an open letter

dear general world of mentors:

ok, we are all human. we all presumably have some sort of life outside the workplace that contributes to who we are as a person, and i appreciate that small shared personal connections can enrich a professional connection. in fact, i have found a lot of enjoyment in some of these little personal connections.

i’ll admit it, i’ve even received valuable advice for personal things that i have shared in some of the longer-lasting and more trusting working relationships. (though reaching that level took a while.) and when i’m through working for you, yes, i can consider you a friend of sorts for the personal interactions we had along with the professional ones.

but there are many, many, MANY things i do not want to know about you. because you are my boss. because i do view you as a professional first. and i am here to learn how to be a professional, through your influence.

so look. in general, we’re pretty cool as it stands, alright? for instance, i’ve really appreciated the professional-development stories that put me a little more at ease about my own professional development. i get it, you used to be one of the gang in the lab, not the boss-person. and maybe it’s strange, being on the other side of that balance. but there is a line, and it gets kinda fucking weird from this perspective when that line is crossed. until we’ve had a little more time to establish the professional relationship and i’ve had some more time to figure you out, let’s keep just a little farther away from that line. then we can look back and laugh about it later.

kthx,

leigh

transforming moments

some of these memories are fuzzy. some are clear as day.

#1

high school junior leigh is into chemistry. she is also enrolled in a psychology class, where she occasionally makes an appearance. occasionally.

in one of the rare scenarios that leigh is present, the teacher mentions use of lithium to treat bipolar disorder.

lithium rings a bell in leigh’s not-particularly-focused mind. that’s chemistry. wtf? why would you give someone a metal to treat a mental disorder? she asks. (i think i even said “what the fuck” but that’s another story.) the teacher has no idea. seizing the opportunity to maybe connect with leigh in some way other than not checking her name on the attendance reports, she encourages me to find out. who does leigh ask? her chemistry teacher. ha.

unless i’m forgetting something, which i admit is highly likely, this was leigh’s first neuropharmacology discussion. little did this delinquent know what she was getting her ass into.

#2

the phone rings. i’m at my desk working on graduate school applications. the fixer answers the phone. footsteps on the stairs, coming to get me.

“it’s for you.” the fixer looks bewildered.

alright… who could this be?

“hello?”

“hi…,” says a nervous voice on the other end of the line.

“i… um… my name is [firstname lastname]“

wait a minute. isn’t lastname my biological father’s name? i… oh fuck.

“…and my dad is, um, your dad. well, i mean your biological father.”

oh fuck, really? really? this is the first time in my life that i’ve randomly thought i need a fucking cigarette, and i don’t smoke.

“my… well, our… grandparents in [small city near hometown] saw your and the fixer’s engagement announcement in the paper. they sent it to my… our… dad. we all sat down and read it… we think you look like [middle sibling].”

jeezus tapdancing christ! i look like someone? they actually think about me? what the fuck is going on here? what do i even say? am i capable of speech right now? … ah, the answer to that is a resounding no. um. maybe she’ll keep talking until i get over this shock.

“i thought i would try to contact you. i saw in your announcement you’re going to [small state u]. i’m at [state u, another campus]. so i looked you up on the student system. and… well… congratulations! and hi.”

i gather myself

we had a nice conversation, my new sister and me. that opened the door to the other half of the family i knew i had but never… had.

#3

college sophomore bio prof stands in front of the class and announces, “my name is [firstname]. don’t you dare call me doctor [lastname]. i was a mediocre undergraduate. i got a lot of Cs. i am living proof that anyone who wants it badly enough can be a phd”

first time the idea entered my mind… “ya know, if these guys can do it, why can’t i? bah, who am i kidding? but… hmm”

famous last words, i say.

functional is not the same as having it all together.

it’s funny how different my life has become over the last several years. it all started in grad school. the work-takeover-of-life took a sharp curve upward. not immediately, but years 2-4 were the exponential growth phase, and they weren’t fun. most of year 5 and the postdoc transition was, i think, simply a vertical line. all work all the time. no life.

well, i feel like after a few months on the job i’ve gotten my feet under me a little bit. some things are feeling much better, some things that irritate me remain unchanged. i’m back to feeling like i have some bastion of control over my work universe. and i think i’m being a pretty damn good postdoc for my level of experience, considering the circumstances. i am meeting my own expectations, which i try to set higher than those i receive from the rest of the world. work is finally hitting a plateau, but the rest of my life is on a crash course.

the problem is that i am not applying this careful construction to the rest of my life. see, my stress/anxiety-related problem is really kicking the living shit out of me lately. it’s been heavy stress for months- MONTHS- and i think i ran out of fuel sometime in the middle of moving to postdoc city. some major but unbloggable shit. it hit me very hard when i was quite possibly at my weakest. at that point, i was already relying on alcohol and/or drugs to sleep… usually “and”. well, that pushed me off a cliff. since then, i’ve been scraping along trying to get myself off the ground again.

i’m told by an objective party that the circumstances are totally unfair to me, and i deserve to be upset about being totally and utterly fucked over. that nobody should have to do this. but i have little choice in the matter. unless i do something i don’t ever want to do.

but i’m awesome at putting out this air of having all my shit together. yeah, i’ve got it covered alright. covered up. what i don’t tell myself at work is that i’m also reading these papers to find out what is wrong with me. what i don’t share with the world is how i can’t sleep no matter how hard i try. what i tell the fixer is not to tell me is how many times i woke up in a cold sweat, heart pounding, hyperventilating. not to remind me of things he knows but i might not remember at the time. i ask him to forgive me, because despite having come to the conclusion that i should, i can’t afford to see a doctor right now.

i ask him to not blame himself for being unable to find a job, which is in part the reason i can’t afford that… because it’s my fault for bringing us here.

all this aside, i refuse to fail and am well aware that somehow i always manage to come out on top. i have the instincts to pull this off- survival instincts well-honed over many years of really relying on them. i trust in myself to do what needs to be done. but i’m wondering how much farther this can go before i do fail in a big way. i got a lot of failure out of the way during my early years of independence. it’s been a while since i’ve truly, royally fucked some of my own shit up beyond recognition. after all these years of keeping things on the straight track, i don’t want to watch it all come tumbling down around me.

i’ve been too functional, worked too hard, for too long to blow it now. i’m a little afraid.

in which reality smacks leigh right across the face

and reality is fixing to get sucker-punched right back, because leigh doesn’t take kindly to such affronts.

after…

sixteen years i barely survived.

then two years of scraping by on nothing, home being where i made it, before reaching the age of majority.

three years of college, self-supported (with the gracious help of the fixer).

and finally five heavily punishing years of graduate school, the last two of which i returned the gracious help of the fixer by putting him through college too.

…all this followed by finding a suitable job in the worst job market of my life and a pretty ugly funding climate as well.

here i stand, on the top of that mountain of accomplishments. i did it! twenty-six years spent in total- the ones i remember spent telling myself i just had to make it through to [next step] and man, things were gonna be alright. though i looked before i lept every time, i kept on adding steps. racking up shit to do.

but you know what? things aren’t magically alright just because i crossed all those finish lines. i was telling myself this to get through all the challenges i faced. but i’m not home free just because i did all this shit. the accomplishments mean nothing if i don’t chase down the underlying reason for all these accomplishments. i didn’t do them just to do them. i did them so that my life would be better somehow.

the problem? all these things i’ve done haven’t given me the chance to figure out what that life is like, the theoretical and nonspecifically defined “better” one i’ve been chasing down. i can’t keep being this high-performance achievement machine, neglecting myself and things that are important. i realize i have no idea what this life looks like, where it is, or how to get there.

to some extent, we all are just making shit up as we go along. i get that. but the only example i had is a strict what not to do. so um… where do we go from here?

fun with writing

i’m really not feeling ready to start writing heavy stuff again after the dissertation and the giganto-manuscript. i feel like i pulled a writing muscle and need more time for it to heal or something. i don’t know.

grad mentor admonished me when i said i was tired of writing. said this is my job now! my reaction was something along the lines of, “oh, fuck.”

i’m pretty relieved that gigantoscript has not returned with an outright rejection yet… presumably, they’ve decided to review it. that means it’s off my back for a little while.

but now? it’s time to write some more. another grant application. and this is applicable to the blog too, i’ve really let this thing go in terms of pharmacology content.

silence… eerie

generally, i have a hard time sharing bad things. i prefer to share the good stuff, and let the bad stuff just kind of hide away in the back of my life. but let’s break through the silence today. i don’t have much to go on, but i’m going to post something. even if it’s a random smattering of stuff.

-i’ve had some kind of really obnoxious illness for about 5 days. i’m very tired. at least it is limited to my sinus passages.

-the fixer quit smoking yesterday- cold turkey- due to lack of funds. he is extremely unhappy.

-net result is a very quiet home today. me sinking into my illness-induced misery and some less than exciting data analysis, and him keeping to himself because he’s in a very foul mood.

-i went to a seminar last week that ended up being a false front for some weird ass program recruitment thing for postdocs. not thrilled, but thanks for the free lunch i guess.

-considering what to do about the growing-term spousal unemployment. i caught a job ad that was practically made for my desired career track and to-date training in a bigger city. i’m going to apply and see what happens- once i’m more clear-headed. right now i’m not with it enough to sell myself.

-regardless, when my contract here ends, if the fixer is not using his college degree, then we’re moving to Semi-nearby Big City.

-i’ve been awake for about 4 hours. i kinda want to take a nap now. yeah, i’ll go do that.

there’s one in every crowd

interesting how everywhere you go, there’s that one person. you know who i’m talking about. the one who’s trying to make themselves look good, by trying to make everyone around them look bad.

you’d think the most direct way to make yourself look good is to accomplish shit, and kick ass, create a collegial environment, and that kind of thing. internal standards. the kind of actions that earn you the respect of those around you. right?

but not that one person. that one person is so externally focused, that their own work begins to suffer. as their work suffers, they need to swing more vicious attacks at others to continue making themselves “look better”  – which, as everyone sees their game, eventually quits happening. because nobody bothers to waste their time talking to that one person anymore.

these types will assuredly destroy themselves on their own. no intervention is required from you except staying the fuck away from them and avoiding any destructive radius around them. it requires a little patience, but is uniquely satisfying to watch their own douchebaggery take them down in flames.

thought process on the kids question

i’m female, and i don’t have children because i have some other shit to do first.

really, it’s not that we don’t want children. we’ve tried in the past. back before, suffice to say, life got in the way for a while.

life is still in the way, really. one of us is (still) unemployed. i’m really starting to think that van parked across the street is actually sallie mae, waiting for our first late payment. i need to take care of some aspects of my health, which is admittedly not the best right now.

i’m extremely insecure, which likely goes back to my own early days. i would sooner not have children, than give them the life i had. this is taking me some time to mentally negotiate, in several ways i can’t really describe.

and i don’t for a second try to pretend that my career isn’t a consideration here. after all, i busted my ass to make it out of hell and get an education. to become something more, to do more and to contribute more. but somehow, having a career and having a family isn’t super scary to me. i’ve had some very powerful female role models, who have shown me that it IS possible, if a major juggling act and a ton of work. since the presence of motherhood has been integral to work environment for so long, this isn’t foreign and frightening to me. for that, i can thank my grad lab. seems like my other concerns are more of a barrier than concern for my career.

but my present career stage is by nature not very long-term. this is unnerving from the perspective of someone on a lifelong quest for stability.

so for now, i’m glad that i don’t have children so i can take care of my other shit first.

omg! dental insurance!

i haven’t had that in YEARS! i’m so excited that it’s even an option!

i have wanted to get my teeth cleaned and some minor dental work for ages. now i can hardly wait until i can actually get that done.

amid it all, i press forward

life has been discouraging lately. extremely so. it’s nothing new to me, but i was looking forward to at least catching a breath away from the toxicity of the shit my life (more specifically, my family) throws at me.

the unbloggable nasty things are behind me now. i need to get down to business in coping with them. but any time i even attempt to share this bit of myself, i just hear the violins playing as if i’m whining about it. i’m not. this is my reality.

but i would sooner keep things to myself than fulfill this fear of coming off as someone who uselessly whines about the unchangeable. i’m very self-protective. this inhibits me quite a bit.

in short, all i want is a little bit of stability and a chance to make progress on my own life goals, and my search hasn’t even gotten me to the same universe as stability. in part, i had hoped that acquiring/finishing my education would help. it has not. so now i’m left wondering if i just haven’t gotten there yet and need to keep working and waiting, or if i am totally on the wrong path.

it’s not all negative lately- i’ve scored a lot of points in my work life. but having success in my career does not, on its own, make me satisfied with my life. this is part of what i’m fighting with.

or maybe i’m just being impatient. i have impatience in bulk quantity.