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The medical disadvantages facing American women (especially educators)

In the past 2+ years in the US, the medical industry has been through a draining and dramatic strain due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Doctors and nurses were overworked, lauded as heroes, were at the center of both praise and criticism due to COVID and COVID-deniers, and have faced incredible and unprecedented struggles. So, in no way do I mean to disparage the medical field. Doctors and nurses are a vital necessity for the health and wellness of our society at large. The incredible amount of knowledge, training, tuition money, grueling residencies, and other parts of being a physician, surgeon, nurse, nurse practitioner, pharmacist, or hospital employee inspire a lot of awe. However, as a woman and as a school leader, I have to say that a profession that claims to be based on “doing what’s best for patients”, often falls very short in not only it’s overall treatment of women (especially minority women), but an important subset of women – educators.

On paper, medical doctors and educators have a lot in common. Both are professions that are actually made up of a MAJORITY of women. Both professions are filled with women with advanced degrees who face a pay gap between themselves and their male colleagues (especially when those women are women of color). However, the difference in the amount of public respect, pay, and the ability to maintain a work-life balance are often vast. While many nurses and doctors at hospitals work grueling shifts, they don’t often take tremendous amounts of work home with them. Growing up, I watched my mother become an award-winning nurse at the University of Chicago. She’s won every nursing award that the hospital gives. She has an incredible work ethic and was intensely devoted to her work, her patients, their families, and her coworkers for her entire career. That being said, as a full-time nurse that earned generous overtime pay on holidays or for staying late, she never once took a piece of paperwork home. She worked 3, 12-hour shifts per week plus every-other weekend. She earned a great living, had a good work-life balance, and when she was home, she was HOME. The lifesaving, incredibly brilliant trauma-surgeon that saved my ex-husband’s arm from amputation works 2, 16-hour shifts a week (which might be extended due to complex surgeries), and every-other weekend (plus being on-call while other surgeons are on vacation/out of the office, etc.) Of course, both of these examples are anecdotal and were HOSPITAL employees at the busy University of Chicago Hospital – not private practice or local doctors’ offices. The vast majority of my current frustration with the medical industry is actually NOT with hospitals in general, but rather with local medical offices.

But before we get into all of that – let’s look at some demographic data of these female-majority professions. According to the research on www.zippia.com, regarding medical doctors in the United States, 53% are female with average pay varying per region between $120k and $192k (see graphics below). Obviously, those with additional degrees, more specialized areas of expertise, etc. could exceed this amount. Additionally, a report by The Physician’s Foundation released in 2018 found that a majority of doctors worked 51-60 hours per week (see graphic below).

Let’s compare this same information for teachers (ALSO a highly educated, majority-women profession that has a pay differential between males and females). Teachers are 74% female, with an average salary (depending upon region) between $31k-$63+k (see graphic below), and per recent research published in Education Week, the average teacher works about 54 hours per week (read the full article on how teachers’ workweeks break down here). What a STARK difference in pay for somewhat similar hours. (And these statistics do NOT include the piles of paperwork that any of these educators take home and work on on their own time).

Ok, ok – maybe comparing medical doctors to teachers isn’t really fair. After all, aren’t medical doctors required to have much more education, training, and experience than the average classroom teacher? So, let’s talk about school principals. ALSO, a female-dominated field (but only if you lump all schools together though. A VAST majority of high schools are led by men and since there are many more elementary schools and the majority of THOSE are led by women it sort of skews the data). Female school principals account for 55% of all school principals and make an average (regional variations) of $65k-$105+k (see graphics below). Additionally, the average school principal reported working about 60 hours a week BEFORE the pandemic; but in my experience, a follow-up study with updated numbers just might show this being AT LEAST 60 hours a week.

Why do I bring any of this up at all? Well because I’m a woman who needs to see a gynecologist. And good luck doing that if you aren’t a woman who can go to the doctor between 9 am and 3 pm. Recently, I (tried to) make an appointment with my gynecologist. She only works between 9 am and 3 pm. So, an early morning OR an afternoon appointment would mean that I would have to take off of work (since I can’t go for a 7 am appointment and just come in a bit late OR leave with the students at 3:15 for a 4 pm appointment as neither of those are options). Even taking a half-day isn’t possible unless I can get guaranteed an on-time appointment at 10 am and get to my building by 11:30; or get a guaranteed appointment between 12:30 and 2:30 so I can stay until 11:30 (the cutoff time for “half-day).

Being the educator that I am – I don’t like to take time off when students are in the building. Although it’s less of a big deal now that I’m an administrator – it’s still not ideal. I remember the pressure (some put on myself by myself and some put on me by students, parents, and administrators) to not take off of work. “We only have 180 days with students – everyday counts”, “not enough learning happens when there’s a sub”, “it impacts the whole building when an adult is out”. And all of those things are true. So, like MANY educators, I RELY on early-morning, late-afternoon, weekend, or evening appointments. Failing those options, I pack my Thanksgiving, winter, spring, and summer breaks chock full of eye doctor, annual physical, gynecologist, blood test, mammogram, and dental appointments. Frankly, it sucks, and I’ve always resented having to line up tons of appointments on the rare days off of work that I get all to myself. I’ve always preferred the early-morning, late afternoon, or weekend appointments so that I don’t NEED to give up vacation time, impact my students, or burden my coworkers so that I can sit in waiting rooms. However, this has become less and less of an option for me lately. Every time I call an office to try to get an early, late, or weekend appointment I am told, “oh the doctor no longer has any evening, weekend, or early morning hours”. So begrudgingly, I mentally prepare myself to give up Winter, Spring, or Summer break days. And lo and behold, apparently all the doctors are also taking off during all of the school breaks as well so they can hang out with their own children. And I GET IT. I understand the desire to take a family vacation, spend time with family, etc. But those same doctors ALSO have a certain expectation that their own children will have teachers on a daily basis when they go to school. They have a certain expectation that Open Houses, Back to School Bashes, Parent-Teacher Conferences, School Tours, and Meet the Teacher Nights will take place outside of those teachers’ and administrators’ paid hours. So why don’t those same doctors have the occasional night, weekend, late afternoon, or “around the holidays” hours? Don’t the women who care for doctors’ children deserve the same convenience that their children’s teachers give to them?

I am ALL FOR work-life balance. And I am not suggesting that any overworked and stressed out medical professional works MORE hours themselves. I am asking why more of them won’t work SMARTER? For example, even if the cost is a little higher, I will remain an avid patient at my dentist’s office until the end of time. They are closed every Monday and open at noon every Tuesday. They are open Tuesdays from noon-8pm and Wednesdays-Fridays from 8-4PM and every other Saturday from 7am-noon. The 4 dentists take turns on who works on Saturdays and Tuesday evenings so that they each only work 1 in every 4 evenings or Saturdays. As a result, I never have to take off of work to take care of my dental health. This includes their endodontist! I have had 2 root canals at 6 PM and haven’t had to take off of work. It meant that my students, my teachers, and the other administrators in my building didn’t have to feel my absence and I also remained healthy enough to keep working because the dental issue was taken care of before it turned into an infection.

How many average workers (teachers or otherwise) want to take off of work on a random Tuesday morning to get a physical or an eye doctor appointment? (Especially if you get paid by the hour and will lose income?) Survey your patients to see what times would be the most convenient for them and eliminate the times/days that are less popular and maybe close on Monday and Tuesday but work Wednesday evenings and Saturday mornings. Split up those days with the other doctors in your office/network. I guarantee all of the shift workers and teachers and school administrators that can’t take off of work on a Wednesday at 1 PM would be grateful. A person that is willing and able to receive preventative or basic care at a convenient time would be a loyal patient. Regular, everyday medical care is what prevents more serious illness and keeps people healthy. Imagine the long-term impacts on children whose teachers have medical issues that aren’t diagnosed early and result in a leave-of-absence? When I asked the receptionist at my gynecologist’s office what I could do if I had a serious medical concern and they couldn’t get me a first-thing-in-the-morning appointment, her response was “I dunno, go to the emergency room, I guess. We tell people to just take off of work.” I was so annoyed that I looked for another doctor and when I called his office was told that there was a 4-month waiting list for new patient appointments. Imagine the uproar from doctors (or any parents) if schools said, “sorry but we only do parent-teacher conferences from 9-3 and we don’t have events like Open House outside of the school day – just take off of work.”

If there is one thing that the COVID-19 pandemic has done to transform the world of work, it was adding flexibility to the workplace. Many industries are allowing for flexible hours, working from home, hybrid work, or a combination of all of the above. Even the medical industry has embraced the teledoc system for more minor medical conditions that don’t require testing or in-person interaction. Many of the “essential workers” such as retail workers, school employees, many medical employees, and those involved in the transportation industry haven’t gained any of this flexibility or the option to work from home or split our hours. As a result, educators still have to make the difficult call of, “should I leave my students today and impact their education to get a pap smear/blood test/cancer screening from a doctor that won’t work before or after school, on the weekend, or during school breaks?” or “Should I just put it off?” Either way – those doctors’ (and other people’s children) will be impacted. Either the teacher will miss a day, or they might actually get ill and miss potentially a lot more days, or worst-case scenario they’ll have to have a long-term sub due to a serious illness or even death). Meanwhile, those same doctors and parents expect those educators to be present outside of their contracted hours to support them and their children through athletic games, Open Houses, conferences, parades, events, Science Fairs, etc. We can talk all day about “self-care” and how if you have the PTO that you should take it when you need it – but educators will ALWAYS have the added pressure of how this will impact the learning of their students. Many are more than willing to take care of their personal business on their personal time – but they can’t find doctors that will accommodate them. So, doctors, I beg you to take your children’s teachers, principals, paraprofessionals, and other school staff (as well as essential workers in other industries that don’t have flexibility) into your planning of your office hours and operational systems. No one is asking you to work more, just work differently. Consider the health of the people that care for your children and how your children might be impacted by missing their teacher (who is willing to come and see you at 4 PM or on Saturday morning with no impact on your child’s education).

Women’s health in general in this country is in a sad state of affairs. There simply aren’t enough OB/GYN’s and in my anecdotal experience, the quality of a lot of the gynecologists that myself and the women in my life have come across have left a lot to be desired. I don’t have data to back this up – it’s just a feeling that I’ve developed over the years; but a lot of gynecologists don’t seem all that interested in women’s actual health. MANY of them love babies, pregnancy, pregnant women, and helping women give birth. It’s not only obvious by the decorations in their office, their excitement when a pregnant woman walks through their doors, but it also shows in what kind of care that their office hours show has value. Once I FINALLY got an appointment at the gynecologist (2 months AFTER I was due to go AND had to take off of work), I was at the counter paying my co-pay and waiting for the receipt to be handed to me. While I was standing there, I overheard the other secretary get a phone call from a newly pregnant mom who was calling to make an appointment. She was fit in THAT WEEK with no notice. But when I had called with a serious MEDICAL CONCERN it took me 2 months to get that same courtesy of an appointment. (Because the doctor only blocks out 2 hours a day between 10-12 for non-pregnancy related appointments). If this had been a one-time thing, then maybe I could consider it a fluke. But at the same gynecologist, 2-years prior (after my having to take off of work to have a procedure done due to the lack of early morning or late afternoon appointments), I was called AS I WAS PULLING INTO THE PARKING LOT to be told “the doctor is with a patient in labor at the hospital can you come back in 2 hours?” A procedure that I was having to TRY TO PREVENT cancer. To add insult to injury, the procedure wasn’t successful, and I needed it repeated. Again, I took time OFF OF WORK to come in for the re-do when it was convenient for the doctor. 2 days before the procedure the doctor’s office called me to tell me “The doctor has to reschedule you’ll need to come in on the 10th instead.” In a total Karen moment, I told the secretary that that would be impossible as I’d already taken the time off – whomever was covering for the doctor when her patients went into labor would have to do the procedure. She informed me “she doesn’t have anyone to cover. All the appointments just need to be rescheduled. The other doctors in this office have their own appointments scheduled already.” (So do all of the teachers that I have to pull from their breaks to cover the classes that have no sub, and we make it work even though it’s not even a little bit ideal). I was so nervous and worried that I cried on the phone. She took pity on me and told me if I promised to be in 25 minutes earlier than I’d originally planned then the doctor would have enough time to do the procedure and go to the hospital for the C-section.

I 100% get it – babies come when they want to come. They don’t break their moms’ water between 9 and 5. They’re born when they’re born. But it’s not just while the moms are in labor has my care been de-prioritized. Many times, while in a gynecologists’ waiting room I’ve been made to wait while a pregnant mom-to-be gets to go first (even when my appointment time was first). In the past 4 years, despite having some serious gynecological issues, my gynecologist has spent maybe the equivalent of 45 minutes of her time with me in an exam room. Our appointments often feel rushed-through and are sometimes for painful procedures that are very stressful to undergo. Even when I have been there and there is an empty waiting room, these appointments seem to have been given less precedence than the pregnant patients’ routine appointments. I got so frustrated last year that I actually googled the phrase “how to find a gynecologist that doesn’t deliver babies and only deals with women’s health issues”. Needless to say, I didn’t have a TON of local results pop up. Many women in my life have had similar issues. IUD placements, birth control consultations, ovarian cysts, fibroids, cervical and ovarian cancer, and endometriosis are all health issues that women that I know have dealt with over the years. And their appointments/care are often on the “back burner” of their doctors’ rotation. You’d think that with all of this over-prioritization of appointments and care for American pregnant women that we’d have the best outcomes in the world. However, per a 2020 CDC report – that’s FAR from the truth.

The United States has one of the highest maternal mortality rates, if not the highest, in the developed world.

https://www.americanactionforum.org/insight/maternal-mortality-in-the-united-states/

Of course, in the report it is even pointed out that there is disparity between white and minority women with minority women dying even more often than white women. As you can imagine the number of deaths increases as the woman’s insurance coverage amount declines. To put it in scary figures, it is safer for women to give birth in EVERY SINGLE OTHER FIRST WORLD COUNTRY on the planet – and most of the third world ones as well with the exception of Sub-Saharan Africa. And it’s getting WORSE not better. So, the “most important job” that American OB/GYN’s are “blowing off” other things for isn’t even going well. With the ridiculous new laws being passed with regulating women’s healthcare/birth control/abortion/miscarriages/forced birth/gender-affirming care can anyone predict anything more optimistic than “more deaths on the horizon”? If you were in medical school right now, would you choose a specialty under such a horrible microscope? Governed in some states by confusing and patient-harming laws? While we have a shortage of doctors now – what will happen when the ones that we do have (despite their range in skill levels) are vastly diminished?

My mom the nurse has always given people the advice to “get a second opinion they’re just doctors they’re not gods despite what their egos may lead you to believe.” I’ve given the same advice to people in my life before, but it wasn’t until my recent health issues that I truly listened and took it myself. After my marriage fell apart due to my husband’s cheating and stealing of massive amounts of money from me, I started having weird and painful abdominal pains. They felt like sharp menstrual cramps but were not near my period and were further up near the base of my ribs on my right side. I went to my general doctor, and she listened, examined me, and set me for a large battery of tests. I had abdominal ultrasounds, transvaginal ultrasounds, x-rays, a CT scan, and blood tests. When they all came back normal, the doctor referred me to a gynecologist to rule out things like endometriosis or fibroids or ovarian cysts (although she admitted that she didn’t see anything like that on my ultrasounds). So, I went to the gynecologist that she referred me to.

In retrospect, I should have stopped seeing this doctor after the first appointment. But I was still so shaken by what was going on in my personal life that I let things slide that I shouldn’t have. I told the doctor I needed testing for STDs since I’d been cheated on and that I had been having a lot of pain. She recommended that I go on birth control pills to control my cramps. I teared up and told her that I had stopped taking them because my husband and I had planned to try for a baby. I wasn’t even divorced yet and felt that taking birth control pills would not only mean that I was admitting to defeat; but was also potentially closing the door forever on what I had so desperately wanted. I told this to the doctor tearfully and her response was “well just so you know if you get pregnant at your age it’s dangerous for you and the baby anyway. I wouldn’t recommend it.” So, we did the exam, she told me to take some Midol if I got cramps, and I went out to the car and sobbed feeling like my concerns were sort of dismissed. The entire appointment minus all the waiting in the waiting room and in the exam-room waiting for the doctor to come in took maybe 20 minutes total, and I walked out feeling like I had no answers. A few days later my test results came back and thankfully I was negative for HIV, gonorrhea, syphilis, meningitis, herpes, and a whole host of other infections. Unfortunately, I tested positive for HPV – most likely due to my husband’s recently discovered serial cheating. The doctor had me come in for a colposcopy procedure to do a biopsy to ensure that the lesions weren’t cancerous or pre-cancerous. The procedure is not fun, and they don’t use any sort of pain medicine. That first test’s results were CIN1 – mild dysplasia that the doctor seemed unconcerned with and told me is a “mild concern” that as long as it doesn’t progress would most likely clear up on its own.

The second year, the process was repeated. She did another colposcopy, and again stated that there was little to worry about as her samples showed CIN1. I asked her if I should get the HPV vaccine as I had seen a commercial that it was now recommended for women up to 45 years of age (When it first came out, I couldn’t get it because I had just turned 22 and it was only given up to the age of 22). She told me that it would be a waste of time as I had already been infected and the vaccine would only prevent new infections. Most of my mysterious abdominal pains had stopped although I was having heavy bleeding and very bad cramps during my period. I told the doctor and again she told me that I should go on birth control pills. I told her that I was simply not comfortable closing that door as I had started dating and had come to terms with “if it’s meant to happen it’s meant to happen”. She again told me to take Midol if I had cramps.

The third year was this year. In February I went for my appointment optimistic that the infection had cleared (the doctor told me repeatedly that most people have cleared the infection by the third year and that as long as there are no changes that I would be in the clear). Again, the pap smear was disappointing, and a third colposcopy was scheduled. (That was the procedure that was discussed above almost being rescheduled due to someone else’s c-section). This time, things had progressed from CIN1 to CIN2 and CIN3. She told me I would need surgery to remove pieces of my cervix to prevent the growth of cancer. Below you can see the Mayo Clinic’s diagram on what the cells on the inside and outside of the cervix look like with CIN1-CIN3 dysplasia compared with cancer.

I called my best friend, who had almost died of cancer at the age of 28 from exactly this same chain of events. She immediately gave me the name of her University of Chicago specialist and told me to call the office that day as her doctor had “saved her life and was the only person who had taken her concerns seriously”. She told me “Forget these podunk suburban baby-deliverers you need a researcher who is a leader in their field not someone who does this stuff just because they have to sometimes.” Unfortunately, her doctor couldn’t take me because he ONLY deals with people who already have cancer. However, his office called me back the SAME DAY, connected me with someone on that doctor’s team, and got me an appointment within 10 days for a second opinion. I had my medical records sent over to the new doctor’s office for him to review prior to the appointment. In the meantime, I researched him. He was an MD and has TWO PhD’s from Yale and countless awards. So, I was hoping that if anyone could give me good advice it would be him.

This man spent 45 minutes with me in his office (in a suit across his desk – not on a stool in some exam room). He gave me an entire science lesson on what was going on in my body. He showed me diagrams, answered all of my questions, and reviewed my case thoroughly. He actually knew my gynecologist and had gone to medical school with her father. He assured me that she was a competent doctor, but he had concerns about my case. He stated that each of the 3-years’ worth of biopsies that she’d taken were far too small to be conclusive or enlightening so that there is a “small chance” that I already have cancer. He concurred with the necessity of the surgery to remove the damaged tissue and find out if there was cancer already and prevent it if there wasn’t. When I told him that I had asked about the HPV vaccine 2-years prior he said “yes you absolutely should get it. It’s been found to boost the immune system in already infected people and help clear the infection. Any gynecologist who has been keeping up on their research should be recommending that since about 2016-2018. I’m surprised and disappointed you were told not to. We’ll get you that shot today before you leave today.” He assured me that my doctor was competent. I specifically said to him, “this is the only life I have. I don’t want competent, I want Gray’s Anatomy Christina Yang-style, confident brilliance. So, are you brilliant?”

He told me that he didn’t want to toot his own horn and I said, “please toot.” He told me he’d studied at the lab of the man who had invented the Pap smear and had invented a more modern version of doing this surgery that his hand-selected team trains on in practice labs and that he’s done thousands of them successfully. He told me that he’s just a doctor and not a magician and that he can’t help what’s already there but that he does have a plan for the best-case scenario, the medium-case scenario and the worst-case scenario for my care already in place with specialists that he trusts already on hand to assist. He sent me home with diagrams, information, and confidence. I didn’t leave his office wondering if he cared about me. And it wasn’t his “bedside manner” that converted me to switching to his office. He was very clinical. He wasn’t unkind or cold, just very business-like. His personality was actually a bit colder than the other doctor. But he was thorough and exuded scientific knowledge. And his office has a TEAM of specialists who deal with ONLY this issue. His office has both early and afternoon appointments and an entire day of the week dedicated to only surgeries and procedures. I left scared of the future but confident that I would get the best care that his office and team had to give.

So, when I had my surgery yesterday and he walked (more like swaggered) into the room beforehand he calmly explained the whole process to me. He assured me that if there was bad news, he would call me immediately, but he still believes that the chance is small, despite my previous doctor’s (in his words) “lack of attention to detail”. He gave me his cell phone number in case I didn’t feel well, (Despite it being the 4th of July weekend), or something felt wrong when I got home. He explained all of the aftercare instructions to my boyfriend and personally introduced me to all of the nurses on this team. He is not “in this just to hold new babies” and clearly keeps up with and even contributes to new research. I am grateful to have found him. Every interaction that I had with all of his staff have been caring, professional, and have made me felt like my health was their priority. I only wish that I had switched doctors earlier – but due to my having such a hard time finding doctors without months-long waits, I hadn’t even considered that I deserved better.


So today I sit and recover with my painkillers and heating pad – wondering if I have cancer or not – wondering if my first doctor’s lack of attention to me prevented me from catching this earlier. (No less on the 4th of July one year after the overturning of Roe v. Wade). I also sit worrying not only about myself but what will happen to other women when doctors are so swamped that they aren’t keeping up with the most current research, aren’t spending time with their patients, aren’t able to listen to them, and aren’t able to provide them with the care that they deserve. When to keep the lights on, private-practice doctors cram in as many patients as possible, don’t really listen or craft high-quality care plans, or just plain don’t prioritize women’s health beyond the run-of-the-mill normal pregnancy. I will say this much – we have to do better when caring for women in this country. People who can’t easily take time off of work but want to be healthy deserve the opportunity to do so. New moms, moms-to-be, never-moms, and moms-who-want-to-be all deserve high-quality specialty care not just “competence”. If they don’t get it, who will run stores, banks, schools, and retail shops? You want the world to keep on rolling? Supply chains to stay intact? Students to stay in classrooms? Businesses to run? Then we need healthy women who are able to access high-quality care when they need it without delays, under-prioritization, lack of insurance, or a lack of empathy. Women make up more than half of the population worldwide – it’s time to work smarter not harder and to just plain DO BETTER.

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Scorched Earth? Or Salted Earth?

Fire has long been a powerful symbol. Used in stories, poems, songs, fables, myths, art, and all manner of human expression – fire appears in an endless number of ways. Sometimes fire is depicted as a destructive force of nature; or as a method of cleansing/purifying; or as a terrorizing weapon of war (ala the Third Punic War); or as a life-giving fuel for innovation/civilization; or any combination thereof. Some anthropologists, namely Richard Wrangham of Harvard have argued that human beings actually BECAME human by mastering the use of fire – that early hominids only made the jump to humanity through taming fire. While this theory is still hotly (pun intended) debated – it certainly shines a light on one of the most pivotal and complex relationships that human beings have – with the pure energetic and unpredictable element of fire. We certainly benefit from it – but it can also really mess us up!

For myself, fire has been an unspoken theme in one way or another throughout my life. At times it has been horrible and terrifying, and others it has served as a purifying blaze that made my pathway forward possible. As a child, my dad was an insurance claims adjustor. As a result, I often heard risk analysis as if it were scientific fact. We weren’t allowed to put our arms out of open car windows just in case a semi truck drove past to whack it off (your dominant arm is only worth about 200K if you have a great policy – see below for why I know that tidbit); fireworks that flew into the air weren’t allowed on our 4th of July celebration because they might land on someone’s roof and engulf it in flames, etc. etc. So I always had a healthy appreciation for what was dangerous and what activities should be avoided. Fire was obviously included in the list (along with crazed amputation-hungry semi trucks). However, we had a fireplace and were taught early on that although it could be a dangerous element; when controlled fire was useful and safe when treated the right way.

The block that I grew up on had a lot of storm-related power outages when I was young. Candlelight was a staple in being able to clean up the flooding basement, hook up the generator to the sump pump or the refrigerator, or just to be able to see while we waited the hours/days for ComEd to restore our power. To this day, I have an abundant hoard of Bath & Body Works candles on hand. My “closet of shame” has an entire shelf of candles that are my “candle backups” that sit waiting for their opportunity to be needed. The closet only contains extras as each room already has it’s own supply in current use and “on deck candles”.

This is less than half of the ones in the house – these are the backups to the backups in each room.

In reality my life experiences have included a wide variety of both literal and metaphorical flames; but none as physically dangerous as the one I experienced in college. When I was an undergraduate at the University of Illinois, I rented a house off-campus with several friends. On February 3, 2001, a stupid argument/incident caused a rift within our house. As a result, the most important friendships that I had had in my life up to that point fractured. Two of the roommates moved out suddenly and another went home for the semester to heal from the situation. Left in the house were just myself and my roommate Justin. We started to look for an additional roommate to help pay the rent (mid-semester when very few people are looking to move). It was a crushing blow to me. My entire life I had struggled to have long-term meaningful friendships. I had always felt like I was a “side friend” in most of the groups that I had been a part of. I had several close friends in high school but even those friendships would wax and wane throughout the years. The group that I had met my freshman year of college had finally felt like they would be my “crew for life”, the “long term friends” that I had always craved. The break up of our little house was defeating to me. I went into a pretty deep depression. The boyfriend that I was madly in love with at the time was living 6 hours away in Cincinnati and couldn’t be with me more than once every 4-6 weeks; all but one of my friends had left; and my close friend and dorm-roommate from the previous 2 years was studying abroad in France for the year. I thought that the first two weeks of February was the loneliest that I’d even been. Until Valentine’s Day that year. Around midnight on February 14th 2001, the shitty early-1900’s house we were renting caught on fire while Justin and I were getting ready for bed.

Being in a fire is NOTHING like what you see in TV or in the movies. It’s not this loud siren-level smoke alarm that you immediately recognize as trouble. You don’t calmly run to the phone and call the fire department and grab the family photos and the pets and briskly walk out the door as the fireman simultaneously pull into the driveway and put the fire out in less than 5 minutes. At least that was not what my experience was. I was washing my face and brushing my teeth in the bathroom getting ready for bed around midnight on a Sunday night. With the bathroom door closed, I heard the faint beeping of the smoke alarm but it sounded very far away and I thought it was a part of the music that Justin was listening to downstairs. (During a real fire the smoke alarm sounds WAY more quiet than it sounds when it’s going off due to low battery at 3 am in your silent house) So I finished up what I was doing and opened the bathroom door to see smoke billowing towards me from my bedroom at the end of the hall. I ran TOWARDS the fire to see what was going on and saw the room engulfed. I yelled downstairs to Justin and he brought up the fire extinguisher. We quickly emptied that extinguisher plus the additional one from the kitchen. I remember being overtaken by adrenaline while we fought the fire with a couple of buckets of water and both fire extinguishers before it got pitch black and impossible to breathe.

Eventually, we went downstairs, grabbed the crappy 90’s portable phone, called 911 and stood outside in the snow barefoot for what felt like forever. We tried going back in a couple of times with some stupid attempts at putting water on the fire to slow it down, but the last time had to be taken out by the firemen. I got carried out by a stereotypically “cute young fireman” (who barely looked older than myself), and stood out there in the snow crying like an idiot. At the time, I was blind as a bat (pre-LASIK) and couldn’t even see what was happening as I had left my glasses in the bathroom. I begged the firemen to try to go and find them and somehow they did. The frames were a little damaged but I was at least able to clearly see my life literally going up in smoke. Sidenote – there was no cute dog in a coat and a hat to comfort me. Another let down of the in-reality fire experience…..

I have vague memories of the college emergency dean coming to the house and giving us letters excusing us from class to give to our professors. I remember calling my boyfriend in Cincinnati frantically and him making the 6 hour drive in 4.5 to come and be with me and help me. I remember my parents coming down to help and taking me to Target to get an outfit since all I had were the pajamas I had been wearing. But the thing that I remember the most was after the whirlwind of the first few days feeling extremely alone. Maybe for the first time in my entire life I felt truly alone. My boyfriend had gone back to Cincinnati, Justin was staying with friends, and I was at a hotel off-campus until I ran out of money. I was on a waiting list for an emergency dorm room but definitely spent some very cold February nights in my car in a parking garage. The friends that I’d recently lost didn’t even know about the fire until they read about it in the Daily Illini. At first, I felt like the fire had destroyed my entire reality. But slowly and methodically I started using the experience as fuel. I credit that ordeal with beginning my lifelong and deep-seeded desire to survive in spite of adversity. I trudged forward then and I have trudged forward in the face of all forms of adversity since. At the end of that tumultuous semester I ended up with straight A’s for the first time in my academic career. And I did it totally on my own. Despite the challenges, I had slogged through the worst experience of my life (to that point) successfully. Now that decades of distance and time have passed – I feel like that was one of the first opportunities that I had in my life to stand on my own two feet. While at the time I thought that the fire had destroyed my life – it had actually cleared the way for me the way a brush fire clears the land for new crops.

Soot and ash enrich the soil for farmers. It’s why seasonal crop/brush fires are used to clear the land – to purge the toxins and renew the earth for new growth. At the time I didn’t realize that the fire was clearing the way for me to be truly independent, but in retrospect it was. I have had other metaphorical “fires” in my life since. Some set by myself and my own decisions, and some set by others that tore through my life in either productive or destructive ways – sometimes both.

Controlled burn being used on a golf course.

Fires have different reasons for igniting. Sometimes they are difficult to build and don’t want to stay lit – the wood is wet or the wind is blowing in the wrong direction and it seems like all of the kindling and all of the stoking in the world just won’t keep the flames going. Sometimes lightning or a spark hits dry brush and an inferno is raging immediately. Sometimes coals heat up slow and hot and keep a fire at a low grade simmer for what seems like forever. The major metaphorical fires that have burned their way through my life have all had different starts. My house burning down in college was definitely a lightning strike. It was unexpected, scary, tumultuous, and turned my life (which already was at a low point that month) upside down. But in the long run – it forced me into changes that I wouldn’t otherwise have made. It also gave me the skills to empathize with students that I’ve taught over the years. I know how to survive living in a car if I have to. I know how to make $250 (mind you this was 2001 dollars) last for half a semester. I learned how to live with LESS and learn the difference between a want and a need in a very real, very quick way.

If you’ve never been in a fire or a flood – the way that the whole recovery/insurance process works is that a company comes and empties the accident site of all of your belongings. The people that did my fire recovery was ServePro. I can’t say enough about how amazing these individuals were to me. I was living in Urbana and they were based out of Rantoul. So I would go to class on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday until about 3 PM; then schlep over to the ServPro warehouse in Rantoul and sort my items one by one until they closed at 6:30. (This process took weeks – and it was only the stuff that I had with me at college not everything that I’d ever owned!) You put all of your worldly possessions into 3 piles: Trash (can’t be repaired), Clean (maybe it’s salvageable and maybe it isn’t but you wont be able to tell until it’s cleaned), and Salvage (clean and keep). It’s not until you go through every piece of paper, sock, pair of underwear, clothes hanger, and random bric-a-brac that you own that you realize how much you really HAVE – and how pointless most of it is.

Even now, more than 20 years later I can’t stand being in a space that’s overly cluttered. It makes me feel tense and like the walls are closing in on me. I can’t stand being surrounded by junk. I purge things often and crave open space. A major issue within my relationship with my ex-husband before we got married was his “hoard”. He “collected” (in the language of males the word “collection” really means “hoard”) DC comics stuff, Batman stuff, Catwoman stuff, HeMan, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and comics – SO MANY HUNDREDS AND THOUSANDS OF COMICS!! We had 2, 2-bedroom apartments during the entirety of our 10+ year relationship and I barely entered his “room” because it was wall to wall JUNK. Even the closet was stacked from floor to ceiling with boxes and boxes of STUFF. Totally unusable storage space. The sight of it gave me miniature anxiety attacks. Below is a picture of a fraction of his hoard AFTER more than half of it had been sold. Each shelf was at least 15 items deep and this is less than 1/3 of what he had – just wall to wall PLASTIC that held very little actual meaning. I hated to look at it but tolerated it because he loved it and I loved him. But I felt an internal cleansing when I sold it all when we separated. It was like I could breathe in my own space again; like an anchor had been lifted off of my chest. I could finally SEE the walls and the floor and move more than one or two steps without hitting a “collectible” aka JUNK.

Recently I started working at a new school. The office that I moved into had it’s own hoard of files, papers, random items, etc. that I have been slowly working my way toward cleaning. Unlike the office I had at my previous school, there is at least a window to the hallway so that I can see out in addition to having space to move and work. As I purge all of my predecessor’s unneeded things from the closet and shelves I feel like I am clearing the “brush” with a controlled burn and am enriching the soil on my new path. Open and clean space calms me more than I ever realized before losing everything in a fire and starting over.

Not every metaphorical fire in my life was sudden like a lightning strike, nor purposeful and cleansing like moving into a new office. The fire that would eventually blow up my marriage was more like the coals of a charcoal grill. Slowly burning things below the surface without me even noticing the heat until a couple of events blasted lighter fluid onto it and things quickly got out of control. Now that I’m through the other side of it all and have had time to live and reflect and heal – I can see that the way things went down actually reset my life and made room for me to build my future – but at the time all I felt was the scorching heat of the flames and was choking from the fallout/smoke.

My relationship with my ex-husband was nothing if not unique. We “met” in the Q101 chat room on AOL in 1994. The first thing that Morbidgal and DeadRabies ever talked about was music. 14 year-old him private messaged 14 year-old me because I was the first person that he’d ever heard of who liked both Type O Negative and Screeching Weasel. Our first conversation was about how Bark Like a Dog was the greatest Pop Punk album to ever come out (definitely still in the Top Ten). I was from the South Suburbs and he was from the Northwest Suburbs – in the time of dial up internet, pre-driving, and long-distance phone bills we may as well have lived on opposite sides of the planet. Both of us got in trouble for the astronomical bills we ran up with our dial-up internet and phone conversations. The entire time we were in high school, he was always referring to a mysterious “Master Plan” for his life. He never went into detail but always implied that it was “something big”. When his band(s), Break of Day and The Prospects played at the Fireside Bowl in 1997, I skipped school to get to the city and be able to meet him in person. Like a loser, I was too scared to talk to him and watched the show and left. 20 years later he still didn’t believe that I was there. We wouldn’t actually meet in person for another 5 years in 2002.

In September of 1998, when I was a freshman at U of I, he called me asking for my college address. In October, I got a letter from him explaining that his “Master Plan” was finally coming to fruition. He was moving to California and wanted me to run away with him. While it seemed horribly romantic – at the time, I didn’t even know him in person. I also didn’t realize then that I was smart (my high school was INCREDIBLY hard – harder than either of my graduate degrees); so I didn’t even think getting accepted into any other colleges or transferring would be possible. (Side note: I also didn’t know University of Illinois was a good school – I thought it was super subpar and just an average state school that was really easy to get into) So, I called his mom’s house to try to find out the details about when he was leaving so that I could at least meet him in person and say goodbye before he left – and maybe see if I could figure out a way to join him the next semester. But by the time I called his mom’s house he was already gone. I assumed he would be out of my life forever and moved on. I met who I thought was going to be the love of my life and had a 5+ year relationship with him. He and I broke up right after Christmas of 2002.

2002 was my first year of teaching in my own classroom. AOL was dying it’s slow death, and was becoming an unnecessary expense. My dad told me to save all of my stuff so he could delete all the accounts and stop paying for it. I sat in Room #105 on my desktop during my planning period, logged in and started to delete all my emails, write down important email addresses, and save some files. And there it was – an email from DeadRabies – like a lightning strike. “I have no idea if you still use this address. I don’t know if your phone number is the same. I’m back in Illinois. My band is playing a show close to where you used to live on Thursday – please come.” I had recently broken up with the man I thought I was going to marry and had no plans – so I went. And thus began our non-virtual relationship. We dated on and off for a few years before we eventually moved in together in 2010. Between 2002 and 2010 we were on-again, off-again. He was a punk musician – he sewed plenty of wild oats. But when we decided to move in together he had settled down, become a health nut, stopped drinking, and was functionally employed. Things were good. But in reality the coals had already started to ignite and I didn’t notice. We knew each other for 20+ years in some form or another. We lived together for 10 years before getting married. And things ended in a few gigantic “flashbombs” that were actually just squirts of lighter fluid on the hot coals that had been smoldering for years right underneath me.

Fast forward to our wedding in March of 2019. We had gotten engaged in July of 2018 on the roof of the St. James Hotel in San Diego. It made sense to me that he’d want to propose in the place he’d once asked me to run away with him to. He even mentioned the Master Plan while we were there on the roof. We went to multiple punk bars and got free shots for getting engaged. We got tattoos from Pappy McCall at Tahiti Felix’s. Life was good. Sorta.

Unbeknownst to me, the briquettes were slowly getting hotter. We moved forward and planned the wedding. We chose a venue, decided on a menu, made a guest list. The one decision that we agonized over the most was the music. We eventually chose a fantastic DJ (Chris Brower – just hire him!) because music was a major part of our relationship and we needed a person who GOT us (I love that we’re still on his Instagram and that to HIM our story was only ever joyful).

Then in December of 2018 a blast of lighter fluid hit. My mom was hit head on by a texting teenager. She broke her neck in a “hangman’s fracture”. She’s damn lucky she wasn’t killed or paralyzed. But that by no means meant things were easy. She was in a HORRIBLE brace. She couldn’t lay down and had to sleep in this brace that could’ve also doubled as a Medieval Torture Device. She needed all sorts of help. She couldn’t bathe herself, eat easily, sleep, etc. She was deeply depressed and it was hard on us all. At her lowest point, when she was in the hospital, she cried and asked if we could move the March wedding back. She felt sad she wouldn’t be able to help me do anything to really prepare for it. She’d looked forward to the experience of planning my wedding for a long time and it nearly killed her that she couldn’t help the way that she wanted to. She was worried she couldn’t look nice and wouldn’t be out of the brace in time. That was a pretty dark and depressing Christmas for my family. My mom, the Queen of Christmas Spirit didn’t get to spend Christmas making a spectacular and fancy meal or decorating happily – instead she spent the holidays as you see her below. The entire guest list of my wedding in March of 2019 was thrilled to see her braceless and nearly unassisted and looking great as she defiantly walked down the aisle at my wedding. She was like a mighty warrior phoenix that day and I was ecstatic to be able to share the attention with her alive and upright.

Before: Mom’s Christmas Spirit 2018

After: Mom Kicking Ass March 2019.

One burst of lighter fluid down – several more to go. Two months after our wedding; my ex-husband was hit by a pickup truck as a pedestrian. I got a call at about 4 am from a hospital that there had been an accident but it was the weekend and their hospital didn’t have an emergency surgeon on call. They stated that he was “not critically wounded but will need a surgical procedure” and they even put him on the phone briefly with me before he was transported. We only had about a 5-second conversation where I asked him “What happened? Oh my god are you ok?” and he said “Please don’t freak out or I’ll freak out. Just come. They’re making me hang up the ambulance is here.” Since he had spoken to me and they made it seem like he just needed some sort of minor surgery – I quickly got dressed and flew to the University of Chicago and arrived around 5 am without calling anyone. Around 5:45 they pulled me into a private room and explained that his arm had almost been amputated and he was in surgery (and that amputation wasn’t off the table yet). They started talking to me about prosthetics and all sorts of other scary things. Cue the lighter fluid because I thought he just needed some extensive stitches or staples when I’d arrived and was shocked and alone. I hadn’t even been married two months and I was being told I might have to be choosing prosthetics for my husband (I wasn’t even used to calling him my husband yet). They rushed me upstairs to the emergency surgery waiting area. The surgeon came out of the operating suite and told me I had no time to deeply think or deliberate and that he needed an answer in 2 minutes. He told me he could guarantee that he could save my husband’s life easily and amputate right now, or try to save the arm and make no guarantees either way. He was a gifted guitar-player and it was his dominant arm (later I’d find out those are only worth about $200k). So I told him to try to save it. A miracle happened and the doctor saved both the arm and hand; nor did it die in the next critical 72 hours. He had movement but a gruesome and long road ahead of him.

Obviously after a traumatic injury like that you’re going to be in the hospital for quite some time. After his 4th or 5th surgery on May 31st (ironically the day that our wedding pictures were delivered in the mail and waiting for me on the porch when I got home); I got to meet his mistress. She came to surprise him at the hospital. Turns out he’d been living a double-life and had been with her for 3 years BEFORE we got engaged. LIGHTER FLUID. He and I fought about it – obviously. He took me off the approved visitor’s list at the hospital. I wasn’t even allowed updates as to whether or not he was alive. I was DESTROYED like Carthage.

Then the phone calls from bill collectors started. (MORE LIGHTER FLUID). His secret life had included stealing small amounts of money per month from my checking account (we never had any joint accounts ever). He was using the $40-$80 a month to pay minimum balances on credit cards he’d taken out in my name and run up tens of thousands of dollars worth of debt in my name. Now I find out I’d been humiliated, traumatized, and was also broke and in big debt. (All while starting a brand new school administration job at a turnaround school). When he was finally released from the hospital in late June he went to his mom’s house. He begged for forgiveness. I told him to leave me alone because I had no idea if any of it was ever going to be forgivable. He responded by attempting suicide and being admitted to a psychiatric hospital. (BURN BABY BURN!)

In the meantime, I did what I needed to do (sold everything and took out a loan) to pay off all of the debt. But I was afraid to file for divorce because we were legally married – and if he DID kill himself or die – any debt that he had in his own name could become my responsibility and then I’d be right back to square one (6 figures in debt). Due to his arm injuries, they had to transport him back and forth to the regular hospital for his arm checkups. After I refused to take his calls on the morning of one of these transports, he tried to “escape” by trying to jump out of the moving ambulance and fucking up his other arm. More surgeries.

Once he was out of the hospital – the unhinged behaviors, scary texts, stalking behaviors, and threats – mixed in with frantic pleading for another chance and wild declarations of love – became relentless. He’d text me all day; call and leave rambling and frightening voicemails all night. (Duplicate texts that I’m sure that “Lady Hoebags” was also getting from him in his attempt to get one of us to forgive him so he’d have a place to live once his mom finished moving to the land her and her boyfriend had bought in Nevada). Needless to say I couldn’t even see straight from how tired I was. I was too afraid to leave my phone on silent all night in case something happened; but it rang constantly.

On August 31st our lease was up. I had already moved away and the last time I saw him in person was when he came to get the last of his things. When he left with the U-Haul he was still begging for forgiveness out of one side of his mouth while being threatening to me out of the other side. (Even though he had already starting reconciling with his mistress). At the end of September, I felt confident enough that he wasn’t going to kill himself or die; so I filed for divorce. He didn’t show up for court, didn’t hire an attorney, didn’t return my lawyer’s calls and hid. We had to hire marshals to serve him with his papers. My divorce was final on April 9, 2020. I was separated and alone for more months of my marriage than I was physically with my husband. We only lived together as “husband and wife” from March 23rd-May 18th (the night of his accident). The bursts of lighter fluid between my mom’s accident and his suicide attempts, betrayals, and accident made the coals flare several times. But in reality, once I found out all of the layers of the truth I realized that our entire relationship had been a mirage that I was always viewing through a haze of smoke.

A lot of support from my closest friends, a forensic accountant, a crisis therapist, a wonderful mentor, and working relentless hours at a Turnaround School got me through the worst of it. I persevered through a mix of stubbornness, spite, and pure grit. Seeing all of this typed out in print it all seems ridiculous or like it wasn’t actually real. Sometimes when I look back on it all it feels like I’m watching someone else’s life and not my own. But now, I laugh about a lot of it. Now my life is probably the most amazing that it has EVER been. I am working at a great job in a great school district and am FINALLY confidant in my skills as an educator. My money is more under control than it’s been since 3 years before my marriage. (I am 15 measly months away from being 100% debt free and am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel caused by Senor Dickhead). I have recreated and reinvented myself and am stronger than I ever thought that I could be. I started dating and (fingers crossed) have met an incredible man who treats me better than anyone I have ever been with before. For maybe the first time in my entire life I am happy and relatively at peace. The Romans tried to scorch my earth and tried to salt it after they left – but I persisted and am growing anyway. Unlike when I was in college; this time I didn’t do it all on my own. But the confidence and skills I learned from my first fire prepared me for the resilience I would need to overcome the scorched earth that was my marriage.

Ironically, several weeks after my house burned down – my roommate Justin and I went out for Chinese food. For as unbelievable as it is, the fortune from my fortune cookie from that dinner is still in my bedroom all these years later. (I recently got new carpet and when they moved the furniture I couldn’t find it for a few minutes and thought it was lost and nearly had a panic attack – but it was just hiding under my jewelry box.)

Been through 4 apartments & 2 houses and is still with me! Ride or die fortune cookie!

Like most former goth/punk kids – Charles Bukowski has always had a special place in my heart. For as problematic of a man he may have been – he makes a great point: “What Matters Most is How Well You Walk Through the Fire.” If mankind’s greatest achievement was taming fire – then maybe it takes us a lot of tries to learn how to control the blazes that we encounter so that they create productive and fertile futures. In the end, I’ve learned that sometimes it’s better to burn it all down and start fresh with only the things that really matter and not all the “clutter” that we jam pack into our lives. Crops can’t grow when their roots are choked. Ash doesn’t have to choke us – it can fertilize the ground for what we actually need. Control the blaze the best you can and take only what you need with you; but be prepared for the occasional blast of lighter fluid or lightning strike and don’t let it take you by surprise and burn you at the stake unprepared. And when it gets hard – make the best of it. Like the lady in the painting in my bathroom.