Seven years ago I was sixteen years old, a junior in high school and no job. With threats that if I didn't get a job soon I would be forced to get a volunteer position. Well, guess who ended up volunteering twice a week in a fourth grade classroom, this girl. After a few short weeks, I thought I had found my calling, I was going to be a teacher. It seemed like the perfect job, I enjoyed kids when I knew they'd be leaving to go home with their parents and I enjoyed it even better knowing I'd have a whole summer off. I continued to volunteer those next couple of years until graduation, even after I got a job. I was headed to college to get my teaching degree and knew all the experience I got was a positive way to get things going in the right direction.
Two years after I had began volunteering, I found myself 18 years old and a solid first year of college under my belt. This is when the questioning began. Was I following the right dream? Was this ever really a dream of mine? I pushed the questions aside and began my second semester of college and again everything went well.
That summer things took a turn for the worst. My mom found out her job was relocating in return causing her to lose her job and my dad was struggling to maintain work as well. That came the time of realizing my dreams of a four year college were quickly taking the back burner. They wouldn't be able to help put my through and I couldn't get enough financial aid to pay for it on my own. So, I began community college part time and quickly began working full time.
Guess what began happening again, the questions of my future. This time, however, I knew I was going down the wrong path. It was time to decide what I needed to do, so I took two years off of school and began working full time to help out at home, as we had lost our home and was trying to find somewhere else to move while we lived with my grandmother. June 2010 came and we had found a home that would become our own and settled into make things right again.
August 2010 things again took the wrong turn and I found myself in a hospital for two weeks after my dad had suffered a severe heart attack. Doctors discovered his heart wasn't strong enough to keep up with him anymore and was going to have to get a heart pump and be put on the list to receive a heart transplant. He survived the surgery, only after dying on the table and being brought back. The next day however we found out the rest of his body was shutting down and there was a 50/50 chance of him making it. My mom made the decision to take him off life support to see what would happen. He couldn't do it. August 14, my dad passed away and life really changed.
I am not sure what's scarier, your dad dying or watching your mom disappear in front of your eyes. It was like losing two parents at once, but one was alive. My mom has been fighting post traumatic depression now for two years and I see her some days look like she's really changing and others, like it was two years ago. It's a day by day thing.
A year ago today, I decided that I was going back to school full-time and get my degree, finally. I applied to a four year college into their business program. This past August I began taking classes full-time as well as working full-time. It's a struggle, but everything is. Plus, somethings do work out...
Jess
