i just don’t get it and i feel so stupid for even feeling like this and i know everyone says it’s fine and my sister was like it’s totally ok and my nephew won’t even remember and i know that and i totally understand that but it’s his first birthday and i missed it because of grading seventh grade essays on animal farm which like i love teaching and i love my students and i want them to do well and i want to be a good teacher but it was a saturday and the party was at 2pm and i was still at school until almost 5pm and i just kept thinking about it and i could literally hear my sister singing happy birthday in my head and i just felt this like… deep disequilibrium and i didn't even cry or anything but i just felt so off kilter. and i know it’s just one party and i see him all the time and i’m like the fun aunt and i bring him books and i read to him and he laughs at me but this felt different like a really specific missed milestone and i kept telling myself it was a choice and a necessary sacrifice for my career and my students but that didn’t make the feeling go away and i kept thinking about all the little details like the smash cake and the little party hat and him trying to grab the frosting and i just felt like this really profound sense of… absence and it felt like i was watching a movie of my life where i was supposed to be there but i wasn’t. and when i got home my sister had sent me videos and he was so cute covered in cake and everyone looked so happy and i watched it like ten times and i tried to feel happy for them and i *was* happy for him but underneath it there was this really intense affective flattening and i just felt nothing and everything all at once which i know is a contradiction but that’s exactly what it felt like and i just kept going over the decision in my head like i could have graded some more on friday night or i could have done less on saturday morning but i just kept going and going until they were all done. and i was so proud of finishing them and getting them back to the kids on monday but then this feeling just like hit me out of nowhere and i literally don’t know what this affect is and i can’t pinpoint it and it’s not sadness or anger or regret exactly it’s more like a low-grade anhedonia mixed with this weird sense of… like a cognitive dissonance between what i think i *should* feel and what i actually feel and i was just exhausted and mentally spent but also hyper-aware of the fact that i wasn’t there and my family was celebrating without me. and now it’s 2am and i’m still awake just replaying the day and replaying the decision and wondering if i made the right choice and i know it was the responsible choice and the professional choice but i just feel like i traded something really precious for something that just feels… empty now and i just don’t understand this emotional response and i wish i could just switch it off or label it or understand why it feels so weighty when it was just one party and i still have so much to do tomorrow.