If you know me in real life, you know that I tend to be a bit of a control freak. I feel most at ease when I know what is going to happen and when I can steer things in the direction I feel they should go.
At this point in my life though, there are quite a few unknowns.
My two oldest children aren’t living with me. What their future holds is a big unknown to me. I thought I had guided them on a course to be successful in life, but they’ve both chosen to take other roads. So, I’ve had to give them over to God and pray He will continue to guide them while I cannot. This has not been easy for me to do since I was so involved with them for so long, and I struggle with it everyday.
The next few months are going to be challenging to say the least. I’ll finally be working toward my dream of being an RN, but that is going to mean so many changes for my family. The classes I’ll be taking will most likely be in the afternoon/evening, so I will be gone during dinner and most of the time I’m here will be spent studying instead of cleaning, laundry, doing housework and being on facebook. I have so many unknowns that come with going back to school. I have no idea how much my Pell grant is going to pay and how much the Hope grant will pick up, therefore I don’t know what is going to have to come out of pocket for us. I don’t know how many classes I’m going to be able to handle at once and still be “Mom”. I guess once it gets going, it will become my new normal, but for now it’s all still an unknown, which makes me nervous to say the least!
Another unknown right now is what kind of preschool to do for Devin and Makenzie next fall. Since Devin just turned 4, he will be eligible to do the state funded pre-k here in Ga. That means he can go to “big” school for pre-k, instead of the private church preschool. As with anything else in life, there are pros and cons to both. The one big drawback for me at the moment is the fact that the “big” school pre-k goes five days a week from 8:30 am until 3:10 pm. Up until now, his preschool has only been three days a week, 3 hours a day. So you can see my dilemma in the time difference. I feel like it’s going to be a much longer day for him. I just don’t know what to do. I feel like this will be his last year not “having” to go a full day and I don’t want to rob him of that. But, when he’s at home, he’s either bored, watching Spongebob, or picking on his sister- so who knows… full time school might be a good thing for him. As far as Makenzie goes, she’ll most likely go back to the preschool she is currently attending.
*Sigh*
All these unknowns are driving me insane. I know if I put it all in God’s hands, it will be taken care of and all will fall into place. There’s just that one little thing though…I like to be in control! I guess if these last few months have taught me anything it’s that sometimes no matter what you do, things just don’t come out the way you planned. And when that happens, it’s not your fault. It’s just the way it’s supposed to go for some reason. God may have plans we don’t know about yet- and may never know about. So just do the best you can and hold on for the ride because sometimes it’s bumpy. Sometimes you feel out of control… and maybe that’s a good thing. God has a funny way of reminding us who’s really in control. So, thank you God for the unknowns. Keep them coming. I’m ready…I think. :)
© 2010, Michelle. All rights reserved.
((hugs)) I have no advice for the older 2 children as I am not there yet. I can offer some advice on the other stuff. I also just went back to school last fall. So far I have made it all work and it’s not so bad. I was taking 2 classes her term (my college does 9 week terms as opposed to longer semesters so there are 4 terms in a year instead of 2 semesters) These terms are basically smooshed all in and the same work in shorter time. I took 2 classes at first so it would equal to 4 classes in the fall and 4 in the spring. That felt crazy and hectic (DH is also gone so that didn’t help) This term I did 1 class and feel much more at ease. I have no idea what the limits are on the pell grant, but I qualified for $575 for going full time in the fall. I got $575 each term so $1,150 in the fall is what I received. This was not the max nor the minimum one could get.. just somewhere in the middle. I actually think they base it on your school and it’s cost also. Troy is $220 per credit hour.
As for the preschool I was in the same situation coming here from VA. In VA Hunter and Madision did 2 days a week at 3 and 3 days a week at 4. here they had state funded preschool, but they ride the bus and it leaves at 7:30 and arrives back home at 3pm. This freaked me out. In the end I freaked for nothing. Most of the learning activites are in the morning. Then they have lunch, recess, centers, nap and snack in the afternoon. The previous preschool in VA had no lunch, nap, outside recess.. it was all inside learning. So basically that is still happening in the mornings here then they do some more fun stuff and a nap. That still makes the day long, but it is not like the older kids who do work the entire time they are at school. It really worked well for Madison. Now Landon will go to the same next year. It is scary, but it really does prepare them for K when they do more learning and they HAVE to learn the stuff. It sets them up well for that while still doing more little kid things too. Just wanted to encourage you. YOU can do it and the kiddos will all be just fine! You will be showing them a great example by going back to school. : )
Thank you Trish :) I really appreciate ALL you said. It’s nice to know someone else is or has been going through what I’m going to be going through! Thanks so much for posting!!!