Fragile, family, 40 and facing the future. All Fs, all relevant at the moment.

I remember my dad's mid-life crisis. Crises. There was one for his 40th birthday and one for his 50th. Each lasted just one day. He's never been one for overdoing it, my dad.
For his 40th we took a daytrip to Rye. It was bank holiday money and there's a tradition of the mayor throwing hot pennies out of the guildhall window for the crowds below to try and catch. My dad grumped a bit, refused to join in and said "well!" a lot - he doesn't swear, ever.
For his 50th he bought a little green sports convertible (a Eunos, I think), a few years old with a leaky roof. My parents had a happy few years cruising bumpily around the English countryside until they sold it for a far more comfortable Volvo version.
Now I'm a few years away from 40, but my husband reaches that landmark age this year.

It's definitely a period of change for us, but there's no way this could be construed as a mid-life crisis. Is there? My husband's done ok so far. He's got the new baby, the new job, the househunting... all of this against a background of little sleep, ongoing illnesses (never enough time to get properly recovered), loss of a grandparent, our car accident, stupidly long working hours, a stressful job. It's certainly been tough, in it's way.

The thing is it's not just him. I'm feeling restless too.
I'm happy to be married, delighted to have a son and accept that with the joy this set up brings there is extra responsibility and extra stress and complication. I know all that and wouldn't change it for the world. I'm lucky to have a husband, son and extended family that love me and support me. The change I think I need is in my career.

I was lucky enough to find the career I wanted to do before leaving university, and get accepted on a very prestigious graduate training programme. I've worked incredibly hard and with some success in various forms in different jobs, for over 8 years. Some of it I've loved, some of it I've hated with a passion but that's usually been due to the actions of people rather than the nature of the work.
But the context of my sector has changed. Now in order to get promotion, or even to maintain the level I've already achieved, I'm told I'm going to have to leave the stuff I love and am good at and can really make a difference with, and take up things I didn't come into it for and don't feel called to do in the same way.
This is the easy option, staying in the same career, moving around between vacancies, learning the vocabulary to rebrand my skills depending on the latest trends. It may be that that is the right thing, that by working in areas that don't appeal on things I don't care about I'll learn new and interesting things about the world and about myself. I might be challenged, fulfilled and happier than ever.
But it might not work like that. Maternity leave is giving me the opportunity to think about this in some depth. And I guess the key question is this: is it worth doing something I don't want to do because it's the easy choice, or finding out if there's something I want to do more?
In my sector we describe what we are doing as requiring pace, pride, professionalism and passion. That's the 4 Ps of the title.  I want to see if these fit for me.

I know I need to do something fast moving - pace- to keep me stimulated and motivated.
I need to feel pride in what I'm achieving, to see the difference I am making. I have had that in the best of my posts in my organisation, but some other bits have felt completely pointless.
I've always been professional - if I'm not doing something to the best of my ability I feel like I'm letting myself and others down. But I don't see the point of qualifications for the sake of it. For specific jobs yes - I'd want a finance director to be qualified in accountancy. But I didn't want to be an accountant. And there are some things, like communications, management etc. where I'm just not clear that the people I know with qualifications are actually any better at it than those with a natural flare and some experience. So professional yes, but professional qualifications to demonstrate skills rather than skill and experience?

But it's passion that really matters. I was passionate about the reasons I joined my profession, I still am. But right at the moment I'm not clear it's going to be enough.
I need to work out what my passions are now, what motivates me, where I want to be, how it fits with childcare arrangements that enable me to be the primary person bringing up our son and, if I'm honest, how much I need to get paid doing it.

I keep being told that the longer you are out of the office, the more your doubts and insecurities get to you and you start feeling that you're not good at what you used to do. I know what they mean, but part of me knows that I was, and am good at my job. I'm just not sure that's enough.
But moving on to something else? Doing this in the face of an economic downturn is possibly not the most sensible thing I could be thinking about. Probably most sensible to keep your head down, do what you are told, play the game and hope you weather the storm. But I'm not sure that I'm that person.

It's all a bit of a scary prospect. I'm feeling a bit fragile. There's another F-word. And we're praying about it - that's another P - but whatever we work through together I want to make the right decision and avoid another F-word, a f*** up...