Hello, My Name is Dr. Tausha Allen

My husband visited his old job at The Garden City Hotel as he waited for me to finish one of my classes this past fall semester. He ran into and had conversation with his old co-workers, one of which is the dining room manager and asked where I was. When he told her, her response was "she's still in school?! You gotta stop that shit!". When he told me about it, he said it in a joking manner and I mentally processed it as a comment that I could care less about. But he constantly jokes about it and I'm not sure if my discontent is with him joking or her thinking that I need to stop or that HE should stop me. During my work out today, I was listening to my motivational videos and tears welled up in my eyes as one of the speakers said "Don't count the cost". This one hit me because for next semester of my Masters program I owe $4185. If I don't pay it, I don't go and right now I'm not working and can't see a way to pay it. But faith tells me that I will finish this program because "I ain't quitting 'til I get there"!

And not that there is anything wrong with working as a dining room manager at The Garden City Hotel or any hotel, but I can't imagine that anyone desired as a child to hold that job. I will not settle for a life that is anything less than the vision I have for myself! Getting to medical school entails me having a higher GPA than my current 2.9. Mind you, I also have to score high enough on the MCAT, which I've taken twice to date (485, 488). But guess what, "Ain't nobody gon' stop me BUT ME"! I swear I will die fighting to see myself graduate from medical school, no matter how long it takes and NOBODY, not my husband, not my kids, not my family or friends nor a dining room manager at The Garden City Hotel can stop me! Yes, this has taken me some time to get to but I can say for damn sure that all of this has contributed to the mindset I know I'm going to need to get through medical school. It's going to be tough, its going to be challenging but, there's no quitting!

I say this not lightly, "I wish a motherf***er would" try and stop me!

Signed,

Tausha Allen, D.O.

Headaches

Last night I took mental inventory of the headaches I've had recently and until just now I thought I had only had three of them but I've actually had four. The first one was the summer before last. My mother and I were going to be doing a Spartan race at West Point on Saturday August 26, 2017. So, my mother, my mother-in-law, my two daughters and my older daughters friend and I were all sleeping over my husbands aunt Maria's house. My mother and I shared the room of Maria's son. We talked a little before she fell asleep but I was having trouble. I was fine for a while I just tossed and turned. But not wanting to wake my mother, I tried to stay still. I know I fell asleep at some point but it was not a deep sleep, nor was it long. I was awakened by a pain on the left side of my head which I thought came from the pillows I was laying on so,  I moved to the floor. I laid there for a while still in pain, wondering if I was having a stroke, or a heart attack, was I going to die? But I told myself to stop thinking crazy, you are fine. And again, I fell asleep for some short amount of time. Around 6 am I woke up again, same pain but this time I moved to the downstairs couch where finally, the pain stopped and I could sleep. My mother thought she had been snoring and I left because of it. We both thought it was weird but as planned we did our race and I was pain free.

August 26, 2018 around 4 in the morning I woke up because I was experiencing the same splitting headache. But being a year later, I had not remembered the one from before. I was in so much pain, it was as if my brain and skull were trying to split in half. I took my head scarf off trying to get relief and removed the pillow I was laying on. Eventually, I went back to sleep and woke up, pain free.

November 27, 2018 0' dark hundred, I was awakened. Same headache, but this time I remember that my left ear felt like it was on fire and had a lot of needles sticking it. So, removed my head scarf, moved my pillows tossed and turned until I found rest. Some time later, the pain was still there so I even removed the two braids I had in my hair. I was due to wake up at 5:45 a.m. and knew I needed to get some rest so I got as comfortable as possible and fell back to sleep.

December 5, 2018 I was in a meeting with my husband. My husband coaches our daughters basketball team, so the meeting was held at one of the parents house. The meeting lasted from  9:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. It was called because the father had had a disagreement with my husband the night before during practice. There was a whole storm around the issue of practice and how my husband is running a one man show and not involving the parents. The whole situation was upsetting to both he and I. As I sat through the meeting listening to the father complain, I felt the infamous headache begin to come over me. My left ear began to burn and I suddenly became very uncomfortable. I removed my glasses and the scarf I had on my head but the pain persisted. And now I could feel the pain spread to the left side of my jaw. I had never felt the onset of the headache while awake and this thing seemed to come out of nowhere. Once the meeting was over, we left and began driving home. I had to pull over and switch with my husband because I was still in pain. But I noticed that once we left, the pain began to subside. And as we spoke about positive things it left more. When I went to bed it was only a small amount of pain in my jaw but the headache was gone.

Finding the connection between these headaches and certain situations was easier after last night. It was not until this past summer that I found out that the young man whose room my mother and I shared charged his mother, Maria, $50 for us to stay in his room. I was shocked and could not believe what I was hearing.

August 26, 2018 I was due to start a new job on the 27th but I had been worried that the hours would interfere with my masters program. When I woke up in pain, I took it as a sign that I should not take the job. I promptly emailed the manager and let her know that I could not accept the position. The pain did not subside immediately but I could feel it going away. 

November 27, 2018 I was getting ready to go to work at McDonalds, a job I knew my husband did not want me to have. But I felt I needed to help the family financially and any job would work. I ended up leaving the position after 3.5 hours.

And finally, last night. I sat there listening to the father speaking untruths about my husband and so as to remain in character, my integrous character, and not lash out at him in anger, I sat quietly. 

The headaches were tied to things I did not want to be a part of. Now having had one while being awake and watching what actually prompted it, I am aware and will watch diligently the next time one shows up. I also realized that once I acknowledged the root cause and changed the situation, the headache went away on its own. I think we should take our body's physical symptoms to heart and try to find out where they are stemming from. By ignoring them we are allowing illness to run as it pleases. Listen to your body.

Through A Child's Eyes

This morning my husband and his mother left at 6:45 in order to get to an appointment she had far out on Long Island at 8:30. I was awake when they left since my older daughter had to be at school by 7:50 and had to walk this morning because we are managing with just one vehicle. So, at 7 I made sure she was awake so that she could leave by 7:30. That left my four-year-old, Alicia, home with me. She was asleep because she tends to party hardy with grandma at night when everyone else is asleep. However, she has a need to feel someone next to her while she is sleeping. But since she was asleep, and it was early, I left her in her grandmothers’ room and I proceeded to continue work on my presentation for class, upstairs in my room. At 7:51 I heard the shuffle of little feet on the floor. I figured that she would come upstairs and lay in my bed so that she would not be alone, but she did not. I heard her walking around for at least 3 minutes, then I heard her begin to sniffle. I was shocked because she would normally come right upstairs. Then it got quiet, she had gone back to her grandmothers’ room. I wanted to go get her but part of me wanted to see how long it would take her to check for me upstairs. I then heard her come back out. I thought she was coming up, but she had gone to the kitchen and slid the blinds over to look for the truck. She obviously saw that it was not there and began to cry again and I wondered, why she didn’t just come upstairs. I wanted to go but still I waited. Again, she went to grandmas’ room. And at 7:58 she finally made her way upstairs and when she saw me, she gave a little smirk with tears in her eyes.

At the moment I had asked myself why she didn’t just come upstairs, I had an epiphany! I could hear inside of me, God saying “this is you and Me. I’m always here and aware of you, even when you think you are alone. I know you are safe even when you are scared. If you really needed me, I would be right there, but I want you to come to me out of your KNOWING that I’m here, not out of fear. When you cry, I wonder, why doesn’t she just ask for me? You just forgot, but in My wisdom, I know you will figure it out and I give you the space to do so.” As parents we tend to want to help our children over and through everything denying them the opportunity for the growth that occurs when THEY try and subsequently figure things out for themselves. We should always be there as a guide when needed, not a crutch to always lean on.

This follows an experience I had yesterday, Monday, which actually began Sunday night. Before going to bed I had asked God, why I keep going through the same patterns where I have “down time”. During these “down times” I’ve not been working and felt I should be working, or business died, and I was not able to find more, its as if, the well dries up and with all of my efforts, I can’t get anything to flow. And during these times in the past, I’ve called a friend of mine who talks me through, prays me through and listens to me and my questions to God. But this time, although I thought of her, I decided to just ask God. The answer came to me Monday evening as I was leaving Walmart. And it was simple, “fallow, you are in a fallow season”. I heard it, because I’m getting used to hearing this internal voice. I first learned the word fallow because of a semester project I am working on covering deforestation. The best explanation I received concerning the fallow period said that this is when the once productive farm land is given time to rest and rejuvenate, by regenerating the nutrients in the soil that will make it productive for the next season. The nutrients come from the natural microbial life, worms, the grass that grows and animal excrement that happens organically. Farmers said that if the land is not given this period of time all nutrient in the soil will be depleted and crop production will be low or unsuccessful. They also said that with the advent of agricultural products that allow for continued production from the land, this actually causes a further depletion of soil nutrients making the land obsolete. As I listened to these farmers, I had an epiphany…again. The land was likened to man. We are depleted by continuous production. We need a time to rest, a fallow season, where we rejuvenate naturally, with God. And in this fallow season, we are being prepared for production in the coming season. So, a full circle answer because I was listening. It is now my prayer that I recognize this pattern when it returns in the future and am not unnerved by it. Even through my feeling of unease, I had moments of clarity where I would tell myself, “you know the seeds you’ve planted, you can’t dig them up, they will germinate in time.” I also had moments of crazy, I worked at McDonalds for 3.5 hours and my rationale for this was that we need money and McDonalds is an honest job. But that didn’t work out because of the KNOWING that I did not belong there.

All that to say, trust the process, God knows what He is doing. Your fruit will come forth in its proper time and no amount of pushing or forcing from you can speed that up. Also, remember that God is our father and His view of our situation is not that of a child.

Luke 8:15

                           

McDonald's

Tuesday November 27, 2018, at 10:28 am I walked out of the Levittown McDonald's after making the decision not to continue working there after only 3.5 hours. This was the shortest employment I had ever had. I was hired the day before and asked if I could work the following day from 7 am to 4 pm. I knew my husband would not approve because his advice to me was to relax and do nothing, as far as work was concerned. But I couldn't, because of a belief I was holding on to. What was that belief? I'll tell you.

After months of job interviews and disappointments from not getting them, I settled on McDonald’s. I was planning my escape from McDonald's as the manager was sending people on break. I told myself not to leave at the moment I wanted to but to wait until after the young man who was "training" me had taken his break. The plan, when she sent me, I would just not return. So, when it was my turn, I gathered my belongings, changed clothes, turned in the uniform to the new manager on duty and told her that I would not be staying as an employee. I left and proceeded to walk home. I texted the manager who hired me to let her know. She seemed very concerned as to what had happened. I let her know that the level of respect among the staff was lower that what I held for myself and could not stay in that environment. She apologized and said she would speak to her staff. 

As I continued my walk home I knew my husband would have something to say. I called him once I reached the library where I planned to continue work on my semester project. He told me he would pick me up for lunch. Once he got there, he didn't say anything, surprisingly. We drove back towards his office and he got something to eat. After he got his food, he proceeded to give me his advice and asked why I didn't listen to him about not getting a job in something I did not want to be doing. He said "I understand that you are disappointed that you did not get the other job and that you feel you are not where you would like to be in life but you should be o.k. with just doing nothing. Sometimes its the best thing to do". The only problem with that is my belief.

So, what is it that I believe? It's simple, if I am not bringing monetary value to our situation I do not see the value in the other things I'm doing. For example, taking our daughter to school in the morning, making breakfast and tea for my husband before he leaves for work, the laundry, cooking, having lunch with him daily, and spending quality play and learning time with our four year old. For him, those things are enough. From my point of view, those things are not helping us pay the mortgage, bring food into the house or pay our bills. I'm no longer a member of a church but I still speak to God regularly and would say that I have a decent relationship with my Creator. It's just extremely difficult to sit still and do nothing, as far as work goes. I feel as though I need to be busy in order to be accomplishing something. But, after walking out of McDonald's, I had a better sense of happiness and ability to be still. 

Wednesday, on my way to class I was listening to a speaker on Youtube as she spoke about life patterns and how we need to recognize them when they show up in order for us to change them. And as she spoke, I realized that this was a pattern for me. I would have ebbs and flows, springs and winters, planting seasons and harvests. And I always have had an issue with the down time. I took a mental note of the seeds I've planted and what I'm expecting to come forth. So, why is it so difficult to wait for the seeds to germinate? This is a question, I do not have an answer to yet. But it will come and then and only then will I be able to change this pattern of mine. 

I look forward to taking this writing journey with whom ever is interested in going with me. Until next time.

Spartan On