Learning How To Be Okay With Rest

I have never been good about taking care of my body.

You can only avoid your stress, your health, and your mental health for so long before your body will tell you that it is time to take a break.

As someone who has pretty much always been a perfectionist, overworking comes naturally to me. I have a deep fear of failure. I’ve been watching the career I worked so hard to build over the last 13 years slip through my fingers since 2020, and I currently feel like I am losing everything I’ve worked for. I lost my full-time job of almost 5 years, right along with the reliable make-up artistry and theatrical freelance work I had been doing for even longer. My backup plans went out the door at the same time as my current life plan, and I have been desperately grasping for what’s next ever since.

Attending a theatre conservatory for undergrad taught me how to work myself even harder than I was already conditioned to do. By the time I hit my second-semester senior year in 2014, I was sleeping 3 to 5 hours a night, designing multiple shows, and finishing my degree and my minor, all while also being in an emotionally abusive relationship.

I am unsure of how I got through those years. When I look back at photos of myself from then, especially from my graduation, I see more exhaustion than joy for accomplishing so much. Though I did love so much of my undergraduate experience, I cannot help but wonder where I would be now if I had just been taught to slow down instead of cram in as much work as humanly possible (and also to strive for a level of work that was far beyond attainable).

From my undergraduate graduation in May 2014. One of the few photos I have from that day.

I joke now, 9 years later, that I still haven’t caught up on rest from those years. In all seriousness, I don’t think I ever will. I think the damage is done, and now, looking back at all of the work I’ve done, I am left wondering if it was really worth it.

I watch my former classmates open shows on Broadway, get engaged, and become everything they’ve ever wanted to be. And then I look at myself, as I sit in my Subaru in the suburban parking lot of the retail job I work at because teaching at two different universities is somehow not a sustainable career, and I feel like a failure.

The happiness I feel for my classmates is abundant. It’s my inadequacy that I am upset about. I just want to know where I went wrong.

I have no physical contracts for either of my teaching jobs for the upcoming school year. One I have verbally and in an informal email; one I cannot even get an email back about it (somewhere I’ve now taught at for almost 6 years). I’m uneasy about how the fall will go. I’m not sure how much work I will have and how I will be able to find anything else when I barely have had time for the 3 part-time jobs and the full-time grad school schedule I have already been juggling.

The future feels very bleak currently for the industry that I work in. I am trying so hard to be excited for the futures of my students, but I can’t help but feel like we are catapulting them into a hell they may not be ready for. Union hair and make-up artists are struggling over contracts and fair pay. The writer’s strike means there are no new film and tv opportunities popping up. Prestigious theatres are going on unclear hiatuses due to debilitating financial issues. And yet, I am supposed to stand confidently in front of my students and tell them it will all be okay.

Honestly, you guys, I don’t know if it’s going to be.

I don’t know if the arts can get itself out of this one any time soon. Without a serious restructuring of how finances are handled and people are treated, I cannot look into the future and confidently say that any of this is sustainable.

I love theatre with everything I have, and I love make-up artistry just as much as well. But I am just so tired. I am exhausted from so many years of juggling so many jobs to try to impress everyone around me, while also struggling to stay above water financially (as well as mentally, emotionally, and physically). I envy my friends with office jobs and PTO. I miss having health insurance I don’t have to pay $500 a month for. I miss when I used to have the energy to spend time with my friends.

It’s so important to remember that we have been living in some incredibly troubling times. And even the people in your life who are supposed to be your role models, the stability amongst the chaos are also really fucking struggling. We just aren’t always allowed to admit that.

So far, this summer has been anything but restful. With all of my career and financial issues looming over my head, I’ve neglected my health and unfortunately spent the majority of this summer unwell. After being on an antibiotic for most of June, I then ended up with a fairly severe allergic reaction to that antibiotic (at least that’s what I’m guessing it was) to begin my July. And what were my first thoughts when I started developing intense full-body hives and rashes?

I won’t be able to work this week.

I was more worried about missing the only two shifts I was given that week and the holiday pay I so desperately wanted than if my throat was going to close from the allergic reaction.

Sorry about the hives, y’all.

I’ve spent most of the last week asleep from allergy medication and blaming myself for not taking better care of my health. If I would have taken my breaks at work, then I wouldn’t have stressed my body so much. If I didn’t feel obligated to overwork myself, my body might not have gotten so exhausted and so broken down in the first place.

If I would have put myself first and not my work, maybe none of this would have happened. But to me, thinking that way is like living in a dream world. I don’t know how any of us can prioritize health in a world that places value on productivity and financial gain over everything else, always. I am somehow always doing too much and never enough at the same time, and I just want to know if I will ever find the balance I am so desperately searching for.

I am very uncertain about what my future holds, and not in a cute, influencer-traveling-the-world kind of way. I am uncertain in a very scary, very real, and very traumatizing way. No decision feels like the correct one to make. I have been slowly fading out of working in the make-up industry due to working so much elsewhere, being in school, and truly just being overcome with horrible anxiety about no longer being good enough to do those jobs. I fear that one day those opportunities will stop coming. And I can’t say I blame them if they do.

I’ve been incredibly absent in my make-up artistry and theatre careers (aside from teaching) since I lost my full-time job and other opportunities. When I am given new opportunities now, often I cannot take them because of my other work responsibilities or also very frequently because of my anxiety.

I suppose that is part of the reason I feel the need to write something like this. I want people to know what’s been going on, even though I will seldom tell someone when asked. So here I am, still moderately itchy from an allergic reaction and hoping that one day all of this will be sorted out, for all of us. I hope that one day I can make peace with where I am at in my life and my career. I hope I can forgive myself for not being where I thought I wanted to be and where I feel like I should be.

I am sorry that I have been so absent, in my career, friendships, and relationships. I appreciate everyone who has stuck with me through the last few years. Thank you for still offering the jobs and asking me to hang out. Your patience and understanding mean everything to me.

I hope one day we can fix all of this. And that rest will be prioritized just as highly as productivity. That health will not be a luxury but something so commonplace that we don’t even have to think about it because we all have the same, equal access to it.

I hope for all of us that things get better.

And I hope that one day, I can confidently stand in front of my students and tell them it’s going to be okay.