Here We Go Again!

I really need to keep up with my blog. I've written on scraps of paper, and I can't even tell you where they are right now. I should have a notebook or a journal. I used to journal all of the time. I carried my journal with me constantly in high school. Well, things are just a wee bit crazier in my life than they used to be, and so the writing doesn't always happen like it should.

This will be disorganized, and the writing will be personal rather than poetic or technical, but this is me jumping back in and getting my feet wet.

I'm at an exciting time in life, and as I've mentioned before, I love my late 20s. It's so much easier being 28 than it was to be 18, 21, 24...I figure myself out more and more each day. I like who I am. My husband is my best friend, but I had to go through absolute crap to get to him. Now I cannot picture my life without him in it. My kids are at really fun and interesting ages, and they're all so smart and fun to be around. I have wonderful family and friends, and I am so blessed in that respect.

I have major things to worry and stress about and wake up in the middle of the night several times a week having a panic attack over...but many of us do. Life has to go on, so you deal with it, and you make it work. I have been getting better at this. I have to work at it, but I don't let things get to me as much as I used to, and I'm proud of my progression.

This is my final year in school to become an Occupational Therapy Assistant. I want to become an Occupational Therapist, but that requires a Master's degree. I'm starting here so I can get to work, gain experience in the field, and work more directly with people. I can apply for the Master's program after a year in the field, and it will require more hard work and sacrifice--but I am so beyond excited that this is the career path I've chosen. This is the perfect fit for me. It took me a long time to get here, but the combination of being an educator, a counselor, a nurse, and more--PERFECT career for me. I considered all of those fields, but I always knew they weren't quite right. This is for me, without a doubt. The holistic approach, the diversity of patients, the opportunities--the helping people--this is for me. I am nearly in tears writing this because it means so much to me that I've finally found the direction my life is meant to take. I will truly be making a difference, and I can't ask for more than that.

The classroom hours are long, the fieldwork includes travel and being away from my family, and the workload is intense. But we as a family are going to make it work, and it'll all be worth it when all is said and done. Without a doubt.

So I thank my husband, for being an amazing partner and father, and working with me to make this dream of mine a reality while he goes to school full time as well to fulfill his dream of being an educator. I thank my children, for being understanding when I'm tired, busy with schoolwork, or have to be gone for a few days for fieldwork. This is for their future, just as much as it is for mine. They know, because we tell them every day, that they are the most important people in the world to Mom and Dad. They know that everything we do is for them, and so we're teaching them to be tolerant of the time we have to do what we have to do so that they can have the best life we can give them, just as our parents did for us--which is why I thank them too. It may have taken my husband and myself a little while to find our paths, but we wouldn't be the people we are without our families.

I thank all of my extended family members who helped me throughout the years, my aunts and uncles who drove home the importance of reading, of traveling, of family support.

I thank my grandparents. My grandma has been gone since May 28, 2011, but I know she's always watching. She inspired me to choose this path, and the tears that threatened to fall earlier do now as I write this. She's absolutely my angel, and was just as much as when she was on this earth as she is now.

I am so blessed, and motivated, and passionate about being the best I can be, and helping as many people as I can. When it comes down to it, we are all in this together in this crazy world, and if we can make it just a little bit easier for our fellow humans, why wouldn't we?

I'm definitely on the right path. Now I just need to buckle up for the bumps ahead, and remember to enjoy the ride.