Family debt report! I'm actually really excited about this one. We were able to liquidate some family inheritance that turned out to be worth more than I expected. After paying off all the credit cards (doggie expenses), there was still plenty to put toward the loan, which is a really good thing now that there are rumblings about the student interest rates rising. The last report in April was 27.2% paid. As of today, we've jumped to 49%. Party!
We are six years paid ahead by the original payment schedule, and at long last our on-hand cash almost equals our obligations. Not that we're going to empty the bank, or anything.
I finally feel like we're making some real progress. Just thinking about all the interest we're avoiding makes me happy. Someday our adoption fund won't be in the red.
Since officially putting this household on a war footing last month, we have successfully reduced our total debt by 11%. That was a combination of my new paychecks, the sale of some pre-marital assets, and general penny pinching. Seriously, I'm tearing dryer sheets in half at this point. I don't think we'll be able to maintain this pace, but it would sure be nice if we could. I'd at least like to maintain a 3.5% decrease each month, which would represent five months' worth of payments. Once the debt is gone, we can officially start building the adoption fund. I'm currently searching the apartment for stuff worth listing on Ebay.
I can't believe I get so excited about paying bills. It's like buying back our lives a few months at a time.
A month ago my mother-in-law asked me whether we were thinking of buying a house soon. Quite honestly, that was the farthest thing from my mind. She's right about it being a buyer's market right now, but even if we weren't considering a move in a few years I don't think I would want to bite off that kind of financial commitment, particularly in this political climate.
At the moment, I'm much more passionate about paying off our household debt and bracing for the allegedly imminent financial collapse of the country and/or the implosion of this inflated currency we're using. Also, while still being something of a novice navy wife, my experience of the lifestyle so far has left me reluctant to lock my landing gear in place. If someday we have to pack up and cut all ties, I want to be free to do that, which is why it makes sense for us to buy a brand new car and not a house.
Speaking of the car and paying off debts, if we scrimp and squeeze the blood out of pennies, we can have everything paid off in three years. It will be right about that time that David will be considering a career change. If we can be debt free by the time we have to pack up and start a new life, it will be awesome. At that point we can reassess our budget and start socking away cash for adoptions.
That's personally why we rent, and apparently we're not alone. I was getting caught up on my belated news, watching episodes of ABC Nightline on Hulu, and they ran a segment about how more Americans are renting whatever they possibly can. The website Airbnb advertises short term rentals (much like you would rent a hotel room) directly from private owners "in 27,266 cities and 192 countries." Some people are apparently using the site to sublet rooms they are themselves renting. This economy is being dubbed the "share economy." Have you ever thought about letting someone rent that bridesmaid's dress you never wear anymore? How about the tools in your garage? Some choose to rent rather than buy those baby toys the children grow out of so quickly, although in the Catholic tradition of large families we usually get our money's worth out of those. RelayRides allows car owners to offer their cars for rent to other members of their community. The renters say it's cheaper than owning a car, and the owners say the renting pays for maintenance. It's an interesting trend, but I'm sure there are all kinds of insurance violations going on.
There are some of my belongings I wouldn't mind pimping out for some extra cash, but I'm still far too possessive of my car.
Yesterday I attended the baptism of Michael Joseph, our first godchild. Unfortunately, Dave had to miss it, but we had a good friend stand as proxy. It was a gathering of the usual suspects, other young families of Christendom's class of 2008. Thankfully, I found I wasn't nearly as bothered by it as I would have been six months ago.
At this point, more than a year removed from losing Little Dave, I'm probably about as over it as I ever will be. The last few weeks in particular have been much better, all things considered. Everyone's personal tragedy has a social expiration date, after which one really shouldn't keep nagging Facebook about it, or look for ways to bring it up in conversation. The world has moved on, even if I feel like I physically haven't. Being alone has really brought it all to the forefront lately. If you've seen the movie, "Into Great Silence," that's what it's like around our apartment, and not in a good way. I got married because I was no good at the contemplative life. Yet, here I am.
They say you never think it will be you. I know I never did. My life had been picture perfect vanilla until two years ago. I had a lovely childhood with no serious injuries, illnesses, or setbacks, cruised through school, went to college, met a great guy who is so much like me he could be a long lost twin, and was engaged a year after graduation. We did have some suspicion that the matter of children could be dicey just because of certain aspects of our medical history, but we didn't let it dampen our spirits too much. We were married in January and pregnant by Easter, but then all our expectations began to crumble rapidly.
I had been looking forward to those kids for years. I remember a specific trash bag commercial I saw during those weeks while I was waiting to follow Dave to California after the wedding. I was sure Dave would be an excellent father and make adorable children, probably even cuter than that kid.
Needless to say, my expectations of my life have changed significantly. At this point, taking all my medical setbacks into consideration along with our hypothetical genetic issues and my apparent inability to carry to term, I am resigned to the fact that we'll never actually be able to raise those adorable children we were supposed to have. At least, not any that are biologically our own. Some people just knock harder when that door refuses to open. I tend to take the hint and accept the rejection before we waste a lot of money or I really hurt myself trying.
I have no problem whatsoever with adopting. That's currently the five-year plan. What actually still bothers me - more so while he's not around to tell me I'm being stupid for thinking it - is that Dave deserved to have his own family. I feel like the defective one in this relationship. He was wonderful throughout the whole ordeal, but he never asked for all this. Of course, no one does, but I was mortified, particularly because the timing could not have been worse for him, BOTH times. I married him to be a help and support, not an invalid who can't stay out of the hospital or muster up enough strength to feed herself. Part of what has scared me away from deliberately attempting another pregnancy is the thought that the black icing on the cake would be for me to die of uterine rupture and leave him completely high and dry. I can't even bear the thought. I've already failed him often enough.
In the meantime, most of our friends have budding families with all the traditional milestones, baptisms, first teeth, first steps, first birthdays. Their blogs and Facebook pages are full of happy pictures and updates. It can be extremely bittersweet. I've invested a lot of mental effort into trying to feel blessed to have two saints rather than merely deprived of viable offspring, and some days are better than others.
In order to move on and be functional we almost have to forget, but we really don't want to forget anything because we already have little enough to remember, and the only memories we have are of hospitals and heartbreak. I feel guilty when I forget. It seems particularly hard while there aren't any other children demanding my attention. Instinctively I feel like I should spend time with them now and then, but what that has basically amounted to up to this point is sitting on the couch and thinking about what we could have been doing.
One lesson I have learned, or at least finally come to accept, is that none of us is entitled to anything in this life. Their normal may not be our normal. Our normal is not what we thought it would be, but we are expected to make something of it, and in the end it will be for the best. Eventually it will be like cheese. For almost a year I went dairy free and felt painfully deprived each time I saw a pizza. But after several months I just accepted that cheese was only for other people and that I would have to be happy with something else. Eventually I forgot what cheese tasted like.
Meanwhile, I'm trying to pull it together to be the tough Navy wife with nerves of steel who can handle anything. I refuse to fail at anything else, because that would just be lame. So long as I have some meaningful human contact at least once a week, I'll stay sane. I actually don't know exactly how long Dave has been gone. I don't remember, and I haven't kept track. It's easier that way, since I don't know when he'll be back.
In any case, being alone has given me the chance to confront all my issues and pull my life back together for its own sake. My life is still awesome, even with all it's apparent flaws. I haven't been permanently traumatized, and the only substance I have ever abused is chocolate. I'm determined to get this show back on the road despite the detour. I haven't quite achieved the goal of domestic warrior demigoddess, but just you wait.
I've finally started taking the Christmas tree down, probably six weeks sooner than the last time. At least this time it won't have a hand in inducing labor, as I suspect it did last year.
I want this year to be better than last year. Lots of good things happened last year, particularly for Dave's career, but it was an emotional train wreck. It was much like 2010, actually, but more so. It started on a hopeful note, then crashed and burned, and the nine months following March 8 were engulfed in a kind of Trauma Recovery Mode. I don't believe I'm functioning at the level Dave deserves of a wife and homemaker while constantly in Trauma Recovery Mode. (He hates that I think that, because he's awesome and thinks I'm perfect, often though I've tried to disabuse him of this notion.)
Now it's a new year all over again, and everyone is going on about resolutions. I really want to get my life back on track, but what does that even mean? Where is my track? What am I supposed to be doing with myself? I love being a wife, but it seems to me that there should be something else I should be doing besides sitting at home being a wife, doing laundry, dishes, writing fanfiction and playing online computer games. My first choice was motherhood, but obviously the traditional approach isn't working. Whenever I haven't been in Trauma Recovery Mode, I've been in Pregnancy Mode, which in my case is every bit as miserable. Pregnancy Mode excludes every other type of activity, and of course leads to Trauma Recovery Mode, and the cycle begins again. Remember the kid from Despicable Me who had his balloon animal popped? That was me last year.
So now what do I do with myself? My new year's resolution was to start functioning at 100% again. As a result of the 2010-11 cycle of pregnancy and recovery I've gained all my college weight back and my running shoes and I aren't on the best of terms. I always promised myself I would never be that overweight military wife with a host of emotional problems. I want to stop being a black hole sucking down inordinate levels of Dave's attention, sympathy, and time. All this would involve avoiding pregnancy, and that's where the Catholic guilt comes in.
Are we allowed to stop trying? It's not like we're going to start using contraception or anything, but I can't decide whether the risks to my health and well-being are grave enough to justify the indefinite use of NFP. Does this mean I have trust issues? If I could just live a normal life during pregnancy, or if it were only about losing the children over and over again, it would be another story. I would beat my head against that wall for the rest of my childbearing years if that were the case. But, since I have to play the hand God dealt me, any pregnancy would automatically be high risk and require immediate and complete bed rest. The original prognosis was a 25% chance of miscarriage just due to my condition. Now that my already faulty system has been scarred by biopsies and a cesarean, the odds are rather worse. Not being able to take care of myself is certainly not an ideal circumstance, particularly now that Dave is likely to be gone more often for the next three years. I know I have several friends in the general area who would be more than happy to help, but they don't exactly live in the neighborhood and almost all of them are pregnant themselves.
I got the usual vague recommendations from the doctors and specialists. The classic, "It could be nothing, or it could be life-threatening." Not exactly helpful, but I suppose it was the best they could do. There was a phase during which I was willing to take the risk, but we tried for four months and got nothing.
Now Dave is gone and I'm here alone trying to sort out my life. The more I sit and think about it, the more I'm inclined to believe we're just one of those families who were meant to adopt. But it seems like such a simple answer that I start second guessing myself, and wondering whether I'm interpreting the facts to suit my needs.
What are my needs? I want to lose twenty pounds and fit into all the old clothes hanging in my closet. I want to be free to go running, healthy enough to look after myself and stay out of the emergency room. I don't want to be constantly stressed about the possibility of disappointing Dave and all the family again, about every little cramp being the beginning of the end. I want to get out of this apartment now and then. I want to be free to do my own grocery shopping, to vacuum, to walk a dog, to dig my cars out of the snow, to function like a normal person. Is that something to feel guilty about? I do.
It's not that I want to simply "have a life" for myself, I'd like to have enough of a life to share it with someone else. I'm useless to everyone while I'm pregnant, and it always comes to nothing. "Always" is perhaps a strong word for only two failures, but each time feels like tempting fate. Instead of spending "the best years" of my life as an invalid, alone and feeling sorry for myself, can't we just adopt and make some other poor kid's life better? Is that so wrong?
That's what I want to do, regardless; but I can't help feeling that I'm just wimping out. I've always needed someone to tell me what to do, because if I make up my own mind, I always suspect my conclusion is biased. I feel like I need some kind of dispensation. I used to tell myself I'd rack up four or five miscarriages before I'd call quits, but at this point I'm more worried about surviving to fight another day. I want to have our own kids in the worst way, so much so that I still get physically nauseated around my pregnant friends. But I'd rather give that up if it means being able to function as a healthy parent for two or three kids who would have otherwise have been stuck in foster care.
Anyway, I have a few more weeks of being alone to think about it.
In the very near future, we will have our first deployment experience. I can't complain, because it won't be for a terribly long time. It will be the longest we've been separated since our wedding, but only by a smidge. There will be other longer deployments throughout the year, but nothing unbearable. I finished sewing the new patches on his uniforms today.
Apparently I'm considered a bit of an anomaly by Dave's shipmates, in that I encourage him to volunteer for these things, not that he really needed my approval. If he's going to go, he might as well go now while there's nobody at home but me. While God still sees fit to deny us living children, we're determined to make the most of it. I'll probably take the chance to take a few road trips while he's gone.
Besides, this all plays into the larger plan of making his resume look better than the next guy, getting a promotion, moving into a larger apartment, and eventually being in a position to adopt.
