MayMay, Goosie, Annie-girl,
Mom is taking a big leap and I want to tell you a story—a journey that began 23 years ago when I didn’t get into the nursing program at BYU-Idaho.
As early as I can remember, I wanted to be a nurse and work in the neonatal unit of a hospital; I wanted to take care of babies! I also used to tell Marielle I wanted 17 children…
Since as long as I can remember, I have never felt smart—not in school, anyway. I didn’t understand anything my teachers were teaching. I had no confidence when it came to learning, taking tests, comprehension, recall. I wouldn’t study for tests because I couldn’t understand what I read. I would just go take them, knowing I’d get a D or C. Learning was hard and took an excruciating amount of time. Teachers didn’t have time to take multiple weeks to teach one concept to a single student. I was always behind and could not grasp how everyone else learned. I felt insecure and embarrassed.
Then I learned I wasn’t bad at teaching myself music. I had a knack for sight reading and for picking up an instrument and learning to play. I started playing the clarinet in jr. high (I wanted to play the flute, but the teacher said my lips were too pointy and I’d never be able to.) I loathed the clarinet so I practiced on my friend’s flute until I could play. When I begged Pa to rent me a flute, he did. I played flute through jr. high and high school—even learning challenging music (literally) overnight (because I didn’t know I was supposed to be practicing on my own), recording the songs with my teacher the next morning. The cassette tape of my playing was sent into a competition where I earned myself the second to last seat in the flute section of the orchestra. Mema and Bacca and Big John came and watched me perform at the concert. Then, I played the alto sax in jazz band. Then, I took voice lessons from John Capik for a year (but once again lacked the confidence to continue). Then, I was learning how to play the violin, until I became pregnant with our beautiful Annie-girl and had to quit my job, violin, and everything else, because I was so ill.
I never felt smart in school, but I felt capable in other ways; I could learn almost anything by doing.
When my low GPA did not qualify me for the nursing program at BYU-I, I wanted to be a photographer. But I thought you had to be born “a creative” and I “learned” in 6th grade—after making a hideous mask—that I wasn’t that, so any artsy majors were out the window.
My patriarchal blessing spoke about receiving revelation about the major I would want to have. When, at BYU-I, I was deciding what major to choose, memories of Clay Aiken on American Idol rolled through my mind, specifically him jumping on a trampoline with a young man with Down Syndrome. I went to the academic advising center and told them what I wanted, “NOT TO BE A TEACHER. I DON’T WANT TO BE A TEACHER! I want to play with babies with disabilities.” It wasn’t because that’s what I wanted, it’s because I felt something tugging me, pulling me that direction. At the time, BYU-Idaho had just begun an Early Childhood/Specialized Education major. I began to cry as the advisor explained the details. She said, “This must really mean something to you. Do you know someone with a disability?” I shook my head.
No.
No connection. Just doing my best to follow the taps (as my friend, Cathy, recently said to me).
After graduation, I landed a job playing with babies (“Play is a Child’s Work”) and coaching their parents. The Spanish team at Kids on the Move, in Orem, UT, became my first dream job. Again, I didn’t feel smart in school, but I easily connected with the families I served and learned rapidly from on-the-job training. I’d shadow my favorite physical therapists and occupational therapists and speech therapists and do what they did. All day I drove to family’s homes, heard stories, laughed and cried, fell in love with them and their babies, and did my best to help in every way I could.
After a few years, Annie was on her way and we moved to Seattle. As life goes, Seattle ground us up and spit us out and that fiery furnace broke open our hearts in preparation for everything else that was to come.
More than 20 years after that moment in the advising center at BYU-Idaho—and a MayMay later—I was walking MIT and Harvard campuses. My insides caught fire: I wasn’t done; I wasn’t done with school. More lines from my patriarchal blessing returned to me and begged fresh questions.
While I racked my brain, asking what I would return to school for, I texted Marielle. She asked, “Would you ever be a therapist?”
“Never.”
She says she asked twice. I likely said, “Never” twice.
I don’t know what happened next, exactly. I can’t remember the details—new awareness was coming so fast. I think since I had published my book, and was listening to more of Jennifer Finlayson-Fife, my heart was changing drastically. I was also reading every book I could get my hands on about Buddhism. Elements of my former self were shedding faster than I had ever experienced. And then, one morning, I had the thought, “I’ve just gone through something, overcome something enormous. I can help someone else through this. Do I want to be a therapist?!”
I began looking at MFT programs. It was ~July. Grad school applications were due in October. I had no time to waste. We were trying to move from Utah but we didn’t know where we were going. BYU had an MFT program. Would we move to Provo? I’d go to school in-person? With a 2 year old? Not the right thing…
Still racking my brain, and the internet, I went to the temple. Initiatories—my home away from home. Pouring out my true and honest heart, pleading for help, begging for guidance, clear as day, a thought came, “Check out the U.”
I ran home and jumped on my computer. The University of Utah had an online social work program, with a mental health emphasis. Social work?! I pictured social workers sitting at desks passing (the most depressing of all) paperwork, while getting absolutely nothing done.
Naturally, I turned to YouTube to study social work and learned: Social workers just might change the world. They can work everywhere, in everything, and it’s all about helping people. They also can be therapists.
It was a no-brainer.
On a whim, I was going to apply to the U’s Master of Social Work Program, but the only reason I could was because, 20 years earlier, I followed the tap to play with babies with special needs. Those years spent years in Human Service work at Kids on the Move, and my time as the relief society president in Ogden, gave me the hours and the essays I needed to complete an application.
Because I had followed the taps decades earlier, I was in a position to exercise more agency. For a moment, I was ablaze.
Then I got scared.
I had to take two pre requisites: human development (not hard) and research (scared me to death). They had to be completed if I were to start school in the fall.
Human development was fine. I juggled my calling—and MayMay climbing to the top of the piano—but I was petrified for the research class. Remember, I didn’t feel smart. I didn’t know how to do research. The only thing I knew was that I could write a paper. Even then, if it wasn’t a memoir, it wasn’t in my repertoire.
I was so scared, girls, that I almost dropped the class, which would have meant that if I were accepted to graduate school, I would not have been able to go. I was so scared for the class, I would picture myself online pressing the “drop” button. The thoughts sounded like, “Quit everything. It was a nice dream. A nice idea. But it’s too much. Give yourself the peace of mind you crave, right now.”
In the midst of this wrestle, December 2023, I sat by Kami at the Messiah sing along at the Ogden Tabernacle. I listened to her gorgeous soprano voice and once again poured out my true and honest heart: “Am I crazy?! Am I doing something ridiculous?! Is this too much for us?! I want to drop that class! Do I drop the research class?! I’m too scared!”
Clear as day the words came, “Don’t drop the class”
I wept.
And wept.
Nothing to do but follow the taps, especially in the face of fear.
22 years ago I never, never, NEVER could have seen how following the taps in such seemingly unconnected ways was actually setting tiny stones into the most healing, stunning mosaic(al) journey we are on, right now. I wish I could see 22 years from now…
Follow the taps.
Now, as graduation approaches, I’ve been considering many options of where to work, but everything has felt unsettling. I practiced staying slow, staying open, observant, whispering, “The right thing will reveal itself in time…”
A couple weeks ago, in a blessed chain of events, I happened to have a day of multiple meetings with friends and former co-workers. It turned into sleuth work, interviewing, pondering. Between meetings dad happened to say, “Well, if you want to start your own practice…”
Magic words. There was no turning back.
My body felt on fire. That was it: I’m (we’re) starting my own practice after graduation.
I spoke with dad for all of 10 minutes, then ran out the door to get pedicures with Emily, where I said the words out loud, “This is it. We are saying—deciding—right now, I’m starting my own practice.”
Everything feels perfectly right. And calm. And slow. And unrushed. And exciting. Puzzle pieces fall into place when and as they’re ready.
Had to throw back to Feb 9, 2024. Taught this kamikaze girl to ski last weekend (while tyler was out of town).
Girls, you can do anything. You will feel your limitations and they may drive you crazy. You may wish you didn’t have them. But stick ‘em in the back seat and punch the gas—you have places to go, things to do, people to rescue, lives to heal, hearts to touch, adventures to have.
Follow the taps.
You’ll find yourself everywhere you didn’t know you wanted to go.
I love you more than these words can express.
Love,
your mama
ps last year I had an epiphany where I realized I likely have an undiagnosed learning disability. I am starting to feel smart. I am learning to notice and accept my natural gifts and talents (which don’t include textbook learning). I appreciate them, want to hone them. I feel thankful for them. And, I’m (slowly) becoming less concerned with what I’m not good at and instead practicing more of what I am! It’s making all the difference.
All We Can Do Book (I have more books in the works—a children’s book and others).