I recently wrote an article that talked about my journey, one which led me to study psychology and ultimately, the desire to train as an Educational Psychologist in the future. What I didn’t talk about was the transitions that took place along that road, that very long and nonlinear road.
Part of our special series of articles on transitions
On reflection I realised there is something deeply unsettling about transition periods and I believe it’s because they interrupt the stories I have been telling myself about who I am.
Motherhood and the loss of certainty
The key catalyst for me was the birth of my son. After what was a horrifically traumatic birthing experience I engaged in a course of Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) to help with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). It helped enormously, and for me, it was the final push to study Psychology, an area I had always been interested in but didn’t pursue. This major transition of becoming a mother at the same time as learning to understand my trauma, well frankly, it gave me emotional whiplash.
Motherhood is hands down the most significant transition of my life, after years of building a successful career in business everything changed. For years my identity had been rooted in competence, productivity and performance. I understood how to navigate pressure, solve problems and maintain control. Success had become how I measured my value and although I can now recognise I wasn’t truly happy, it was a source of psychological safety. I knew what I was doing, I had control. Motherhood disrupted that certainty that I’d come to rely on completely.
Nothing in my professional life prepared me for the emotional vulnerability that came with becoming responsible for another human being while simultaneously trying to recognise myself within this new reality. The transition was not only a practical one, but it was also psychological. The parts of me that had been rewarded in business, the independence, resilience and constant capability, no longer protected me in the same way.
Trauma, identity and psychological safety
Alongside the transition, I was also navigating PTSD, which complicated my understanding of both motherhood and myself. Trauma has a way of mutating your relationship with safety, trust and control. Experiences that might appear ordinary to others can feel overwhelming when you are operating from a place of threat. What made this period particularly difficult was the disconnect between external perception and internal reality. From the outside I was someone who had achieved success, managed responsibility and built a career. Internally, I was confronting fear, hypervigilance, emotional exhaustion and the grief that often accompanies what feels like the loss of identity.
Studying psychology helped me to understand that transition periods are rarely neat. They expose unresolved patterns, challenge long-held beliefs about strength and force us to reconsider who we are when former versions of ourselves no longer fit. I began to understand that healing required me to integrate these experiences rather than return to the person I had been before motherhood.
Returning to education and beginning again
For a long time, I viewed strength as endurance and achievement. Now I see strength as vulnerability, self-awareness, asking for help and learning to exist without constantly performing competence for the benefit of others. This new perception takes centre stage in my return to studying, with aspirations of becoming an educational psychologist.
Something I had not fully anticipated is the complexity of entering such a competitive field without an established foothold within it. Psychology, particularly educational psychology, is deeply meaningful work but it is also a sector shaped by limited opportunities, high expectations and constant comparison. These are moments when it feels difficult not to measure your progress against those who appear more experienced, more connected or just more certain of their place within the profession.
For me as someone who has once built confidence through endurance and professional achievement, this transition exposed a new kind of vulnerability. I found myself confronting feelings of self-doubt, imposter syndrome and uncertainty in ways I had not experienced before. Yet experience has taught me that transitions often require us to tolerate periods of discomfort before a new sense of identity can emerge.
Becoming
Perhaps that is what psychology continues to teach me and what I hope to someday teach others, that identity is not fixed, and growth rarely happens within the safety of certainty. Each transition period – business, motherhood, trauma and now education, has challenged my identity, each one bringing me closer to a more honest understanding of who I am becoming.
