I had a job interview this week. It was the second one I’ve had within five months. Job interviews are humbling for me after being in my former job for almost nine years. I’ve decided that after the age of 40, while I’m completely comfortable in my skin and am fully aware of my clinical skills and my ability to do outstanding work, it is hard to sell myself. So I sat through the interview, and I gave what I thought were good answers. I kicked myself afterward thinking, “Ugh…I should have said (this) or (that).” Afterward I did all the rote things that you do with a job interview. I thanked the committee. I sent thank you notes. I talked to my friends and my professional colleagues about how it went. But in the end, I’m not sure if I’ll get the job. If I don’t, it will only be the second time in my professional career that I didn’t. And it will be humbling.
One of the questions in the interview was “what was your most challenging life situation, how did you deal with it and what did you learn from it?” The follow up question to that was how I handled stress and dealing with the stress of this potential job. I didn’t hesitate when answering and said that having my son has been the most challenging experience for me. The principal and the teacher on the committee know Thomas, but the rest of the committee does not. I didn’t go into huge detail, other than to say that raising Thomas had challenged every parenting assumption I had, including comparing one child to the other, that he has challenged my ability to remain patient, and that he’s taught me to learn to back off and let things happen instead of trying to control things and run the show (for those people who know me, they understand that this is no easy task). I talked about handling stress through photography, creative writing, and other creative endeavors.
Afterward, out of all the questions I pondered, I realized that this was the one I felt like I flubbed. So given that, here’s what I should have said:
My most challenging life experience to date has been being a parent to two children who could not be more different. I’m sure every parent says this and I’m sure they are correct. In the case of my daughter, I have had to work through having my own expectations for my child that she doesn’t necessarily share now that she is sixteen, knows everything, and I am completely dumb. I am currently working through the stage where she begins to exert her independence and I try to control her under the guise of “setting boundaries”, when in fact I see her making the same mistakes that I did and my heart breaks for her some, if not most, days. I have learned to develop a thick skin and rely on the abundant friendships I have cultivated over forty years, on whom I call when I’m told that I’m hated because I won’t turn over the car keys on an icy night, or when I have checked her grades on Zangle, or when her toast burns and it’s somehow my fault. I have learned to work through the guilt over getting pregnant sooner than I wanted and never feeling prepared to parent her, relying on what I knew from my own childhood, and finding that I was woefully unprepared. I also realized during this time that my parents only passed along the tools that they were given, and that their life circumstances were affected by situations far worse than my own. I learned to forgive wholeheartedly and not just with lip service. I forgave painfully and begrudgingly at times, but I did. It doesn’t make the days of raising a strong-willed, brilliant, intelligent, defiant teenager any easier, but it does remind me to at least TRY to make my words softer and be encouraging as she makes her own mistakes and discovers things about herself that I can’t teach her.
In the case of my son, I have faced more trials than I have wanted, beginning from conception. He was a hard-fought second child, not only in convincing my spouse that having a child at 35 and 42 respectively was a great idea, but also in actually conceiving and carrying that child. We almost lost Thomas at 20 weeks in the pregnancy and I was placed on bed rest for 13 weeks. Every day I worried that this would be the day we were going to lose him. Every day for 13 weeks. That is 91 days. That is 2184 hours. That is 131,040 minutes. That is 7,862,400 seconds. That is eternity. On the day Thomas was born his heartbeat dropped to a dangerously low place and he was born by emergency c-section and spent five weeks in the NICU. He had irregular blood sugars and an irregular heartbeat. There were concerns that something was wrong with his heart. While we weren’t strangers to the NICU, as our daughter had spent three weeks there, it was a daily fear that he would suddenly die. He didn’t, and in the end we brought our 4 lb. 2 oz. bundle of joy and for the first time in 34 days, his older sister got to hold him. Life was good. In the months that followed, he had to have surgery to correct a urological problem (= four hours of pacing on a hospital waiting room floor) and then the bomb dropped at his 18 month developmental checkup. He was measuring at least six months behind on all of his screenings. We were referred to the Comprehensive Development Center for a likely diagnosis of autism. I’m not sure why, but as a mental health professional, hearing that possible diagnosis was worse than hearing my child could have cancer.
The next year involved weekly therapy, occupational therapy, and multiple disagreements between my husband and me. He followed the ostrich theory of put-your-head-in-the-sand-and-he’ll-be-fine theory, I followed the throw-everything-except-the-kitchen-sink-at-him theory. And ne’er the two shall meet. I stood my ground and pushed to do everything I thought Thomas needed, but our little boy continued to scream and throw tantrums everywhere we went, would pound his head into the floor so hard that he had a constant bruise on his forehead, and would throw himself around in his crib as if he were in constant pain. We began avoiding public places, taking him over to friends’ houses, and sometimes even to the park. We endured the comments of well-meaning people who told us he just needed to be held more, that he needed a comfort object, or that he needed a spanking. I cried myself to sleep on more than one occasion next to his crib. Then, we discovered that he was hypoglycemic and the world suddenly changed with a drastic change in diet. Our two year old who could speak five words (poorly), spoke over 500 words a month later. He began making eye contact and learning some sign language. He was able to sleep through the night and learn how to calm himself. I felt like I had a new child all over again. He still has challenging behaviors and still struggles with managing his emotions, but in comparison to what we were facing, this seems like a piece of cake to me.
In the time that has ensued, I have learned to parent differently. I have learned to be incredibly patient, even though this is a constant challenge for me. I have learned to let my child communicate to me what he can or cannot handle, and not to push things too quickly, but to push things enough to challenge him and help him learn he can overcome his fears. I have learned how far a gentle reminder can go versus a harsh punishment. I have learned to love unconditionally and challenge myself because this is not something that comes naturally to me. I have learned to go with the flow and let mistakes and catastrophes happen, only to realize that they aren’t nearly as catastrophic as I thought they would be. I have become more patient with and forgiving of my spouse, who brings to the table as many outdated and bent and twisted parenting tools as I do. I have learned to recognize that EVERYONE has a story, and that my interpretation of that story isn’t always accurate, and to listen better when people talk.
I have also learned that having an overall appreciation and gratitude for life is the most positive thing I can do for myself and those around me. I have learned to make lemonade from the lemons that life gives me, even when I realize I AM the lemon. I have learned that every day I can learn something new. A new skill. A new craft. A new attitude. A new way of coping or doing or thinking. I have learned just how much of a virtue patience is, and that much can be said in the silent spaces between words.
So I may get the job or I may not get the job. What I get instead is the time to reflect and think about how I answered questions and why I answered them the way I did. And I’ll learn something from it. And it won’t just be lip service about “learning from that experience”. At my age, I actually WILL learn something from it. And I will be ok.
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