GreatPretender
11-21-2011, 03:16 PM
Hi everyone. Not sure where to start, so I'll just throw some things out there. This will be a total blur of a ramble, as I'm frantically typing before heading out from work to get the kids. I apologize in advance if this is a complete tornado.
I'm a 42 yo old male, professional musician, also working as a QA professional during the day. Married to a 42 yo teacher, and we have two boys 6 and 1.5. My story is way too long to include it all, so I'll just throw a starting point out there. Currently, both my wife and I are feeling very overwhelmed, and I think we both struggle with being overworked and overtired while trying to be good parents and spouses, as well as siblings, children, etc. We struggle with the same things most people do, probably - money (making good money, but still not a balanced budget with regularity...sitting on a little $ from her dad's death last year and afraid to spend it for fear that it'll be gone too soon), marriage/communication issues (mostly pent up frustrations with work situations, combined with normal home needs, kids, lack of together time issues), keeping up with the household needs, and needing time to just think once in a while.
She doesn't know I'm looking at this, but I'm sure she wouldn't mind.
Me: schooled musician with master's degree in performance / bachelor's in education. Grew into QA as a means to make money 10 years ago, initially said "no" to promotion then got talked into it (read: leadership track in this profession), now feeling very stuck. I am doing a respectable amount of freelance playing/writing/clinics, but I had to drop my studio of students earlier this year because it was one thing that was "droppable" to give us more balance. That was very disappointing, but despite the income, it just wasn't the most important piece of our puzzle and something had to give. Completely understanding of my wife when she complains about her workload, which is insane with 5 preps when most other teachers complain about 2...however, I struggle to sympathize, when in reality I wish I could be doing what I went to school to do. Making nearly twice what my wife does and wishing the tables were reversed sometimes. If only she had a nice office job and I was all musician/educator. Yearning to make a difference in kids' lives and connect with them and parents the way I do sporadically (and they wonder why I'm not doing it fulltime). It's frustrating. But I'm always glass half full and reaching for more "milk". Keeping others going strong at my own expense. Keeping my struggles as bottled up as possible so that I don't freak my wife and others out. But anger simmers (not as in danger to others; only as in danger of breaking a knuckle on a wall). More and more difficult to be a cheerleader to my wife or anyone else who's full of negativity. Despite all of that, awesome dad, and wanting to be a better husband...trying to listen more than offer solutions.
Her: completely overworked veteran teacher, master's started out East / not sure when/if she'll ever finish it, not enough time for home, family, or to do the job the way she knows she can (though I and others think she's amazing...but I do see that it's not her best stuff because there's not enough time to really put it all together). Her parents divorced when she was in high school, and it was ugly. Feeling inadequate as mom, wife, teacher, person. Probably borderline depressed (runs in her family), finds it very difficult to see light at the end of the tunnel one day, then seemingly OK the next. Definitely glass half empty person, but she and her siblings got raw deck of cards growing up and deal with various levels of coping issues as adults.
I see our oldest son watching me get angry at stupid things (when I'm faced with something frustrating), which usually just means tossing something out of the way a little hard or clenching my teeth or loudly clearing my throat and my getting tense. Seems minor, but I see a little bit of fear in his face when he sees me that frustrated and that makes me very disappointed in my actions. He sometimes growls or lets out some exasperated sound like I do when he gets frustrated, which only bums me out more. I used to be ultra positive and only bummed out at other people who were negative all the time. Now I show that attitude sometimes myself.
What I'm most anxious about is that I don't know when we'll be able to afford for me to leave my day gig, and I think that's the single most contributor to my unhappiness. It's a great gig for what it is, but not what I thought I'd be doing / what my son(s) would see me doing. I'm good about piecing music things together, but we moved to the Midwest from the East Coast, and now it's not so easy to do that. This isn't exactly a pro performer mecca...not fulltime, anyway. I think I can figure it out, just not so fast. What I want is to be able to be grateful for what I have, deal with this situation better in a positive way, all while being OK with this all taking another 2-3 years. But what I fear is that I'm going to drop from a heart (or anxiety) attack before that happens, or my dad will die of lung cancer (66 and just found a mass in his chest...still getting tested...her dad died of lung cancer last November) and I'd have been too busy to spend quality time with him,...or, just that this is/becomes our life and it will just always take forever to accomplish my music tasks. I should have multiple CDs out, be teaching somewhere, be traveling on occasion to play a high profile gig, be leading a youth jazz orchestra, forming my own adult one. And instead I'm "kind of" doing stuff and feeling completely inadequate and feeling like others are starting to give up on me sometimes, too (wanting me to teach, play more often, write for them, etc).
Anyway, that's it for the moment. Not sure when we'd have time for counseling, but I sometimes think we need it. But I keep thinking, we're incredibly smart and ambitious and communicative, let's TALK and get this figured out! The problem is that we're so frustrated that our conversations devolve so quickly these days. Great trip to NYC a month ago, and that seems like a year ago already...where'd THAT "us" go so quickly?? We keep running out of time to talk (it's too late in the evening to speak coherently, the youngest wakes up screaming, etc).
In the meantime, I feel like at any moment, my day gig's going to just disappear (either from the economy, or I'll mess something up due to being unfocused). Ultimately I've gone from killing everything / being Superman, to being the Great Pretender who does it all but nothing so well anymore. Something's going to break unless I get control of this. Argh...
I'm a 42 yo old male, professional musician, also working as a QA professional during the day. Married to a 42 yo teacher, and we have two boys 6 and 1.5. My story is way too long to include it all, so I'll just throw a starting point out there. Currently, both my wife and I are feeling very overwhelmed, and I think we both struggle with being overworked and overtired while trying to be good parents and spouses, as well as siblings, children, etc. We struggle with the same things most people do, probably - money (making good money, but still not a balanced budget with regularity...sitting on a little $ from her dad's death last year and afraid to spend it for fear that it'll be gone too soon), marriage/communication issues (mostly pent up frustrations with work situations, combined with normal home needs, kids, lack of together time issues), keeping up with the household needs, and needing time to just think once in a while.
She doesn't know I'm looking at this, but I'm sure she wouldn't mind.
Me: schooled musician with master's degree in performance / bachelor's in education. Grew into QA as a means to make money 10 years ago, initially said "no" to promotion then got talked into it (read: leadership track in this profession), now feeling very stuck. I am doing a respectable amount of freelance playing/writing/clinics, but I had to drop my studio of students earlier this year because it was one thing that was "droppable" to give us more balance. That was very disappointing, but despite the income, it just wasn't the most important piece of our puzzle and something had to give. Completely understanding of my wife when she complains about her workload, which is insane with 5 preps when most other teachers complain about 2...however, I struggle to sympathize, when in reality I wish I could be doing what I went to school to do. Making nearly twice what my wife does and wishing the tables were reversed sometimes. If only she had a nice office job and I was all musician/educator. Yearning to make a difference in kids' lives and connect with them and parents the way I do sporadically (and they wonder why I'm not doing it fulltime). It's frustrating. But I'm always glass half full and reaching for more "milk". Keeping others going strong at my own expense. Keeping my struggles as bottled up as possible so that I don't freak my wife and others out. But anger simmers (not as in danger to others; only as in danger of breaking a knuckle on a wall). More and more difficult to be a cheerleader to my wife or anyone else who's full of negativity. Despite all of that, awesome dad, and wanting to be a better husband...trying to listen more than offer solutions.
Her: completely overworked veteran teacher, master's started out East / not sure when/if she'll ever finish it, not enough time for home, family, or to do the job the way she knows she can (though I and others think she's amazing...but I do see that it's not her best stuff because there's not enough time to really put it all together). Her parents divorced when she was in high school, and it was ugly. Feeling inadequate as mom, wife, teacher, person. Probably borderline depressed (runs in her family), finds it very difficult to see light at the end of the tunnel one day, then seemingly OK the next. Definitely glass half empty person, but she and her siblings got raw deck of cards growing up and deal with various levels of coping issues as adults.
I see our oldest son watching me get angry at stupid things (when I'm faced with something frustrating), which usually just means tossing something out of the way a little hard or clenching my teeth or loudly clearing my throat and my getting tense. Seems minor, but I see a little bit of fear in his face when he sees me that frustrated and that makes me very disappointed in my actions. He sometimes growls or lets out some exasperated sound like I do when he gets frustrated, which only bums me out more. I used to be ultra positive and only bummed out at other people who were negative all the time. Now I show that attitude sometimes myself.
What I'm most anxious about is that I don't know when we'll be able to afford for me to leave my day gig, and I think that's the single most contributor to my unhappiness. It's a great gig for what it is, but not what I thought I'd be doing / what my son(s) would see me doing. I'm good about piecing music things together, but we moved to the Midwest from the East Coast, and now it's not so easy to do that. This isn't exactly a pro performer mecca...not fulltime, anyway. I think I can figure it out, just not so fast. What I want is to be able to be grateful for what I have, deal with this situation better in a positive way, all while being OK with this all taking another 2-3 years. But what I fear is that I'm going to drop from a heart (or anxiety) attack before that happens, or my dad will die of lung cancer (66 and just found a mass in his chest...still getting tested...her dad died of lung cancer last November) and I'd have been too busy to spend quality time with him,...or, just that this is/becomes our life and it will just always take forever to accomplish my music tasks. I should have multiple CDs out, be teaching somewhere, be traveling on occasion to play a high profile gig, be leading a youth jazz orchestra, forming my own adult one. And instead I'm "kind of" doing stuff and feeling completely inadequate and feeling like others are starting to give up on me sometimes, too (wanting me to teach, play more often, write for them, etc).
Anyway, that's it for the moment. Not sure when we'd have time for counseling, but I sometimes think we need it. But I keep thinking, we're incredibly smart and ambitious and communicative, let's TALK and get this figured out! The problem is that we're so frustrated that our conversations devolve so quickly these days. Great trip to NYC a month ago, and that seems like a year ago already...where'd THAT "us" go so quickly?? We keep running out of time to talk (it's too late in the evening to speak coherently, the youngest wakes up screaming, etc).
In the meantime, I feel like at any moment, my day gig's going to just disappear (either from the economy, or I'll mess something up due to being unfocused). Ultimately I've gone from killing everything / being Superman, to being the Great Pretender who does it all but nothing so well anymore. Something's going to break unless I get control of this. Argh...