I Had To Be Surgically Removed From My Job

Otherwise, I might never have let go

Every year, Christmas was supposed to be my come-to-Jesus moment.

If I’m as miserable at this job next December 25th as I am this year, I’m quitting.

Or so I vowed. Nine Christmases later, I was still working as a copywriter at a big ad agency in New York City, a job I hated but couldn’t leave.

More than fifteen years earlier, a fateful lunch date with my mother had propelled me into the business.

“Your father and I have been talking.” Uh oh. “It’s clear you’re not interested in a real career,” she said. “You’re getting long in the tooth.” I was twenty-six. “You’d better concentrate on finding a husband.”

Yes, she did go there. No, I did not storm out.

Two months earlier I’d escaped to Europe after quitting my job and breaking up with my boyfriend. My job was a dead-end. My boyfriend was too, given his sadistic streak. The last straw was an impromptu medieval art history quiz at The Met. I got my Carolingian and South Netherlandish Masters mixed up or something, and he mocked me until I cried.

So, I had my reasons for ditching the job and boyfriend, not that they mattered to my parents. But it was true that I was adrift.

Once past the parental no-confidence vote, my reaction was classic I’ll show them.

A decent relationship would be the tougher quest; I think you were supposed to like yourself before you got one of those. I concentrated on a career, instead.

I’d heard advertising paid well. My choice was as random as that. I put together a portfolio, and several jobs and promotions later, there I was at the world-famous agency where I was ticking off Christmases, year after unhappy year.

The fun part of being “a creative” at an ad agency is being creative. That’s the hard part, too, along with the competition, hours, and pressure, but that’s what I was paid for. There was no hazardous duty bonus to make up for the misogyny and sexual harassment that were part of being one of the few women working at a place as famous for being a boys’ club as for its award-winning work.

It could be rough, and often humiliating. (See what I mean, here) Still, on the surface, the reasons I stayed were sensible. There was always the promise of something. A new account. A raise. Selling a campaign and producing work I was proud of.

But under my jeans-boots-blazer creative department uniform of the time, with my fake patina of toughness in place, I was always scared. Whether or not I got “the nod” felt like life and death. Secretly desperate for approval, I was addicted to the rollercoaster of you’re a genius/you suck, always trying to climb back to the top of the hill.

I was like a forty-something child trying to win the approval of adults powerful enough to behave like cruel children. In fairness, it was not their job to make me feel okay about myself.

That process should have begun when I was little, at home with my parents. Meanwhile, I was still trying to prove to my mother that even without a husband-worthy boyfriend (or even a boyfriend-worthy one), I was enough. And I was still trying to prove to my father that I wasn’t a coward, by hanging in well past knowing I was in the wrong place, perhaps in the wrong industry, pretending I was someone I was not.

The pain of letting go was as bad as the pain of staying. I was stuck.

“We have to biopsy.”

My routine mammogram was suspicious.

Two thoughts occurred to me on the operating table.

First, why was I awake but unable to speak or move, with what felt like a knee pressing into my side while the surgeon said to her resident, “No, pull it this way!” I guess he was sewing me up.

More importantly, I thought All that time wasted being miserable, and now I’m going to die. Fuck it. I’m not spending another minute waiting for a pat on the head from some asshole. Like the boss who’d stolen a TV spot I’d written about breast cancer. There’s irony for you. I was shut out of production, apart from reviewing casting tapes. His response to an actress I liked was, “Is she fuckable.” That kind of asshole.

A possibly life-threatening diagnosis puts things into perspective.

I’m not a believer, but just in case, big thanks to The Universe, Mother Nature, Lady Luck, and any gods and goddesses out there for making it Christmas in April, sometime in the mid-1990s, when I got the results of the biopsy — benign! — and gave myself the gift of finally getting the hell out.

Scarred, but not defeated, I have never looked back.

Thanks for reading, and thanks to Liberty Forrest, Author for the thought-provoking prompt.

I love this story about meeting daunting challenges head-on, beautifully told by JonesPJ.