Why now?

Why now? What keeps pushing me to post on social media and to write a parenting book? I am at the top of my career. Over the last 20 plus years I have completed a doctorate, birthed and raised two kids while nurturing a marriage, got licensed, obtain board-certification and built a thriving practice. I should just sit back and relax, coast a bit and enjoy the fruits of my labor. But now I am starting over in some respects, trying to launch a “brand” through social media, broaden my reach and publish a parenting book. WTF? Why now? Because I only now do I feel like I have the space to step into who I am and the confidence to be fully seen.

I have always been highly sensitive and excruciatingly shy. When I was a toddler, my mom tells me that if I ran into a room with extended family who were sitting around laughing at anything, I would freeze and begin to cry or bury my head in her lap until she carried me out of the room. My preference to stay unnoticed and be an “observer” has been a source of comfort for me. It has made me a great friend, confident, therapist, partner and mother. When my children were very little, I can remember feeling a sense of relief that I could focus my attention on caring for them rather than having to engage in small talk, or to answer questions about myself at any number of social gatherings that my husband and I attended. The busyness of parenting, although exhausting, played to my strengths of over-functioning and hiding behind my children’s needs.

And, as the kids became less dependent, I focused more on my career, building the practice which also focused on the needs of my clients and their parents. Once my kids were both in college and the private practice was humming along well, I noticed a shift inside of me. I felt a deep sense of grief over the loss of those intensive parenting years. I enjoyed hiding behind their needs. My day to day had been filled with so much physical, emotional, and psychological work surrounding the kids, that without them I felt unmoored. And yet, I did have a huge career, something I had been continuously building, but not fully reveling in or expressing to its’ fullest. My career was there, it was going very well and bringing me amazing satisfaction, but I also wasn’t fully owning it. I was playing small.

Now, at 53, I am stepping into a space where I am ready to be fully seen. It’s not easy because I will always be that shy little girl on the inside. And to be honest, I cherish my highly sensitive soul, and will always nurture those introverted needs I have when it’s time to recharge my social battery. But I see now that I don’t have to choose. I can be shy, introverted, and brave at the same time. I can be quietly strong, bold, and unapologetic. I can still be the dedicated mom, clinician, wife, daughter, and friend who is nervous about looking stupid and still do this new thing. Because, in the words of Marie Curie: “Nothing in life is to be feared, it is to be understood.” And I now understand that my fear of being seen pales in comparison to my fear of regret.