Hello CA family,
I haven't been posting on here so much lately. I have, however, been reading everything through my phone throughout the day. I don't like posting from my phone and I really don't have the extra time to do so.

I started a post on the Financial Challenges group called The Financial Vise Gets Tighter and Tighter. This explains it well. the pressure grows. My cleaning business has become our only income since my H's unemployment ran out, except for an occasional bookkeeping "odd job" Cole gets every now and then. It is not enough. I am doing the majority of the housekeeping work myself and having Cole help me when it is more than I can get done by myself. I am working such long long days and I come home all used up, so tired and crashy. FB is the only thing I really keep up with because of my kids and family and I manage a post on here every now and then. I am actually trying to get MORE work for more money and Cole will have to work with me more. We have yet to leave any important bills unpaid, but we are only on month 3 of trying to make it with only my business and we are gradually falling behind.

Cole is taking care of a lot of things on the home front. Especially now as we are trying to get our older, disabled, son off to culinary school. He will live in an apartment there. Only an hour away from us, but I am so nervous about this. The financial problems are complicating things a lot too. Financial aid and SSI will cover most of his needs, but there are expenses right now that none of us has the money for. Ugh! It's a race to see if we can get him into his apartment before classes start. NERVE WRACKING!

Our youngest son is at UT and holding his own right now, financially and life in general. Yay

Our daughter is 11 hrs away from us. In a good marriage, expecting her first child. Our first biological grandchild. She is due in less than three weeks and has been in early labor for 11 days. It has eased up a bit from what it was the first five days. They have told her this early labor could go on till her due date or she could go into active labor at any time. It is hard for this Nina's heart to be so far away through all of this.

We had to give up the gym last week. This made me cry. We have been swimming at the gym every week night since Dday. We start in the hot tub to ease my soreness from the day then we swim for exercise and then have 10 min of fun play time (marriage therapy) It has meant so much to me and it hurts like crazy to give it up.

I am back in therapy (a free program) to deal with some issues that got stirred up in me when OM called last month. I am doing a program called "This is my Life". I am just getting into it. It looks good. I am filling out a time line of all the significant things that have happened in my life from birth till now. It can be gut wrenching. I just made it to the birth of my first child.

The book Cole has written about my A's and our recovery and all the helpful articles he has written, is in final edits. I am going through it one last time. I am getting more comfortable with it. Since it is close to publishing we have told all of our family members about what we have been through. Some in person and some by phone calls. It went way better than I had even hoped for. I was so scared but now that it is done I feel much better about it all. We are not promoting the book among friends. It will be "out there" on Amazon for those who need it and it will have an accompanying web site so people can make contact with us if they wish.

Sorry for the mostly off topic thread. Sometimes I am dealing with all this okay and sometimes I just spiral and feel like I am being buried. I selfishly just wanted a little support from my CA family. :-) I have this entire day off with nothing to do and no place to go. I may not even get dressed today. :-)