Big Changes Afoot

Over a year ago I began pursuing my masters degree in nursing with the aim of one day becoming a nurse midwife. Birth has been my passion and my life since I was nineteen. As I'm coming up on my thirty-fifth birthday, those of you who are numerically inclined can figure out that that's sixteen years. Sixteen years is a long time to hold a dream in your heart, so it came as a surprise to me to find that it's a dream I no longer want to pursue.

But let me back up a bit. Last year I had a little nervous breakdown in the Spring and realized that I need to take better care of myself and that at the time I needed a break from school. I couldn't exactly drop my parenting gig and I needed to continue working but something had to give and so school went away for a time. I had a wonderful summer, I took medication for my depression, I worked out and spent time outside. I played. I planted a garden. Life was good.

Renewed and rejuvenated I went back to school in the Fall. But I felt stuck. The work wasn't terribly challenging but I just couldn't do it. I felt like the subjects I was studying had no more to do with learning to catch babies than digging a ditch! I would lie awake at night crying and thinking about the slavery I was selling myself into. Slavery to a system I felt was abusive to women and babies, and the slavery of debt and I the thought came "just quit". Quit? Would that be....failure? How could I face anyone? What about the time I'd already spent working towards this goal? What about the last sixteen years of my life? "You do have other interests, don't you" came that little voice. I considered that, I have a lot of loves, a lot of interests, could I possibly pursue any of them?

Well, I'm officially resigning from the program after this holiday weekend and I can't wait. I want to go back to school and learn to speak Italian, or Arabic, I want to throw pottery and write. It's a fascinating, if a little scary, journey to be on, in this uncharted territory. I can't wait to see what happens next.