The Break Down, The Build Up

As the new year unfolds, I find myself a part of the quintessential time of transition that is so typical of a turning of the tides.

As anyone who has followed along with me in the last few years already knows, I have worked with my husband in his business for four years, and not in a capacity that particularly pleases me. As a writer at heart, being a bookkeeper is not something that brings me joy. I also am not great at it. I have never had any proper training for it, it’s not my instinct. Have I royally messed up his books beyond repair? No. I have had the assistance of an accountant, I have asked questions when needed, all our taxes are in line, everyone gets paid on time. But I bet, actually I know, that everything isn’t always…totally correct.

Over the past 12 months especially, I have found myself less involved and less interested in the business. I have talked with my husband many times about leaving, about pursuing things outside of my roles there. I have worked another job that gives me joy alongside my work with him for over a year, and I am so grateful he supported me in doing that, especially when it meant less time at his business. Last April, on a Monday (it’s always a Monday), he came into my office to find me crying, which wasn’t particularly uncommon at the time. This was different though. I looked him in the eyes and said “I can’t do this anymore.” Much to his relief, I was not talking about our relationship, I just meant the work I was doing for him. That was it. I was done. That was almost 10 months ago.

Quitting has been really hard. I am leaving my husband when he doesn’t want me to, and it feels like I am letting him down so often (it doesn’t help that he has totally adorable puppy eyes). It has had to be a slow process, and he has asked me to stay, to re-consider, more than once. The thing that has helped us both stick to our guns is we know that I will be happier, which will be better for both of us. Even though I know he is going to miss me being there, I am grateful that he is putting aside what he really wants and letting my happiness be a priority. I will miss being with him during the day as well, but I am really excited for us to find a new rhythm together. To come home from our separate work places with stories to tell, get excited about new things happening for each other, and help problem solve. We will always be supportive, we will always be in each other’s corners, and this will be a new way of doing that. I would say I also look forward to missing each other a little bit over the course of a day apart, but we already miss each other after a few hours, so that won’t be new (I know, sappy, but it’s true!). I do look forward to us spending more quality time together though, as we won’t see each other as often during the day.

Saying goodbye to a steady paycheck when I know my income will probably be lower for a little while, was a big fear for me in the beginning. Not being an equally contributing financial partner to my household made me panic. It made my ego freak out because it made me feel like I would be less. Somehow, maybe just through the passing of time, the excitement to have some open doors is overweighing the fear of being less financially stable for awhile. Whew. I was getting a little tired of having that conversation with myself over and over.

Thankfully I found someone to take over for me who may not be in the family, but whom is unarguably more qualified (as they are, you know, an ACTUAL bookkeeper), and I am really excited for her to take on the business and make it better. Now, as I am going through the process of passing over my role, I am curiously presented with new challenges.

The person taking over for me as bookkeeper is as I said more qualified, experienced, and all around a better fit for the role in so many ways. She is very competent, and as I show her what I have been doing so she can integrate herself into the way the business runs, she of course has questions about things. I am finding myself confronted with all kinds of things: not being competent in the role I was doing, not caring enough and checking out way too early, and not keeping up on things I knew I should have been doing. Every time I have to answer a question with something I know that wasn’t right, I feel a little part of me get defensive. It is my ego getting it’s hackles up, it is trying to defend me, when really I just need to admit that I wasn’t operating as my best self. I knew this, but I didn’t want to deal with it. It is right in my face now! No way I can get away from it. And it sucks. It sucks having to admit that you weren’t being your best self. But what else can I do but try to learn from it?

I have been in the past few months making moves to ensure I will be happier in work going forward, helping to find and train staff to replace me. But I have to admit that I didn’t care as much as I needed to in the last year, I didn’t do my best work, and I didn’t do much to try and change it. I could have learned, taken a course, done something to make sure everything was correct. But I didn’t want to. I had no motivation to become better at something that I didn’t like doing in the first place.

I also have to confront the fact that I wasn’t strong enough to make this move nearly two years ago, when I should have done it, for the sake of my own mental health. That I couldn’t let myself add up the number of days (especially Mondays) that I cried at my desk because I was breaking myself down, losing myself, literally leeching my life away into something that made me feel monotonous, ineffectual, frustrated, and honestly, stupid. Like I was driving down a road, and every time there was an exit, I would get sweaty palms, and fidget in my seat. I didn’t know where any of the exits went, but I knew I wasn’t happy about the route I was driving. The view was barren and the music in the car was static, and there was too much glint in my eye. I could never adjust the seat quite the way I wanted it. I knew that the end destination wasn’t somewhere I wanted to get to. That I would arrive, look around, and think “I drove all this way for this?” I knew one of the exits would take me where I truly wanted to be, I was just too scared to turn the wheel. I didn’t know where they ended up either, but I was too scared to try a different road.

Now, not only do I have to admit that I wasn’t performing well in the role I was in, but I also have to admit that I wasn’t making my own needs a priority. I have a tendency to put myself on the back burner, and it always ends up blowing up in my face when I am ultimately unhappy. I am happy to say that I seem to be making progress. It’s been a process, learning to stand up for myself. When most everyone else is looking at you like “Why wouldn’t you stay? It makes sense. It supports your husband. It supports your future, the family you want to build. Why rock the boat?” But is it worth me being unhappy? Worth me living a life that is less full of the things I want? I don’t think so, and I know my husband agrees with me. I matter. What I want matters. I have said it before, my biggest fear is looking back on life and feeling like I made my decisions all for someone else. That I disappeared into someone else’s dreams. The thought makes me a little nauseated.

I was the bookkeeper, the fill-in front end support, the unofficial cleaner, and whatever other role I had time for. Everyone in the business does more than one role, that’s how a small business needs to run. As it grows, I am increasingly proud of what my husband has created. He is supporting jobs (and has the best team he has ever had, which we are so thankful for!), he is growing something that is of his own making. I am happy to support him, and I will, always, in whatever ways that feel right to both of us. But I want that too. I want to feel that about myself. I feel that way about my writing, about putting words down, about them exploding from my mind and my fingers. I love when they can just roll across the page faster than I can think them (like right now), where 1000 words feels as easy as 10. That makes me feel like I am on the right path. I don’t know if that’s the only thing I will ever feel that way about, but I want to find out. I owe it to myself, to any future children I may have, to my husband, (but mostly to myself) to pursue things that bring me joy. That light me up. That make me proud of myself. Things I can look at and say “I did that, I helped with that, I created that, and it was awesome.” To build something you love, sometimes you have to break down things that already are, even if that means parts of yourself.

Scary? I used to think so. That seems to have faded away…I have decided that I want it more than I am afraid of it, which is a mantra I try to live by. I have a small idea of what my life will look like in the next few months, the next year, but I could be totally wrong. And this time, instead of that uncertainty looking like darkness, it looks like light. And I am heading straight for it.

See you in the sunshine.