Time for Reflection...

I figured that since I'm trying to restart my life in a sense, I need to reflect on what I've done leading up to becoming a SAHM. So here goes.

I started my income making journey back in October of 1995, with my first ever job. I was a senior in high school at the time, taking a whopping seven classes when all my other friends were taking only five. Of course three of them were music, so that was an easy "A" for me. As for work, I found a job as a cashier in a family friendly self-serve restraunt. As of this day, my first job was also my longest. I was there until the middle of 1998, probably around May (I can't remember precicely).

Now, during this time of working as a cashier, I met my husband, who just happend to work there as well. So we worked together for three years. The second year I worked there was when we got married, and I had our first child. That was 1997.

In the first part of 1998, I actually got a second job, well, just because we needed the extra money. A new restraunt was opening up next door to my first job, so I applied and got a job as a waitress. That lasted a whole four or five long months. By the middle of that year I was getting so tired of working, and not seeing my son when he was awake, I decided to quit both jobs. Ok, that probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, but we both agreed that it would be better in the long run. Ha. That lasted probably a month.

I found another job, working the opening shift at a bagel shop that was accross the street from my apartment at the time. I had only worked there for a few months when we decided to go to Mexico for the holidays. I put in my notice and we went to Mexico. We were going to stay for three or four months. Problems arose while we were gone, and I had to come back early to try and fix the mess.

When I arrived back in the US, it was 1999, and I came back to no apartment, no job, and no friends. Lucky for me, my mom ran into a friend of mine from school and she offered to let me stay with her and her husband until I could save enough money to get a new apartment. She also helped me get a job. She worked at McDonald's. So after three weeks, I started working with her. I worked as a cashier and as the order-taker at the drive thru for about six months. I think it was my third or fourth month of working at McDonalds when my husband and son finally came back from Mexico. Around that same time I had also started a new temp job as a secretary for an appliance wholesaler. I worked both jobs for two months then quite McDonalds: the temp job was supposed to have been 3 month temp then on to permanent hire (I figured that since I was going to work there for a long time that I didn't need McDonalds anymore). Unfortunately I let my private life interfere with my work life, and three months turned to four, and then the owner decided not to hire me on full time.

So it was around July of 1999, I was about to loose my temp job, and I found out I was pregnant. I was planning on giving notice to my temp job, but they already knew (former roommate called them and told them) and told me that I would not get the permanent position. Time to go back to Mexico.

This time I spent 6 months in Mexico, and came back when I was in my last two months of pregnancy. I nearly did not make it back, but that's another story. So now we are in the year 2000, my daughter was born in March, and my husband and I were living in a hotel with some of his cousins. One of them had a job at a local kennel and knew that the owner had been looking for a new secretary. So I go and interview with her, and low and behold I get the job. I started in the middle of April, and was allowed to have my daughter with me everyday. To this day, my nearly two years at that kennel was the best job in my life. I got to work around animals like I've always wanted, and also had the unique opportunity to manage the kennel, and have my baby with me for a while. I started sending her to my sister-in-law's house when she was six months old because it got to be too much.

So from April of 2000 to September of 2001 I worked at the kennel. Then 9/11 happened and all hell broke loose. The kennel owner started to get frantic because we were at capacity, and quite a number of the dog owners were stuck out of town. Remember, the airlines were grounded for quite a while after 9/11. Things got heated, and the owner started accusing my family of stealing things while she was gone for a few days. After a few days of listening to her yell at me for something that I know didn't happen, she threw a fit and started screaming at me in front of a client trying to drop off her dog to be groomed. That was the straw that broke the camel's back, so to speak. To this day, I still cannot believe the audacity of that woman to do what she did the way she did it. I still feel bad for the client, because she was a regular. I took the key to the office out of my pocket, looked at the lady with a sorrowful expression on my face, and then threw the key at the owner and said "Fine. If you are going to be that unproffessional, then here is your key, I no longer work for you. I'll be back next week to pick up my paycheck." and then I walked out. I still remember that day. I cannot recall the exact date, but it was about two weeks after 9/11.

So I was once again without a job. I took it in stride, feeling good about what I did, yet knowing that we couldn't afford for me not to work. About a month later, right before Thanksgiving I was shopping at Target, and said, "What the hey-why don't I apply to work here?" So I did, and started working at Target right after Thanksgiving. I was there for one year.

I ended up not enjoying that job too much, and started looking for a new job as I neared my one year anniversary. Well, one day as I was walking around the neighborhood I noticed a new store was going into a small strip mall. So I naturally went over there and peeked at the window to see if they were hiring. Well, as my luck would have it, they were, so I pulled together my resume and emailed it to the address that was posted on the sign in the window. This is now the last part of October of 2002.

Much to my surprise, I got called for an interview two days after I submitted my resume. A week later I went to my interview. After my interview I had a doctors appointment, so I left right away. For some reason I called home, and my husband said that someone had called me about the interview. I hightailed it back to find out that they wanted to hire me immediately!! Talk about luck. The next week I went to my orientation training. Two weeks later, the store manager called me and asked how soon could I actually start. Well, I had to submit my two weeks notice at Target but since I worked nights there I could start partial days right away. It worked out that they wanted me to start two weeks later. My last day at Target was my first day at Goodwill as a Selling Supervisor (fancy name for cashier).

I lasted nearly as long at Goodwill as I did at my first job. I was at two years four months and I felt things were going amazingly well. After one year working there I became an assitant manager. The job was great, the people were great, and then- April Fools??? I won't go into the details here but if you really want to know what happend, you can read about it in my post: What I learned about my last job-I wrote the paper for a class I was taking at the time and decided to post it on my creative blog.

So on April 1, 2005 I officially became a SAHM. From that moment forward I had started my journey into becoming a WAHM. I'm still on that journey, but you will learn what I've done since April of 2005.