Our Situation

My husband and I are originally from the northeast.  We had been living in Texas for almost 15 years.  Since we started having kids, we decided we'd prefer to live "closer to home."  In other words, we wanted to be closer to family.  We never really developed a taste for Texas.  Many wonderful things took place while we were there; it was just never home to us.

During the summer of 2014, my husband had an opportunity: the contract under which his company was working was about to end, thus ending his company altogether.  He was able to self-nominate to be laid off, and thus, get a big severance that could hold us over until he found a new job.  My sister offered her Maryland home to us until our family could get on our feet.  I was working on getting myself some part-time work in her area.  Everything was going according plan...

...Until we arrived in Maryland.  My husband received word that another company picked up the contract, and was absorbing not only his former company, but him as well.  His former company never informed him that his self-nomination had not been accepted.  At this point, if he were to quit, he would get no severance, and he wouldn't even be able to collect unemployment. 

There we were... the kids and me in Maryland, living with my sister and her family, and my husband back in Texas, living with his brother.  We couldn't just up and move back because at that point, my oldest had just started his first year of elementary school, and we had already paid for a year of pre-school for my daughter.  Plus, it's expensive to move!

My husband currently lives with his brother, sister-in-law, and niece.  It has been nothing short of a nightmare for him.  Me, on the other hand... well, I've been living as a single mom.  We have been working hard to figure out a way to make this work.  My John has been busting his ass, trying to find work in our area.  Being apart has been one of the hardest things we've ever had to do.  I adore my husband... we miss each other so much.

This has been our situation for the last 15 months.  Fortunately, the kids and I moved over the summer and are in a place of our own now.

Why not just go back to Texas, you ask?  Well.  Many reasons.  Ultimately we just don't want to be there.  We've missed so many family events in the last 15 years because we'd been so far away.  We just don't want to go through that again.  Also, we spent a fortune on our move last summer, then another fortune moving ourselves into our current place.  It would be make no sense, financially, to go back.  On top of that, John was able to make a few contacts that he seems to think will come through soon.  In addition to all that, we really love the area we live in now.  The kids love their new school!  Of the 500 school districts in Pennsylvania, our school is ranked number five.  NUMBER FIVE!  And that's really the bottom line, now that we have a first grader and a kindergartner.  Besides, it's Fall.  Our kids never really experienced Fall.  It's definitely my new favorite season.

It's sucky.  And hard.  But we're going to make it.  He's going to be here before we know it.  And that day will be the [fourth] best day of our lives [obviously, our wedding and the birth of our three babies will outrank most anything else :) ].