Taking my little love to the pool in the hot weather, she runs before me splendid and energetic while I shadow her, watching for danger. She is everything I ever hoped for.

Both girls home, baking in my kitchen. My heart bursts with joy.

Away on holidays with Nana, who is too sick to stay. The big plans get put aside again and yet I know, how deeply I know, the mundane things are sacred. She brushes Poppy’s hair, we play a child’s board game together on the floor. When health is lost these are the things you dream of, to have enough strength in your arms to brush their hair.

Some mornings I wake to the feel of death and the memories of those I’ve loved. If I can find way back into my dreams I often wake later to a different, kinder world. Sometimes I find myself reaching for a sense of meaning and falling instead into a dark void. Each time I must weave my own answer, and each day the answer needed is new. My life slips through my hands in fretful hours.

There’s been such pleasure in my studies. My mind enjoys complexity and challenge. The health of groups is a topic well suited to me. I’ve learned many things that have been questions for a long time. I’m always asking questions about the nature of the world, of reality, what it is to be human. My life can be measured in my pursuit of understanding, what had emerged and from which sources. I find myself curious that in some ways public health is so ignored. We consult psychologists about the health of crowds when they spend very little time studying this. When you want to know why individuals behave as they do, they are excellent. When you want to understand why entire groups behave in certain ways, public health is invaluable. It embraces complexity, exploring the causes and the causes of the causes. Social determinants emerge and I find research to support many private theories and wisdom from lived experience. It’s incredibly validating in many respects. It provides the context I’ve been craving.

I’ve gained confidence and learned gradually how to not write to excess, to do only what is required. My marks are very high and I feel a thrill of accomplishment. I’ve been exploring my next study plans for months and have not yet settled on a solution. Pleasure is one thing, but viable work another. I remain perplexed by the challenge of what I can meaningfully and profitably turn my hand to.

I still wish to pursue my questions, to build frameworks and explore knowledge. I adore learning and even more so in the company of other learners. I have theories about psychosis and multiplicity I wish to develop and share. I know there’s such a need for training and teaching that’s complex and authentic, so that calls me. I’m still seeking more understanding of wildness, art, Narnia, poetry, safety, and why some things make us feel alive while others numb us and break our hearts.

I’ve started working with a business mentor I have great respect for. Gradually I’m untangling some of the knots that have bound me – the need for my work to be somehow unique and spectacular, to build it quickly, to find confidence despite crushing experiences and limited qualifications, to not work alone, to work in ways and places that use my skills and skirt my limitations. To have others set my pay and value my skills because my self loathing forbids me to set myself above the lowest paid and punishes me for ambition or self interest. The fog slowly clears and I find some possibilities emerging. I cannot tell how long the path is that lies before me, and I’m often silenced by my awareness that showing behind the scenes of this area reduces confidence in my capacity, that when I pull aside the curtain to show my doubt and humanity I do so in the terribly shiny setting of consultants and entrepreneurs who sparkle with confidence. Authenticity and public sharing have costs and limits I struggle at times to navigate. And yet, so much of my credibility is based not on my book knowledge but on my capacity to articulate things I’ve directly experienced, and synthesizer it with wider knowledge. And that includes the darkness, the self hate, the terrible blocks that keep us from things we dearly love. I’m not alone in this struggle and neither are any of you. Struggling is part of being human.

In therapy I’m working on self compassion, an extraordinary challenge for someone deeply wedded to self loathing. I pick apart old journals and blog posts, looking for threads and connections. Somehow it’s connected to my struggles with paid work in ways I don’t yet understand. I’ve been trapped here a long time and my struggles, hopes, and self hate have not freed me. I’m trying to face it with calm acceptance and find compassion for this unreachable dream and my own compulsion to keep reaching even though I fall every time.

When I let go of paid work I feel free, and then my sense of self and meaning fray and I start to free fall into despair. When I strive to grasp paid work I become broken by my obsession, working intense hours in impossible circumstances and exploiting rather than nourishing myself. So the path forwards becomes not one thing or the other. A medley of intention and distraction, a part time world of parenting and art and study and paid work and therapy. It is extremely painful, utterly confusing, and thrillingly wonderful all mixed in together.

I don’t have those answers yet but I love and I am loved, and I’ve found good company for the journey. My heart is a tangle thorn and my hands are shredded but my mouth is bright with kisses and my books comfort me when the world goes dark.