May 7, 2017. The U-Haul was packed. It was the morning of Dawson's second birthday and he had a well-check with the pediatrician. Then we left for Ohio.
This wasn't our top choice of places for me to attend midwifery school. I couldn't have identified Ohio on a map if my life depended on it, but we were committed to this crazy calling of mine.
"Seattle or Portland," we always said. That's where we really wanted to be. When I was applying to midwifery school, Josh and I took a trip to Portland and I visited Oregon Health & Science University. It was my top choice of school, and I took this photo hoping to post it as an announcement that we were moving to Portland.
I was selected for an interview, then placed on the waitlist, but I didn't end up getting in.
So Ohio State it was. In our minds, Columbus would be a quick detour on our way back to the Pacific Northwest. We weren't planning to make connections here or lay down any roots. But we very quickly and unexpectedly fell in love with our new city. We connected deeply with people, some of whom would change our lives forever, others who would be lifelong friends.
In 2018, Andrew McMahon, a favorite musician of ours, released a song called “Ohio”. Josh played it for me and I wept because it hit so close to home. In that moment I realized how emotionally attached I was to Columbus. I couldn't stomach the thought of leaving. You should really listen to the song, but if not, here are some of the lyrics that got to me:
Gonna miss Ohio but this time
We're gonna get it right
Station wagon
Tires, flying,
Katie's counting crows through the
Tears in her blue eyes,
State lines and capitals, go rushing
By as, I'm trying to find
A station on the radio
Everything's gonna be better on the west cost,
Better than the mess that we left back home
In Ohio
We had our reasons for leaving
It's better this way
Goodbye blue house
This song hit so many personal spots in me. Tears in her blue eyes. West coast. Blue house. The mess that we left back home in Ohio. It may sound dramatic, but this song was eerily unsettling for me. I didn’t want to leave. I never could really get this song out of my head. It haunted me.
So last August, when I accepted a part-time midwifery position here in Columbus, I remember thinking that I defeated the curse of that song. This job was a dream come true, in part because it meant we could stay. But frequently I would have this thought, “When we move...”. Like I was subconsciously preparing for something else.
After an unexpected and emotionally draining turn of events, it came to pass that the corporate birth system and I were not meant to be. I will probably write all about it in a book someday, but for now, that’s all I’ll say.
Instead, I accepted a full-time position as a midwife at Alma Midwifery. I will be attending home births and also catching babies at Alma's beautiful birth center, located in the heart of Portland, Oregon.
This all happened very quickly and I haven’t fully processed it. On a Tuesday morning, I sent my resume and cover letter to the director. That evening she emailed me back. It was a lengthy 950-word response detailing the reasons why I shouldn’t work in a birth center — that I should work in a hospital instead. She was brutally honest about how all-encompassing it is to be a midwife in a home birth/birth center setting and that she wasn't going to spend time and money investing in a recent grad who would quickly decide to leave and go make more money in a hospital. She elaborated on the quality, highly personalized, and holistic care the team at Alma provides their clients: hour long appointments, deep connections, lots of education and resources, multiple postpartum home visits, etc. It's more care to less people, which simply doesn't bring in as much money. She ended her email by acknowledging that her response may be less than professional, but that it was a boot camp of sorts, to weed out anyone who didn't have a legitimate understanding of what they were getting into. She signed it, "Good luck on your job hunt."
I read her message aloud to Josh and asked his thoughts. He responded, "It sounds like exactly what you're looking for." That night I emailed her back thanking her for her straightforward response. I told her what Josh said — that this position is exactly what I’m looking for, and let her know that I wanted to move forward with an interview.
On Thursday, she emailed me back stating that she had never sent a candidate an email like that. She admitted that she didn’t think she would hear back from me, and said she was thrilled by my statement of passion and would love to move forward getting to know me.
We talked on the phone for an hour on Saturday and then scheduled an official interview with the whole team on Monday, just six days after sending my application. They offered me the job that evening.
Josh and I took a few days to think it over. Then, just nine days after sending my application, I accepted the position. I’m still in shock.
There are pros and cons with every decision we make, and for better or for worse, we have once again chosen to follow our heart. There are many risks and unknowns with this choice, which is very on brand for Josh and I.
All of that to say, this truly is a dream for us to not only move back to the Pacific Northwest, but to be in Portland specifically. I won’t get rich here, but I’ve otherwise hit the lottery. This practice values safe and compassionate, holistic, patient-centered care the way I do. I already feel tremendously valued as part of their team and am so grateful to spend my career contributing to empowering birth experiences.
It’s difficult to fully describe how much of my heart Columbus holds. It’s been a place of tremendous growth for me. I’ve experienced more joy and sorrow here in the last four years than during any other time in my life. I’ve deconstructed and reconstructed my faith, discovered my values, opened my mind and my heart to new perspectives, and have been changed in ways I never could have imagined. I’ve been stretched beyond my limits and somehow came out alive.
We absolutely love it here and nothing about leaving Columbus is easy. I will deeply miss my people, my house, my therapist, and the seemingly insignificant things like the thrift stores, the little libraries, the food, the buy/sell/trade pages — the list could go on.
But it’s time. The last six months have pointed to the closing of this chapter and it makes sense that we’re moving on and fulfilling another dream of life in Portland.
Thanks for following along.
Xo,
T
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