Transitions Can Be Rough – Stay Flexible
“I told Althea I was feeling lost – lacking in some direction.” This lyric by the Grateful Dead has been bouncing around my brain the last 6 months. Why the last 6 months? That’s been the amount of time since I moved from Houston to Oklahoma. The plan was that I would transition to Stay at Home Dad (SAHD)/default parent and Mrs. SSC would continue working. Why do I get to quit work and she doesn’t? Well, in short, she wants to continue teaching because she loves it, it’s her passion and it does a lot to invigorate her soul. It’s the main reason we switched from pursuing Early Retirement and started working to create our Lifestyle Change. While I loved what I did for work, I’ve written about many times before that there are always things that I’d rather be doing than working.
If you read any FIRE (Financially Independent Retire Early) blogs, eventually you’ll read, “You should retire TO something, not AWAY from something” and it’s a valid point. You don’t want to wake up retired and ask yourself, “what now?” There should be some plan in place for what you want to do with the amazing gift of free time that you just gave yourself. I had one in place, and much like our own FFLC (Fully Funded Lifestyle Change) plans, it needed to be flexible because it too has morphed quite a bit.
The Original Transition Plan
My original plans with my “free time” seemed to be pretty simple. I wanted to do more exercising/training for triathlons, more yard work/gardening, play more music, volunteer at the kids school, volunteer as a CASA, fish more, do woodworking, and homebrew more. Oh… And keep the house clean, laundry done, weekly menu planned, groceries stocked, kids bathed, dogs vet appt’s and medicines on schedule, and stay on top of home maintenance duties. Easy Peasy, right? I figured I would set up a similar schedule as Justin at Root of Good and see, there’s time for everything I want to do right there, including video games!
Here’s the thing. Major life transitions and schedule changes don’t come easily. Also, I had the first 3 months of relocating feeling chained to the house with the remote assignment I got with my company. Loved the money, hated the feeling of limbo. That threw things out of whack for a while because I felt like I wasn’t fully committed to anything. Eesh… Also, it seemed that whenever I’d start to get in a routine, something would happen and throw it out of whack. You know, life.
What Actually Happened
I think it’s easier to start with what didn’t happen with those above mentioned “wants”.
- The triathlon training/exercising went out the window pretty quickly. I started running when we first moved here, but after a month or so, it dropped off.
- Playing more music and learning the dobro. That is also not where I’d like it. Maybe it’s that the instruments are upstairs, but mainly, it’s just not as much of a priority as I expected it to be.
- Homebrewing started okay, but I’ve only brewed 1 batch since I got here and have 1 batch on deck. Maybe I’ll do that today.
- Volunteer at the kids school. They have a program called WATCH Dogs and I applied to that before school started. It took until mid-December to hear anything back and be able to start volunteering, so I say that’s a 50/50 as planned. Regardless, I couldn’t do much with it until mid-December, so it didn’t go as I planned.
- Weekly menu planning. Sweet Jesus, did this crash and burn spectacularly… It’s only been this past month that I’ve been doing that more and staying on top of it. Whoopsies!
- Fishing more. I did more fishing with my oldest in the last 5 months than we did most years in Houston. He’s started asking to go fishing more often and we live right by a lake. We also used to live right by a lake, but he didn’t want to go much back then.
- Woodworking… Ugh, I didn’t get my bandsaw setup and put a blade on it until January. I’ll call that a fail.
- Video games. Even with Red Dead Redemption 2, and Battlefield V coming out, I’ve played less than I did in Houston. Maybe less need to zone out in a game and unwind? IDK…
I did get sucked into a LOT more yard work and home maintenance than I thought. I’ve created another massive pile of brush and trees, similar to that first massive set of brush piles when we first moved in.
As mentioned before, I installed 264 batts of insulation, replaced multiple electrical outlets, replaced the guts to 3 sinks and 1 toilet, vacuumed the walls, ceilings, and cabinets of the house due to the massive amount of dust present when we first moved in.
I unpacked and organized some rooms, but so many more to go (organizing, not unpacking, lol), scheduled and met with 4 different AC guys to replace furnace and AC, same with insulation peeps, carpet installers, and multiple various repairmen for things like the septic system or water softener that I won’t tackle myself. Yet… I know there are way more I didn’t mention, but you get the idea.
“I’m becoming less defined as days go by,
Fading away…
Well you might say I’m losing focus,
Kinda drifting into the abstract
In terms of how I see myself”— NIN
In short, I didn’t know who I was, who I was supposed to be, what role I was supposed to be filling and I felt like I was doing a poor job at all of them…
Health – Don’t Forget Your Brain!
I also spent a LOT of time at Dr’s appointments it seemed. A main focus was to get my mental health in check, something I’ve wholly neglected the last 5 years and have been treating ineffectively the last 10-20 years. Exercise and occasional Serotonin boosts don’t do shit to a chemical imbalance. You know what’s made a 180 difference in my life and my families lives this past 6 months? Depression meds. Funny, how that correlation works. I wish I’d done it decades sooner but am more glad I didn’t wait decades later. Don’t be like me. It’s not a failure to admit you need to see a psychiatrist. I know it felt like it to me, but that’s just the depression talking. Trust me, that’s the single best thing I’ve done for myself and my family since I’ve had a family.
I also went to a general physician because my last full checkup was ~7 yrs ago. Turns out I’m still healthy, but follow-ups on a couple of minor issues took way more visits and time than expected because… doctors.
Essentially, even though I had a lot of “free time” it was all focused on my health and getting the house and yard where we want it. But, every time I felt that I had some things under control I’d get reminded that I was letting other things slip. D’oh!
The Current Schedule
I had a lot of calendar reminders setup to help me with everything I mentioned above that I didn’t end up actually doing, and eventually, I deleted all but a couple of those. It was just something else to dismiss when it popped up on my phone or watch.
In January, I had another lightbulb moment!
I realized that I’m the only one in charge of my time and why not focus towards things I want to focus on? Simple, but brilliant!
I get up before 6am each day, and get the kids up, their lunches packed and ready for school, that’s the same.
I have coffee and time to slowly sip it, while I watch deer in the backyard, or check out news, or new blog posts from PF peeps.
Then, I do one of a few things that are “for me” things. This can be going hiking, I’ve gotten into getting out there 2-3 days a week, playing music, painting, or woodworking.
Liberal Arts
Mrs. SSC and I are also taking an oil painting class, and man, I’m digging it. I’ve never painted with oil before, but it’s fun. Very Zen and relaxing and I can see continuing that after our class ends. Plus, I keep finding cool old oak trees while I’m hiking that I take pictures of and think, “Oh, that would be a cool painting, especially in spring when the leaves are just starting to come out…”
Playing music hasn’t progressed as much as I’d have thought, but again, it’s just not as much a priority as I thought it would be. Things go in cycles, and it’s on an off cycle evidently. I do still play more than between Aug. – Dec. but not as much as I would’ve thought. Oh well.
Woodworking
I got my bay of the garage set up to where it’s a functioning shop now. I hung 2 new LED shop lights, a dust filter, and have it where it’s workable. I need to build a router table for my next project but have an old desktop I think I can repurpose well for that.
I’m currently finishing a banjo I began building from scratch ~7 yrs ago. I got it to the point of connecting the neck and pot and then our son was born and I let it fall by the wayside. I’m almost finished with it and hope to have it done by the weekend. So exciting!!
I got the approval from Mrs. SSC to build a shoe cubby for our entry way, so that will be the next small project and my next big project is building a wood-strip canoe. Oh yeah! Starting from scratch again with that one! Of course, I need a planer now, but that’s kind of how these things go. I can use it when I build the stand-up paddle boards next. Yeah, I found plans for those and can build my own lighter and cheaper than commercial ones. Good stuff!
SAHD Life
I’m embracing the SAHD role more and more. I’ve gotten my own schedule for groceries, Mrs. SSC and I tag team the weekly menu some weeks, others I just do it, no big whoop. I’ve gotten into a better routine for kids’ laundry, cleaning, and you know, house hold stuff.
CASA training started last week and will go another 7 weeks, so that is coming to fruition.
Volunteering at school has been great! I’ve been doing at least 1 day a week at school as a WATCH Dog and it’s been awesome getting to see the kids there during the day. I cooked some chili for a cookoff that raised $140 for a classroom and I got 2nd place! I also called Bingo for the chili/bingo night. I have been volunteering enough there that I get told, “We were excited to see you were on the schedule, thanks so much for coming in!” So yeah, that’s been great.
Summary
While the transition to SAHD hasn’t gone as planned, life has been pretty good. It could’ve been better and definitely could’ve been worse, but no complaints overall. If you’re looking to make a transition to anything, just remember it will take time to “get it right”. What you think should be “right” might not end up being that at all. Just be flexible and go with it.
