RAYS

Growing up, the outcomes were always celebrated. Straight A’s, perfect behavior at family dinner, helping out at church. I learned early on that if I acted just right, I would get the love and attention I craved. Now, this is not to say that my parents didn’t love me or give me attention in other ways. This was just the way that my brain downloaded the experience and saved it to my hard drive. Doing things well = good girl. Good girl = love.

I watched all of the women in my family work hard in everything they did. The house was always clean, the yard was perfectly manicured with the crepe myrtles lining the drive, and calling out of work was not an option. My grandmother took it upon herself to build and design the town flowerbeds and welcome sign. Serve and look good doing it. Our work was directly tied to our worth. Work, worth — sounds almost the same. I can see how easily the lines got crossed. Maybe it was a cultural thing, maybe it was just the way we were wired? Who knows? What I do know is that this very trait, so intertwined with my genetic makeup, is in fact not the best way for me to serve — myself or my community. But how do I reprogram this belief system that has been passed down for generations? I can hear my mother telling me, as I’m complaining about so-and-so who didn’t do this or that at work, “Well hunny, you have that Adye work ethic. It’s just how we are wired. You can’t help it!”

My grandmother chose to exit this world by a self-inflicted gunshot wound during COVID. She was 82 years old and still working, cleaning houses. She was sick, and her last client said, “We don’t need your services anymore.” That was the straw that broke the camel’s back. She was broke, and now her only defining trait was taken away from her — to serve people and give them a clean home to come home to. She was tired and done. And who could blame her!? This was six weeks after my children were born. I was going through my own journey of defining my worth and contribution to the world. Little did I know that the next four years would be the season that broke me, brought me to my knees, and made me question everything I had learned about being a mother, a wife, a contributor to society, and a woman in this world.

I was working at an organization during COVID that allowed me to stay home with my boys (born July 2020). They spent time in the NICU, and one was on oxygen. Not to mention, I just flat-out didn’t trust anyone to watch my kids, so I worked from home for the first six months of their lives. In January 2021, I went back into the office but still worked from home every third day while my wife worked her 24-hour shifts in the Fire Department. Let me paint that picture for you — both of us working full-time jobs while also staying home with twins during COVID times. We had a very small circle of friends we trusted to help, and both of our parents lived in other towns. I was drowning, but I had no idea how to ask for help. 

I couldn’t perform to my expectations at work, so of course the solution was to overexert myself more. Prove that I was capable of being a successful woman in the workplace and also a devoted mother. I will also note here that I HATED the newborn season. (I later realized how severe my PPD/PPA was.) I only continued to throw myself further into my work to overcompensate my deteriorating self-view. And then came the golden opportunity — to promote and prove just how capable I was.

Here’s where I can see that ego stepped in and really took over my life. I applied for the Program Manager position, and then when I signed the job description after being offered the position, it said Branch Director. At first, I balked, but then I thought, “Oh, this is a big fancy title. I can really show the world how good I am!” And the next three years went by in the blink of an eye, and I missed so much of my life.

From the outside, I was doing great. All the social media posts of my success, the awards and accolades at work. I had a beautiful family, and we were just living the dream. But inside, I was losing my grip. My grip and control of everything I had used to define my worth.

*The picture is my favorite one of my Grandma Adye. She was a hoot! There are so many amazing qualities in the women in my family, and I am grateful for the resilience and grit I inherited from them. There is also some generational healing happening in my lifetime. I hope she is looking down on me, proud of how I am honoring our family’s legacy and serving our community.