Personal and Professional

We talk a lot about our personal lives but many of us also have professional lives. Let’s assume that our personal and professional lives cross at some point (for some people this happens more than others). Has adoption also affected your professional life? If so, how?

My adopted status doesn't come up at work very often, my close co-workers know that I am adopted.  They know I do not like having my picture taken in a work setting, tagged and posted to social media for business purposes.  That I guard my online identity fiercely.  They know that usually once or twice a year I go off to a conference or a retreat.  They know I have found my close-knit "tribe" and that I am better for it.  They know I return from those conferences & retreats a little brighter, a little more grounded and a little more settled...calmer.  They know I have gone through hell and came out the other side.  I don't share too many details. I am usually a pretty private person but back then I was intensely private, but they know enough...in the beginning of my rocky reunion, it was hard to hide the struggle from showing on my face...no matter how hard I tried.

I can only remember one time when my two worlds of personal and professional crashed into each other. I received the call that changed my life forever at work...which rendered my mind to spin.  I had to leave the office that day.  I remember the numbness most of all and I remember vividly thinking that my life had literally just changed...there was no going back.  From that day forward, references to time had split in two...before & after.  It is a day I will never forget...I still get a visceral reaction thinking about it...even now.  I wrote about that day, those moments in a previous blog post here.  I just re-read this post again today, and my stomach still jumped a little...even after all this time.

xo Two

**edited to add in case anyone was wondering, I do not work in an adoption-related field.

{photo source}