One of those days.

So hear we are.

We are living in my in-laws basement. I'm so glad we have a good support system and people who are willing to put up with us for a while. Our house is empty. Cleaned. And waiting for a renter to come along. We are crossing our fingers that that happens quickly.

Both Jer and I have been applying for jobs and I've been doing a temp job here or there. I had an interview for a job... I didn't really think it ethical for me to do the job of a nurse without having a license though, and for minimum wage at that, so I couldn't bring myself to take that job. It feels like all of the jobs that are available are sorely underpaid. Minimum wage for helping the disabled shower and toilet? This seems inherently wrong, no wonder turnover is so high. We need a more permanent solution.

Goober has been having issues lately at school. It started before we became unemployed... in fact, if I think about it, I was concerned about him clear back when he was in preschool. It comes in waves. For a while he seems to be alright, doing what he should be at school etc. Not the smartest kid, nor the most popular, nor anywhere close to either, but at least not the brunt of the other kids. Then things get rough... I don't know if it's my perception though. It may be that things aren't changing much, and I'm just seeing the problem in a fashion similar to that of watching a train go by a neighborhood. First you hear it, then you see it peak out from behind some houses, then disappear...sometimes for a long while behind buildings, then it pops out again in another place. Is the train really gone? No. Are there times you think it might be? ya, probably.

I worry that he might have an attention deficit disorder. When he was younger I thought it was something like an Audio Processing Disorder because he isn't hyper (usually) and he can focus with intensity at times. But if it's not something he is sincerely interested in? Forget it. Even if he knows he needs to do it and is trying, he is so easily distracted that I almost have to have him in a completely separate room from everyone else. He also gets really upset and I can't seem to calm him down. He's so intent on being upset that there is almost no way to dissuade him from it. You just have to ride it out.

And all this right as we loose insurance.

Then the other night as we sat eating dinner Goober pipes up "Mom, I know why T and I (at school) tell me I'm stupid." (these are two other children in his class). I ask why, hoping it's something like, Because someone else is calling them stupid!

Instead I get "Because I am."

I want to cry.

Jer stepped in and explained that just because you aren't good at one thing doesn't make you stupid, everyone is good at different things. As one of my favorite quotes says "Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." The quote is attributed to Albert Einstein, but it's not verifiable if it was actually him who said it, but it's a good one non-the-less.

Sigh.

School for Jer or I doesn't start until fall, and even then looking into funding etc intimidates me so badly that I procrastinate it. I logically know that it's not that big of a deal... make an appointment, go meet with someone at the school. They should be able to guide us. But I have to fight hard to even take a step. It unknown territory that feels dangerous, then again, it's more dangerous not to do it.

Nothing specifically has gone wrong today. In fact, most of the day has been one that I would normally consider good. Missy had a Birthday party at a classmates house, Turbo gets to go spend the night at my parents house tonight. The kids have been pretty decent outside of a few instances where they have argued.

But I'm still worried about everything. But does that help? No. In fact if anything it just makes it worse.

I worry about loosing our house, and our van, and I worry about Goober and if I need to take him in for testing... and if we will be able to pay for it. I worry about being a burden on people who care about us. I know they love us, but there is a limit to how much help they can offer and how much I can accept. I'm an independent person by nature, and I feel that some of this may just kill me.

I know that loosing all of our things isn't the end of the world, I know we will survive if that happens, but I also know that the process would be painful. If it's going to happen, I just want to get it over with. I want a magic 8 ball that I can ask "will we find a job that will work in the next 10 months?" and it will say "Yes" or "No" and that would be the end of it.

Dammit, if we could pull ourselves up by our "bootstraps" we would... but we don't seem to have any. We are trying to find new ones, but every time we think we might have we find the boot is too large or that the shoe laces are too short.

Hopefully tomorrow will be better.