I'm sitting here thinking about the past two years. Lots of things have changed.
Jan '09 started off in a nice way. Stayed at home with the family, celebrated my 10th anniversary and just enjoyed being together. Then the work week started and we were faced with a problem, my husband had just been laid off and the economy in Michigan was starting to get really bad.
Seven months passed and no job for the husband and we were faced with financial issues. We decided that the best thing for all of us was for him to take the kids down to Tennessee and look for work there. We packed the kids up, loaded the car and they were off to start a new life. I stayed behind to continue working and have some money coming in. I was basically single again.
Nick started school the day after they got to Tennessee. I missed his first bus ride. He really liked the new school and made friends the first day, even though he bet me $5 he wouldn't. I still haven't collected the $20 he owes me....($5 per friend). Paul brought the kids up for the Fall Break and we had a nice time.
About a week after they left, I was at work and started feeling nauseous and went home. A sharp pain was on my right side of my abdomen and I thought it was either a gas bubble that wouldn't break or one of my ovarian cysts again. I tried to sleep and let it go, but finally the pain was too much and I drove to the Urgent Care. I didn't mean to go there, but I couldn't drive anymore and Beaumont Hosp was still about 20 minutes away. Calling someone hadn't even crossed my mind. I get in to see a doctor and it was decided that I had appendicitis. I called Paul and had him call my parents. My first ambulance ride was interesting. The EMT's were wonderful and even had me laughing. So, my appendix was removed and I was a cranky patient when finally released from the hospital. I hated not being able to do everything myself. Paul was a patient nurse and I was soon back up and around. However, he had to go back to the kids and I was single again.
I got to see the kids at Halloween as I drove down less than two weeks after the surgery. We had a lot of fun. I went down again at Thanksgiving and the family came up at Christmas. The only upside to any of this was that I got to see my kids about every 6 weeks with school breaks. The downside was that I missed their birthdays and quite a few other firsts.
Finally, in April '10, Paul got a job and things were looking better. Now we could put a more definitive time on when I could move down and we could be a family again.
I put in my notice of resignation. This created quite a bit of guilt and sadness for me. I had been at my place of employment for 15yrs and loved being there. Not only that, but due to retirements, cut backs and the economy, I was leaving them short-handed. Hard for me to leave knowing that. But on August 7th, I was driving down to TN with a full car, a dog and knowing that a moving truck would be arriving a few days after me and I would be moving into a new home, life and the unknown.
So far, things have been pretty good. I don't work and probably won't for a while. Hard to do without getting a sitter for the kids and why pay money out when you don't have to?
Now here I am at the end of a long year and I'm wondering............What will 2011 hold for us?
