If You Want to Walk On Water, You've Got to Get Out of the Boat

Hmm... that's a good title. Someone should write a book called that!*

But seriously...

If I thought moving to Scotland and marrying a guy I'd only ever been in physical contact with for 7 weeks was stepping out of the boat, well I've just maybe actually surpassed that in the Leap of Faith Scale.

I quit my job.

Holy moly, I quit my job.

As you know, I've been wanting to for a while, but Scott and I just could not see how it could possibly work. We seriously needed my income to stay afloat (to keep up with the boat imagery). But the closer it came to June, the more anxious I was becoming, to the point of illness. I could feel my body giving way under the stress. I knew once time came for the magazine to be done, I'd have to make a choice - Fifi or work. I knew from the past two years of doing the magazine that it would take full, all-day concentration, and I also knew from the past two months that so does Fifi.

There was the option of having the in-laws watch her a few hours everyday, but seeing that I'm exclusively breastfeeding, the thought of pumping constantly for her to have milk when I'm not there only added to the stress.

Yes, I was going to be working from home. Yes, that was an answer to prayer. But before actually having a baby, I thought working from home was the simple solution. After having a baby, I realised it would be almost as complicated as working outside the home. Or maybe even more so.

So I prayed and prayed. I prayed that if working from home really wasn't going to be as bad as I foresaw it, that God would give me peace about it. But I also prayed that if it really was going to be too much, that Scott would come to the same conclusion and give me the okay. After all, the sacrifices he would have to make were going to be enourmous.

Scott came home last week one day and curled up next to me on the bed and said to me, 'How's my stay-at-home mum?'

I panicked the whole way to Glasgow as I rehearsed what I was going to tell my boss. It went smoothly enough, better than I imagined really. But after doing it, I felt the weight of the world fall off my shoulders. I am certain I did the right thing.

It's not going to be easy around here. There will be no extras anymore, at least not for a long time. Scott is going to get a part-time job. I'm working a small part-time gig for someone I know who runs a business. I'm also planning to start my own business (more details to come), in which I can choose how much I work and how many clients I accept. But we both feel very good about our decision.

I kinda know now how Peter felt though...




*That was a joke.