To Health and Happiness

How do you stay positive when everything seems to fall apart?

I’ll be honest – 2022 was not kind to me. I sincerely feel that this past year was truly the worst year for both my physical and mental health. To start, remember when I said I was moving to Japan? Yeah, that didn’t happen.

Teaching abroad has been one of my biggest life goals since 2010. For nearly a decade, I dedicated myself to building up my resume and obtaining the qualifications necessary to pursue this career. I applied for the Japan Exchange & Teaching (JET) Program in 2019 after receiving my bachelor’s degree and went through the entire process of applying, obtaining letters of recommendation, interviewing in San Francisco, and more. I was elated when it was announced in 2020 that I made the shortlist and would be moving to Kyoto, my first-choice placement. I was assigned to the prefectural level at a dedicated, unique high school. I knew going into this that the chances of being stationed in Kyoto were extremely low, so when everything I wanted seemed to fall into place, I was over the moon. My life could not be any better. So when everything I worked so hard for over the past decade started to crumble, you can imagine my devastation.

Before I joined the company I currently work for, I was fully transparent about my situation to my recruiter and management team. I told them that I had plans to move to Japan in about two months but that I would be happy to join their team until then if they still wanted me. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, my plans for Japan were put on hold until the Japanese government reopened borders. The first time, I obtained a false-positive COVID test result that prevented me from boarding the plane. Going to the doctor’s office for the PCR COVID test was the first time I had stepped out of the house in nearly a year, so receiving a call that I resulted positive was truly unexpected. By the time I received the result, it was too late to schedule a second COVID test before my flight. Thankfully, the program and school were both very understanding of the situation and allowed me to wait for the next opportunity, which ended up being about half a year later. This time, I made sure to schedule multiple test appointments along with continued self-isolation to ensure I could get on that plane. The day before my flight, the Japanese government closed the borders again due to the rise in COVID cases from a new variant. Once again, I was disheartened, but I didn’t lose hope. I believed that if I kept waiting patiently, I would make it to Japan in the near future. All this time, I made sure to communicate with management over at my current company the situation and anticipated timelines. We worked out an agreement that I could still work my current job remotely from Japan (I have always worked remotely for this job) while teaching abroad. Finally, the opportunity came again and this time, I felt really good about finally being able to go. COVID cases were decreasing and the Japanese government granted special permission for teachers to cross borders. People from other consulates had successfully flown in and started the quarantine process. I made sure to inform management right away, and I was all set to fly out – except I wasn’t. Management decided last minute to pull out from our agreement that I could work from Japan after two years of full transparency from my end.

What hurt me the most was the lack of empathy from management. I had given up many promotion opportunities because of my Japan situation and dedicated so much to this company by working 100-hour weeks to handle their sudden growth and lack of employees. I was also taking on managerial and leadership roles while remaining a front-line employee making front-line employee pay. I was informed that I would not be receiving the leadership title and pay specifically because of my Japan situation. If there was nothing tying me to this company, I would have left in a heartbeat; however, I put a non-refundable, partial down-payment on a house a few months prior with the understanding that I would have no issue working both jobs. To receive a mortgage loan, I need at least two years of work history at the same company, so I can’t lose my current job until I close on the house. Unfortunately, I can’t close on the house until the house is fully constructed, an ETA of spring 2023. Had I known management would pull out from our agreement, I would have never purchased this house no matter how financially a smart decision for my future it may be. That’s how significant the JET Program is to me. It truly hurt me that management was willing to let me go after everything I’ve sacrificed to save the company simply because they didn’t want to make the case for me. As the cherry on top, my direct manager gave me just a few days to make a decision regarding resignation as it was “more than enough time.” Mind you, we have several people working remotely from overseas, and me working overseas would have had zero impact on my job deliverables. My direct manager was also aware of the mortgage loan situation, so the lack of empathy from him truly felt like a twisted knife.

It’s been about half a year since then, but I still have a hard time getting over it mainly because I still have to work with the same people who made everything I’ve worked hard for nothing but a pile of broken dreams, but also because when people found out I could no longer pursue my dreams of teaching in Japan, many people responded positively to the news instead of empathizing with my situation. They told me variations of “that’s great news!” because so many people told me that I was throwing away my life for something that would destroy my career prospects when I applied for the JET Program. When I said that their responses were hurtful and selfish, I was told to get over it. I was faced with the cruel reality that most people just simply did not care about how I felt in this situation.

I won’t say no one cared because I did have a few close friends express empathy, and to them, I am eternally grateful, but in the end, I still feel that the emotional pain and suffering this brought upon me was dismissed. Maybe it’s because I was constantly told to get over it that I never really had the opportunity to mourn my loss.

I’m currently working two jobs (one full-time, one part-time) while looking for a third to come up with the money for the house. As the economy has taken a downturn, I’m finding that it’s getting harder to save for the full down payment on the house than initially calculated. I’ve gotten back into waitressing, but the restaurant I currently work for requires servers to pool all tips and split them with all other employees including kitchen and cleaning crew. With the remaining amount, we split it evenly among the servers. To my detriment, I end up taking the most tables every night. It’s frustrating seeing the other servers take the money I earned. I wouldn’t be as frustrated if the discrepancy wasn’t so harsh, but I oftentimes find myself taking a ratio of 5:1 tables compared to the other servers. I also see other servers pretending to be busy to avoid taking tables. The stress of having to split my tips with them and ends not meeting on my budget sheet for the house has certainly taken a toll on me as well.

Furthermore, I work dinner shifts at the restaurant as soon as my full-time job ends, so I find myself eating late in the night when I get back home. This unbalanced eating schedule paired with working a desk job has caused me to gain all the weight I lost a few years back plus more. It’s hard to stay body-positive with a lifetime of being body-shamed and eating disorders. My eating disorders have certainly worsened this past year, too. With the weight gain, I’ve been receiving comments and looks that I should eat less, watch what I eat, etc. Due to that, I developed a habit of eating when I’m alone or when everyone else in the house has gone to sleep (again, late nights). Since I can’t eat an appropriate amount in front of others without being body-shamed, I’ve developed a binge-eating disorder because I don’t know when I can have my next proper meal without judgment. The eating disorders further fuel poor physical health, which triggers my self-criticism and harms my mental health. I’m in a constant cycle of eating disorders and depression.

I’m just trying to do my best with the situation I’m in, but it’s really hard when I have people criticizing me left and right. I’m told that I shouldn’t work so much, that I need to go out more, that I should exercise more instead of working all the time, etc., but how can I do that knowing that if I don’t work, I will lose my house and down payment? I, too, would like to rest, but I simply cannot at this time in my life. I wish people would either be kind with their words or, at the very least, just leave me alone so I can do what I need to do.

With all that said, I’m looking forward to having my own space next year to focus on my physical and mental health. One of the biggest things I’m looking forward to is getting back to a normal eating schedule and fixing my eating disorders. While I still wish that I could be in Japan enjoying my youth and realizing my dream of over ten years, I’m sure that things will get better in time even if I never truly get over it. I know that the end of a calendar year doesn’t promise change, but I’m ready to leave 2022 behind me and move on to better days.

The biggest lesson I learned in 2022 is that corporate does not care. I used to be the person who would go above and beyond what I’m expected (and I still am to some degree), but I’ve learned that corporate will just use this to exploit their employees more as it becomes the new norm of what is expected of them. I learned that transparency does not benefit the individual as it will only be used against them. To a certain extent, I’m glad I learned this relatively early on in my adult life. You won’t catch me being a corporate clown anymore.

Instead, prepare for new interior design and beauty content next year. A big regret of mine is how I’ve neglected this blog as I’ve spiraled from all of life’s curveballs, but I hope to dedicate more time to pursuing my passions in 2023. I’m still figuring out what I want in life, but I now know what I don’t want, and I think that’s a valid place to start. Here’s to health and happiness in 2023.

Cheers,