Initial reaction

We had a pretty decent discussion last night, about all that's going on. I've been a bit concerned about how Lisa feels with all of this coming to a head, but she reaffirmed last night her belief that this is larger than both of us, and our wants and needs.

She went in yesterday and spoke to her employer, gave her a copy of the press release, told her that she didn't want her to learn about it from the media, that she'd rather learn about it directly from us. Anyone who knows Lisa would realize what a huge thing that was for her to have to do. I'm so proud of her -- she's discovered courage I don't think she realized she had.

After having given this a lot of thought (and worry) during the past couple of sleepless nights, I've decided my greatest worry is that our relationship will be tested a lot, and how we'll fare with it. We've got a lot of stressors in the relationship as it is, what with the big "M" sitting squarely in our faces (menopause), making me weepy, moody, weepy, bitchy, weepy, impatient. Did I mention weepy? On top of that, my ex just decided he was tired of paying support and stopped paying about 6 months ago. That's another $500 a month we're living without right now and, sadly, I think that the two most common things couples fight over are kids and money. On the up-side of that, I manage money VERY well and had gotten us to a point where, while the loss of the support certainly hurts, it still doesn't put us in a position where we can't meet our financial obligations.

Our union is also in a state of flux -- we broke away from the larger unit this past fall because of some issues there. So, we're still without a "valid" contract, no raises, take-home pay decreasing due to increases in health insurance, union dues, and withholding of those items. It seems our withholding has changed to 24 pay periods instead of 26, but we'll still get paid 26 times. According to the union president, they can't do this without consent of the union, so the matter is now in arbitration.

Small stressors, large stressors, non-stressors -- it seems they all come together at the same time. I keep reminding myself of the adage that, while you can't control what happens in your life, you can control how you react to it.

I just hope Lisa's up to the task of keeping me from coming unglued. Perhaps that's why she bought me a glue gun for Christmas...y'think?