Blobby is officially at 4 weeks which puts me at 6 weeks pregnant! It seems like a strange way to count, but I guess it make sense for the fertiles :)
I learned a very important lesson today. Just say no to the chinese buffet!!! I am so stuffed that I feel terrible! I so need to stick to the many small meals rule. I am not by nature a snacker. I think I used to be (as in when I was growing up at home), but in my many efforts to shed the pounds over the years, snacks have gone away. So now it seems so strange to always have my stash. It is almost like my stomach can never be empty or full. If it is empty, as counter-intuitive as it sounds, my tummy gets very upset. If it gets too full, I start to feel nauseous.
Now that all the directly preggo related stuff is out of the way, I need to stress out a bit...and to those of you in our family, don't give hubby a hard time about this. He is super stressed! And please don't mention my scared rant either!
Some background before I get to the really scary part. I'm a bank teller. I make very little money. I used to be a public school teacher. I made pretty good money then. When we moved from Texas to New Mexico I basically took a 20k pay cut. But the hubby's job more than made up for that. He went from being a broke grad student to a physicist post-doc at a national laboratory. Scientist at national labs make good money.
Post-docs are generally only for two years. This coming October will be the end of hubby's 3rd year. Since the end of the second year his bosses have been promising that he will probably be able to be converted to a full staff member. If this happens, his salary will be about the same as both of our salaries right now. So I can stay home with Blobby. That has been our plan since we started trying. He has been assured along the way that it will totally happen.
Well October is 2 months away!!! And currently they are still saying that they want to convert him, but right now there just isn't the money. They can keep him for a 4th year as a post-doc. If this is what happens, I will have to try to find a better job so that we can afford to have Blobby in daycare. Currently my job would barely cover daycare and our insurance. I would basically have no paycheck since a good bit goes to our FSA and a good bit to my 401K. Hubby also puts lots into his 401K. So I guess we could take that down to a lower level for a while, but I hate to do it. It seems like one of those things that once you stop, you never start back up.
So basically my stress is this: hubby's job ends in two months. They say they will extend his post-doc, but they have also been saying that he will be converted to staff for the past year so I tend not to believe anything that "they" say. I am now in full badger mode. "How many job applications have you done today? Only 3! That's not enough!" (I really say "Hey baaaybeee, have you done some applications? Oh good!") I also told him that with this short of notice, he should look here at the lab or in San Antonio and Dallas where we have family that could help us move or that we could stay with. I'm trying not to show him how scared I am cause as it is he hasn't been sleeping much, but holy crap! I'm terrified!!!
Okay, now its off to look for higher paying jobs just in case!
It's funny, I've got a friend from grad school (in Texas) who also now works for a similar (same? who knows?) company in ABQ. She's a crazy atmospheric chemist. It AMAZES me the money there is once full-time status is achieved. I wish you guys the best of luck with the job search so you can stay at home like you want!
ReplyDeleteOh girl! That is stressful!! We've been down that road so many times (haha except not with good lab pay in the picture). I'm sure it will work out somehow. Something will turn up! And maybe if y'all did have to lower the 401K amount, could you set it up to automatically go back up in a year? Ofc, we would be thrilled if y'all moved here!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteJust saying a quick hello to let you know I'm so happy things are looking good with Blobby! Good luck with the job situation, don't let it stress you, you need to be stress free right now!!!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad to hear that things are going well in the pregnancy department. Good job little blobby! My first trimester was the hardest in certain ways because I also was nauseous a lot unless I had something in my stomach and the only thing that sounded good was carbs. So I gained 11 pounds in the first trimester! It leveled off and I did okay in the long run but yikes, not the way you want to start things off.
ReplyDeleteI'm sorry to hear about the stress of your husbands job. My hubby is also in the science world, as is almost his entire side of the family, so I can relate to a lot of this. It's not as easy as people think it is once you get out of school for sure. I'm hoping though that his current job gets their butt in gear and does what they said they would do.