Since August of last year:
We got a new car and had it for six months. In February, we got into a car accident that totaled the car but fortunately, there were no severe injuries other than my suffering a cracked rib. It took a couple of months but we were able to get another car, this time a van. The girls still miss the car though.
In October, we took a trip up to Fond du Lac, WI to see my mom. It was the first time I had seen her in 9 years and Natalie got to meet her for the first time as well. I didn't take Isabelle since I wasn't sure how she would react to the surroundings. It wasn't too bad but it was kind of hard to see how different my mom was in some ways. Yet, she didn't really look that different at all.
Also in October, we were finally able to leave our roach infested apartment and move to a very nice neighborhood into a duplex. While we lost a bedroom (went from 3 to 2), we gained a laundry room and I feel the trade was a sufficient one as I no longer have to wash clothes once or twice a month. We did have to leave a number of things behind in order to avoid bringing any bugs with us but we've been able to replace most of it since then.
John quit his job at the local call center just a week before our car accident. He had finally heard back from a job he had been waiting a number of months for and decided just work at that one job instead of working at both of them. It never did come through as he planned, only giving him 35 hours a week when he was working 40 hours plus overtime at his other job. He lost that job (as a debt collector) in June and was unemployed for a month. Now he's working a night audit job at a local hotel (one of the best hotels in town where he actually has to dress up in a suit).
I've now completed a full year and a half of dialectical behavior therapy and I'm looking at graduating to stage 2. This program has been extremely helpful for me in terms of giving me the skills I need to keep my emotions regulated.
During John's month of unemployment, I looked into returning to the workforce. However, I quickly realized that being out of the workforce for nine years really put me at a disadvantage and decided instead to return to school. I start Monday as a student seeking an Associate's Degree in IT (Information Technology): Network Systems Administration at the local technical college. I'm very excited to be going back to school and while it's going to be a challenge, I really think it's going to help me a lot in terms of self-esteem and self-reliance.
John also returned to school. Back in April he started working on his Master's in Education degree. He is going through an online university so it's been a very interesting challenge for him as he learns the ins and outs of technology he had had no experience with the last time he attended college.
Both girls are doing well. Isabelle just turned four last month and is a bundle of energy. She has also inherited her father's build which makes finding clothes for her rather interesting. She can still wear 18 month shorts. Pants that size would be a little short on her but regular 3T pants tend to fall off her bottom. Natalie seems to have the opposite problem. She needs a larger size (especially in jeans) due to her waist but can't quite pull it off because of her height. She's not short but it just doesn't quite add up. Knit pants tend to fit her better (now I think I know why my mom rarely bothered buying me jeans when I was her age).
We joined the YMCA earlier this year and the girls have both had a chance to take some lessons. Natalie and Isabelle both took swim lessons and Isabelle also took some gymnastics lessons while she was waiting to get back into swimming. Both of them had a lot of fun and did very well. We're taking a small break right now until I can get our schedules all figured out but I hope to get them back into lessons before too long.
Natalie attended summer Bible camp for the third year in a row through her local church. As always, she had a blast and can't wait to go next year. It was a little bit of a challenge since it was during the month John was out of work but we were able to get a scholarship for the camp and made do with the things we already had.
I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting to mention, but those were the big things in the last year as far as I recall. This next year will be quite interesting as I work my way through college and juggle family and all the other things that are bound to come up. I look forward to the challenges though as I know that they will make things easier for all of us down the line. At the very least, we won't have to keep relying on just one family member for employment.
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Friday, July 11, 2014
So far 2014 has been uh, interesting, and not always in a good way.
The end of 2013 really seemed to be a turning point for all of us. We were able to get financing for a car that we all really liked and one that would be dependable for us. We were able to find a new place in a MUCH nicer neighborhood and moved there without bringing too many bugs with us (SO nice to have an apartment that wasn't crawling with roaches!). John had a dependable job with hours that gave us the money we needed and we were able to get a few things with the tax return.
Then we get to February. A job John had been waiting to hear from for some time finally became available. The original plan was to add this to the job he was already working in order to bring in more money to cover some of the extra expenses that came up from moving and owning a car. Somehow though, he had forgotten this and instead, quit the full-time job he had, just one week before starting the new job. The day before he's to start the new job, we're heading home from a friend's and get into a car accident. Our car is totaled. Insurance covered it but it takes a couple of months before we get a new car and that's a price increase. The new job, while paying more per hour, offered fewer hours. He got, at the most, 35 hours a week. We get the rental renewal notice for our place (original lease was for 8 months) and that went up $20/month to cover the water bill. Just over two weeks ago, John lost his job. They gave him the option of quitting instead of being fired and he took that, not thinking that at least if he was fired, he could have applied for unemployment.
It's been a rough couple of weeks and I'm pushing myself to get out there and do what I need to do to get back into the workforce instead of waiting for John to get another job. He doesn't seem to be all that motivated to do so this time around because in April, he started classes for his Master's degree online. His assignments seem to take up all his time now, even without having a job with it. I won't lie; I'm kind of disappointed in him but this is nothing new, unfortunately. What's different this time is is that I don't have a newborn or even a toddler dependent on me. My youngest will be 4 and has been weaned for awhile now. I'm trying to take this as a sign that it's time for ME to step up and do what needs to be done for the family.
It's not going to be easy though and I'm looking into all my options as far as assistance with job searching and what not. I've been working on getting my driver's license and I may look into going back to school as well. At 33 years old, I'm finally really working on my independence. I wish I could rely on my husband. His religious beliefs do seem to stem from an idea that the male is to be the provider for the family. But lately, I've been seeing that restlessness in him, that restlessness that brings us trouble. There's only so many times I can go through this before I have to decide that enough is enough, that the way things are being done currently just is not working.
So, I'm working on it, I'm trying to figure out what I want to do with my life and figure out how to make my OWN life a life worth living because really, I can't just keep following him around and watching him live his life the way he wants. I need to figure out what I want out of my own life and then do what it takes to get that life. It's a scary thing. It's all too easy to just sit there and watch life go by but I'm not happy with how this year is going and I can't keep waiting for it all to get better without doing anything to make it better. I have to push on and do what needs to be done.
I don't know what that is going to do to our relationship. I've been so dependent on him for so long that I think changing things around the other way will be a challenge. We'll see, I guess.
Then we get to February. A job John had been waiting to hear from for some time finally became available. The original plan was to add this to the job he was already working in order to bring in more money to cover some of the extra expenses that came up from moving and owning a car. Somehow though, he had forgotten this and instead, quit the full-time job he had, just one week before starting the new job. The day before he's to start the new job, we're heading home from a friend's and get into a car accident. Our car is totaled. Insurance covered it but it takes a couple of months before we get a new car and that's a price increase. The new job, while paying more per hour, offered fewer hours. He got, at the most, 35 hours a week. We get the rental renewal notice for our place (original lease was for 8 months) and that went up $20/month to cover the water bill. Just over two weeks ago, John lost his job. They gave him the option of quitting instead of being fired and he took that, not thinking that at least if he was fired, he could have applied for unemployment.
It's been a rough couple of weeks and I'm pushing myself to get out there and do what I need to do to get back into the workforce instead of waiting for John to get another job. He doesn't seem to be all that motivated to do so this time around because in April, he started classes for his Master's degree online. His assignments seem to take up all his time now, even without having a job with it. I won't lie; I'm kind of disappointed in him but this is nothing new, unfortunately. What's different this time is is that I don't have a newborn or even a toddler dependent on me. My youngest will be 4 and has been weaned for awhile now. I'm trying to take this as a sign that it's time for ME to step up and do what needs to be done for the family.
It's not going to be easy though and I'm looking into all my options as far as assistance with job searching and what not. I've been working on getting my driver's license and I may look into going back to school as well. At 33 years old, I'm finally really working on my independence. I wish I could rely on my husband. His religious beliefs do seem to stem from an idea that the male is to be the provider for the family. But lately, I've been seeing that restlessness in him, that restlessness that brings us trouble. There's only so many times I can go through this before I have to decide that enough is enough, that the way things are being done currently just is not working.
So, I'm working on it, I'm trying to figure out what I want to do with my life and figure out how to make my OWN life a life worth living because really, I can't just keep following him around and watching him live his life the way he wants. I need to figure out what I want out of my own life and then do what it takes to get that life. It's a scary thing. It's all too easy to just sit there and watch life go by but I'm not happy with how this year is going and I can't keep waiting for it all to get better without doing anything to make it better. I have to push on and do what needs to be done.
I don't know what that is going to do to our relationship. I've been so dependent on him for so long that I think changing things around the other way will be a challenge. We'll see, I guess.
Monday, June 9, 2014
So here I am, almost a year later.
Where did the time go? It's June again and rather than wait until the week of the anniversary to deal with it, I'm trying to prepare and deal with it now. Not sure what that is all going to entail but distracting myself and trying to forget about it certainly didn't help. It happened and while the anniversary is nowhere near as bad as the event was itself, there are still a lot of emotions bottled up inside, emotions that are very much like a sealed and shaken bottle of soda, just waiting for the moment someone unsuspecting opens the cap.
There's still a lot I have not dealt with. Other than a few cards, I have not spoken with my dad since the impact statement I made in November of 2004. I talk to my mom fairly regularly as she calls me (collect but at least it's not too expensive). Part of the reason for this stems from our very rocky relationship when I was growing up. He was never an easy person to talk to, he was often volatile, and you just never knew what would set him off so it was just easier to avoid him which really was a shame because we're very much alike in our interests. When he did take the time to actually talk (as opposed to venting about my mom or older sister), he had a lot of knowledge and is a very intelligent person but very very often unapproachable. His constant anger and dislike of people and the world eventually drove us all away and so, in the years since the murder (which, as far as that goes, wasn't all that surprising a thing to have happened considering how volatile he was), I never really talked to him. A big part of that has been that fear of rejection as he had rejected me so many times while I was growing up. It had always been easier to control the relationship I have with my mom (especially now) but I never felt that way about my dad.
There are a lot of difficult and conflicting emotions to wade through and for the most part, I'm alone in that journey. For many, it's easier to just move on and forget about it but really, it's not that easy or that simple. It may have been almost 11 years but the impact of that day is still there. The loss of parental units (even if that loss is incarceration and not death) is still a loss and it was at such a time in my life where that loss was very acutely felt. I was 22 years old and still in need of some parental guidance. Since that time, I have been more or less swimming the waters of adulthood alone with no one to really get any advice from. Eleven years later and I'm still having trouble accepting that I'm pretty much on my own.
There's still a lot I have not dealt with. Other than a few cards, I have not spoken with my dad since the impact statement I made in November of 2004. I talk to my mom fairly regularly as she calls me (collect but at least it's not too expensive). Part of the reason for this stems from our very rocky relationship when I was growing up. He was never an easy person to talk to, he was often volatile, and you just never knew what would set him off so it was just easier to avoid him which really was a shame because we're very much alike in our interests. When he did take the time to actually talk (as opposed to venting about my mom or older sister), he had a lot of knowledge and is a very intelligent person but very very often unapproachable. His constant anger and dislike of people and the world eventually drove us all away and so, in the years since the murder (which, as far as that goes, wasn't all that surprising a thing to have happened considering how volatile he was), I never really talked to him. A big part of that has been that fear of rejection as he had rejected me so many times while I was growing up. It had always been easier to control the relationship I have with my mom (especially now) but I never felt that way about my dad.
There are a lot of difficult and conflicting emotions to wade through and for the most part, I'm alone in that journey. For many, it's easier to just move on and forget about it but really, it's not that easy or that simple. It may have been almost 11 years but the impact of that day is still there. The loss of parental units (even if that loss is incarceration and not death) is still a loss and it was at such a time in my life where that loss was very acutely felt. I was 22 years old and still in need of some parental guidance. Since that time, I have been more or less swimming the waters of adulthood alone with no one to really get any advice from. Eleven years later and I'm still having trouble accepting that I'm pretty much on my own.
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