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Between Rooms is a braided memoir about responsibility, resilience, and the quiet cost of being the person who holds everything together.
Moving between present-day life in Blue Springs, Missouri and the formative experiences that shaped my understanding of strength, the book explores how a childhood marked by sudden crisis evolved into a career built around being indispensable—and what it takes to finally step away from that role.
As a child, I learned early that stability could disappear without warning: a brother in the trauma ICU, a mother who nearly died from a sudden medical collapse, a family that survived by standing upright when no one else could. That lesson followed me into adulthood. I built a nearly three-decade career in public education, eventually serving as Executive Director of Curriculum and Instruction for a large Midwestern school district responsible for guiding academic systems serving thousands of students.
From the outside, the work looked like success. Inside, the cost accumulated quietly. Long hours became routine. Professional responsibility blurred into personal identity. Even as my career advanced, exhaustion, grief, and pressure mounted in the background.
After the sudden death of my father just days before relocating for a major leadership role, the pace of my life accelerated further. Over two intense years helping guide a large district through academic and political instability, I pushed harder to prove my value—until my body began signaling that the life I had built around being indispensable was no longer sustainable.
When a moment of visible exhaustion at work forces a confrontation with that reality, I make the unexpected decision to retire from public education at fifty-two.
The story that follows is quieter but no less transformative: rebuilding a life centered on presence, motherhood, creativity, and relationships that do not require constant sacrifice.
Between Rooms explores the tension between responsibility and identity, asking a question many high-achieving professionals eventually face: who are we when we stop being the person everyone depends on to hold things together?
Between Rooms is a braided memoir about responsibility, resilience, and the quiet cost of being the person who holds everything together.
Moving between present-day life in Blue Springs, Missouri and the formative experiences that shaped my understanding of strength, the book explores how a childhood marked by sudden crisis evolved into a career built around being indispensable—and what it takes to finally step away from that role.
As a child, I learned early that stability could disappear without warning: a brother in the trauma ICU, a mother who nearly died from a sudden medical collapse, a family that survived by standing upright when no one else could. That lesson followed me into adulthood. I built a nearly three-decade career in public education, eventually serving as Executive Director of Curriculum and Instruction for a large Midwestern school district responsible for guiding academic systems serving thousands of students.
From the outside, the work looked like success. Inside, the cost accumulated quietly. Long hours became routine. Professional responsibility blurred into personal identity. Even as my career advanced, exhaustion, grief, and pressure mounted in the background.
After the sudden death of my father just days before relocating for a major leadership role, the pace of my life accelerated further. Over two intense years helping guide a large district through academic and political instability, I pushed harder to prove my value—until my body began signaling that the life I had built around being indispensable was no longer sustainable.
When a moment of visible exhaustion at work forces a confrontation with that reality, I make the unexpected decision to retire from public education at fifty-two.
The story that follows is quieter but no less transformative: rebuilding a life centered on presence, motherhood, creativity, and relationships that do not require constant sacrifice.
Between Rooms explores the tension between responsibility and identity, asking a question many high-achieving professionals eventually face: who are we when we stop being the person everyone depends on to hold things together?