Is this my life?

These past couple of weeks have been surreal.

But, really, it all started in March — when we knew my husband wouldn't be teaching at the place that starts with a "C" anymore. I could dedicate an entire blog to my thoughts on that school, but it wouldn't change anything anyway.

Through a summer filled with uncertainty and anxiety, he was called for five different interviews for positions in Ohio. He was even called back for a second interview at one place. No dice. Nothing.

We can't live on my salary.

All of the sudden, it's the beginning of August. The teaching positions have been filled. School is starting.

No job.

Teachers get paid through the summer, thankfully, but the last paycheck has now been deposited. No more paychecks.

It's our last week of having health insurance.

I have a chronic health condition. No health insurance.

We have a baby. No health insurance. 

Health insurance for us through my work would cost half of each of my paychecks.

So ... in just the past two weeks, this is what we've done:

1) We applied for Medicaid/I started taking less of my medicine than I should to make it last longer if we don't get approved for Medicaid.
2) We listed and sold our house.
3) We starting packing, and we're moving to L-town this weekend.
4) We picked up the last of Z's stuff from his babysitter's house and said a tearful last goodbye. (She has watched him since he was 7 weeks old.) We're interviewing a new babysitter in L-town this weekend.
5) My husband applied for and started grad school online to defer student loan payments.
6) He is set up to substitute teach in the L-town area, is going to be teaching private music lessons and might have some other part-time jobs.
7) I'm applying to jobs in the L-town area, but will commute even further to work until something better comes along.

I've never NOT had health insurance. I need medicine or my colon will bleed with painful ulcers, and I won't be able to properly absorb nutrients and die. My medicine costs hundreds of dollars without insurance.

You think you're doing everything you're supposed to be doing. You go to college and get your degree. You go above and beyond your work duties, working crazy hours to help support your family.

And then you're jobless and your whole world changes in an instant.

What would you do if your primary income was gone? (I know, it's too scary to even consider.) It couldn't happen, right? But it could. It has for us.

I'm not even that bitter or stressed out anymore; I've had enough stress in the past five months to cause multiple flare-ups in my ulcerative colitis.

There's nothing I can do at this point but accept the situation, move forward and do everything in my power to make sure my family is okay.

Without help from my husband's family, of course, we would be royally screwed. (I guess it's good to know who is really there for you when you need it.)

So I guess we're starting over. We're young, I've been told, so we'll bounce back. Everything is falling into place now, I've been told, so it was meant to be.

I truly do not believe events and situations are "meant" or "not meant" to be. They just are — whatever meaning you derive out if it is your own.

All I know is these are definitely hard times — but life goes on. And someday, we'll have not-so-hard times. But then that will change, too.

There are no guarantees.