Truth can be dreams: April 2008

Monday, April 14, 2008

Remember the students

So here we are in the final countdown. We have been living with no money, no family (close by), very little emotional support, no spare time for anything including for our selfs and piles of stress for 6 years. three weeks left. three weeks to go, three weeks that feel like 3 years. I find myself wanting to scream out of frustration. I have been reflecting on the past 6 years and all that we have been through. Seriously I can't believe we made it this far. It is only God that kept us going.

So here we are, final countdown. But nothing exciting will happen on Ryan's last day of school. We will continue surviving. We will still have piles of bills to pay. We may stop for a moment and say "Holy crap it's over"! That will be just about it. We will work more and hopefully make enough money to cover our bills every month. We won't have to make embarrassing phone calls to parents for help with buying food and paying bills. I have to say that we could not have made it through this time in our lives with out the help of Ryans parents Al and Sue and my Dad who all helped us with food and rent and many other things.


I remember the day I realized (after about 3 years) that no matter what we did we couldn't pay bills and buy healthy food every month. This would not have been an issue if we didn't have small children at the time. We talked it over and decided that no matter what happened we would buy the healthy food we needed before everything else. That was a tuff choice. We have watched people we know live through the same situations. Everyone deals with the student/family life differently but all had hard times, all struggled. I hated hearing about those who had family close by and if they had no food in the fridge they would just slip over to the parents place and raid there fridge. I was and still am soooo jealous of this. Wow would that have saved us at times. Yes we chose to come to Winnipeg where we have no family so yes we put our selves in this situation but guess what it's still SUCKS.

Am I just venting? Yes partly. Just writing all this out is helping me process some stuff. Do I sound stressed? Well guess what I am. It's still not over and Ryan doesn't have a job for the fall yet. We have a whole world of issues to deal with after the last day of school. This is life I know that. But heck what I wouldn't give for a few days off........maybe next year.

Oh also something I want to do once Ryan is working full time. I want to always give some money or gift certificates for groceries or some thing to a young family with a parent in school. We had a few people bless us over the years and what a huge difference it would make in our week. I want to set aside a certain amount every month for that. I know many families that have been through this whole school thing and sometimes I think they start working and start shopping and forget how hard it all was. I don't want to ever forget. I don't know how I could.
hayes at 5:01 p.m.
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