Starting Over.... thoughts and concerns

At this point in my life, age 40.  I had not planned on becoming a mommy again.  In fact, I have been enjoying  being Nana/Nanny these last several years.  Spoil them and send them home. 

As the days before Aiden's arrival have dwindled to VERY few.  Last night hubby voiced his concerns.  Many that I have been having.  Not so much concerns but you tend to wonder "now that we are older are we going to be able to keep up?"  , will we spoil this one?  Will be be even better parents now that we are older and wiser? 

Never did I imagine having a child at my age.  I wanted one when hubby and I first got together and I was 30.  When it didn’t happen we had tests and was told it wouldn’t be happening for us with out expensive doctors and treatments.  We decided to be happy with the children we have after all, between us, there were five to raise. 

We have had quite the time raising them.  They have broke us in and put us through a ton of things we didn’t expect to face.  We had a daughter who dealt with teen pregnancy and moved out before graduating high school.  She did go on to graduate but stress… oh the stress.  Another daughter moved out as soon as she graduated and moved in with a boyfriend and now has a 16 month old son.  We worry about both of them as the relationships they are in are not the best.  In total, so far, I have witnessed five grandchildren come into this world.  One grandchild was stillborn and that was about the worst experience of my life.  We knew before the  birth the child had passed but even though we knew it was still a devastating thing to witness.  I blogged about it HERE

We have had a son that was in a horrid car wreck.  We got one of those middle of the night calls that no parent EVER wants to get.  BLOGGED ABOUT HERE  I can honestly say that whole month he spent in the hospital and then back in for a follow up surgery for a broken ankle they MISSED before releasing him was nothing but chaos.  It didn’t affect me until about 2-3 weeks after getting him home and I totally lost it.  I couldn’t remember normal things, I was a mess.  I ended up having to go on some meds for ppl with ADHD to get me through that rough patch.

We have always faced the unexpected united and prayerfully.  We are facing the birth of a new son the same way.  We are prepared for him equipment wise.  Crib, changing table, clothes, diapers, wipes etc.  Emotionally it still does not seem real.   Even when I feel him kicking and moving inside it is hard to believe that with in two weeks I will be holding another son.   There are many things I want to change about the way I parented my other children.  I want to be sure to raise this one knowing and loving Jehovah God.  I really want to home school him.  I wanted to home school the other ones but caved to family opinions since I was so young.  I was a big shocked at some of the reactions from family already when I mentioned I wanted to home school Aiden.  According to them we’ll just ruin him that way.   Have they not watched the news lately?  Middle school and elementary students bringing hand guns to school, teachers being pedophiles, kids graduating that can not read , the drugs and sex… how can we do any worse by protecting him as much as we can from these things?  I have already bought a couple of books to  help me see what is the best methods and will it work for us.  The one I am reading right now that I highly recommend is

So You're Thinking About Homeschooling: Second Edition: Fifteen Families Show How You Can Do It (Focus on the Family)

This book gives you the perspective of 15 very different families and their reasons and methods of homeschooling.  It shows that  you do not have to be a “typical” home school family.  I am enjoying the way it is written.

We are at a time now when things have changed for our family.  We only have two children left at home, one of which will graduate high school in about six weeks.  After having lost my job last year my unemployment has run out so things are getting VERY tight financially.  I am using this time now to learn how to coupon, shop frugally, meal plan and get debts paid off and live on ALOT less than we have been.  This is the longest I have been without work in our married life but thankfully, until now, the unemployment helped.  Now that has stopped I want to find every way possible to save money so I can be a stay at home mom.  One book I purchased to help us learn to budget and save is this:

America's Cheapest Family Gets You Right on the Money: Your Guide to Living Better, Spending Less, and Cashing in on Your Dreams

I am enjoying this book and we are at the point where hubby and I are about to set down for the first time in our nine years together and make a budget.  I will be posting about the ups and downs of this.  He is horrid and dealing with this.  I can tell him “do not use your debit card there is only xx amount of money in there” and it won’t be an hour and he is using it!  So, this might just be a struggle. 

Learning to deal with a newborn full time is going to be stressful but so is trying to cut WAY back due to loss of around 900.00 per month in income is stressful also.  I have found MANY helpful websites that I am learning from.  Last night my trip to Winn Dixie using coupons and their sales saved us 35.00 on groceries.  I am just now getting the hang of using the CVS extra bucks system to save a ton of money.  A couple weeks ago I got 2 large packs of huggies diapers, 3 large refill packs of wipes, maxi pads and a couple other items and it cost me a total of $14.00 out of pocket.  I am learning.  This website HERE is great to show you actual scenarios for using CVS.  You can do the same at Walgreens but I haven’t started that yet! 

 

Well, I am going to cut this post short and share more concerns later on.  I didn’t get to sleep until 2 last night and was up with the alarm at 5 this a.m.  I am not having to take my son to his college classes today so I shall nap.