25 June 2007

Teen Angst

I'm having a crisis. I don't know what I want to do when I grow up. When I was actually a teen, I actually wanted to be a social worker, and now I'm going back to school to be one. Yea for me. Except that my program requires me to go back and take a biology class - I had the choice of Reproduction and Genetics or Diseases and Public Health, and I chose the former, since it would be more relevant to my goal of working with parents with reproductive issues. I didn't want to take it, mind you: I'm a girl, and girls aren't good at science, or rather, girls weren't thought to be much good at science 20 years ago when I was taking science classes last, but I figured I'd take it in the summer, and it would be abbreviated in the shorter term and I'd get it over with.

Guess what? I fucking love biology, and not just the bits relevant to reproduction. I am blown away by mitosis as much as meiosis. I am madly in love with the whole mess. And I don't just love biology, I'm pretty damn good at it. I have an A right now, and am also the holder of the highest average in the class. I imagine the instructor and the TA who oversees my lab could both do with a few less questions from me, but something happened to me on the second day of the summer term, a giant light bulb blasting on, the whole Eiffel Tower erupting in a million tiny lights at midnight kind of event in my brain, and I cannot get enough. I want to know more, more, more, and not just the biology stuff but the chemistry and the physics of it and all the associated pyrotechnics.

In short, I want to be a professional science nerd.

Of course, it's not that simple. We worked really, really hard for me to be able to take two years off from work and go to school fulltime and overtime and get through my program and maybe part of grad school without having to be burdened with a job at the same time; to switch gears now would mean more school, which we can't really afford, nevermind the fact that if time and money and family life were no object I'd want to go to medical school. Another obstacle is that to do something reproductively related with a biology degree or two - maybe genetic counseling? - would not pay what my original plan would pay, and part of our master plan was that when I was making that bank my husband would go back to school to do what he really wants.

There are some options, I think. 1. There are loans, which make me wince, since we are currently debt-free except for our mortgage. 2. There are maybe some grad programs in the hard sciences that would accept someone with a soft science degree, and I could put off the biology gooniness until after I finished my social work degree; a good friend of mine did her undergrad in English and then was accepted into a top graduate program in epidemiology and got her PhD in no time flat (of course, she's not making the kind of money I need to make, but that's another wrinkle altogether, which leads me to the next option..). 3. We could all suck it up and I could make less money in the future but love what I do. I don't want to ask it of my family, though - I want to give my living son everything possible, and I want my husband to get to pursue the field he is passionate about. Before I quit my job, we had already made the adjustment from the salary I collected when my husband and I met to half that salary at a job I didn't care about but also required nothing of me and let me be flexible with my schedule and run off to Brazil or Spain whenever I wanted. The next adjustment from half that salary to no salary is already too terrifying. I'm tired of adjusting down. I want to adjust up.

It doesn't help that in the midst of this turmoil, I am feeling crazy. I suspect it's the result of the hormones associated with my IUD, as I have been crazy for months. Those same hormones, I believe, are also making me feel pregnant half the time and sickly and half-heartedly bleedy the other half, so I am not a paragon of stability. I feel disjointed, discombobulated, overwhelmed and overwhelming at that same time. Weird re-visions of little moments associated with my first, stillborn son are coming in waves, making it so I can't get on my feet. I feel disconnected from my husband, and he from me, which sucks donkey ass. My living son is growing up at the rate of about a gazillion years per day - mind blowing. There is a mouse in my house, and I cannot stand it. It's all too much.

I'm trying to get some sanity back. I'm meeting the biology department advisor tomorrow to determine what a switch in majors would mean for me, then we'll see what I can do. I'm camping out at my brother's apartment tonight so I won't wake a million times thinking I hear a mouse climbing the stairwell walls to where my son and I sleep while my husband is out of the country. And when my husband gets home tomorrow, we're going out, just the two of us, no fabulous, flexible son in tow. It might not be tomorrow night, because I have a final the next day, but maybe the next night. Soon, anyway. And I will hope that all this inner turmoil and hormonal surging won't lead to the oily T-zone and pesky breakouts I got the last time I felt this way, two decades ago. I can only take so much.

6 comments:

Kathy McC said...

Nuthin wrong with being a science nerd...hey, I am married to one!

Catherine said...

As my mom said way back when, "You'll figure it out." It annoyed the hell out of me when she said it...but she was right. You and your husband are a force to be reckoned with. You will figure it out.

Le Synge Bleu said...

It sounds like you're scared of burning bridges that you don't even know for sure if they exist or not. In my humble opinion (and based on my own childhood) its much better to have happy and fulfilled parents who are doing what they want to do and perhaps have less money than it is to have money and parents who gave up their dreams for it. i agree that you and your husband are incredibly intelligent and capable people who can make anything work...and I have no doubt that you will.

Sweet Coalminer said...

Two words: organic chemistry. No way to get around it. I have a b.a. in bio instead of a b.s. because of it. I fear it.

I hope it works out. Keep us posted!

Chris, Renae & Annie said...

Definitely explore the career options for science nerds - I am one of those nerds and I am doing pretty good - work for the govt, make more $ but do more office work than I ever thought I would. There are a lot of options. I think it needs to come down to the philosophy of do what you love and the rest will follow. The debt free thing is awesome, but student loans are an investment in your entire life - not worth a price tag (and I don't say that lightly - hubs and i have over $100K in student loans together). Go with your gut!

kate said...

I suggest taking more classes in your new area of interest before making any final decisions...but yeah, in the end, go with your gut.