Hey all, thanks for the wisdom, insight and support you've offered the family and I over the past year. We'll be filing in early October, but much has changed since I last posted.
Just to give a background for those who might not know the history:
2 full-time jobs for 6 years straight
Stress affecting my health and family relations
Finally hit the breaking point in March, stopped making payments to the unsecureds in May
Was going to quit one job (most likely night job) and be a 2-income family again
Well, things have seemed to come full-circle. Both of our boys are now in school full-day, which is great, but presented it's own set of problems. Day-care (aka legalized robbery as far as I'm concerned) was going to be horrendous. To have both of my boys in for 2 hours a day, 5 days a week, they wanted nearly TWICE what my monthly mortgage payment is. Now, I'll be the first to admit that my home is barely anything more than four walls and a roof, but still nearly TWICE that payment? Not to mention the fact that they couldn't go to the day-care we'd known and trusted for the past 4.5 years. No, because the DC is in a school district other than the one we live in, we couldn't get transportation from school to there.
My in-laws graciously offered to get the boys on the bus in the morning and off the bus in the afternoon and watch them for the 1.5 hours between them getting home and either one of us getting home from work. This was great, except for the fact that it didn't cover when they were out of school for Holidays, conference days and summer vacations.
So, the wife and I sat down and did the math. Any extra funds made working one of the two jobs would be lost to child care. It just didn't seem smart to spend money to have someone else watch our kids. I then asked my wife the fateful question "Do you want to quit your job and stay home with the boys?" She replied "I know how much you hate your day job and have been staying there, sacrificing for us all these years. You go ahead and quit it, stay at the night job, and be able to stay home with the boys."
The reality of it hit me like a megaton bomb. Not only was I going to be able to quit a job that I loathe with every molecule in my body, but I was going to be able to stay home with my boys! Sledding during the winter breaks. Camping trips, trips to the amusement park, zoo and museum during summer vacation. I had to sit down. I had missed so much of my boys' growing up over the past 6 years, and while I'll never get that time back, I sure as heck can attempt to make up for lost time.
As the next day came, the initial shock wore off, and I started to rationalize this more and more. I had my wife run and re-run the numbers making sure that we could afford to do this, as my day job pays quite a bit more than my night job does. She said that it will be tight, but as long as we are frugal and cut out a lot of the niceties we had grown used to, we can do it.
The more I thought about it, the more concerned I became. I've been going 100 MPH all-day, everyday for the past 6 years. What was I going to do with myself? Sure, I have a few projects around the house I want to do, but other than that, I was going to be a boredom bomb looking for a place to explode. And then it came to me....GO BACK TO COLLEGE AND GET YOUR DOCTORATE YOU DUMMY!!!
So, I applied to one of the local Universities and was accepted for the spring semester. I have two more that I am considering, but will talk to them when I have a little more free time come late October - early November.
I have an optimism I've truly not felt in probably 10-15 years. I have just a week and a half to go at my day job, then another week later, we file, and the day after, the wife and I leave for our yearly (and probably last for quite a few years) vacation. Then I come back and begin my quest for more knowledge with a ravenous hunger that has too long been denied by not only myself, but the evil creditors whom enabled my family and I to go somewhere that there would be no digging out from.
But I digress. Sorry for being so long-winded, but there was a lot of ground to cover, and you guys have all given me so much that I just had to share it with you.
Now, for a few questions:
1- How long after we file do we need to wait to make more money? I'm not trying to milk the system, but I know my current employer wants to call me in occasionally on a consultant basis and is willing to work with my BK situation, but if I'm going to have to wait until a year from now to collect on work I'll do for them now, I think I might pass. I also want to pick up something part-time, maybe on campus in-between classes, just to give us a little cushion with things.
2- We're filing on 10/12. After that, we'll have our 341 sometime in November, and then the 60 day wait begins. What happens if one of our creditors objects?
3- Anyone feel that the Trustee might object to my quitting of the job that pays more ($6 more an hour to be exact) to stay home with the boys and complete my Doctorate?
Just to give a background for those who might not know the history:
2 full-time jobs for 6 years straight
Stress affecting my health and family relations
Finally hit the breaking point in March, stopped making payments to the unsecureds in May
Was going to quit one job (most likely night job) and be a 2-income family again
Well, things have seemed to come full-circle. Both of our boys are now in school full-day, which is great, but presented it's own set of problems. Day-care (aka legalized robbery as far as I'm concerned) was going to be horrendous. To have both of my boys in for 2 hours a day, 5 days a week, they wanted nearly TWICE what my monthly mortgage payment is. Now, I'll be the first to admit that my home is barely anything more than four walls and a roof, but still nearly TWICE that payment? Not to mention the fact that they couldn't go to the day-care we'd known and trusted for the past 4.5 years. No, because the DC is in a school district other than the one we live in, we couldn't get transportation from school to there.
My in-laws graciously offered to get the boys on the bus in the morning and off the bus in the afternoon and watch them for the 1.5 hours between them getting home and either one of us getting home from work. This was great, except for the fact that it didn't cover when they were out of school for Holidays, conference days and summer vacations.
So, the wife and I sat down and did the math. Any extra funds made working one of the two jobs would be lost to child care. It just didn't seem smart to spend money to have someone else watch our kids. I then asked my wife the fateful question "Do you want to quit your job and stay home with the boys?" She replied "I know how much you hate your day job and have been staying there, sacrificing for us all these years. You go ahead and quit it, stay at the night job, and be able to stay home with the boys."
The reality of it hit me like a megaton bomb. Not only was I going to be able to quit a job that I loathe with every molecule in my body, but I was going to be able to stay home with my boys! Sledding during the winter breaks. Camping trips, trips to the amusement park, zoo and museum during summer vacation. I had to sit down. I had missed so much of my boys' growing up over the past 6 years, and while I'll never get that time back, I sure as heck can attempt to make up for lost time.
As the next day came, the initial shock wore off, and I started to rationalize this more and more. I had my wife run and re-run the numbers making sure that we could afford to do this, as my day job pays quite a bit more than my night job does. She said that it will be tight, but as long as we are frugal and cut out a lot of the niceties we had grown used to, we can do it.
The more I thought about it, the more concerned I became. I've been going 100 MPH all-day, everyday for the past 6 years. What was I going to do with myself? Sure, I have a few projects around the house I want to do, but other than that, I was going to be a boredom bomb looking for a place to explode. And then it came to me....GO BACK TO COLLEGE AND GET YOUR DOCTORATE YOU DUMMY!!!
So, I applied to one of the local Universities and was accepted for the spring semester. I have two more that I am considering, but will talk to them when I have a little more free time come late October - early November.
I have an optimism I've truly not felt in probably 10-15 years. I have just a week and a half to go at my day job, then another week later, we file, and the day after, the wife and I leave for our yearly (and probably last for quite a few years) vacation. Then I come back and begin my quest for more knowledge with a ravenous hunger that has too long been denied by not only myself, but the evil creditors whom enabled my family and I to go somewhere that there would be no digging out from.
But I digress. Sorry for being so long-winded, but there was a lot of ground to cover, and you guys have all given me so much that I just had to share it with you.
Now, for a few questions:
1- How long after we file do we need to wait to make more money? I'm not trying to milk the system, but I know my current employer wants to call me in occasionally on a consultant basis and is willing to work with my BK situation, but if I'm going to have to wait until a year from now to collect on work I'll do for them now, I think I might pass. I also want to pick up something part-time, maybe on campus in-between classes, just to give us a little cushion with things.
2- We're filing on 10/12. After that, we'll have our 341 sometime in November, and then the 60 day wait begins. What happens if one of our creditors objects?
3- Anyone feel that the Trustee might object to my quitting of the job that pays more ($6 more an hour to be exact) to stay home with the boys and complete my Doctorate?
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