Category: Self Awareness

and that’s okay.

(Apology in advance for formatting or typos, I’m writing from my phone. This is so important to me that I want to express it now instead of when I have time at a computer.)

All day I kept thinking about what to write in regards to World Mental Health Day. This year has been hard for me and the last few years have been the hardest of my life. I don’t have any shame or embarrassment talking about the fact that I struggle with anxiety, depression, or any other mental health disorder. I know for some people talking about those things is hard. That’s okay.

Either way, if you’re comfortable publicly talking about it or not, just know that it’s okay to not be okay. Don’t be ashamed or embarrassed. 20% of adults will experience some type of mental health issue this year. Thats roughly 1 in 5 people.

With our society and the culture of the information age, we as humans are likely smarter than ever… which in my opinion opens up so many doors, both good and bad. We have constant access to informational resources, the world’s knowledge at our finger tips, and the ability to communicate 24/7 with just about every person in our lives.

For me, a lot of my struggles and issues are caused by over-analyzing, assuming the worst case scenario, miscommunicating through text messages, or putting WAY too much value and thought into read-receipts.

Everyone values different things. Everyone communicates slightly differently. Everyone expresses their emotions differently. Everyone lives a different life. We even experience the same situations differently. With the variation in the human brain, Living, Loving, and Laughing isn’t always easy. Different aspects of life are easy for some people while that same thing may be someone else’s kryptonite.

I think that the world has a tendency to see new diseases or disorders that become common diagnoses as more of a fad. Take for example, the diagnosis rate of ADHD, the diagnosis rate of Autism, or the diagnosis of Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS). All of these things seem to become “popular” diagnoses at some point in the last 30 years, but not prior to their popularization.

Why? Because it’s the cool thing? Because it’s the newest thing? Because everyone wants some sort of reason to claim they struggle or that their life is harder than others? No. I’m going to say none of those are it. I think one of the major causes is due to the ability to have information at the tip of our fingers in seconds. The ability to co-create, simultaneously. The ability to discuss, confer, and combine data with people on the other side of the world who speak a different language. The technical ability to test for these things has just recently progressed or maybe even has just been invented. For good or bad, the advancements in science and technology have led us here.

Maybe 100 years ago the same percentage of people didn’t suffer from RLS, but 100 years ago how many people spent 8+ hours a day in a sitting position? Not saying that’s a cause, I’m not a doctor. I’m just saying the world is different than it has ever been before. Nature is constantly changing and evolving, thus even nature is different than it was 100 years ago. That’s just how life works; in order for us to survive we must advance and improve ourselves in order to keep up.

Now, I have to say, I wish there wasn’t a negative stigma attached with mental health. I’m sorry that there is, actually. Sure, I am taking the risk of putting myself and my mental health issues out in the open. However, my hope is that at least ONE of my Insta or Twitter followers, Facebook friends, or Snapchat viewers will recognize that their struggles are valid. And that it’s okay to seek help, regardless of what that help is.

I want you to know that it took me 12 months to find a new therapist after having a horrible one. Not all of those months were spent looking for one; half of that time was me allowing myself/convincing myself to be okay with the concept that I needed a new therapist. Help is not easy to find, or to afford unfortunately. But use your good days to take care of yourself for those bad days.

In order for the world to keep improving, we must keep improving. Associating a negative stigma to mental health problems does absolutely no good for society. We must acknowledge our problems (as a society, culture, race, etc.) in order to fix them. Hiding them, suppressing them, invalidating them will only allow them to grow into worse problems. And I mean that in every sense. We have to be okay with the fact that sometimes we aren’t okay. And that’s okay. It is the only way to move forward.

Please take some time this week to check in with your friends. Ask, and genuinely listen, to see if they’re okay. Let them know that it’s alright if they aren’t. Any resource you can provide is helpful whether that be a website, a phone number, a coffee-date, or simply being someone they can text when they’re having a rough day. All of these actions show sympathy, and you never know, but doing this one simple thing may save someone’s life.

Acknowledge that mental health issues are real; they are as real as physical illnesses. Accept that these issues are valid. Whether it’s sometimes or all the time, it’s okay to not be okay. 🖤

Why I Quit My Successful Job That Had Me on an Accelerated Path to Leadership

Preface: I am not trying to cry wolf. I believe in equality for all races, genders, classes, and backgrounds.  I fight for them.  I always have and always will.  Ask my friends, my coworkers, my boyfriend, my schoolmates, or my family.

This week I gave my workplace notice that I will be leaving my job at the end of next week.  For those of you that don’t know, I am in an accelerated leadership program that had me on track to achieve an upper management position or high-level technical contributor role much quicker than normal career routes.  I have been with the company five and a half years and through that time I’ve worked in a wide range of technical roles in a number of the company’s organizations.  I’ve even temporarily lived in different parts of the country for periods of time to work at different sites of the company.

Before I was in the program I made a few extremely significant achievements through the company as well.  Because of my technical success in my first two years, I was chosen to go underway on a U.S. Naval submarine.  The special part about this is not just that it’s rare for people in our company to get this opportunity, but it’s still rare for women to get to go.  In fact, this submarine had to be specially fitted to allow female passengers.  So I was one of the very first women (there were 3 of us) to spend days underway on that sub.  Before leaving for that trip I had been informed that I was needed on another sub that would take place the week following. Thus, I was the first female to spend time underway on two different U.S. Submarines purely due to the fact that I became known for my technical expertise and there were no other females that were capable of doing what I knew how to do at the time in my company.

At the same time, I was putting in a ton of effort and even my personal time to diversity groups; our company’s Women in Nuclear group and the regional Society of Women Engineers (also partially on behalf of the company but mostly on my own personal time). I even served on the executive boards of both of them for a while, organized banquets, and volunteered at events.  I traveled to conferences, recruited for our company, and was a speaker at a SWE leadership development seminar.

Following those first few years, I was selected for the leadership program where I earned my Masters degree and rotated through positions including titles such as Thermal Engineer, Nuclear Engineer, and Project Engineer… among others.  I’ve been sent to multi-day leadership colloquiums, numerous trainings of all kinds, and various technical and diversity conferences for my own benefit.

So why am I leaving?

Because I deserve better.  I’ve always been told that performed “as expected” and no better (even though I’ve never seen another co-worker be as dedicated as me).  I deserve to work somewhere that recognizes all of my contributions and appreciates them.  Additionally, I deserve to work somewhere that doesn’t constantly make me question every single differing opinion that I have.  When my thoughts and opinions don’t fall in line with that of the rest of the company, I feel like I’m constantly feeling guilty or paranoid.  Those feelings have started to propagate into my personal life. My anxiety levels and stress levels are at an all-time high.  I’m always questioning whether or not my opinions or technical justifications are being questioned with validity, or because I’m female, or for another reason.  I’ve been questioned, shunned, and condemned enough times to know that not all of them were valid as my equal male counterparts do not have the same amount of similar experiences. When I question other people’s technical approaches or technical conclusions, it’s never a personal attack from me.

However, more times than I’d like to admit people (individual contributors and leaders alike) have felt I have questioned their integrity.

Would they have felt that way if any of the 39 males in the room of 40 asked that question versus me (the singular female)?  I’m not sure.  I’ll never know.  But I’ve experienced this enough times to know that it happens more often to me, and other females (who are now too afraid to speak up), to know that at least SOME of those times are because I was a passionate female and my industry, and especially my company, is not used to that.

I’m leaving because the culture at my company isn’t ready for me. My company has all but ONE singular female in upper level technical leadership, and that happened within the last year.  Everyone higher than second level management is (from what I know) white male. I applaud the single female who has made it this far, but I have no idea how long it’s taken her.  I also have no idea what she’s sacrificed.  I don’t need to sacrifice my career, my health, my personal life or relationships (nor does anyone else), to MAYBE improve a work culture that isn’t ready for strong, passionate, dedicated, female (or diverse/different from the norm) leadership.

I’m leaving to go to a company that ALREADY has females in high levels of technical leadership.  A company that will not only allow my impact to be heard and seen throughout the levels of technical contribution but also throughout any level of leadership.  A company that’s not afraid of a female leader; a company who is more than ready for THEM, because they’re already there.

I’m ready for a new opportunity, I’m ready for a workplace that appreciates the efforts I put in outside of my technical expertise.

That’s why I’m leaving.

A Permanent Fog

Something has been on my mind lately and I haven’t quite been sure how to describe it.

First of all, I really hate blaming anything other than myself for things that I feel like I can, or *should*, be able to control. In this case, I’m referring to my memory… Or lack thereof.

Second of all, I really hate blaming medication or physical illness more than anything else. However, I think that in this case, after struggling for years and years and years, I might have to credit some of my struggles to those things.

I don’t remember when I was officially diagnosed with migraines or when I first started taking Topamax for them, but I do know it was around the time of high school. My best guess is that it was somewhere near the middle of high school, which would mean it was about 12-14 years ago. Since I’m 28 years old, that’s the better half of my life that I’ve been struggling with migraines, the effects of the medications, and in my opinion, other significantly debilitate headaches that aren’t migraines.

The worst days, of which have occurred both in high school and just as recently as a week ago, I have found myself in so much pain and misery that I don’t want my eyes open because the light makes my head pound, light sources look like exploding stars, movement or drastic contrast changes feel like adrenalin rushes that make my blood race which induce further head pounding. I just want to lay on my side in the fetal position under my desk at work or in my bed at home in pure silence and darkness… however sometimes, when I have my eyes shut I feel as though my feet are floating above my head, to the point my body is flipping and turning around in space, while I see these northern-light-like auras of neon green and purple. Very specific green and purple. This feeling in turn causes me nausea. In summary all I want to do is sleep off these headaches, but it’s almost impossible to do with the contradicting feelings between open-eyes and closed-eyes.

~~

What I might say is the weirdest part out of all if this, to me, is realizing that these “headaches” aren’t normal. I’ve told people almost my whole adult life that I have migraines and there are two responses: (1) some form of ‘that sucks, [someone they know/related to] has them to and I know they’re horrible’ and (2) ‘i get them too’. Because of these responses, I just assumed that they were common and that everyone who had migraines had ALL of the same symptoms, pain, auras, and experiences. In the last ~2 months, I’ve realized this probably isn’t remotely true; I probably have some of the worst combination of auras, pain, experiences, etc. that a person can have when it comes to migraines.

I haven’t told you how often I get them either. When I get a migraine it will last for 4-8 hours and will post likely reoccur every day every day for the week or two. Within these weeks, the migraines vary. Some days they’re the full Gambit if what I described, where I shouldn’t even drive or leave my bed or even open my eyes. Some days, I only get the auras and no headache pain at all, and the auras might only last for a few minutes and then happen again later in the evening. Once I’m migraine-free for about 3 days, then I feel pretty confident I can make it a week or two pretty safely.

Until my left cheek gets pins and needles down my neck for a few seconds. Sounding like a stroke? That’s my warning. Usually means I have a day or two. On rare occasions I will just get auras after that, but usually implies there are migraines in my near, unfortunate, future.

I have always just figured people thought I was exaggerating or lying when it came to this. So I rarely told people how bad they were, or how often I had them, or all of the word symptoms I experienced. After I was prescribed Topamax in high school, the number of days a month that I had a migraine went from just about every single day (of my life) to about ~7 from what I remember. I remember telling the doctor ‘I’ve had this migraine for 3 months’ and then being told that I couldn’t have one that long, but she never explained that it could’ve just been reoccurring daily on and off (which is exactly what it was doing, I was just bad at explaining). Anyways, once I was prescribed that we considered that a ‘success.’ and didn’t continue further with trying other medications (I don’t think) because my family had a bad history with Maxalt and Imitrex.

My doctor refused to go to a high dosage on Topamax because it caused what was referred to as ‘brain fog.’ so about a week a month of migraines for me was what I would live with compared to everyday. Honestly, that was a huge improvement.

However, it became apparent to my family that brain fog had set in, but I think I was too young to really know? I’m not really sure. I don’t remember feeling or thinking or remembering differently, but my mom specifically recalls times of me not thinking or remembering clearly. When it was time for me to go to college, or maybe it was early in my college career, we had me titrated off of Topamax because if brain fog. I hadn’t had any significant migraines in a while and I was struggling at school remembering just daily activities, not to mention my studies. So that was that.

All was well, until about a year later when I can actually recall a few, extremely bad, potentially the worst migraines of my life. One of them I had actually begged my friends to leave class and take me to the hospital, which I had never done before. From that point on, I started finding over the counter methods to deal with the migraines for the next few years.

A. Lot. Of. Advil. And… even more Excedrin Migraine. Like, I can’t reiterate, A LOT. At one point I had a UTI turn into a kidney infection, which almost turned into kidney failure because I had been using so many OTC pain killers that they did nothing for me anymore but my pain tolerance was so high that I never knew when to sell medical attention. In that incident I took way too many pain killers before realizing I should go to the hospital, when I finally got care I was told that I was within hours of kidney failure. I’m not surprised; I couldn’t sit without pain, not to mention lay down, or even stand or walk… my mid-back was hot to the touch and I was visibly pale.

Eventually the time came, and I graduated college. I got an adult job and I went to work every day 8 hours a day for 5 days a week. This is where it became obvious I might need medication again because I could not longer skip a class here and there to go lie down and sleep off a migraine. Sure, I had Excedrin or Advil, but really? At this point they did nothing for me. Nothing. I couldn’t even tell you if or when I had ‘normal-person’ headaches (that’s what I called them) because my pain tolerance when it came to headaches was so high. Often times, for the first year in my job, I would get a migraine and just work through it. Sometimes I would put on sunglasses while I stared at the computer and hoped no one noticed.

Luckily we got 5 days of sick time a year. You bet I used all 5. I also got 3 weeks of personal leave a year. You bet I used some of that towards migraine recovery too. Some days when it was so bad that I couldn’t even keep my head up, I would try to make it until about 2 hours left in the day and then leave early. Some days I only made it until lunch. The worst were the days I woke up with them because I had to try to save my time away from work since I was constantly not knowing when I’d have another, worse migraine that I’d need the time for. It was, and still is, a constant battle of balancing time away from work to figure out if it’s worth it: ‘for THIS migraine or the Next migraine’ because I never know. Either way I’m not getting work done, it’s just a difference of should I struggle and be in pain at home in bed where I’m safe, or at work wasting time where I could be potentially risking my safety from driving or commuting (or working, etc)?

Anyways, to discuss the title a little more, the brain fog. I know I have these memories. I know I want to remember them and I know they’re still there. When I try, I can’t remember them. When I need to, I can’t remember them. BUT on occasion, after trying or after needing them, that memory will randomly pop into my brain from a foggy abyss.

It’s very frustrating knowing I purposely tried to remember something but at this moment in time, this moment when I need that memory, I can’t remembe it. It’s usually when my intelligence or integrity or capabilities are being tested, and I almost always fall short. But I know that the knowledge is in there because more often than not, I remember whatever it is that I needed after the fact.

I hate looking stupid, or forgetful, or worse, a ‘stupid boonde,’ or ‘its ok because you’re a woman.’ I know those jokes are light hearted but they stem from somewhere and since we keep using those jokes, those stigmas still exist. And since they still exist, it feels even worse when my crappy ‘brain fog’ shows up just in time to “prove” one of those stigmas right. When that happens I really let myself down because I feel like I’m letting down an entire group of people and I’m disappointing those who believed in me.

At that point, it already feels too late to explain my migraines and the side effects of Topamax. I’m on one of the highest possible dosages and I STILL feel like it’s an excuse that I can’t remember things clearly. Just living my daily life right now feels like I’m constantly forgetting something but I don’t know what.

All joking aside, imagine feeling like you’re *constantly* forgetting your own name, or what day of the week it is, or your age. That’s how I feel all too often.

Time is Relative

How do you pick just one place to start when trying to describe this time of my life? I have no I idea where to start and what to talk about first. There’s so many things I feel like you should know to get the whole picture; like about my long history of head injures, my scarring heartbreaks, my isolated childhood, or my most recent influx of anxiety and stress. Being ghosted just after finally feeling like you’ve found ‘the one,’ falling into deep(er) depression and isolationism, then swooped back up, told everything you’d want to hear, getting your life back on track, to only find out you’ve been cheated on for months, and he now needs you as a character witness to prevent him from going to jail for the next 7-10 years of his life because of her.

Sometimes reality is a bitch.

Sometimes you realize that you’ve been blissfully ignorant for 28 years of your 28-and-a-half year life.

Right now, it’s a Saturday night in the middle of February. Given the context clues I’ve provided above, that would make the current year 2019. My dog, who is five and a half months old now, is laying next to me in my king size bed and soon my kitty cat will join us for the night. She’s quite the snuggle-puss.

I can remember thinking about a year ago, at the start of 2018 just after the new year, that 2017 had probably been the hardest year of my life. New year’s had never been a big thing for me in terms of parties, resolutions, or any sort of sentimental value but on the 2017/2018 new year night it was. I had been struggling with a lot. I still struggle with a lot, that’s why it’s almost midnight and I’m writing to you. That evening was what I felt would be a positive turning point for my life going forward.