The Inner World of a Particular Free Spirit

Although Lark (pseudonym) is in her sixties, she does not look it. She sports wavy brown hair and a baseball cap, looking like she might be in her forties. She speaks energetically, freely declaring her opinions. Lark shares about her childhood, her experiences in the military, and lifelong tendencies that have shaped her life.

Lark's family divided their time between their home in Florida and their summer home nestled in the mountains of North Carolina. Lark was happier in North Carolina, where she felt more at peace and where she loved swimming in the nearby lake. As the summer months transitioned into fall, the family usually remained in North Carolina in an effort to avoid the "unbelievably humid and hot" Florida weather. The extended stay meant that Lark started each school year in North Carolina, before being unceremoniously uprooted mid-semester (usually in November) to return to Florida.

While Lark was provided for physically and financially, her parents were "not ones to hug" or to tell their children that they loved them. Both Lark's mother and father were "very old-fashioned" and were more passionate about their individual interests than being parents. One time, Lark's mother told Lark that she and Lark's father "should have just only had animals, and no kids." Lark agrees with that sentiment: her parents never offered "real love" and they "didn't know how to emotionally put themselves out there." Instead of offering support, they focused on what Lark was doing wrong, such as what she said or how she dressed. It was "not a loving, warm, close-knit family at all."

Pretty early on in her childhood, Lark came to the conclusion that her parents "weren't like other parents." When Lark spent time over at her friends' houses, she noticed that her friends' parents also did not want to be around her parents, and had only "bad things to say about them." She remembers that she "got it coming from everybody… that nobody liked [her] parents." In fact, in the entire time that Lark lived with her parents, she never saw them have company or friends over.

For her part, Lark was shy and had few friends growing up. She made one close friend "up in the mountains" of North Carolina, but generally preferred to be by herself. Her family also preferred to reside in more remote areas. Being "in the middle of nowhere," with not many residents, Lark's parents did not seem to care if she made friends or had social connections. Lark spent her time playing alone outdoors, developing an appreciation for nature and for the mountains. In Florida, Lark cared for her guinea pigs and dogs, and she also rode horses.

Early romances

In her "tiny" high school in North Carolina, Lark became a cheerleader at one point ("believe it or not," she quips). She also had a couple of boyfriends ("good people from good families"). In particular, she admired them for being intelligent and responsible.

Lark's second boyfriend was a "tough" guy with a penchant for motorcycles. He taught Lark how to ride. Her parents were concerned about her riding, which Lark found "amazing" – she could not believe that they actually "worried about [her]," after their years of detached parenting. Lark dated this boyfriend from when she was sixteen through her last year of high school. They would write to each other when she left for Florida and reconnect anytime Lark returned to North Carolina.

One winter, Lark's boyfriend came down to Florida to visit her. When it was time for him to leave, Lark told him, "Let's just go. Let's just take your car and go." Lark ran away with her boyfriend back to North Carolina, until her father came to bring her home. Upon reflection, Lark realizes that no specific incident "triggered" her desire to run away. She just wanted an escape from her parents. With greater perspective, Lark also traces her flight to her characteristic impulsiveness and unconscious need to self-sabotage.

A Fleeting Marriage

After graduation from high school, Lark decided to join the Air Force. She completed basic training and underwent Air Traffic Control training to prepare her to become a radar approach controller. The training program lasted over a year and Lark surprised herself by mastering the challenging phraseology.

While in the Air Force, Lark met a man who also served in the Air Force, and they soon got married. Lark notes "It was stupid. Way too young to be married." They were naive and Lark describes herself at that time as "way too crazy." She reflects that she "didn't have a clue about life" at that time and found herself "always in trouble with financial stuff." Her parents "didn't care" that Lark was married and did not bother to advise her on marital life. Lark and her husband fought bitterly following the wedding and would aggressively "throw things at each other." In several instances, the police were called due to their loud fighting. Even still, Lark maintains that this husband was "a really nice guy." They mutually split after a short time and divorced years later.

Faced with the immense responsibility of coordinating millions of dollars of equipment and with lives on the line, Lark says that many people find the radar approach controller role to be highly stressful. She shares that "If I continued being an air traffic controller or radar approach controller, I would have probably killed myself – which a lot of people do… There's a high suicide rate." As a result, Lark decided to find a more fitting position in the Coast Guard.

Becoming a Mother

After an abbreviated bootcamp and some time in the service, Lark was sent to an official Coast Guard school to study operations and administration. Everything seemed "pretty great" at first. Lark found a new love interest at the school ("Another really great guy, super gorgeous"). Just as they were starting their relationship, a friend of Lark's new boyfriend sexually assaulted her. Lark kept the assault a secret, not even telling her boyfriend or her parents; she remembers that she "just didn't talk about it with anybody. Nobody knew… I was so embarrassed. And I thought maybe I brought it on myself." The assailant was "on his way out" of the Coast Guard school and Lark continued seeing her boyfriend, pushing away her memory of the assault into a dark, dusty corner of mind.

After completing her Coast Guard schooling, Lark took on an administrative office role. She worked in and out of the Pentagon and was at one point stationed at the Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, D.C. Lark ultimately left the Coast Guard after three years of service ("a little bit early") due to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from the assault. Looking back, Lark regrets not staying in the Coast Guard longer and she wishes she chose to work on a ship and travel the world instead of staying at desk jobs.

After leaving the Coast Guard, Lark began working "little odd jobs" and attending school. She was still with her boyfriend from the Coast Guard, although their relationship was "on and off" through her late twenties and thirties. Lark takes ownership of some of their relational turbulence, attributing it to her "roller coaster" personality and her tendency to be impulsive and "unstable." While Lark was "lots of fun" and enjoyed impromptu travel, she is certain that her boyfriend "got sick of [her]." However, she also recognizes that her boyfriend "was difficult, too." Following her brief first marriage, Lark never wanted to marry again, including marrying this boyfriend. Lark thought she did not possess "the right personality" to "be able to stay married." Further, Lark says she is atypical of most women in that marriage "never appealed" to her.

Lark and her boyfriend, however, did have two children, both of whom were "accidents." Shortly after Lark became pregnant with their first child, they split up. They reconciled a few years later when Lark broke her foot. He came to help her, and she accidentally got pregnant again with their second child, a boy. At that point, her boyfriend told Lark that he was "done" with her. Lark decided to have the second child, although the boyfriend had initially not wanted children, he eagerly took on the role of being a father.

As someone who shies away from long-term commitment, parenting was daunting for Lark. Although Lark "wasn't a perfect parent," she made a concerted effort to not repeat her own parents' many failings and mistakes. She openly expressed her love and offered frequent hugs. She reminded her children of how great they were and "how what they're doing is wonderful," even when she felt differently. Following her own roots, she also brought her children up to appreciate the outdoors. While Lark's children's father (who later married someone else) provided stability, Lark "provided other cool things too." Most importantly, Lark has always been accepting of her children and their individuality. Lark's son is gay, which is a "big problem" for his father, but not for Lark.

Understanding Her Inner World

In addition to co-parenting, Lark went to school and worked short stints at a number of jobs. For a while, the jobs were odd jobs that she could juggle while she raised her kids. Eventually, she landed a job in the IT department of a large company, launching her career as a technical writer. Even still, Lark found that she is unable to stay at jobs for extended periods of time, turning down permanent employment from large, stable companies. She never wanted to feel "tied down" and feared that on an emotional level, she could not "successfully pull it off."

At one point in her forties, Lark needed a place to stay and found a room, probably off of Craigslist. Her roommate was an intuitive counselor and they became personal friends. As they got to know each other, they started talking about Lark's fear of long-term commitment, whether in personal relationships or in work. The therapist roommate helped Lark identify a habit of self-sabotage. Feeling enlightened by this discovery, Lark began researching her symptoms. She came upon the condition known as borderline personality disorder (BPD) in her research, and realized that she had many of its symptoms, including impulsivity and a pattern of unstable relationships. For example, while Lark is attracted to stable men, she finds herself growing "bored." She feels that her unpredictability and self-sabotaging cause her to "do stupid things" that "boyfriends… just don't want to deal with." Now, Lark says she no longer needs "to deal with relationships at all," as she feels past the age of romantic attachments. She learned long ago, back in her early childhood, that she was one to be fiercely independent and her "own best friend."

Lark subsequently received an official borderline personality disorder (BPD) diagnosis from a therapist through her health insurance. However, since Lark did not exhibit all of the associated symptoms (specifically, Lark is not "aggressive and dangerous" nor is she "super suicidal"), her therapist was "on the fence" and "was not one hundred percent sure" that Lark indeed had borderline personality disorder. The therapist also suggested that Lark could be "in remission" from the condition. Having completed her own research, Lark maintains that she has the condition - "it makes perfect sense." She believes that her borderline personality disorder can be traced to her parents' lack of affection, suspecting that her parents' neglect "set her up" to lack emotional intelligence and to repeatedly self-sabotage.

While Lark ultimately found therapy helpful, she is disappointed that it did not have a stronger effect on her. She still often experiences an inability to "get along with people." "I'm still the same crazy person," she explains. However, therapy did help Lark improve her intellectual and emotional understanding of human behavior, allowing her to gain perspective on the disorder's effect on her past and present.

Lark also still grapples with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from the Coast Guard incident. As she "didn't seek help for years," it layered "on top of [her] already having borderline." She is frequently overcome with anxiety and gets "triggered" in public, such as when people walk behind her. This uneasiness leads Lark to often retreat into solitude. In 2019, Lark wrote a claim for PTSD stemming from the incident. From Lark's written testimony and an in-person interview with a doctor, Lark was recognized with PTSD and awarded compensation. Looking back, Lark feels that she would have healed more if she had reported the assault and not compartmentalized it. Lark has found that having a dog has helped her manage this anxiety, a symptom of PTSD. Although not trained as a service dog, Lark's dog had performed many of a service dog's duties. If Lark became anxious about entering a room full of people, the dog would "redirect" Lark and compel her away from self-isolation. Lark thinks that her dog "helped more than any therapist." A secondary solution for her PTSD is anti-anxiety medication, which Lark currently takes, but she still thinks the dog had more impact.

When reflecting on her current life, Lark shares that she does not mind being alone. In fact, she "loves it" and enjoyed the solitude the pandemic offered her. However, with decades of life experience accrued, Lark sometimes looks back and wishes she was more stable at certain junctures. Her advice to others dealing with instability and BPD is to seek therapy. Many people with mental health issues "just don't want to go to therapy." Lark confides that she "fell into that category… for many years." She also recommends adopting a dog, if one is able to provide and care for it. Most importantly, Lark emphasizes, "try to listen and try to keep an open mind."