i have given up a lot for love

i've given up a lot for love.  some of it i would do again.  some of it, i would like to punch myself in the arm and say: what the heck were you thinking!?!!

my dream had been to go to college in vermont.  i was elated when i was accepted at UVM.  i lasted two weeks.  i came home because i missed my boyfriend of almost a year!  i couldn't live without him, or so i thought.  a few months after returning home and enrolling in community college, we broke up and i was devastated.

sometimes i think that is one of the times when i should punch myself in the arm.  but, i actually think i got a great education at community college and it was perfect for me!  the classes were small and the students get a lot of personal attention and opportunity to make real, lasting connections with their professors.

also, i never would have met my husband if i had stayed in vermont!

i always thought i would have a brilliant career.  i had a lot of ideas.  but decided on social work with a specialization in family and child advocacy.  after three semesters of community college, i transferred to rutgers college.  i spent three years totally devoted to my goal.  then, in my junior year of college, i interned in a head start program.  i became so emotionally involved that my mother and my boyfriend (who is now my husband) thought i would have a nervous breakdown.  when that semester was over, i changed my major to education.

a year later, my then-boyfriend-now- husband had graduated from college.  i was desperate to get an apartment with him, but in order to do that, i needed a full-time job.  i had at least two more semesters in order to make up the credits for graduation after my change of majors...or, i could get my degree in sociology and psychology, as i had enough credits and core requirements in each to have them both considered as majors.  despite the advice of several well-meaning college advisors, i filled out the paperwork to graduate with a degrees in Sociology & Psycholgy and started looking for a job and an apartment.

that is one of the times when i really think i could punch myself:  my husband and i would still have been together a year later; we could have put off the apartment together for a year.  in fact, that was even what my husband had wanted!  but i loved being able to forget about term papers and exams and instead spending my time cross-stitiching towels and picking out furniture!

i was offered a job at an insurance company, as an underwriter.  but i accepted a job as a recruiter because it was closer to the apartment we had rented.  i despised being a recruiter, but i was planning our wedding, so i didn't have time to look for another job.

we were married in august.  in september, i started a job search.  in october, my husband accepted an excellent opportunity out-of-state.  that ended my job search.

by decemeber, i was no longer a recruiter and i was living hours from family and friends in a new state.  that was when i really got hooked on the romance genre.  i was out of work and far from family and friends.  i had a lot of time to read and i devoured romances.

we lived in a tiny, picturesque New England town.  my husband commuted 45 minutes so that i could live in a town with the quintessential New England white steeple poking through the treetops as you approached the town and the most perfect town green!  there were dozens of little shops and boutiques and restaurants and churches. 

there were no big businesses.  other than a couple of banks and a few doctors, dentists, attorneys and veterinarians, there was no business. 

the only thing remotely close to my career interests was a local daycare/pre-school.  i applied for a job there and was hired on the spot.  i loved working there!  the pay was next to nothing and it definitely was not the brilliant career i had in mind, but i loved it!  i loved planning activities for the children and watching them develop; i loved being able to be silly and get down on the floor with them; i loved spending my days making macaroni art and performing finger plays!

i guess that is an area where it all gets tricky...career-wise, the way i had always seen myself, i was not doing what i always thought i would; happiness-wise, i was lovin' life!

my husband and i bought a gorgeuos 200 year old farmhouse that overlooked fields and mountains.  we spent all of our free time and money renovating the house.

when i got pregnant with our first child, i was determined to be a stay-at-home mom.  i loved watching all of these other children and planning enriching activities for them and i wanted to do the same for my own child.  so i did.

being a stay-at-home mom has been the most amazingly wonderful experience for me!  i have absolutely adored every moment!  i would not trade even one second!

but, now, my daughters are both in school full-time and i am lost.  and i wonder, if i had had the brilliant career that i had thought i would have, maybe i would not be so lost now.  maybe i would have direction.

i feel inferior to people who have the same or a similar education background as i, but who have pursued their career interests.  and that is really bothering me.

but, now is the time for me to make some decisions...what am i going to do with my life? 

i feel that my children need to come first.  i am not sure even how much i can devote to a career...

so, that is what i am struggling with...

that is why i need the escape of a good romance...

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