When I was a child, I didn’t know it would be possible to lose myself. No one told me how fragile that sense of self is. How, like the candles I burn every morning, it can easily be snuffed out.
Following the end of my marriage after more than 20 years together, I was hurled into a world of isolation from family and friends in the wilderness of Northumberland. I could no longer define myself as half of a couple; I didn’t want to be half of anything. My role as a parent-carer of four young children, some with complex needs, was all-consuming. But I wanted to peel back the layers and reveal the woman hiding beneath.
I had met my husband when I was barely in my twenties, and still hadn’t worked out who I was, or who I wanted to be. The narrative I heard when I was growing up was that women can ‘have it all’, and I wonder if this tricked me into thinking it would all turn out okay. Feminism had happened, and I could enjoy whatever ‘having it all’ meant.
I was so clueless. Feminism was still a baby. It turned out that ‘having it all’ was just another way of saying ‘doing everything’. Or perhaps ‘doing everything except paying attention to myself’. Had I been naive to think I could have several children as well as a successful career?
Despite going back to my demanding job as a special needs teacher every time I had another baby, I slipped into the gender stereotype I had been trying to avoid. The one I had been told no longer existed because women can ‘have it all’.
I was trying to be everything to everyone and, in doing so, I was quickly losing sight of myself. One of my daughters had recently received a diagnosis of autism, and was finding school extremely stressful, so I was supporting her learning at home myself. My job became more and more part-time as the needs of my children increased, and the dream I had of equal parenting faded.
And so my life unravelled, becoming one I didn’t recognise as my own. I was stuck, and the only way to move forward was alone, as a single parent, to a new life that placed me closer to the edge.
In order to heal from the sadness of marital breakdown, and to find ways to help my children thrive, I started to explore what it means to exist on the edge of society. As a woman, a parent-carer, and a home educator to my daughter, for whom school represented trauma. Even physically living on the wild edge of the country, miles away from my friends and the city that matched my racing brain.
I wanted to unpick how it felt when the life I dreamed of shattered into pieces, when being a good girl was no longer enough to make me feel safe. I became meticulous in this analysis because I wanted to know where I went wrong, where I lost myself, and make sure it didn’t happen again.
What I discovered was that, as each day passed in a strange mixture of despair and fierce love, I was slowly and gently building a new life. The very act of learning to be alone with my children, knowing that if I crumbled we would all break, allowed me to pay attention to exactly who I was and what I was capable of.
I realised that I can be enough; that it is possible to carve out space for me despite huge caring responsibilities. My role as a mother and a carer has informed my creativity, and it feels okay to step outside the box. In fact, stepping outside the box has been the best move I could have made. And, although the city continues to call me, my heart leaping towards every train hurtling south, I can
cling to the edge of the Northumbrian wilderness all around me.
I’ve stopped chasing the dream of ‘having it all’ - and have learned to realise that I had it all to start with.
Twelve Moons: A Year Under a Shared Sky by Caro Giles is out now