that library, I then wanted to draw as many children to it as possible, to encourage reading and literacy. Pokemon Go is very popular with young people. To play the game, one goes to pokestops in the real world. If my library is one of those pokestops, more children will visit it.

Achieving this goal took many months and hundreds of hours of dedication. I figured I’d have to play the game to suggest the pokestop, so I put the app on my phone and started playing. Then I found a suggestion form on the Niantic website (the creators of Pokemon Go), and filled it out. They responded, politely, that you have to be at level 40 in the game to make a pokestop suggestion, and that they only choose a few countries at a time, and that at present the US wasn’t one of those countries. I was crushed.

But I figured that I could at least work up to level 40 in the game so that if the US gets chosen, I’d be ready. Well, I’m at level 32, and that took forever. And each level takes longer to achieve than the last.

Meanwhile I figured that my suggestion had been discarded. Well, recently there was a Pokemon Go upgrade, and I installed it, and blink! My pokestop was there! Just like that.

But after going back to the Niantic website, and reading the requirements for pokestop suggestions, it seems that I may have just gotten lucky. Some level 40 person must have made the suggestion for me. And in retrospect, the description attached to the pokestop is in different words than I’d have chosen.

But still, goal achieved. Woo hoo! I’ll take it!

But after that “Excelsior!” moment, I experienced a little bit of a letdown. I had been working toward this goal for so long. Now what?

Once a goal is reached, especially if it’s reached so unexpectedly, you kind of go through a period of mourning. Life will be different, now. You have to find another purpose. You have to let go. You have to move on. Change. It’s really disconcerting.

And then there’s the awkwardness of knowing that I’m now addicted to Pokemon Go, and I no longer have a “legitimate” reason to play, other than the fact that it’s fun.

That should be enough, right? But it was ever so much nicer to have a loftier purpose. Now I kind of feel like a creepy adult who refuses to grow up.

I’m sure I’ll get over it, though. At least until I focus on the next goal, whatever that turns out to be.I guarantee there will be one. For me, there always is.

Maybe I should continue to try for level 40, and then suggest that every little free library I come across as a pokestop. That would increase literacy, too. Hmmmm…

My Pokestop
My very own pokestop! Woo hoo!

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A New Future

The older I get, the more people I know who are mourning the loss of a partner. Along with that, inevitably, comes the mourning of the loss of your future. Because couples make plans. That’s what they do. They have an image of what they’re working toward. When your partner dies or you get divorced, that image turns to dust.

That’s unsettling. Suddenly you have absolutely no idea where you are going. It is as if you’ve been blindfolded and spun in a circle. You spend a lot of time swinging your arms around in attempt to orient yourself and avoid crashing into things. And while you’re doing that, it seems as if the rest of the world is cruising merrily past you, intent upon one destination or another, not even having to rely on a GPS. You feel as though you can’t keep up. You’ve been left behind.

It can take many years before you’re able to find the strength turn your face toward the sun again. And when you do that, it feels really strange at first. What is this warmth I’m feeling? It feels good. Do I deserve to feel good? Should I feel guilty?

And then a funny thing happens. You start doing things that you like to do that you perhaps had abandoned because your partner wasn’t into them. And you stop doing things that you only did because your partner enjoyed them. In other words, you begin to take back your individuality.

Being an individual takes strength and courage. It takes confidence and creativity. At first you’re going to feel like a newborn giraffe. Not quite steady on your feet. A little confused about how you got here and why you’re suddenly towering over things that you never knew existed. The world will seem new.

But with any luck, one day you’ll wake up and you’ll realize that you’re actually kind of excited about the fact that the world seems new. Colors are brighter. Smells are more intriguing. Food has regained its flavor. Everything seems rife with possibilities.

And just like that, you begin to plan a brand new future. It may not look anything like the future you once imagined for yourself, but my wish for you is that it’s an adventure that you’re eager to begin. Onward!

the-future-is-ours

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Giving Up

Not every dream you have is going to work out. Not every person you fall for is going to love you back. Sometimes you will make the wrong choices, life will get in the way, or things will be out of your control.

That was made abundantly clear the other day when I was unpacking boxes that I had been storing in my guest room. I was confronted with about 25 pounds of notes that I had taken when I was pursuing my Dental Laboratory Technology degree. Despite graduating with honors and having high hopes about buying a cabin in the mountains of North Carolina and starting my own dental lab out of the garage, here I am, a bridgetender in Seattle.

I wanted that dream so badly I could taste it. But I couldn’t convince anyone to hire me so that I could gain the needed experience, and I certainly couldn’t control the fact that 6 months later I needed surgery on my wrist that would make it physically impossible to do that work.

The death of a dream. Hate when that happens. I think I went into mourning for about a year, and despite the fact that I’ve since moved on, I couldn’t quite bring myself to get rid of those notes. I lugged them all the way across the country with me, even though I knew, without a doubt, that I’d have no use for them. I just wasn’t ready to let go.

So here was this massive pile of emotionally-charged notes that were taking up space in my guest room. But this was ridiculous. The last thing I need is a 25 pound albatross around my neck. So, trying not to think too much, I pitched them all into the recycle bin.

Well, no, not all of them. I kept my orthodontic notes. And textbooks. And tools. Because that’s what I wanted to do—make orthodontic appliances, like retainers. I know I’m being silly. I know that dream isn’t happening, ever. But it’s a part of who I was, who I am. And those tools might actually come in handy. You never know.

But it was rather cleansing, getting rid of all the other stuff. It felt like another step toward healing. It was high time.

Giving up on something or someone after you’ve exhausted all viable avenues of pursuit isn’t necessarily defeat. It isn’t abject failure, either. It means, quite often, that you’re being a mature adult who is being realistic and moving on.

There’s no shame in that. It’s a huge part of life. And if you’re lucky, like I’ve been, you can look back from a good place and realize you actually wound up right where you were supposed to be all along. You may not have been able to see it in the past, but things have a funny way of working out the way they should.

Sometimes you have to give up in order to get something spectacular. Sometimes giving up is the right thing to do.

white_flag_surrender

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False Starts

I remembered something last night that I hadn’t thought of in years. I went to travel agency school! I had recently gotten my Bachelor’s Degree in Spanish and Latin American Studies, and my Associates in Sociology, and it was becoming increasingly obvious, to my horror, that I was not going to be able to do a thing with either one of them.

So I got it into my head that one of those fly-by-night train-you-for-a-career-in-next-to-no-time schools was the answer to my problems. And hey, I absolutely LOVE to travel. I adore everything about it. And travel agents get cool perks like free trips to Madrid and things like that. Sounded good to me! Sign me up!

What those career schools don’t tell you is that their goal is not to get you a career. Their goal is to prey on your desire for a career in order to separate you from your money. Don’t believe me? Ask the admissions office for placement statistics for their graduates. I guarantee you, they won’t provide them.

Regardless. I attended that school faithfully, graduated with honors and then… never got a job in the travel industry. You see, by the time I showed up, that industry was already dying. Computers were starting to rear their ugly heads, and now everyone makes their own reservations. When’s the last time you even saw a travel agency? They’re as rare as hen’s teeth.

I did get an interview with Eastern Airlines. They even flew me first class to Miami. That was the first, and probably last time I’ll ever fly first class, unfortunately. But it’s a good thing I didn’t get the job, because Eastern Airlines went belly up about 6 months later.

I seem to do that a lot– Hop onto a trend when it’s already on its downhill slide. I got 8 tracks when everyone was already moving on to cassettes, and cassettes when everyone was getting CDs, and now I have all these CDs that I never listen to, taking up space in my closet. I also went to Dental Lab Technology School and got a third degree at a time when labs are starting to automate. I’m off trend in romance, too, falling for guys who are either not ready or no longer interested or were never interested in the first place. I’ve also made a lot of friends who turned out not to be friends. That hurts like hell.

False starts suck. While you are backtracking, you’re also experiencing a sort of mini mourning period. Then you have to gather your strength to start over. That isn’t so bad when you’re young and you think there will always be a new opportunity just waiting for you, but as you get older, you realize that isn’t always the case, and even if it is, you only have so much energy and time and money to start fresh. And you therefore start to get a little gun shy.

Learning when to go for it and when to listen to your voice of reason and give something a pass is a fine art that seems to elude me. I think moving from Florida to Seattle was my last big hurrah. But I don’t want to turn into one of those people who does less and less until one day I wake up on the couch with daytime television blaring in my ear, a room full of cats, and a serious lack of Vitamin D. That would be tragic.

BXP135658

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