It’s almost two years to the day since I moved to New Zealand. I’m currently sitting in a condo in Panama City Beach, Florida, my first leg of the visit home. While I am glad to be back, visiting is harder than you might think. I have friends and family scattered all over the country, all of whom I want to see. Unfortunately, I only have a couple weeks vacation and flying to multiple cities with associated rental cars gets really expensive really fast. I had to choose where I went this first trip back and my parents and my partner’s parents are the only stops we were able to make this round. Hopefully next time we can see some of the people and places we couldn’t this trip. I was happy to find that driving on the right side of the road was easy to slide back into. I guess now I am an ambidextrous driver?
I landed in Nashville, the city I was born and raised, where my mom still lives. I had a quick breakfast with my best friend and then hopped in a car to drive to Florida. Doing this has a history. My mom and I have always struggled to get along, for as long as I can remember. We took a three year no contact break many years ago and then did a year of couple’s counseling before slowly renewing the relationship from a better place. Doing this saved us; however, we are still very opposite people who see the world in very opposite ways. We have to choose our conversations carefully and actively seek out common ground. The beach serves this purpose for us. It gives us an enjoyment we share and it is a healing space for me if I need a break. We started these trips 11 years ago, with my mom, aunt and myself making the drive to Florida. It seemed natural for us to do it again this year.
It’s funny that no matter how old I get, it’s so easy to fall into old family patterns sometimes. We have come a long way, but I can honestly say my mother is my biggest teacher. Learning how not to directly react from being triggered and figuring out when to have boundaries or when to let go and allow her to be different than I am, have been some of my biggest lessons. I don’t always learn gracefully, either. We don’t have a traditional relationship, but I wouldn’t be who I am without her. I’m grateful for the solace we have been able to find in stolen moments at the ocean. It’s also been nice to just rest and swim in water warm enough to get into. New Zealand typically requires a wet-suit unless you are OK with cold swims.
I leave tomorrow for Texas to see my dad and one of my best friends, and my partner will join me while there. My partner has been traveling around to different parts of the world as part of his schooling, so he is in Canada now while I am here. We will join up in Texas and then travel to his family in Pennsylvania.
Relationships can be hard sometimes. We all have wounds and triggers from our past and it is usually in our most intimate relationships that they get rubbed against the most. It’s in those moments where we get to decide whether we take out our past on the present, or we use the triggers as information to look at what is in us that still needs to be healed. I have done A LOT of personal growth and development through the years. I look at therapy as preventative care, or a way for me to enhance my quality of life. I don’t believe in waiting until a breakdown before seeking help; rather, I want to intervene before the breakdown. I don’t see it as weak, I see it as smart, because I want to empower myself to learn how to go through life more effectively. Sometimes we can’t heal ourselves without help to show us the blind spots, or teach us skills we didn’t learn.
I didn’t always feel this way though. In fact, it was a few very painful life experiences that brought me to my knees enough to be willing to try something new. Once I saw how much it changed my life, not only did I start my pursuit to become a psychologist (so I could help others in the ways that were so life changing for me), but I became a huge fan of continuing to look inside when things weren’t going well on the outside. While I no longer regularly do therapy as I once did, I still reach out for help if life throws me a curve ball my skills aren’t big enough to fully manage, or if I get triggered about something I need help working on.
I say all of this because my partner and I have decided to progress with IVF. The fertility journey has been interesting, and while initially I said I only wanted to try naturally, I have since learned I only have about a 3% chance of conceiving without help. As there is a relatively small window of time, we have decided to get some help to increase our odds. The thought of bringing a new life into this world has me reflecting about my life and the life I want for my child (if we get fortunate enough to have one). It has me reflecting on my childhood and what I want for my own family.
My dad left when I was nine years old and while we have long since repaired his absence from my life, it has left its scars. No matter how much work I have done, I have a trigger point around abandonment (or being left) and I often get scared that people I intimately love will leave and cause a similar pain from the one in the past. This has led to some counterproductive strategies throughout the years to try and keep myself safe, as I try desperately to keep things within my control and prevent it from ever happening again. As I know we all do things like this in one way or another (based on our individual life experiences), you may know that this strategy rarely has the desired effect. What usually happens is that we act in ways that cause the very things we are afraid of happening to actually occur. It’s been a real lesson for me to feel the fear, not act on it and instead decide to trust. This can feel incredibly hard in the heat of being triggered. It requires me truly knowing my worth and my resilience to overcome obstacles thrown at me. It requires me to keep my heart open rather than giving into the anxiety, something that at times feels like it stretches me to my very limits. I have to catch myself when I am wanting to respond through the lens of my past and keep it to the present moment. It’s tough work. I know if I want healthy relationships, I have to figure out how to break the cycle.
Brené Brown talks about vulnerability in relationships and I haven’t found anything more vulnerable than purposely lowering historic defense mechanisms to trust in the present without guarantee. It’s what I want for my child though. I want to role model how to manage my emotions and how to navigate relationships in ways I didn’t see growing up. I want to have a relationship with my child where we are close and I can support them to grow into whatever version of themself they choose to be. I want them to see their parents navigate conflict in healthy ways and express all emotions in appropriate ways, including having boundaries. I don’t expect I will do this perfectly, but good enough is OK with me. I don’t know what the future holds and if a child is not it, I feel oddly at peace with that. If it is though, I have a feeling this will be the biggest new chapter I have started yet. I’ll keep you posted on how it all goes.
On a quick work update, the training was set to roll out site wide in August, but due to another training needing to extend and low staffing issues, it has been postponed until November (so I hope). Still hopeful that it all continues to go as planned. Patience and flexibility are definitely requirements in this sphere. I did buy some new facilitator outfits from my favorite clothing store here in the States, so hopefully it will continue on and I will be ready for it when it arrives.
As always, life has a lot going on, the typical mix of beauty, pain, joy, fear and sometimes sadness. In truth though, I don’t know that I would want it any other way.
Until next time.
The Journey So Far 