Goodbye New Orleans, and Goodbye Tulane
Today, I made a really hard decision. I denied a PhD offer at Tulane to start over again, to leave my comfortable home in New Orleans, and to pursue a new dream, working at Harvard’s psychiatric hospital, McLean Hospital on research on I absolutely love.
It’s really hard to explain just how I feel right now and the wave of emotions I’ve experienced in the past week, and the past month in general in the wake of this change. I feel scared, overwhelmed and excited for a new chapter in Boston, while simultaneously my heart is breaking to leave my little home, safe place and community I’ve found in New Orleans.
My heart breaks to leave my beautiful little apartment, my sacred space, to leave my school, and to leave the city that welcomed me into its arms like an old friend. Most of all it hurts, it hurts to say goodbye to Tulane and the neuroscience department there. How much I’ve learned about myself and my life’s purpose, the amount of growth I’ve experience and how much each teacher and friend in the program has touched my heart deeply these past months is really hard to put into words. I felt at home here, for what feels like the first time in my life, with my fellow grad students, my fellow neuroscientists. Tulane was where I was supposed to be for this time. I knew it in my heart and soul every minute here.
In all of this, I still so deeply grieve the goodbye I wanted with New Orleans and the end of my masters that I didn’t get to experience. I thought I would grieve this when the quarantine first started and it would pass, but that was not the case—it has been a constant longing since this has all started, coming in waves of sorrow that threaten to swallow me whole. And there is anger too for the last two months of my time here that were stollen from me. Along with the constant stress and fear we all feel around the state of the world in these times. These next few weeks will be tear filled I know, as I finish up my masters at a Tulane and prepare to leave New Orleans, two places that have meant the world to me. These weeks would have been challenging with or without the corona, but the tears that fall now are different tears that long for an ending I will never get to experience.
In all of this of sadness, all I can be is so grateful that I got to experience the most amazing 9 months in New Orleans at Tulane. I know immense grief comes from immense love and I know I loved this place and this program more than I can put into words.
Thank you New Orleans. Thank you Tulane. Thank you to my cohort. Thank you to my new friends here. Thank to my lovely little apartment. Thank you to the professors who believed in me. Thank you to everything and everyone that made this place feel like home for me and helped me in following my life’s purpose in neuroscience. This time will always hold a special place in my heart. And Nola, you will always be my home.
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In all of this, here is to making hard, gut-wrenching choices in the pursuit of growth. Here is to choosing fear over comfort. And, here is to another new beginning, as I work toward creating the life of my dreams and learning as much as I can along the way.
~Much love and deepest intentions,
Madeline B.