Undefined and Un-nerved

Last night I went to a graduation party for the outgoing residents with my husband. It was strange to be in a room with people J has known for 3 years, began his intern year with, and know that we will probably never see them again. J has one more year of residency given his chosen track. It was also strange to be in a social situation where I was officially unemployed.

One of our friends came up to me and was dying to know what happened. Her best friend worked in one of the programs I supervised. Apparently there are several rumors and theories floating about my departure. This is to be expected, I suppose. What was difficult was trying to figure out what exactly I could say and what exactly I should say. I landed somewhere in the middle still not knowing exactly if I did the right thing.

Perhaps I was a bit sensitive to this as I received a very cowardly comment on my post regarding my resignation. One cannot say that they are anonymous while then pretending to be the two individuals I named. For all this person knows, I made up the names (as I frequently do) to protect everyone involved. I've changed them once again, BTW, just to keep everyone guessing.

Let me clarify: I do not wish these people badness. Its not productive nor does it bring about good karma. I believe that they acted to the best of their abilities, which in my opinion fell short of what was needed. I too acted to the best of my ability. Its a tough situation. In light of the comment received, it caused me to reflect and change the moderation on my comments section. Too bad, really, as my trust has dropped precipitously. I've been more angry at this one individual than I have with anyone during this whole ordeal. Its a bit of displacement, but I'm ok with that too. I do wish the individual who did write the comment to speak up for a real dialogue, but chances are, they won't.

I once had an ex-boyfriend do a low blow by opening up my moving boxes and reading all of my journals. He then re-taped the boxes and moved out while I was at work. When I came back to our apartment he announced he was abandoning me and told me about the trust violation. It has taken me many many years to figure out how to write once again from my heart with no codes alluding to situations fearing that the information could end up in the wrong hands. I write for me. This is my outlet, my emotional vomit, so to speak. One cowardly individual will not change that, but has caused me to redesign a few things.

I have a lot of feelings on now being undefined in the way that society expects you to be. My MIL was highly concerned about how I was doing, according to a conversation she had with my husband the other night. She asked if I was fired. J restated that I resigned. However, there is some sort of shame involved when people don't know the whole story and I have to find that balance of telling my truth without compromising my integrity or my potential future employment somewhere else. If I say too much, I am a risk to a future employer as I look like I lack discretion. However, if I say too little then I look like I was terminated/fired/let go/pushed out/discarded/etc.

A few weeks ago when this drama was unfolding, my father suggested that I lawyer up. Granted it was well past cocktail hour. And when I didn't agree, he went straight to the jugular stating I wasn't listening to his advice and that I was a washed up, has been, who was fired. I was smart enough to know that these were is own issues and told him to put Mom back on the phone. He was just being mean for the sake of being mean which isn't uncommon when he's swimming in a bottle. But he's my father and of course it hit a nerve because his opinion will always matter. At least I was smart enough to recognize the dynamics, not take the bait, and terminate that conversation. This is something I wouldn't have done even a few years ago. I do not have that kind of relationship with my MIL to say what I need to say, even though I really value her opinion of me as well.

I honestly feel like a burden at this point in time to my husband and I fear how that will manifest in our relationship. He has been nothing but supportive and I know this has taken a toll on him. The pressure of being a sole breadwinner for two people and a dog is huge. I couldn't imagine what it would feel like if we had kids. Part of me feels like I should be enjoying the break, but its hard to relax when you feel uninteresting as a human being. We devise so much of our self-identity from what we do. People talk about what they did at work at the end of a day. My days have become pretty uninteresting all because I lost identification by resigning a large part of who I thought I was.