Leah Fisher will discuss her memoir on how she found fulfillment in the third phase of life on Jan. 11 at 2 p.m. in the Garden Room of the Orinda Library.
When Leah Fisher graduated from college in the 1960s, she dreamed of traveling the world and serving in the Peace Corps. Instead, she married, established a successful psychotherapy practice, settled down in Orinda and raised two children.
In her 60s, with her children grown, Fisher found herself yearning for that unfulfilled dream. “It gnawed at me,” she said. “I had forgiven myself for so many things, but that one I couldn’t let go of because it meant that I hadn’t followed my heart. Instead, I was following my parents’ and society’s expectations of what a good woman and wife should do.”
The solution was to seize the day, take a sabbatical and travel. The challenge was her husband didn’t share her dream. For many couples, this would have led to resentment, but Leah and Chuck used the communication skills they had honed over 38 years of marriage to negotiate an agreement: Fisher would travel solo for a year. Her account of this transformative experience, “My Marriage Sabbatical: A Memoir of Solo Travel and Lasting Love” launches this month.
Fisher wasn’t running from the empty nest or marital issues; she was running to the realization of buried dreams and the rediscovery of herself.
“It was non-negotiable that I would return as my husband’s wife,” she said. “Had there been any doubts, I wouldn’t have gone.”
Fisher’s journey took place in three segments over two years, beginning and ending in Guatemala. This structure allowed her the flexibility to return home for key events, such as spending her mother’s final days with her. Her travels spanned Costa Rica, Indonesia, Cuba and Columbia, ranging from relatively safe to more challenging destinations. She chronicles surviving the 2006 Yogyakarta earthquake in Java, where she stayed in a rebar-reinforced hotel while witnessing buildings flattened to rubble outside.
Her goal was to travel without feeling lonely or fearful, and to see if her clinical skills could be applied globally. “Being on your own is real, but aloneness is just an idea,” she said. “It’s your fears that change one into the other. What’s really terrifying is letting go of the familiar to walk into the unknown.”
Fisher’s clinical background proved invaluable, especially when she was living in an indigenous community in Guatemala that was recovering from devastating mudslides. She translated and adapted a trauma-reduction workbook into Spanish for the children. Because many of the places she stayed were with families, she became a “global grandma” and maintains many of these relationships today.
The time apart also revitalized her marriage. Chuck visited every six weeks, sharing adventures and deepening their bond. “As couples get older, the relationship they had while raising their families can feel stale,” she explained. “But traveling independently showed me that we were together because we truly wanted to be, not out of habit.”
The Fishers moved to Orinda in 1993 with plans to return to Berkeley once their two children graduated high school. However, they fell in love with the town and put down roots.
Today, Fisher lives by the mantra, “people, purpose and play.” In addition to being a grandmother of four, she participates in the Threshold Choir, an outdoor boot camp (Camp Menopause in Moraga) and cofounded a weekly meditation group.
She views the third stage of life, after work and family, as a time for self-fulfillment. “It’s about feeling full, not in a bucket-list way, but by exploring and expressing all of who you are.”
Leah Fisher’s book launch, sponsored by the Friends of the Library, will be held in the Garden Room at the Orinda Library on Saturday, Jan. 11 at 2 p.m. Books will be available for sale by Orinda Books.
