Passion

Have you ever been stripped or robbed from a passion?  I have experienced this several times in my life where I have looked up to someone as a good example and found they were the worst leader, and from that I have lost interest in certain passions.  It makes me wonder if they were real passions in the first place when I haven't chosen to pursue them again.  Surrogacy, for example, was one passion that someone tried to strip from  my life.  It is obvious that it's a true passion since I chose to pursue it even though someone (remember that therapist from my first post) may not agreed with my decision.  I don't think you can hide a genuine passion!   

Most recently, I was stripped from my dental hygiene passion.  Before moving back to Minnesota I worked at the most incredible dental office.  I was given an example by three amazing dentists that it is possible to love going to work.  My co-workers were an extension of my family and I love them to this day!  I'm positive that I would have stayed at this office until I retired if we wouldn't have moved back home.  The choice to move back to Minnesota wasn't very hard, because we knew that raising our kids around our family was the right thing to do.  Changing of offices was very difficult.  I thought I had picked a great office to work at, but boy was I fooled big time.  Don't get me wrong, I had wonderful co-workers, but the stress of going to work was doing more to my body than I even realized.  In the three years I had worked there I saw a 100% turnover in their employees.    

I went into work on my day off to tell my boss, in full detail, what I was doing with this surrogacy journey.  I brought in pictures of the transfer and I had more excitement than anyone could imagine.  I've been working on getting to this point for eleven months and I couldn't wait to fill them in on a piece of my personal life.  My boss didn't give me a minute of her time to share my news and asked me to come in early the next morning.  I guess she had a different agenda. 

I showed up the next morning with much less excitement than the day before.  Ben and I decided that I shouldn't even share that this was a surrogacy pregnancy and to just tell them that I'm pregnant.  She started the meeting off by telling me that she's cutting my hours from 22 per week to just 10 hours because they didn't want to loose the gal who was job-sharing with me, so they gave her a full time position and were cutting my hours.  Then she asked my exciting news.  I just said I was pregnant.  Later that day she wanted me to sign a piece of paper stating that they were cutting my hours.  I was very uncomfortable signing this form, so I asked if I could take it home and go over it with Ben.

After I finished the next day she asked if I signed the form.  Ben and I hadn't had a chance to sit down the night before, so I stated just that and we would be happy to sit down and look at it over the weekend.  She proceeded to tell me how it was a simple form and any normal person would just sign it.  She said if I wouldn't sign the form right now then she'd have to let me go.  I shook her hand and thanked her for the last three years and told her how much she has taught me.  I finished all my charts, my end of the day paperwork, gathered all my personal items, and went home to find myself able to sleep a full night though.  The stress of the working environment took way more out of me than I knew.

I'm starting to temp around town.  I'll be able to set my own schedule and work as much or as little as our family needs.  I actually have my first day tomorrow, and I'm really looking forward to seeing a light at the end of this black hole that I've been stuck in for a few years.  It is a passion that I was robbed from and I'm looking forward to lighting that fire in me again.  I feel really happy about where life is going at this point! 

We've been teaching our kids about choices, and how you are the only person that can make a choice in your life.  There are people who guide us and help us to make decisions in life, but there is only one person who can actually choose...That person is you!  What's your passion?  Have you been stripped of a passion that you would like to choose to regain?  It's your life...make the choice!  Life is GOOD!