Thread by @usnehal

Handling uncertainty has been the work of the last few years. First there was the abyss of #womenshealth issues I fell into following what seemed simple enough egg freezing, then the unearthing of years of remote & recent medical system trauma causing me to question my own work

https://twitter.com/WSJ/status/1373197682630651904

Oh, cancer monitoring too. & other types of uncertainty

One thing that I changed was my level of frankness. I became much more direct and not concerned with whether what I communicated was liked

You can't be a "pleaser", outwardly focused, & deal with uncertainty from own body

My mom gave me "permission" to be less perfectionist despite that being a trait she had most of her life. You have to develop self-compassion. When you have the latter you seek less external validation

More than that is recognizing control is only ever an illusion. Ride the wave

I focused less on "control" and more on generating options. To an extent Mom also modeled this all her life. If not this then that. She had multi-level contingency plans. Her goal was perfect execution, which she always achieved. Options without perfection is different, freeing.

More recently she would tell me that "you do it your own way but you always get it done" which was different from her always worrying about me. I don't have any official diagnosis of anything but have a lot of traits of neurodiversity. Girls/women like my thrive with right mom.

Am SO grateful for the recent years because even though she is now gone, I know she felt I would be okay, I was capable, etc, etc. She often worried about my bleeding heart and getting drawn in by everyone else's story at expense of self-care. She was right. Moms always know best