You know how popular culture reinvented capability to not be about inborn ability, but resilience? “It’s not about how many times you fall off the horse, but how many times you get back up.”

I failed that litmus test. I quit. Not only did I quit, I spiraled. Coping mechanisms were my life for 5 or 6 years. It’s almost 15 years later. I’m in a good place professionally. I work at the local DA’s office. I contribute. I’m valued. But there was this underlying misunderstanding. No one could understand why I gave up; why I wasn’t an attorney.

Despite that, because of the relative comfort of my position, I applied for and took the bar in February. I had to tell my boss. And I had to tell 2 assistant DA’s I work with because the character and fitness portion of the application asks for references from a spectrum of your life. Over time, it got out. Everyone knew I was taking it. Everyone knows I took it. And the pressure that destroyed me the first time around is back.

Every single time it’s brought up, I couch everything in the conditional because I don’t trust myself to pass. “If I pass, then.” I have a job set aside for me at my office. Everyone is telling me I’m being too negative. And I’m 90% sure I failed. I didn’t realize examsoft was the new normal, so I was one of 14 handwriters in my state. I bombed the secured transaction essay question. And I’m dreading having to disappoint everyone the way I did 15 years ago. Thank god I didn’t tell my family this time around. I think I’m set on going at it again…so I have at least that much resilience in me. But there’s a real part of me that worries thst I’m going to react the way I did the first time around.