I felt a huge load of responsibility completely wiped away upon the last car door slam that contained my high maintenance pet in route to her new home. With this came a lot more time to reflect about my life in general. In some ways I felt like a little child who had begged her parents for a pet, only to discover that it was too much responsibility. I had performed a hand-off to another more responsible adult, and it made me feel like a quitter and a failure. In other ways, I felt great! I knew in my heart that she would be better off. To this day, I don't like thinking about how that dog, my first experience in allowing myself a type of indulgence, didn't work out for me. It didn't matter that it had worked out for her. That was't enough.
As a single parent, I was trying to be a good role model for my children. There was a load of guilt that I felt for breaking things off with their dad. Being the best parent I could be was my first and foremost goal. I had always thought it important to show them how to be a good person by example. After the divorce, I discovered that I was wearing my best poker face more and more. This was uncharted territory for me. I wanted to be a great mother, and at the same time be true to myself. Instinctively, I knew that I had to keep trying to succeed and the rest would follow. So I kept getting up day after day, sticking to my goals, hoping that things would get a little bit easier, and that I wouldn't continue to feel so isolated and alone.
I began to realize that my life was already a super busy place when the kids were home. Because I was sharing custody with my ex, I was still performing almost all of my original parental duties, driving them to and fro, helping them with homework, making sure they didn't go hungry, sharing quality time with them at bedtime. The kids lived with me in our original home most of the time. My ex took them to his place every other weekend. Those visits began after school on Thursday and I would get the kids back when I'd pick them up from school on Monday. I was fine when they were around, but when they were with him, I was miserable and lonely. I needed something, and I didn't know what.
While I was going through the divorce, somehow I had managed to graduate from college. I had heard so many times that college graduates make more money, but I didn't have a compass to navigate the re-employment territory. I didn't think it was going to be easy to enter the workforce, but I knew that it couldn't be impossible. Also, I was a little desperate to make money, and it was powerful motivator. I kept thinking to myself. I worked hard to get though college, and I didn't get paid. Now I want to see what it's like working and getting paid. So I bounced around from job to job, feeling too far behind the pack, and at the same time being grounded in one place by the responsibilities of single parenting. It was a frustrating time filled with crappy babysitters, new technology, stress, conference calls, meetings, travel, and never enough money for me to feel like I was financially stable or able to stand on my own two feet without the support of my ex.
One Sunday, during a conference call, I realized something. I felt like I was on treadmill, working really hard, and not getting anywhere. I also realized something else. It seemed more rewarding to be a student AND a parent than it did to have a job. I had become all too accustomed to financial struggle, so I felt I had nothing to lose. I decided to go further down the path of learning about psychology. I decided to take out some student loans, and get my graduate degree in counseling psychology. My ultimate goal was to become a Marriage, Family, Child Counselor or MFCC for short.
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