I wish I had the choice

"There are jobs in this world that I would love to be able to do. But because of my brain, I can’t."

I don’t want to return to law, but I do wish I had the choice. It’s a funny place to be - knowing that I was once able, but now I am not. 

Maybe I sound conceited but training to become a lawyer took many years and a lot of hard work. It started with getting good grades at school, and would have ended with becoming the general counsel of a financial company. But I never got there; it turns out it wasn’t meant for me. 

But my work ethic, and drive to achieve, is still there. Despite the burnout, the trauma, and the understanding of how burning the candle down to the wick got me here. 

Now my job is to temper this drive, to reign myself in, to think twice before I jump in guns blazing. I have to think ahead, calculate the cost, consider sensory environments, work out social expectations, look for working hour flexibility and remote location possibilities. 

I am one of the lucky ones who has financial, practical and emotional support whilst I emerge from the hazy depths of my work trauma to ask ‘what can I do?’. 

But there is an underlying sadness that lingers with every job opportunity I consider. That is, the sadness that I don’t have a choice. There are jobs in this world that I would love to be able to do. But because of my brain, I can’t. 

It feels as though the choices are being made for me and it is my job to accept whatever ends up fitting ‘about right’. This is a different way of operating to before when I felt as though I could do anything if just worked hard enough. 

Recently I’ve been thinking about working with dogs. Walking them, training them, and maybe one day grooming them. It doesn’t feel like a choice right now, because in a world where I was able I would be working as an entrepreneur or in a creative corporate job in the city. But I’m wondering if, with time, the choices come. 

Sure, there may be professions that are no longer accessible to me. I mean, let’s be honest, they never really were. But of those that are there will be choices to be made. 

Do I work for an existing dog care company? Do I set up my own? Do I board dogs? Do I train them? Do I groom them? Do I create dog products? Do I create content about my journey as a neurodivergent small business owner? 

These are all choices. And whilst I don’t think silver linings need to be found to outshine the sadness I feel about the choices that are not open to me, I can see how focusing on the choices I can make for myself is the only way forward. 

I can’t and don’t want to spend my life wishing I could. There will be moments where the grief of what could have been is overwhelming, but there will also be moments where I find agency in the choices that are for me.