Hanging in There

I'm hoping that the stress will be decreasing - or, at least, plateauing - here over the next month or two. We no longer have to worry about whether or not we're going to lose our house - because we just did! Yep, the sale was today, and after a quick call to the sheriff's office, Stephen was able to find out that our bank bought our house. Which, I suppose, is a good thing, simply considering the fact that we're used to dealing with those people. And, I hear they got an awesome deal - how about they got it for $60,000 less than the amount they sold it to us four years ago! Bastards! Stephen made a phone call to our mortgage company yesterday and was told that, if they do indeed purchase the house, we should have at least 45-60 more days here. This is great compared to the panic we had for two days when one of the two attorneys we've been in touch with informed us we might have to vacate almost immediately once sold. Keep in mind that the other attorney said we could have 4-6 months. That's a pretty big difference in advice, don't you think? I guess that's the thing that's been making me the most panicked - the fact that no one seems to know what in the hell is going on. One minute we have months, the next minute we have days.

I know some people think that I shouldn't talk about this stuff - maybe because they think it's too personal, or that, perhaps, we should be embarrassed about it. And, to be honest, I am a little embarrassed about it. It's a slap in the face of our pride, and it's given us a good taste of failure. It hurts that we've tried to go the "normal," responsible route in our lives - you know, dating for years, completing school, getting married, getting a house after a few years, starting a family a few years after that - only to have it not turn out quite as perfect as we'd hoped. But, you know, things happen. You quit one okay job to take another one that should be more rewarding, only to be downsized a few months later. In the meantime, you have a baby, right at the same time the mortgage company jacks your payments up over 50%. You finally feel like you're climbing out of the financial wreckage when you get a promising job a few months later, only to have some horrible allegations made against you and a company that won't stand behind their new employee. The economy is bad, and you can't find a decent job. You can't make your house payments. There's just not a whole lot you can do about it - life just sucks that way sometimes. I'm slowly learning that no matter how much you try to prepare, no matter how much you try to do things the "right" way, life is bound to throw you curve balls. It's okay, and I get it. I'll take these curve balls in a heartbeat over some of the other bad things that could have been - and one day will be - thrown our way. And I guess that's why I'm trying not to be ashamed over what's going on with us and why I'm talking about it on here, WHERE EVERYONE CAN SEE. It's a part of our lives right now, it's what we're thinking about, it's what we're going through. Besides that, it'll be nice to re-read this one day in the future, after we've won the lottery and are soaking up the sun on some tropical island, and laugh about how stressed out I was over a stupid house.

Now that one hurdle has been jumped, we're on to the next: finding a place to live. Hopefully we'll have a place lined up within the week. We're quickly running out of empty space in the garage and house for packed boxes. Moving is FUN! Updates will surely follow soon...