moosh in indy.

Stereotype would have you believe that as soon as Cody graduates we’ll be driving new SUV’s and living in the nice part of town with all the other doctors and lawyers. We will be going on family vacations to the Bahamas and have matching Ralph Lauren luggage and linen pants. Carefree! Rich! Raking in the dough!

Wrong.

The closer his graduation gets the more I realize that not only are we going to have to be grownups and buy a house with a water bill, a garbage bill, a sewage bill, a gas bill, no landlord to take care of the leaky faucets,  we are going to have loans to repay. Loans that will amount to even more than what a mortgage and two new SUVs would amount to; not that we’re getting SUVs but whatever.

I look forward to having a house after eight years of marriage, while at the same time I want to curl up in a corner and cry because I don’t feel old enough to be dealing with IRAs, stock portfolios, life insurance and mortgages.

Today I had an experience that angered/frustrated/humbled/outraged and opened my eyes all at once. I had to go see a doctor at a new clinic about some issues I’ve been experiencing. It was a low income clinic because we don’t have insurance, and medical tests and procedures are expensive. Because we go to low income clinics, the wait times are longer and getting appointments can be like trying to get a lunch date with the President. But hey, I’ll take what I can get.

After my appointment today I was made to sit down with a “financial counselor.”

I had been “flagged.” Apparently they thought I was trying to “mooch off the system.” They wanted me to prove to them that I was eligible for financial assistance for my medical care. Even though I had a card that said I was eligible for a discount on my medical care through their facility, they thought there had been an oversight and that I was to pay full price for a visit to their clinic. Their clinic was for people with “no insurance” and “strained financial situations.”

When did living off $1500 a month become a “wonderful financial situation”?

This is where I get nervous about writing what I want to write. Trolls? Stay back. I don’t mean this to sound the way you’re going to want to twist it and make it sound.

I’ve never really been put in a situation like this before, but as I sat there trying to explain to this man that my husband was in school and we were living off small amounts of borrowed money that isn’t even ours, I started to feel like I was being accused. Because someday my husband will (hopefully) have a decent income we should find some magical way to have health coverage? Or we should pay full price for our health care now? No, we’re not going to be in this situation forever, it’s only temporary. But I still needed to see a doctor whether my husband was a hobo or an attorney. And I’m still on a tight budget whether my husband is going to school to become a nose picker or a lawyer. Nothing is going to change that. And if there’s an option where I can get medical care for cheaper I’m going to take it. If you’re on a budget and there was a way you could save hundreds, if not thousands on your medical care, even though it meant longer waits and appointments made far in advance, wouldn’t you do it? Assuming you were eligible (on paper) to receive such care?

I’m frustrated. No, we currently don’t pay taxes, but in another year we will enter a tax bracket so ridiculous we’ll be sure to make up for lost time. And honestly after our experiences over the last few years I am grateful for taxes and taxpayers in a way I never was before. A lot of people honestly need a little help sometimes. Yes, there are those who abuse the system, but then there are those who just need a little something to get them on the right track. We are in the latter.

This is one of the reasons this election is so hard for me, and I’ve never really known how to get it into words. By the time the new president gets his policies into effect we will be in a different scenario than we are now; we will be taxpayers with a mortgage and we’ll be hanging out in a high tax bracket. But for now, for this election we are a low income family trying to gain an education without any easily attained health care.

So do I vote for the candidate who will best suit who we are now, or who we’ll be in anther year? I don’t want to forget about all the wonderful people I’ve met while in this situation, the doctors, nurses, social workers and government employees who do all this hard work without enough gratitude or glory for the people who honestly need help to get back on their feet. But at the same time I don’t want to be paying more in taxes than we are able to save or put towards our own loans or mortgage.

So there.

I’m afraid I come off as a whiny baby. Hopefully there’s some of you who have been through the graduate school thing or a rough patch and can understand. I’m not a whiny baby, I’m grateful for the great life I enjoy and the comforts and opportunities I have in this country. I guess the stereotype that comes along with being an attorney’s wife is starting to rub me wrong.

Bah.

Be nice. I will delete on this one.

I never wanted kids. Even in the delivery room with my ankles by my ears I was seriously rethinking the decision to bring a needy, dirty, messy, loud, life encompassing being into my life.

It didn’t come easy to me, the whole mothering gig. I still don’t feel like it does. A while ago I admitted to not loving her right at first. And there’s still days that I count down the minutes to bedtime. Parenting is, well, amazing. Watching them “get” things you’ve taught them. Having “I love you mommy” whispered into your ear. the moosh is so much a part of my life after four years that we’ve become a team. We are left alone so much we have a relationship that she may never have with anyone else. That I may never have with anyone else. It baffles my mind how well I know her, how well she knows me. This doesn’t mean that parenting is easy by any means, it sucks sweaty dog balls sometimes. And yet I am so grateful that I get to be the one to be her mom, that I get to be with her, through good times and big hairy tantrums. And through it all, for the most part, the job of a mother stays thankless. But I’m okay with that.

What I’m trying to say, is that when the beast is asleep and I’m left looking at pictures of her something happens in my chest that I have yet to find a way to describe. Maybe you other moms know what I’m talking about. It’s a tingle. A swelling of your heart, a quickening of your pulse. An intense desire to go in the other room and kiss that little chubby sleeping hand that smells of cookies and bananas. To pick her up and rock her because these days are so numbered. To feel her wispy little hairs tickle my nose, to hear her slow soft breathing. To nuzzle my nose into that warm spot right on the back of her neck that always smells of sunscreen.

I love her so much it hurts.

She’s growing up so fast.

I hope one day she can realize that her mom loves her so much that she can’t even find words to describe it.

And I hope one day she will have a little person of her own to care for and that she will be knocked flat with an overwhelming indescribable love for the warm little body in her arms.

While I want everything in the world for her, I want nothing more than for her to be happy.

You will always be my baby, moosh.

Ah sweet succulent depression, how I loathe thee. How I wish you would just curl up and die while ceasing to exist in all corners of my life. I’ve had enough of you. You exhaust me.

I was hoping it was anything but you. I’ve been finding excuses for weeks. The weather, me being sick, Cody being gone, the stubbornness of my resident three year old, my period. But all those things came and went and I was still left feeling like a sack of beaten potatoes.

So I got help. It wasn’t easy getting help with the fear that they would keep me in the back of my mind. I came awfully close to what could only be called a panic attack when I saw the locked door next to the Psychiatric Intervention Unit. They promised they wouldn’t keep me, and I agreed to a new medication and regular counseling.

I know too many people who think depression is a cop out, a choice, an excuse or a justification for laziness. I know because I used to be one of those people.

For me, depression is a real, live, all consuming monster that would gladly eat me alive if I let it. But I refuse to let it. I am going to kick depression’s black inky rear. I am not going to let it define me, I am not going to let it win. I have too many things to fight for, to live for.

So if you’ll please excuse me, I’m going to be putting myself back together for a bit. Thankfully Craig over at Puntabulous has a tasty bit of the me I’m trying to put back together.

So please, don’t dwell here, I’ll be fine, really. Head on over to Puntabulous and show that little Star Wars geek that I am the true queen of all things baked and cream filled.

Because here at moosh in indy, I’m all about focusing on the good, and taking down any brownie loving fruits in my way.