To bite off more than one can chew!

To try to do something that is too difficult. If you bite off more than you can chew, you try to do more than you are able to.

Do your best. Do whatever you can, but don't bite off more than you can chew.

It has been busy since I last wrote...a trip to Guernsey, visitors and then beginning the practical of my studies at a Nursing home nearby.

I wish I could say that I am plodding away through my practical, enduring.... but I can only share that after one week I had to terminate this initiative.

Stuck between a rock and a hard place: to "abort" my practical with all the feelings of failure etc that accompany such a decision, and or to continue working in this situation that inspired such worry and anxiety to the extent that I wasn´t eating or sleeping??? It was a case of Hobson´s Choice! What was the lesser of the 2 evils?

On May 14th I started my first day in the Nursing Home and sadly instead of being a "shadow" to a profesional I was pretty much left to sink or swim. Thrown in the deep end as it were to fulfill the tasks of an auxiliary. It was frightening to say the least!

One is not dealing with mere files or books that can be moved about with out fear of damage or rather if they do get lost or harmed; no lives are at stake. But when you are dealing with people, this prospect takes on a whole different persepective plus a tremendous weight of responsability. I found this and other experiences I encountered there to be overwhelming....

One size too big!

I realized that this was not where I wanted to be headed....just like becoming an astronaut and experiencing G force is not on my 10 things I want to do before I die list!

I want to "be" with the dear ones and interact with them & somehow bring sunshine into their day but instead I found myself on a sort of factory line moving pieces from here to there and the more you get done the better.

The pace was intense because of lack of staff. I hasten to add that although they didnt acommpany me as they should; each one of those auxiliaries deserves a medal for the way in which they fulfill their duties with the limited time and energy they have. I take my hat off to them.

I recognize that I personally had reached my limits. Do I struggle with a sense of failure? Yes I do! I like to finish what I start.

Yet, I must be big enough to see that I am not super woman and this was just one size too big for me. I guess my pride has suffered a blow. I must not confuse passion with capacity and it is important to be level headed and honest with myself about my ability to step into this role. After all it´s not every ones thing.

I am encouraged though that I gave it a fair go... To recognize ones shortcomings is not an end, but rather a new opportunity to redefine the initial dream and the way to realize that dream. I have to keep persuing the dream...and try another via....

I am finding rest and peace in the comfort and support (especially from my husband and kids) that many have given me both in my initiation to study after 20 years and now in this moment where I have had to stop the practical. Inspite of my sadness, I do not feel without hope. I say with dear Alfred Lord Tennyson:

I hold it true, whate'er befall;

I feel it, when I sorrow most;

'Tis better to have loved and lost

Than never to have loved at all.