One Year Into Sudden Retirement (and I Finally Exhaled)

It’s been one year, today, since I made the decision to leave my job because the environment had become toxic.

Not “kind of stressful” toxic.
The kind that seeps into your sleep, your patience, and your Sunday nights.

The first week after I left was… a lot.
There were all the emotions — relief, anger, fear, hope — often cycling through in the same hour. I rage-cleaned like it was an Olympic sport. Closets were purged. Cabinets reorganized. If something sat still too long, it was in danger of being donated.

There was also a lot of soul searching.
The quiet kind. The “who am I without this job?” kind. The kind that sneaks up on you while you’re wiping down baseboards at 10 a.m. on a Tuesday.

The months that followed were a roller coaster.
Some days felt exciting and full of possibility. Other days felt unsettling and unfamiliar. I missed the structure, questioned my decisions, and wondered what do I do now — usually while folding laundry for the third time that day.

It wasn’t until the last three months that something finally clicked.

I began to feel the comfort of retirement.
The freedom.
The ability to plan my day without mentally checking work emails, deadlines, or unfinished projects.

For the first time in years, my time felt like it belonged to me.

I learned that there are other ways to earn income if I need to — and just as importantly, other ways to spend my days creatively. I found myself writing again. Baking. Gardening. Creating just because I wanted to, not because someone expected something from me.

I spent time with my husband, my daughter, and my granddaughters without the nagging guilt of “I should be working on something.” No mental to-do list running in the background. No unfinished project tapping me on the shoulder.

And somewhere along the way, I started enjoying things again.

Rediscovering myself has been amazing — and it’s still ongoing.
Because here’s the thing no one really warns you about:
We lose pieces of ourselves to jobs, responsibilities, expectations, and other people’s priorities. Slowly. Quietly. Almost without noticing.

Sudden retirement didn’t give me everything back all at once.
But it gave me space.
And in that space, I’m finding myself again — one day, one project, one peaceful morning at a time.

Turns out leaving a toxic job doesn’t solve everything… but it does dramatically reduce the number of Sunday-night stomachaches — and increases the amount of baked goods in the house.