I Have to Let You Grow Up

"Why did the fairy godmother cry at the end of the play, momma?" asked my older daughter as she was obviously still contemplating the steady stream of tears that flowed from the senior actress's eyes as she took one last bow on the stage of probably one of her greatest childhood memories.

"As excited as she may about college and growing up and whatever awaits her in the next chapter of her life, it's always a little sad to say good bye to the chapter in your life you're ending," I told her. They still looked slightly confused. "Our lives consist of chapters. Your childhood here with us is  your first chapter. Then you start a second one after you graduate school, and how many you write depends on how many doors you open and close in your life. But we all write several chapters as our lives are constantly changing and growing. You know how mommy use to grow up in Missouri where Nene and Papa and Aunt Kel and Te are, right?" At their nod I continued, "Well, as excited as I was to start a new exciting chapter out here with your dad where we would hopefully create the life that we did end up creating here with you kids, I was closing a huge chapter in my life back home. I probably cried all the way across the state of Missouri the day I left. As excited as you are about what's to come you still mourn a part of what you're leaving behind. It's all a part of growing up and moving through life."

"Mommy, I don't want to grow up. I don't want Linky to grow up," my younger daughter said for what was not the first time. In fact this growing up thing seems to have been weighing on her mind a lot lately as I had lost track of how many times she has told me this of late. I looked down at her with those huge hazel eyes framed by those ridiculously long lashes with all the innocence of five years old shining on that little precious face of hers that still had that soft feel of new baby skin.

God, how I wish I could keep her, her sister, and her baby brother bottled up in their childlike innocence, naïve to the sometimes harsh realities of the world. But the world awaits you, baby girls, and I have to let you grow up. Believe it or not one day you will be ready to grow up. You will be ready to walk out that door of your childhood, the silence that follows echoing in your parents' saddened heart because that door closes a chapter of our life as well as yours. We will watch in the shadows as you pursue the visions you spent your childhood fantasying and pretending about in your childlike wonder of the grown up world you imagined.

That grown up world may not always treat you kindly, but know it is yours to conquer. If you work hard and take risks for the life you want to build you can make it happen. Find your talents- and you have talent don't doubt that- and share them with the world. Know you are always enough. You are enough for the people that truly love you and you are enough for the roles you play. Take risks. It takes risks to find great success. Taking risks are how you make your dreams a reality. Life will get busy and crazy but always hold those that love you near and make time for them as the older you get the faster the sand will pass through the hourglass of time. It's okay to grow up. I don't want to let you sometimes, but you'll be okay.  Hold on to your great wonderful childhood memories and all the others you'll make as you move through life as those memories will get you through the tough patches. You'll be sad to leave some things behind but remember to focus on the great things that are always ahead, and great things are ahead for you both.

 

The Fork in the Road

In my last post How Did We Get Here I looked back at the uncertain and doubtful moments we've had in the last thirteen years of our family journey to here where we are now and I hinted that we're once again facing an uncertain moment. Last week my husband found out the job he's been doing for the past two years that he's loved in a school he's loved under a supervisor he's loved was cut due to next year's school budget. He's also been in our school district's AP pool for about a year now and is still in that pool until Sept of 2018; however, unless he was transferred into an AP position he was really hoping to stay right where he was though it was a short term position created when he took the job to begin with. His principal is really hoping he'll get an AP position for next school year; however, even as much as her and other Title I supervisors of his has given him positive references he just keeps getting silence on the other end of his inquiries. We've also figured out from him trying to apply out of district and even out of state is no one is going to take someone from a teaching position (though he's been in leadership positions like this Title I program the past two years) to an AP position. Positions outside the district want him to come in as a teacher, go through their hoops, to then move into a AP position after he's already done a bunch of hoop jumping here the past three years so the thought of starting that process over somewhere else is just very discouraging. For right now he has a good five months though to heavily pursue AP positions in our school system, if openings ever start popping up.

Even though so many other teachers I have spoken to from ones in my school, others in our district but other schools, and even teacher friends in other parts of the country have validated my feelings of frustration with this position of late it is also sad that at times that's the only thing that makes me feel better about staying the course in this profession at times. This job creates a lot of anxiety. Anxiety where you can't sleep at night because you're wondering what kind of confrontational battle you're going to get into the next day, and you wonder if this time it's coming from a student, a parent, or a supervisor. Too frequently you feel on the defense of being attacked. It is an emotionally abusive job and some teachers will even tell you a physically abusive job, and unfortunately as others have validated for me it is similar to being in a toxic relationship at times. I have just really struggled this year and as I posted in my post Career Change I have also been researching a career change, but I also know rough years are usually followed by better years. Last year I had my best year ever in thirteen years of teaching, but on the other hand I have pretty strong feelings of disagreement with where our school district is headed with their recent changes. I feel that it's a huge disservice to the kids and their future. I have a hard time being a part of something I don't believe in.  The thought of doing the same thing for 30-35 years of your life just seems so uneventful as well, and I also know I took the position I'm currently in  three years ago that I only planned on being in temporary to begin with due to its distance from home. But even as much as we've tackled change, and both Nate and I have worked in five different schools in our thirteen years change is still hard. Obviously at the minimum we're both going to be changing schools in the next year or two. I already have my assignment in the same school for next year so unless I get an offer to try out middle school like I've wanted, to try out this different position (that would require an added endorsement to my certificate) I spoke to HR about the other day, or happen to get an offer into the school district where we live I will stay another year in my current position. I have a good five months to pursue those three options though.


So on one hand we're both happening for some big change in our current career path. It needs to happen for next school year or the following year at the latest. Due to the budget cuts that eliminated Nate's current job though we now feel an urgency for that change to happen for this coming year. However, due to our current frustrations we've started looking into the path my husband has wanted to pursue since he left home at 18 and went to culinary arts school. We've started looking at and inquiring about turn key restaurants for sale, have started speaking to a business lender, and have started brainstorming our "business plans" for our Winging It restaurant that's been our dream board for years but never went past the back of our minds, and now comes the part I've been mentally doing for two weeks now weighing the pros and cons of one path verse the other. So the teacher graphic organizer below is for our benefit but maybe you from the outside looking in will have something add.

Restaurant Pros

-own boss
-creating and seeing a vision become a reality
-established business to hand down to our kids if they want it
-rarely have to ever cook dinner again/lower home grocery cost??
-no commute
-I'll have more time "off" at home with the kids because I'll either work PT for insurance or not at all depending on location (Con for Nate though because he will be working all the time)
-moving (con too) but we would have our home in the same community as the restaurant and though I love our current community I also like the excitement of reestablishing yourself in a new place and if we left here the cost of living is almost lower in every other place we're looking at moving to
-closer to family (due to the con of time we're leaning towards being within an hour of one of our families for help with the business as well as the kids as well as eliminating the need to travel to see one family)
-vacation whenever (I could take the kids to go see my family whenever but it'd be a few years before Nate could probably leave for a week though I suggested closing Christmas week and having a strong manager and kitchen manager in place within two years so he could take time off for family)
-teach our kids valuable lessons (elaborated on below)

Restaurant Cons
-time (a huge one) as it'll interfer in our family life on the evenings and weekends as well as     eliminate time for our beloved traveling for pleasure and seeing extended family
-moving (con more so for the kids particularly the oldest who I think would have a hard time at first leaving her friends and starting a new school)
-money and insurance (based on the ##s I've been looking at with established places I think in a few years we would be fine and back to where we currently are, but my biggest personal financial concern is insurance which if I could find a job that let me work PT and have insurance for the family- like I would be able to do in my current school district-then this wouldn't be much of a con. Also want to have more $$ saved before we did this which I think we could have in 1-2 years and for sure with the selling of our house if we were moving)
-retirement????
  
Education Pros
-insurance
-time off
-hours fit with kids' schedule
-retirement in early 50s (though we may go do something else for awhile)

Education Cons
- the emotional drain on our mental health
-commute
-dictated vacation times
-missing job satisfaction at the moment (which is and has always been huge to me. I'm a strong believer in we spend too much time at work to not be happy at work)


As we've discussed where we're at with some we encounter some who admire our willingness to chase change and reinvent our lives; others will call us absolutely crazy and think we've lost our minds. Honestly with some of the things we've done in the past that's not anything new to us. Calling us crazy almost makes us want to do the "crazy" more.  Some will say we have no idea what we're setting ourselves up for, and I don't really know if I have a counterargument for that. How do we ever know until we try the unknown?  Some will cheer us on; others will hope for our failure. Some will say the grass isn't always greener on the other side; but our expectations isn't for it to be greener but for it to be a different experience with it's own benefits and disadvantages.

I also think about how we live our life can teach our children. It'll teach our kids they have never have to settle. It'll teach them to adapt and even seek change. It'll teach them to take risks.

The safer path is to obviously stay the course in education. That may be what we do. What happens in the next five months may make that the greater possibility. If little changes between now and about 18 months from now then trying a new adventure may be the new path, which is why we're doing our research, saving our money now, and talking to lenders because I don't think we'd jump ship this summer but I think we want to be ready to jump ship next summer if this path appears to reach a dead end. I hate uncertainty; I'm a planner. I like to know what's coming; what we're doing. For now I guess I have to watch the plot twists of our story unfold and see where it takes us. Wish us luck!

 

How did We Get Here...

I feel like we're rounding this weird corner in life at the moment. Our oldest is about to turn 8. Eight!! How is that we've been parents for eight years already??? Our middle who was my baby for so long is getting registered for kindergarten next month. How is it that she's ready for school already and that we're about to have two kids in school?? Then the baby-he's about to turn a year old already- here in few months our last baby will be a toddler. How is this all possible? Where did our life go? Sometimes I feel like we're spinning on a merry go round and it's picking up speed and our life continues to flash by in a kaleidoscope of short little moments that blur out as new memories and moments quickly replace the past.

But being the moment catcher that I am whether it's through the endless amount of pictures I take or the snippets of our life on record here or in other journals I don't want us to forget the past, even the doubtful moments of struggle. Overcoming those are what reassures me again later when we face doubt and uncertainty once again.

Because here we are with these three quickly growing kids that give our life so much joy and meaning in the home we could raise them in, yet find ourselves in uncertain territory again. Just when we thought we had made it through all the hurdles and twists and turns of establishing ourselves and our life, we're unsure and find ourselves questioning what path we should take from here. This is where I think looking back at the road behind us matters.....



Sometime around this time of the year thirteen years ago I was debating whether to take our friendship a little further. I love you, husband, if you're reading this, and God knows you've come a long way, but not only did you have tattoos and earrings which were "no nos in the Williams daughter dating book" but your life was in the shitter for lack of a better explanation because I'll leave the details out. You were a pretty high risk gamble back then. (2004)

Then a year later again right around this time of the year I broke up with you as you like to remind me even to this day. Honestly, I was a big chicken. I was scared to death. We were talking about moving across the county together, and your life still wasn't in the greatest shape. More so than that though was the thought of being so far from home and my family. Pretty sure everyone was placing bets that I'd be back within a year, but we went. With literally a microwave, a box TV (remember those?), good ole Bettis, and our personal belongings. What do you know? Twelve years later here we still are. (2005)

A year from then-two years from the beginning- your life was definitely a little more figured out. However, how a bank ever approved us for a mortgage loan on poor credit was a risky gamble on the bank this time, but they gave it to us and we got our first house, spending the first night on a blow up air mattress with a cooler as our refrigerator beside us. (2006)

Those first three years which seem so long ago now were so clouded with uncertainty and doubt. They are why the song "Livin on  Prayer" always reminds me of us. We definitely struggled. We struggled with money, with each other, it was a struggle for me being so far from home, you struggled with starting a career in education.  They were not easy years. I would not go back to them, but I think they were valuable in molding us and even being a reminder to us in moments like this.

The next five when we got married and started our family as one of us finished grad school and the other started grad school we began to find our footing and momentum. We weren't as lost or uncertain anymore, but we weren't immune to struggle.  We struggled with money in a crashing economy that sank our home's value and skyrocketed gas prices for our long commutes on top of the added expense of a baby, the struggle of raising a family so far from family would leave us questioning our choice of where to live, but we started to figure it out and got more confident in where we were headed in this life. (2007-2012)

Five years ago though when the houseing market still looked very doubtful from the  market crash of 2008 we listed our house in hopes we'd get to move our girls out of the city before they started school. Unfortunately or maybe fortunately the possibility of selling it was as bleak as it seemed. In about six months we had maybe three showings. Moving was looking pretty doubtful. Luckily in the six plus years since we bought the first house our credit situation was in much better shape and though I was doubtful pursued what you always intended for that first house anyway. We rented it and moved out of the city and into a small town community like we always intended for our family. (2012-2013)

Though the financial adjustment of the move was pretty rough at first we were making progress towards our vision. Graduate degrees were done, had two of the originally planned three kids, we kept the first house to rent it, and bought a home in a small town to raise our family, we were officially vested in a career that guaranteed us a pension, but unfortunately two years ago after a second miscarriage followed by a rough post partum period after the second baby I was doubtful and uncertain on following through with having the third and final baby. Obviously as we look at our three babies now we got past that uncertainty.  (2015)

Doubt and uncertainty has always hovered on the edge whether it's been with our choices, making our dreams a reality, our financial situation, with each other (on top of the health ones with a back injury, depression/mood disorders, and Lincoln's heart and diagnosis scare) Though the struggles at times have been overwhelming and mentally exhausting, we've always overcome.

So here we are...Uncertain because we're not sure whether to stay the course and hope for some good luck or to veer off and select a new, more unknown one to explore other possibilities we've dreamed of but have been too scared to pursue. I don't know what we will do; what we will decide for sure. But I do feel confident in this. It'll work out; we'll overcome and we'll look back at this moment of uncertainty much like I just looked back at the ones that have already passed. If or when we do pursue change I know it will be hard; I know we'll struggle but I like to think at this point we know there's another brighter side on the other side of  struggle.

Next post I'll weigh out the pros and cons of our choices as I've been saying for the past two weeks I would do since we learned it might be time to revaluate our options sooner than we originally thought.

 

Two Years Later...The Lost Baby

I didn't need my facebook memory feed on Thursday to remind me that two years ago was when I suffered my second miscarriage, the one that definitely marked me in a way I understand now that I won't ever forget. Friday a childhood friend of mine who has also experienced her own pregnancy lost shared this post about miscarriage that generated a nice discussion among moms that lost babies in pregnancy.

I shared my experiences with my two miscarriages, particularly that last one two years ago that left me devastated in a way I had never expected. I shared my fear in the months after that about continuing to try for a third baby despite the emotional storm of going through two miscarriages in the past year. I learned many things. I learned that losing a baby you never met is still a loss you will grieve in your own way in your own time. But here I am two years later and I'm still learning.

Because see first I thought losing a baby you never met couldn't really be that bad. But that day, January 26, 2015 will haunt me for the rest of my life. I understand now that women don't just forget the babies they've lost but never met. Those babies stay with them forever. They define each mother's journey of motherhood in their own just as each baby that came before and after them define her. I thought the rainbow baby that we all hopefully have at some point would in some way make up for that baby's loss. But this is where it all gets tricky in my head. I love my son; I couldn't imagine my life without my son. I think how if I had that baby I lost I wouldn't have had the son I have now or maybe even a son at all as maybe it was another girl. But I still think about that other baby. Was it a boy too? A girl? We had talked about four at one point. Maybe we would have still had Lincoln after that one though and maybe it was the fourth one (guess technically the third and Linc was the fourth).

The process of moving on is not what I expected. I think in my arrogant non experienced way I thought I would eventually just forget that it happened. However, I see now it/they are not something we just simply forget. I think I thought we would just forget because it s (possibly was rather than is) taboo to talk about our lost babies that some don't consider a real loss because it was never a "real" baby. Their existence is real to us though as soon as we see that hope of a positive pregnancy test.

Career Change???

I am burnt out. I know this may not be the best year to judge exactly how burnt out of teaching I am with all the policy changes we faced on top of the changes at home with adding a new baby. Even though I definitely feel leaps and bounds better than I did in October, though I don't believe I still have PPD, I'm not back to being my positive chirpy self.  But I  faced my last year of burnout just four years ago. Twice in five years seems too frequent. That year was definitely worse than this year. Maybe because I just don't have the sense of panic I did then. Maybe because as I get older I know myself better, and I know myself well enough to know I won't stay in a miserable situation for long. I will take action to resolve it. And if that action involves change I know myself well enough now to know though the idea of change scares me and can make me anxious I know I don't let it intimidate me enough to stop me. And the third thing my 35 year old self knows better than my 30 year old self is if I set my mind to something I know if I really want something I can do it. I just have to know what I really want.

I think that's been the biggest struggle with thinking of leaving education. If I leave the education field what can I go do that's not a huge financial hit? At first I haven't been finding anything that seemed worth the hassle of change and facing the fear of the unknown, yet the thought of doing the same thing for my whole working life is just starting to feel like I'm short changing myself. I worked in the educational setting at daycares the four years before I started teaching so that means combined I've been in education for 17 years. I've been a supporter of most education reform these past few years, but recent reform this past year has taken away a sense of student accountability worse than it even was before. I'm so tired of grading, and I know being critiqued and criticized is a part of every profession but I'm just tired of feeling like I'm doing something that I'm really just not very good at.

I've been looking for a way out for probably the last five years as it is. Honestly the things that keep me from leaving teaching aren't the right reasons- summer vacation and retiring in my 50s. Summers half the time stress me out because we don't get paid in the summer and unfortunately I've had to work three of the eight summers I've been a mom as it is. The other concern though is as much as some say teachers don't get paid much, it's been really hard to find a different job that would pay me the same. Maryland teachers make pretty decent money especially with a Masters Degree + and 13 years of experience.

Most of the best possible things I've found has been in sales and that's all dependent on commission which makes me nervous as I'm use to a fixed income that comes from a salaried job. Working in sales is not exactly my dream job. Though I've looked at education related jobs that are not in public school classrooms, again because I'm so burnt out of education in general none of those leave me very excited to tackle change.

Something I read recently about change and the unknown left me asking myself if I wasn't teaching and money didn't matter for a minute what would I really really want to do. I came back to this blog. No, it's not writing. It's actually what I discovered I really enjoyed through writing this blog and what I loved about my masters degree program that I started to formulate a new possible direction.

I went to get my Masters in Counseling ten years ago now this month. However, as it came time for the internship I had just had my first baby, things were tight financially so I was coaching volleyball on top of finishing grad school and it looked like the internship would require me to go part time at work or involve a whole lot of hours I had no idea how I would complete with a new baby at home on top of a full time job. So I did something I kind of regret now. Just short of the internship hours I decide to change my program of study and completed my degree with an Educational Studies degree rather than a counseling though my whole program focused on counseling. I am an internship and certification licensing away from being able to pursue career paths in a variety counseling settings.

Through this blog the most enjoyable thing to come from it, even before the publication acceptances, is the connections I've made with other moms. I love talking and consulting with other moms about the highs and lows of motherhood. I have loved and appreciated how other moms have felt comfortable in coming to me with their own personal struggles and worries with motherhood.

So how could I combine my counseling courses and passion for working with moms and still make a comparable wage to my teaching salary? This was the big question I set out to solve to see if I could even come up with a possible workable solution. Researching all of that is how I've started my new year.

Turns out I am 7 health science classes away, a new CPR certification, an online module training course, and of course an actual internship away from being able to become a lactation consultant/maternal health counselor (the roles vary base on place of employment) employable by private companies, hospitals though they prefer RN certified, physician clinics, and government agencies like WIC. Through further research I also found there is another course training program with a another set of online training and certification exam I could take to add certified childbirth educator  (I would not be delivering babies! Just preparing moms mentally for labor and birth and taking care of a newborn) to my list of credentials in which I would have an easier time working in physician clinics in educating new moms on childbirth, parenting, and breastfeeding. Depending on the actual job assignment with an education background, coursework in counseling, lactation certification, and childbirth education I would have the qualifications to function in many capacities with new moms as a parent educator, lactation consultant, and maternal health counselor as they prepare for labor and delivery and bringing home a baby.

My new career goal is to "retire" from teaching after 17 years, four years from now. Over the course of the next four years I would take my 7 missing health science classes and childbirth educator course, do the online module trainings, and complete an internship to take my two Board Certification exams in April 2021. Once I get my foot in the door of making the change then I may look into completing my official counseling certification if it'll benefit me in some way wherever I end up working.

I have found where to take all the courses I need. If I do this- I plan to start taking my first course in August or Sept. The biggest hurdle would be first in finding a place to log internship hours and second in actually logging those internship hours. Though April 2021 is four years away I would like to start logging those hours possibly as early as this summer.

I am no stranger to the fact that change comes with sacrifice. Not only would there be sacrifice in my time which is already pushed pretty close to its capacity at times to get myself certified to make the career change, but once I was able to make the change there'd be more sacrifices with time and money. Obviously I would work all year round and not ten months, and on top of it I would probably take somewhat of a paycut, possibly because if I could work a 30-32 hour work week in four days I would do it rather than a five day work week. But on the flipside I would be doing something totally different that I am excited about doing and anticipate loving despite the fact that all jobs have their hard, not so fun moments. I would also possibly have different hours that again though I may get to get up after sunrise and see my kids off to school it'll be traded for being home with them right after school; however, because the kids will be getting older I'd much rather leave my then middle schooler in charger for an hour or so after school then in the chaos of the morning routine so at that point in our family life I think it'd be better for me to be around in the mornings and returning later in the day. Then of course I would give up retiring at 53; however, with the youngest still in college at that time I was probably looking at working doing something for another 3-4 years after that anyway so really I'll only be working about four years longer than I would have.

When it comes to the uncertainty of tackling such a big change my biggest worry is that I'll do all this work to get all these certifications and qualifications and then struggle to find a job. I keep reminding myself I've been on uncertain roads before, but faith has always seen me through.

Photo courtesy of Blueprintchurch.org