Rebellious acts of 2023 and looking ahead to 2024

I would’ve written this end-of-year wrap-up a lot earlier, but I’ve had Covid for 9 days :P

Part of my Covid experience involved passing it onto my brother who I was staying with in Auckland just after Christmas, and probably passing it onto a few passengers on a plane on which I had to sit for three flights instead of one. The plane couldn’t land in Wellington due to high winds, and was diverted back to Auckland. The journey took hours. I didn’t know I had Covid at this point, but did wear a mask, so hope I saved some people from getting it. My 4 year old son, ever enthusiastic, was yelling “weeee!” at the turbulence as the plane shook from side to side in the clouds, buffeted by strong 120 kms/hour winds.

“Yippee!”

Not too many people were smiling, although it must’ve been slightly funny to hear him ask “are we going to crash into the sea?” Reflecting on my 2023, it was a lot like that plane journey: at times a meandering, but mostly wild, ride. Sometimes it was anxiety-fueled and sometimes it was a ride I had to just sit with, while trying not to crash into the sea. In keeping with the title of this newsletter, there was a lot of rebellion in there too. I have to remind myself of that when I feel I’ve become too much a part of the system or not feminist enough. Before I recap some moments of rebellion in 2023, I want to say thank you for reading this little newsletter. I’ve enjoyed writing about topics that are important to me, thinking about what would be interesting for others to learn more about, and discussing things with you. I’ve tried to centre most of the newsletters on rebelling against gender norms, though I’m sure I’ve veered off on other tangents. Now, onto those rebellious moments of 2023:

I did a lot of running around in the first half of the year especially, as I tried to get used to working again after a year off for parental leave. This time with two children to take care of, it was challenging to have energy for them, paid work, and even just co-ordinating pick-ups. The sick-leave required for these two, and the inevitable juggle of who would take it and how much, often felt futile. My husband and I were on sick leave a lot. At times I accepted this, and rebelled against my capitalist work-ethic. Other times, I cried about the stress of knowing my paid work was piling up and I wasn’t sleeping much and looking after ill children. I was usually looking after my youngest, the daughter who has just today turned two! More on why I was always looking after her, in a bit.

In 2023, I had to rebel against my inbuilt tendencies to try to do all of the things: paid work, parenting, life admin, house stuff and hobbies. The load had to be shared. My husband and I tried many ways to do this equitably: we wrote comprehensive chore lists and divided them up. We downloaded an app with a shared calendar on it, so we could input and see upcoming family activities. We took small steps to divide up the household and emotional labour, and sometimes it felt like we leaped forward in our abilities to cut through shit, together.

Doing the things with and for this family - pictured here on my daughter’s 2nd birthday.

I had to rebel against the healthcare system in 2023. I was told many times, that there wasn’t anything wrong with my 1 year old daughter. It didn’t matter that she got constant ear infections, was always on antibiotics after a cold, and snored extremely loudly. She also couldn’t breathe properly at night and woke constantly when she was sick. I’d already had a ear nose and throat specialist referral rejected the previous year. I told every GP we ever saw O’s back-story and eventually we struck one, a woman in her thirties, who finally wrote us a referral letter for an ENT specialist.

It took a couple of months of waiting for an appointment. Finally, just before Christmas, we got one. And straight away after observing our daughter properly, we found that she has large, oversized tonsils, and sleep apnea. She’s finally going to have surgery in about a month, fingers crossed. This has been one of the great successes of the year – although it is far from over. It required overriding the reckonings of GPs and holding fast to my intuition as a mother – often we know something isn’t right even if we can’t necessarily articulate it. I hope this story gives others who have the same problem with getting healthcare some impetus to continue the fight. See a different GP, get a different opinion. It’s hard work and its expensive, but it’s worth it.

In the last quarter of the year, from October onwards, I had a semi-relaxed time. I was recovering from a concussion and trying to rebel against the expectation to carry on and get back to normal, as quickly as possible. It was a refreshing time for me, as I had to pare back everything and rest.

Lastly – I’ve tried to live a creative life in 2023, as much as I could. I read a lot of amazing Substack articles, wrote this blog (thank you for reading it! It truly means a lot!) and I wrote my own fiction: I’ve almost finished the first draft of a book and it’s taken me five years. I think this is a ridiculous length of time, but a lot of other life events have taken my attention. I believe creativity, and enjoying being creative, is a hugely rebellious act. In this world, we’re taught to optimise everything, but creativity often can’t be optimised. You might write 100,000 words and throw out 30,000 of them. You might take five years to research and write something decent. You might take 3 months to read a book (I did, this year… a history book on New Zealand cities). You might spend a lifetime understanding the nuances of art. It’s all good. In 2024, I’m looking forward to more creative acts, more writing, and hopefully a little more relaxation, or at least trying to take more things in my stride.

What about you?

A calm day, not at all like the day of 120 km/hr winds.