This October marks a year since I started working with adults with disabilities and subsequently left my job at the YMCA and dropped out of my English Education degree.
It's hard to imagine now, because I absolutely adore my job and I feel consistently fulfilled by my role at Quest Outreach, but there were many months where this wasn't the case. I contemplated leaving last December.
It was a difficult transition to begin with. I had worked at the Y toward my degree in education for several years and that's what my whole life was fixed on. So much of who I identified as and what I felt my purpose in life was hedged on my education and career and it was perhaps not ideal timing for me to leave both at once, but financially it was really the only decision for me. I had grown so used to knowing that I excelled at what I was doing. I was always an excellent student and I thoroughly loved school just as much as I enjoyed working with youth at the Y. I was being validated constantly with my good grades at school and consistently good performance reviews at the Y. But when I left these things and began working full time at Quest, I was unsure for many months whether I was happy in the position and more importantly, whether I was at all useful.
That winter was brutal. Temperature wise 2015 was probably the mildest winter I can remember, but I battled with depression for the first time since I moved out of my mother's home in 2008 and this was what set the tone for me. I would see one individual consistently for 4 hours a day that whole winter. I was his first and only staff and he was essentially my first and only client. This individual gave my life purpose in a time where I was dealing with a lot of doubt and guilt for giving up on what had been my dreams for well over a decade. When I was with him I felt without any of the prevailing doubt that I was here to help and that in one way or another I was succeeding. Despite everything that happened with him later on, I know that my company and services mattered to him.
I know this much is true: I didn't feel like a young, incompetent, and depressed fool when I was working with him. I didn't feel small and desperate, nor lonely and isolated. We had a relationship and he will probably never know how much it meant to me and how his needing me around made me feel like, at least in part, I hadn't just surrendered myself to this broken reality I took part in.
However, due to the nature of the work, my other clients didn't take hours with me and though now, at this point, I wouldn't take it personally, I absolutely did that winter. While I sanitized thrice cleaned doorknobs and mopped floors I found myself hoping and praying that someone would come to the outreach center (which, at that time, was hardly used at all) so that I could prove myself. I knew I had replaced someone loved and valuable. I could feel it with every interaction I made. My confidence was destroyed while depression had weakened my ability to bounce back and so I sulked outside shoveling snow, trying to convince myself that I was still doing something good for the world even if it didn't feel that way.
For the first time in my life I was working for the weekend. I made a lot more money than I'd ever had before, and at the time I didn't have any student loans or car payments. I suddenly knew what it felt like to be financially stable and though much of this is still just a gray blur of remembered emotion, this thought I remember with awful clarity; it wasn't enough.
I was miserable. I didn't feel like I fit in, I didn't feel like my skills were being used for over half of my shift, and I spent hours alone without anything to do but clean things I'd only just cleaned the hour before. I gained weight because my job no longer had a built in fitness routine and visiting the Y only made me feel more regret. At the time, I was too shy to make small talk with my coworkers anyways, but I still wished for the opportunity. I was going to leave. On new years eve I wrote it on my wall; "If I am not happy by spring I will find a new job".
I can't believe it, but by early March things began to turn around. It wasn't just the new building and the tremendous increase of traffic and though my becoming more busy did factor in, there were still weeks where my evenings were spent exclusively minding the center. No, what happened was that I identified my need to have a platform to apply myself at Quest and I made that need clear. I asked for meetings where I expressed what I believed my strengths were and I began expressing those strengths to clients once they began taking my hours with them.
I learned to embrace what made me insecure. I was a good listener and I learned how to be light-hearted but not obnoxious, to show that I was invested and cared but never put stakes in any conversation, and I was vulnerable but never flinched. I made it clear that I had no judgement on any matter but backed it up with a determination to help as well as accept what was happening with people. Everything that kept me from succeeding like others did at the Y became my niche strength at Quest. My introversion and the seriousness with which I take my fluid, not necessarily rigidly defined job allowed me to focus and foster open, honest communication. I couldn't believe it. I remember the first day someone really opened up to me with sensitive information and I remember when I started figuring out how to make them laugh. I began getting paired with individuals who didn't open up to others and who had behavioral concerns. I learned that I wasn't a good fit for some, but for others I knew how to apply myself and applying myself made every difference.
My energy came back. I woke up each morning and started swimming and reading again. I stopped counting the hours until I could go home, drink, and watch Mad Men. I took a few weekend shifts! And when I am at the outreach center, I have a new platform with which to apply myself. Now, I will do cleaning, but I will also be an ambassador, a friend, a counselor, a pool partner, or whatever I need to be in that moment to someone. Everything changed, and by the time spring rolled around I couldn't imagine doing anything else for a living.
Because of my choices last winter I was able to afford a trip to Montreal and a new car. I was also able to start paying for my education in FASD studies- a line of study and work I find truly rewarding for all the same reasons I was drawn to teaching. I made more money this year, but this is not what I am most grateful for. I made it through a stormy period of depression and I came out the other side waking up eager to apply myself and with infinite ways to do so. This is what I am most grateful for. My relationship with my clients and to my work has gone above and beyond what I ever expected and I will never again see my introversion as a weakness. This seed of introversion I've had buried in me my whole life has grown in to something else- something leafy, proud, and forever reaching out.
It's hard to imagine now, because I absolutely adore my job and I feel consistently fulfilled by my role at Quest Outreach, but there were many months where this wasn't the case. I contemplated leaving last December.
It was a difficult transition to begin with. I had worked at the Y toward my degree in education for several years and that's what my whole life was fixed on. So much of who I identified as and what I felt my purpose in life was hedged on my education and career and it was perhaps not ideal timing for me to leave both at once, but financially it was really the only decision for me. I had grown so used to knowing that I excelled at what I was doing. I was always an excellent student and I thoroughly loved school just as much as I enjoyed working with youth at the Y. I was being validated constantly with my good grades at school and consistently good performance reviews at the Y. But when I left these things and began working full time at Quest, I was unsure for many months whether I was happy in the position and more importantly, whether I was at all useful.
I know this much is true: I didn't feel like a young, incompetent, and depressed fool when I was working with him. I didn't feel small and desperate, nor lonely and isolated. We had a relationship and he will probably never know how much it meant to me and how his needing me around made me feel like, at least in part, I hadn't just surrendered myself to this broken reality I took part in.
However, due to the nature of the work, my other clients didn't take hours with me and though now, at this point, I wouldn't take it personally, I absolutely did that winter. While I sanitized thrice cleaned doorknobs and mopped floors I found myself hoping and praying that someone would come to the outreach center (which, at that time, was hardly used at all) so that I could prove myself. I knew I had replaced someone loved and valuable. I could feel it with every interaction I made. My confidence was destroyed while depression had weakened my ability to bounce back and so I sulked outside shoveling snow, trying to convince myself that I was still doing something good for the world even if it didn't feel that way.
For the first time in my life I was working for the weekend. I made a lot more money than I'd ever had before, and at the time I didn't have any student loans or car payments. I suddenly knew what it felt like to be financially stable and though much of this is still just a gray blur of remembered emotion, this thought I remember with awful clarity; it wasn't enough.
I was miserable. I didn't feel like I fit in, I didn't feel like my skills were being used for over half of my shift, and I spent hours alone without anything to do but clean things I'd only just cleaned the hour before. I gained weight because my job no longer had a built in fitness routine and visiting the Y only made me feel more regret. At the time, I was too shy to make small talk with my coworkers anyways, but I still wished for the opportunity. I was going to leave. On new years eve I wrote it on my wall; "If I am not happy by spring I will find a new job".
I can't believe it, but by early March things began to turn around. It wasn't just the new building and the tremendous increase of traffic and though my becoming more busy did factor in, there were still weeks where my evenings were spent exclusively minding the center. No, what happened was that I identified my need to have a platform to apply myself at Quest and I made that need clear. I asked for meetings where I expressed what I believed my strengths were and I began expressing those strengths to clients once they began taking my hours with them.
My energy came back. I woke up each morning and started swimming and reading again. I stopped counting the hours until I could go home, drink, and watch Mad Men. I took a few weekend shifts! And when I am at the outreach center, I have a new platform with which to apply myself. Now, I will do cleaning, but I will also be an ambassador, a friend, a counselor, a pool partner, or whatever I need to be in that moment to someone. Everything changed, and by the time spring rolled around I couldn't imagine doing anything else for a living.
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