who am i today?

“We have to keep reinventing ourselves, almost every minute because the world can change in an instant. And there’s no time for looking back. Sometimes the changes are forced on us. Sometimes they happen by accident and we make the most of them. We have to constantly come up with new ways to fix ourselves. So we change, we adapt. We create new versions of ourselves. We just need to be sure that this one is an improvement over the last.”

-Grey’s Anatomy

I’m not sure if it’s coincidental because of my mood this weekend, but I found the focus of this article (sent to me by my dear friend) so interesting: focusing on being happy.  It’s worth your time to read it, in my opinion.  This post doesn’t quite respond to the article, but was prompted by it.

I went through a bout of depression over the last week or so (ugh, time of month) and finally broke out of it with a long talk with Pops.  It started with the question of “whether I am unhappy.”  The word “unhappy” caught me off guard because I didn’t feel unHAPPY; I felt like … there was no me.  I don’t derive joy from my work (though I do derive pride and I’m excited when I do well) and I don’t feel like I have much of a personal/individual life.  I think this is largely because I feel like when the kids are here, I have to be here (and I truly want to be here) and then when they’re not here, I feel like I should soak up the “grown up time” with Pops.   Sometimes I wonder where I am.  The girl who used to spend hours on a Saturday in a museum, or sleep until 1pm, or sit in the aisles of bookstores to read magazines.  When’s the last time I did those things???

If I think about myself as having “identities,” I can come up with a few: the stepmom, the lawyer, the poet/songwriter. The stepmom thing is always stressful and confusing (duh, for so many reasons); while I’m very thankful that I have a job – and one where I’m appreciated, at that – I’m not practicing the type of law I wish I was practicing, and that is hard for me to accept; I barely touch my guitar anymore – I used to spend hours writing and pushing myself to come up with new chords and better lyrics.  So none of these identities – none of these pieces – are complete, and as a result, I feel like I form a person, but that I have holes in places where I don’t want them.  I need something to feed ME – not Pops’ girlfriend, or Cupcake and Calvin’s practical stepmom – but me, the person I am and want to be.

I want to be clear about a couple of things:  my family brings me immeasurable happiness – deep happiness I never expected to feel at this point in my life (i.e. through children and a husband).  They are amazing and have brought me more joy than I could ever describe.  What I’m talking about here is beyond them – it’s a “me” thing.  There’s no one to blame for this but me –  I clearly could go do things I want to do anytime we don’t have the kids around; Pops has always been supportive of me taking time for myself.   However, I want the kids to think of me as a “full-time parent,” and not a distant step-mother figure.   In my mind, that means being home for dinner when they are here, doing homework with them, tucking them in at night, etc.  Same for the weekends – I don’t want Pops to feel like he has to do all of the parenting while I get to go hang out somewhere doing something fun.  I made a conscious choice to be as involved in their lives and upbringing as possible.

Pops and I had a really long and honest talk and it helped a lot in sorting out feelings and setting goals for ourselves. For example, I am going to try to do some of the things I used to do without feeling guilty if it falls on a day/night we have the kids:  go to a concert, attend a reading, visit that exhibit.  He discussed his goals, too, and I’m proud of him for being the kind of man who wants to work to improve himself.  We recommitted ourselves to making sure that we’re the best individuals we can be, so that we can be our best for each other and our family.

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