Saturday, June 9, 2012

Fight or Surrender, what next?


Today is my daughter’s 10th birthday. She was my first home birth. It was a difficult experience that has lead to amazing things. Her whole life so far has been an difficult experience that has lead to amazing things. Now I have to remind myself exactly those lessons today. My mother called to wish her happy birthday, she was lucky to even get that. She also informed me that because her and her husband are behind on her taxes, her financial advisor has told her that she is not to co-sign for any more of my student loans. I am $11,500 short for the 2012-2013 year. I have no idea where I am going to come up with that money. I am basically, excuse my Foul language, FUCKED. I am scared, disappointed, wanting to roll in a ball and feel sorry for myself. But I don’t have time for this. I want to finish my college education. It means a lot to me. I don’t know how much harder I am can work to make it happen and still be able to continue my commitments for assignments with AAMI. I regret joining too soon, I should have waited until I was done with college. But now, now, it might mean I make a hard decision to quit college, get a job and get focused on midwifery sooner than I expected. It might mean that I call Carla, tell her what is going on, hope for some mercy and take a pause in my studies. I hate that my update this week is so focused on ways I might fail instead of all the things I completed and succeeded at this week.
Photo by: Tambako the Jaguar

This week I turned in a 20 page Zine project on VBACs that helped me learn so much. This week, my friend, another student midwife, called me to schedule a visit to process a recent birth she attended and said, “ I just need to talk to another midwife.” Referring to me… I was flabbergasted, I know I am still a student, but she knows, in my heart, I am still a midwife and she honors me as such. So much she has asked me to be her partner in surrogacy as she was just accepted by a company and is in the process of being matched to parents and she wants me to partner with her through her pregnancy to be her support person. I am available to be on call to attend births in August and September and I have been reading the latest issue of Midwifery Today. I am so focused, so excited, so determined to make something out of all this, I can’t believe that I may not be able to complete my degree and walk. It means so much to me. I want the education, I love my classes, my teachers, the experience of being in college and learning and questioning and challenging and meeting exciting people and having opportunities to learn things I have never been exposed to before. I feel like I am thriving but I am floundering at the same time. It is terribly difficult and terribly exhilarating at the same time.

I am transforming so much right now it is overwhelming…  My heart is full.