Who am I? What is my purpose? I wrestle constantly with these questions. It seems I’ve been suffering from an identity crisis for most of my life. As a teenager, my identity depended on who I was hanging around. I enjoyed being the center of attention and being in the “popular clique.” One day I…
I remember the exact moment I began to hate my name. I was eleven and my family had just moved to the Washington D.C. area from the tiny town in New Mexico where I was born. The first day of sixth grade, having lived in the area for all of two weeks, I introduced myself…
When I was in my forties, I asked my mom, who was in her sixties, “Mom, at what age did you finally feel like a real grown up?” “I’ll let you know,” she said. “It hasn’t happened yet.” I thought being a grown-up would be a little less–I don’t know–messy. I thought it would be…
“Do you love yourself?” “Sure, I guess,” I mumble, praying the conversation ends there. Talking about how to love and value myself makes me incredibly uncomfortable. Even as a therapist who talks with clients about this very subject, I find it impossible to personally navigate the topic. This, I recognize, is the sign of a…
The green numbers on the microwave clock told me it was 5:36 p.m. In the playroom behind me, a Gotham city had been constructed, complete with Bat Cave, a Mr. Freeze something or other, and a Joker Fun House. The dog was on the couch contrary to the No Dogs On the Couch Rule, chewing…
Some days I’d like five minutes in a locked room with Eve. Anyone else feel this way? When the day is too crazy, work feels too hectic and hard, money is short, demands are endless, and the woman in the mirror looks older and more haggard than I wish she did, I feel myself becoming…