Rising Like A Sparkling Phoenix Just Like Jenna Lyons
By: Jennifer Barnett
Tags: Career Change, Personal Essay, Fashion, Celebrity, New Beginnings

We’re both moving forward after leaving careers we loved before we were ready.

On the surface, I guess I knew I had a lot in common with Jenna Lyons. I’m also known as Jenna to my older family members; we’re nearly the same age and so are our sons, both of whom enjoyed having their toenails painted; we both worked in fashion in NYC and have a passion for blending sparkles with drawstring pants; and we were both forced out of careers we loved before we were ready to leave.

Bold Jenna, courting controversy

What I didn’t realize was how similar and bleak we both found our post-mega-career life, and how difficult it would be to pick up the pieces. It turns out, Jenna and I are living parallel lives.

In a recent profile for the New York Post, Jenna gave a surprisingly candid interview in which she’s brutally honest and vulnerable about the darkness she experienced after she left her career, revealing how her initial aspirations for her post-J.Crew life — ‘She planned to brush up on her French, learn how to dance and maybe whip her body into killer shape’ — fizzled out, leaving her feeling isolated and unmoored, instead spending her time alone on her couch in front of the TV: “I did none of those things. I was struggling. I think I was probably depressed. I had a real internal crisis. I didn’t realize how much of my identity was connected to the brand,” Jenna said in the interview with the New York Post.

Jenna in the NY Post profile where she’s shockingly honest and vulnerable about what leaving behind the J.Crew brand meant with so much of her own identity tied to it.

Hearing Jenna talk about what it was like to leave her career resonated deeply with me.

Jenna came into my life the first time I left my career, when I left my job as managing editor of Teen Vogue and moved from NYC to Virginia shortly after my son was born. After a brief stop in my parent’s basement, my husband and I bought a townhouse in Reston, Virginia and I settled into my new life there.

Soon I was interviewing for jobs at regional magazines, but the wardrobe I had from my high-fashion magazine days wasn’t quite right for the suburbs or conservative Washington, D.C. After seeing Michelle Obama’s inauguration day coat, I fell in love with the J. Crew catalog. The coats, the sequined jackets, the tissue-tees with fluttery and sparkly bits, but most of all, the earrings: Perfect, crystal chandelier kind that suited me best.

I could never quite pull off the contrasting patterns like Jenna could, but stripes and chandelier earrings became my signature look.

Jenna’s Picks helped me dress for work but her brand extended to her personal life, which I found especially attractive, particularly when it came to her home. I took the Domino magazine virtual tour of her townhouse and marveled at the chalk paint and the bathtub with feet in the bedroom. No longer confined to a one-bedroom apartment, I now lived in a whole-ass townhouse with an actual hallway that led to more rooms, and Jenna’s townhouse served as the aspirational blueprint for what I wanted my home — and life — to look like.

Chalkboard painted walls and a bathtub with feet IN THE BEDROOM

As Jenna’s career soared, so did mine. After bouncing around at regional magazines and weathering the financial crash of 2008 at a non-profit publication, I finally broke back into the big leagues when I became the managing editor of The Atlantic. We moved to our dream house in Falls Church, Virginia. I thrived professionally and personally and looked great doing it and so did Jenna.

But then it all came crashing down.

Jenna was fired from J.Crew. I quit The Atlantic because of a terrible boss who abused his staff and his power. I told everyone I was leaving to focus on my family and to finally write the book I’d always dreamed of writing. Some of those things came true. But mostly I fell into a deep, dark hole. After I quit I ate sheet cake, buried myself in volunteer work, Marched, went to therapy, wrote a collection of stories that remain unpublished, took horse back riding lessons, I drank too much then stopped drinking alcohol, I did a photo shoot at the Watergate while dressed as Jackie O that my photographer friend insisted would make me feel empowered and I watched the Faye Dunaway “Don’t Fuck With Me Fellas” clip from Mommy Dearest repeatedly before the photo shoot to psych myself up. Still, I didn’t feel empowered. Nothing was exorcising the events of my job that led me to quit. They were always there, right under the surface. I felt like a failure. I lost my confidence, and along with it, my ambition. I spent a lot of time alone on the couch watching TV.

Much like Jenna, I climbed out of the depths slowly, humbly, lowering my expectations, checking my pride, taking tentative baby steps.

Jenna began taking lunches with anyone who called. She opened herself up to opportunities outside of fashion, taking on a project to design a furniture line at a boutique hotel that expanded to designing staff uniforms. Now she’s working on a beauty line and will launch a set of faux eyelashes with a patented tool for easy application, which I’m most intrigued by. No one tells you your eyelashes fall out in your 40s. Consider yourself warned.

Jenna doing business lady things

Jenna’s feeling the energy of creating art in new ways. She’s finding her groove.

Five years later, I’m still working on getting my own groove back. Since moving to Amsterdam, my wounds are healing. I’m writing again, and I always feel best when I’m writing. I approach it as creating my art, nursing my craft, figuring out what kind of writer I want to be. I’ve found a community of writers whose work is similar to mine and I’m cultivating an audience. I can feel my spark, and I’m nourishing my tiny flame.

I’m also rooting for Jenna, and I hope her dream of returning to the full glory of a career centered in fashion comes to fruition. I hope her flame burns to bonfire level heights once again, not just for her, but also for me. I need her guiding light.

Also, when I eventually get my book deal and ensuing tour, I’m going to need something sparkly to wear with my drawstring pants.