Swingset Year 6: In the Middle

I can't believe it's been a year since I last wrote. It was quite a year with not much positive to mention. I'm sure not quite as much of a year as someone who had to deal with fires, and floods, and civil rights violations, but it was still almost too much for me to handle.

I've often heard the universe won't give you more than you can handle. Well, I've gotten to the point where I really wish the universe would start underestimating me. All those goals I wrote in my last post never quite materialized. Instead, I spent another year struggling with health issues, parenting crisis management, crippling depression, and just weird stressful shit like damaging hail in July.

I spent the first half of the year trying to get Sexual History Tour back up and running. I was losing confidence but dove back into creative work over the summer, riding an inspiration high after attending BlogHer. It didn't last long as parenting and adulting took most of my time in late summer to early fall. I found myself stricken with writer's block and a creative logjam. Everything stalled.

I tried to prime the creative pump and start writing again. I wrote a few things but mostly random posts spurred by prompts. I didn't publish any of it. Just as I got into the flow of words in my head to words on the page, I got sick. Really sick. So sick I did nothing for the rest of the year but rest. Creative work was derailed again. It seemed that each time I dove into something that lights me up, a roadblock would go up. By years' end, I found myself questioning my life choices and afraid I wasn't allowed to pursue my passions.

As last year passed into this, I had a lot of time to ponder. Recovering from illness gives you time and fuel for thought. I had lots of “my god, how did I get here” thoughts. How did I go from harried housewife to blogger/podcaster/educator to harried housewife who feels like a has-been in just six years? I thought I had found my calling. Now I'm not so sure.

I've been contemplating how much of a sex educator I can be right now and what kind of educator I truly want to be. I know I want to keep writing about sex history but not sure if that makes me a sex educator or just a historian what writes about sex. To further complicate things, my interests are not limited to sex history.

There are many other things I want to do and many other subjects I want to write about. I'm multi-passionate in many ways. Being a Jack of all Trades and master of none is not serving me well at this time in my life. Unfortunately, I can't seem to focus on just one thing. It's like being non-monogamous, I want to pursue more than one interest in life. Or maybe I just have undiagnosed ADHD.

On top of my career choices, I'm struggling to figure out who I am right now. I'm definitely not who I was when I started here six years ago. But I'm also not who I was four years ago when I was a regular on the podcast while writing, and attending conferences. Nor am I the same person who, two years ago, had to retreat to the editorial shadows. I've been around for nearly a half-century and feel like I have to discover a whole new person.

Hello, midlife crisis.

I kept thinking over the past six years that I was a butterfly struggling to get out of its chrysalis. Wings getting caught and bending at odd angles until I gave up fighting to escape. I would take a breather then try again; then collapse in exhaustion. I think I was premature in my evolution and I haven't yet achieved my post transformative form. Perhaps, I've been inside the chrysalis all along becoming that primordial goo that caterpillars become in between stages. I've been struggling within as every cell of my being deconstructs itself and readies to become the new form.

Unlike the caterpillar, I don't have instructions within my DNA to tell my cells what I will become. I need to find the pieces of me and put them back together. I'm hoping that sometime this year I will be closer to my true form. Right now these are the in-between days. When it comes to midlife transformations, It's going to take some time. I'm in the middle of the ride, and I think, everything will be alright.

*And if you haven't heard The Doubleclicks version of The Middle, go listen right now! It's awesome!