2010 was the fifth year of my adult life, not by legal age, birthdays or anything. Just stick with me and you'll get it.
In 2005, I graduated from college with a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology from a Christian college, while pregnant. I was 20. Two weeks after graduation, I became a Mrs.
After a rocky start at marriage, living in a small one bedroom apartment, and getting a job at a small non-profit as a youth coordinator, I soon found that there was a whole new experience to life: becoming a mother. Isabel Maria was born on October 19th. Beautiful. I cried. She ended up in the NICU with a fever, but soon came home with us. Life quickly became more difficult as we juggled work schedules (Jose worked 2nds, while I worked 1st) and a baby. But we knew that she was perfect in every way.
For our first New Years, we planned to have my mom watch Isa and we were going to a huge local club. I had turned 21 while pregnant, so I was ready to bring in the New Year properly for a 21-year-old. Isa was gone, we were primped, and the car wouldn't start. So, we walked to the nearest liquor store, bought a six-pack of Smirnoff Ice and returned to our apartment. By midnight, Jose was asleep in bed and I was drinking alone watching our 19-inch tv.
I just had hope that 2006 was more peaceful. I'm not sure of the verdict. When our lease was up, we moved to a larger townhouse in the same complex. It was a 2-bedroom. Then Jose lost his job. His cell phone was stolen at the unemployment office and he got fired from a temp job. My cousin lived with us for a few months and we had to quickly learn how to "parent" a 15-year-old.
Thing is, he was an awesome help too. Jose, my cousin, and Isa spent every day at the pool while he wasn't working and they quickly became brown. I however, worked inside all day and remained white. My daughter grew up before my eyes and my cousin returned to live with his mom and dad. Soon after, my brother-in-law, his wife, and their newborn moved in. Isa turned one.
And for the life of me, I have no idea what we did for New Years, so it obviously wasn't that spectacular.
I could only hope for good changes for 2007. It proved to be good indeed. Jose got a job for Coca-Cola. First as a temp, then he got hired in, just in time for us to buy our first house.
We found out at the first of March that our rent would be increasing and on a whim, wondered what difference it would make to buy a home. The first home we visited should have been condemned and when we saw this house, we fell in love. Foreclosure. About $20K less than what we were approved for. Three bedrooms with all wood floors. It was painted horribly, but we saw its potential.
Isa grew up a lot more. She turned two. We were happy; the picture perfect happy family.
I can't remember ringing in 2008 either. But I will never forget the changes that it brought us.
In January, my boss at the nonprofit left for another job. I asked for his position and I recieved in. I soon became the one who wrote all the grants and greant reports, managed staff, managed programs, fixed maintenance problems, managed the entire IT element of the organization, and basically did security. Jose continued his job at Coke. We kept trying to add another little person to our mix, but it seemed as if we would never get pregnant.
In June, we took our first family vacation to Myrtle Beach to visit my sister-in-law. Isa loved it.
And when we got home, we found out that we were expecting! :) We joked that it was the best souvenier ever! When I went to the doctor, we learned that we would be due March 5th, the day before Jose's birthday. And just days before Isa's third birthday, we learned that it would be a boy, a fat lil' boy - Mateo Jose.
We began to prepare. And we hosted a New Year's Eve party to ring in 2009 with hopes for the most joyous year yet. I had gestational diabetes with Teo and he was weighing in on ultrasounds as a big baby, so when I went to the hospital in February, they kept me. And I attempted to deliver him normally. After a full day of induced labor, and an epidural (which I didn't recieve with Isa), the doctor was ready to prep me for a c-section. In mere minutes, my stubborn boy decided to arrive, "sunny side up" as the doctor said. He has been a pain in my butt ever since. ;)
Shortly after I returned to work from my maternity leave, my world fell apart: the affair. Much of Teo's first year is a blur. Anger. Sadness. Guilt. Denial. Heartache. I gave Jose a choice to leave or to fix it and he got to work.
For our fourth wedding anniversary, less than a month after I found out about the other chick, Jose arranged to take me away for a weekend. He managed to remind me why I fell in love with him.
And we began the roughest time of our lives. We dove into counseling. We dove into a church. We stayed up for hours each and every night, talking and crying. We were shaken, but we did not shatter. And that is what mattered. There is an absence of photos in 2009. Isa turned four. Teo grew bigger and bigger.
We were surprisingly okay, most of the time. My job was becoming my hell though, and it became unbearable. I was suffering from a lot of migraines from stress and would call in sick to spend the day in bed. There was always a heavy weight dangling over us, threatening to send our world crashing down and shattering to pieces. So we continued to focus on re-building our marriage for us, for the kids.
Mere days before we were able to send 2009 away, the baby was born and we spent the first days of 2010 figuring out what to do. A paternity test was done and the results came back. The thing that I feared the most had come true, but I was either in shock or just relieved it was over for the time being. The other chick disappeared out of our lives. We returned to counseling, just to make sure we stayed on track.
Teo turned one.
In the first months of this year, I began to have many discussions with my pastor and soon an opportunity came. In April, I quit my job at the nonprofit organization less than a month after I had the first panic attack of my life after dealing with my boss there. The timing was perfect and could only be attributed to God. A week before my last day, we recieved the news that a huge grant was not awarded and more than half the staff got let go within the month. I settled quickly into a new job, that soon became three jobs. Our marriage settled back into a normal state, which was nice and scary at the same time.
We began to dive into some huge house projects. We re-did a bathroom we installed quickly our first year in the house. We painted my craft room pink and black. We tore out a wall and put in french doors. We rebuilt basement steps, built a food storage pantry, and began to finish the basement. We also recently installed new living room windows.
We have had plenty of ups and downs, through the past five years, but I am so thankful for our life and am ready for 2011, whether it brings more ups, more downs. I know, now, that with God, patience, and the people in my life who care and support us, we can make it through anything.
Soon, I will post about 2010 specifically. And another post soon will be a look forward to 2011. God bless and Happy New Year!
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