Coming Together

Hey Friends!

It has been a while. For those of you that follow along with my blog, I hope you are all doing well. For those of you that might be visiting my page for the first time, if this is the first post of mine that you are reading – I hope you are well too. This has been such a crazy year, the least I can hope for everyone is that they are well.

I haven’t written a new post for a few months. No particular reason other than I haven’t had any major updates. But more than that, I have not felt compelled about any particular thing to write about it. I don’t consider that to be a good or bad thing. Since my last post where I spoke about not having a sense of direction, life has been much smoother. There have not been any big moments that defined my thoughts or course of action. As a result of that, I have been fortunate enough to just “relax”, let the dust settle and figure out my next steps. And lucky me, without having to do much, what I have been praying for started to happen. Of course, none of it just happened. It was the result of planning and execution – and having the time on my hands. Since my last post on July 1st, my mental and emotional health have improved tremendously.

That is not to say there are not still lows and setbacks. Healing, much like life, is not linear. I’ve learned to embrace the tough days and ride them out with as much grace as I can muster. I believe what helped with that was I had developed a (somewhat daily) routine of writing in my gratitude journal, getting a (decent) night’s rest, and taking supplements and medications. There was a time I was exercising a few days a week as well. It was going great. But as things sometimes go, I hurt my back. I have back pain daily, particularly middle and lower back. Going to the chiropractor had helped. But I have not seen my chiropractor since March. My lower back hurt not just to move, but even to the touch. And that lasted a few weeks. Towards the end of summer, I found myself laying down a lot because it hurt too much to move. And you can guess what happened – I lost all motivation to get healthy after that. I’m still struggling to get back on track.

I had also finally started to get control of my finances. That was huge for me. I had paid off a good amount of debt, and my credit score was the best it had been in years. But money got tight again. I won’t lie, there’s no point. I had finally gotten to a good place financially because of the CARES act. For years, but especially the last two years, I never had a moment to “breathe”. Financially, I felt like I was suffocating. The supplemental funds helped me pay off debt and take care of myself without having to constantly borrow. Let me state, I still live at home with my mom. That extra money helped me clear debt. I fully understand that for thousands of others, that supplemental money only helped them to barely get by. I know I was fortunate. But as we know happened, the extra funds stopped coming. And quite frankly, my regular unemployment money does not cover much. So, the struggle came back. And sadly, so did my bad habits. Bad habits that tend to be exacerbated when I have little money. Yes, I am working on that.

Since I shared where I am financially, let me share my furlough status. As of Friday, December 11, I will no longer be furloughed, and not because I have been called back to work. No, my furlough status is ending with my employer. My director called to share that information with me. It was actually a pleasant conversation with no hard feelings whatsoever. She never actually used the words “fired” or “laid off”, just said that my furlough will end. I am not sure what else that means besides being fired. But again, no hard feelings. I haven’t worked since March, I knew there would come a time I would get that call saying I was let go. I’m thankful I was able to keep my health insurance as long as I did, and I’m thankful for what that job did give me the last two years. By no means, was it easy. In fact, I was looking into taking a leave of absence back in February. I needed a break. I knew I was done working at the daycare a long time ago. I absolutely loved being around the kids. I loved it, but more than that – I’m beyond thankful for it. Even on the hard days, those kids filled my empty and broken heart. Those kids, especially a select few, saved my life. With that said, I was still done. So when I got the call my furlough was over, it was okay. My only complaint would be that it was not the call I would have wanted before the holidays, but oh well. I wished my director and the school well, and parted ways on great terms.

You know how they say when one door closes, another one opens? It’s true. Sometimes the other door opens days, weeks, months, years later – but it opens. In this case, the other door opened the next day. Friday morning I woke up to great news. I woke up to the news that my application for real estate salesperson had been approved! Thats right, as of Friday December 4th, my license to be a New Jersey real estate salesperson is active! I have dreamed of being a real estate agent for most of my adult life. For years I talked about getting my license. I took the steps last year and took the course. And this year I made that dream/goal a reality. I actually accomplished it.

I FINALLY DID IT!!!

And it feels amazing.

I’m going to end there. With all the chaos going on in this country and my state, I am focusing on the positives. Positives being my family is healthy. We have a new President and Vice President coming into office in little over a month. I have faith they will start to get this virus under control. And I now have my real estate license. You can absolutely expect to see me sharing listings on my page going forward. And I absolutely hope and expect you guys to use me as your agent.

Take care everyone. Stay safe and stay mindful. I will be writing more soon, and hopefully on a regular basis. As always, drop a line letting me know how you are. Follow me on social media, @oaknmetal on both IG and Twitter, and Oaknmetal on Facebook!

Talk to you all soon!

Nat