For most of my life, who are you had an easy answer. Wife. Mom. The one who handled things. All real. None of it the whole picture — I just didn’t notice until 2020, walking the same few blocks with Tom while he recovered from having both hips replaced.
There wasn’t much else to do that year, so we talked. About what we actually wanted, underneath what needed to get done. I didn’t have a good answer. A year later I went back to school at 54 for radiology, a decision that made no sense on paper and turned out to be less about knowing who I was than finding out by doing it. (I was afraid the entire time, for what it’s worth.)
I don’t think who am I is actually the right question to sit with directly — it’s too big, and staring at it tends to produce nothing but the sense that something’s wrong with you.
Ask Smaller Questions
Here are three that have actually gotten me somewhere.
What have you kept coming back to, even as its shape changed? Not what you’re into this month — what’s shown up again and again, in different forms, over years. For me it’s making things. Quilting for a long time: designing patterns, teaching, lecturing, getting fully absorbed in how pieces fit together. Then radiology, which looks unrelated until you notice the actual shape underneath — something hard to learn, done with my hands, useful in a specific way. Now it’s this site. Different containers. Same thing inside them, showing up again.
When have you felt completely like yourself, and what was actually happening? Not a trait, a moment. I can point to specific ones: driving somewhere new with Tom. Coffee outside before the house wakes up. Taking on a project I don’t know how to do yet and figuring it out one mistake at a time. None of those are personality descriptions. They’re just true things that happened, and they’ve told me more than any adjective I’ve ever used about myself.
What would you actually choose, if nobody was watching or keeping score? Not the fantasy version — a genuinely open Saturday. No errands, nothing required. What do you reach for? The answer usually reveals whether you still know your own preferences, or whether you’ve gotten so good at anticipating everyone else’s that yours went quiet.
Then Do Something With It
None of these questions solve themselves on paper. The part that actually moves something is what you do after: take the class you’ve been circling, plan the trip, call the person, start the thing you’re not sure you’re qualified for, or finally stop something you’ve quietly outgrown.
I didn’t think my way into becoming a radiologic technologist. I decided, and then I found out more about who I was in the process of doing it. I think that’s mostly how it works. You don’t arrive at the answer and then live it. You live your way into it, one decision at a time.
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Go use the life you have.