#26: Choice.
We think we are making choices, but in reality our choices make us.
I will never forget the day I unexpectedly decided to quit my corporate job, after years of trying (and failing) to do it all. I had reached a point where I could no longer ignore the choice that needed to be made even though it was the absolute last choice I wanted to make.
I never imagined myself as a ‘stay at home’ mom and knew that leaving the career I had built would be require leaving significant pieces of myself behind, but I was done fighting for my career at my own expense and deep down I knew it was time to finally choose my young son, to choose motherhood, choose myself. This choice ultimately changed everything, as I knew it would.
Truth be told, I definitely left (or lost) parts of myself when I left my career all those years ago and it has taken me years to be okay with that choice. I ultimately ‘stayed home’ long enough to know that I did not want to stay home with my kids but returning to my corporate career no longer felt like an option, which left me at a serious crossroads.
What happens when the choices we make don’t feel like our own? What happens when we are expected to be or act or do a certain thing? What happens when we choose someone or something other than ourselves?
I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Alex Tower Ewers
to capture her words for the Self-ish Stories series, an interview series designed to bring women together through storytelling.
Alex shared how a joint decision for her to stay home with her newborn son turned into a 13 year commitment that felt anything like a choice, until the pandemic hit and changed everything for her.
Pre-kids Alex received her masters in holistic health education, specifically focused on the impact of the environment on our health and wellness. She dabbled in midwifery and spent a lot of time in the alternative birthing community before settling into a creative design role with Anthropologie. She went on describe the two different parts of herself that played out throughout her work over the years. While she often found herself working in creative design OR health and wellness, she never figured out how to fuse the two and never felt satisfied doing just one or the other.
The birth of her first son came with an easy joint decision for her to spend the first year at home and she shared the excitement she felt in having this opportunity to connect with her newborn, free of distraction. After the first year she found that she was itching to do something, but then one kid became two kids which eventually turned into a 13 years commitment as the primary caregiver for her family.
She went on to explain that she spent several years really unhappy about her situation and unsure how to change it. She said, “When you don’t feel like you are choosing or have chosen your path, especially the paths that are connected to other people, even though at one point you did make a conscious choice, it’s very easy for difficult feelings and emotions like resentment, anger and depression to seep into your life and relationships.”
“When you don’t feel like you are choosing or have chosen your path, especially the paths that are connected to other people, even though at one point you did make a conscious choice, it’s very easy for difficult feelings and emotions like resentment, anger and depression to seep into your life and relationships.”
The pandemic shifted her perspective on motherhood, awarding her an opportunity to pause and truly ‘choose’ her role for the first time. For the first time in all of her years mothering, she felt a sense of gratitude for not working outside of the home, which allowed her to be truly present and available for her family. She accepted this time and her position as primary caregiver as a gift.
Up until then she never felt like she chosen her path, she explained how she fell into the role of ‘stay at home motherhood’ and then it was a train that just kept going and she didn’t know how to fix it or get off. The pandemic offered her an opportunity to finally ‘choose’ motherhood and with that choice came acceptance. It gave her the opportunity to stand and be comfortable in who she is and the value she offers to her family and to her community, where she once felt insecure she now appreciates and steps in motherhood more fully.
She never felt like she chosen her path, she explained how she fell into the role of ‘stay at home motherhood’ and then it was a train that just kept going and she didn’t know how to fix it or get off.
We inevitably arrived at the same conversation that continues to surface. Society has decided we make connection based on ‘what we do’ versus ‘who we are’ and in trying to figure out where we fit in the social equation, we often ask the same question. Alex vulnerably shared that there were many times she felt like crying as all eyes turned to her and the room grew quiet and someone asked, “What do you do?” She expressed her own frustration around the title of stay at home mom and shared how these conversations often left her feeling deeply insecure.
We eventually brainstormed other ways women could answer this question, describing ourselves beyond job titles or the roles we hold. She went on to explain her two super powers: people tend to respond positively to her requests to help out or get involved and she brings people together in really meaningful ways. Her own aha moment happened when she unexpectedly offered up her own personal mission statement, “I create spaces and opportunities for people to be really authentic and honest.” Having shared space with Alex over the past few years, I couldn’t agree more.
Whether you are staying home or working outside of the home, you will end up in rooms and conversations where you cannot appropriately describe ‘what you do’ and these conversations have the tendency to make us feel small, like we are not enough. We are multi-dimensional human beings, rarely fitting into just one box, just one identity. We rarely share the shadows, instead choosing to hide behind our titles and our roles, but this is not who we truly are - our work is not our worth.
We talked about the silent work that mothers do, the exchange of money, and the cost implications of working outside of the home versus staying home. We talked about the overwhelming expectation that motherhood will go one of two ways and we both agreed that this idea that mothers fit into two categories - working versus staying home needs to change. There needs to be another path and more options for women who do not want to choose or who do not identify with either of these titles.
When asked what she wished more women talked about she said, ‘this.’ She said she longs for more authentic conversations around the challenges of motherhood, being able to process motherhood together with less judgment, and more conversations around mental health specifically depression and anxiety. She went on to bravely share her own experience with undiagnosed postpartum depression that surfaced much later, as her kids got older which could be another conversation in and of itself.
I walked away from this interview asking myself two questions: What choices do you need to make? How could choosing for yourself empower your next step?
These conversations fill me up in a million different ways and I am so grateful to Alex for sharing so authentically and offering her story to all of us. You can connect with Alex on substack
and follow along on her blog Wander Kids Abroad.If you have a story you would like to share or would like the chance to be featured in the Self-ish Stories series, simply hit reply and introduce yourself!