Turbulent 20s

 

4-H House sisters, Andrea (left) and Julie (right), me (center)
Sadly, Julie passed away in a tragic accident shortly after we moved back to CT. She is greatly missed!


In my last post, I mentioned how lately I’ve been mulling over truth and what it means to live a life aligned with truth, especially as regards the more subtle truths that are not evident at first but become increasingly clear as time goes on. Combined with having a recent birthday, I decided to make a concentrated effort to think back through my life and reflect on what this has looked like in my own life. So I am starting with the decade of my twenties.

When I sat down yesterday to jot down some notes, I was somewhat incredulous as I considered that decade. It was filled with some of the most amazing highs as well as some of the greatest depths that I’ve known to date. This probably isn’t unusual, and for those in their twenties, I’d say hang on tight for the ride.

Turning twenty found me in a happy place. I was in college at the University of Illinois where I lived at a cooperative sorority with somewhere around 50 other college women. I made some wonderful friendships during this time, grew wings of independence, and had so very much fun. 

For the sake of time, I’m not going to go into every detail. I’ll just say that it was toward the end of my college experience that I began to think more deeply about faith, and that would play a major role in where I ended up next.




 Bill and I met in Yellowstone National Park. We were on a summer project with a faith based organization and working in the park for the summer. By summer’s end, we found ourselves young and in love and ready to take on the next thing…marriage! A year later, dad was walking me down the aisle. I moved to CT where Bill finished up his undergrad. This was both a joyful time and a difficult time for me. I look back now and realize that I was beginning to psychologically deal with some childhood trauma that had never been addressed. Counseling and medication would likely have been very helpful, but it was not really a well recognized solution at that time. Prayer and a job change would go a long way to help me at that time, as well as Bill’s faithful love and support.

Two years later, we moved back to Champaign, IL where Bill would get his master’s degree at the U of I and I would work as a Landscape Designer. Near the end of the second year there, Luke was born.

Do we look just a tad tired?

Bill was set to graduate and we wondered where we’d go next. He ended up deciding on getting his PhD, so when Luke was somewhere around 6-8 weeks old, we packed up and moved to Mississippi, where we would spend the next three years of our lives. Bill drove the Ryder, with Luke and me following behind in the VW. It was about a 10 hour drive but took longer than that as I would need to stop every 3-4 hours to nurse. One clear picture in my mind is of the run down motel we stopped at first that evening, hoping to stay the night. Bill walked in and found  a cockroach, so on we drove to the next hotel that we could hopefully afford. (Cockroaches were a theme in those early years. The summer we got married, Bill’s apartment had cockroaches.)

These were both joyful and stressful times. Money was tight. We were both determined that I would stay home with our children no matter what hurdles we’d have to clear to do so. We got creative with our finances, including what we ate. A favorite regular meal was red beans and rice—a delicious recipe from Frugal Gourmet. We were young and in love with each other and with Luke. 



Adapting to southern culture did not come easy. We found it difficult to find meaningful connections with other young ‘local’ couples. I remember that we were ready to throw in the towel. I mentioned faith earlier—this was top priority in those years for us as a couple. I recall fasting for a weekend as we sought guidance on what to do. Shortly after, we visited a small church with a diverse group of people from many different parts of the world. We found friendship to sustain us through the next stresses that were just around the corner. 

6 months after moving in to a small town apartment with partying college kids, we were blessed with this older, country home. It had a porch stretching across the front flanked by two large oak trees. The memories we made here were precious as our little family grew to include Michaela.


My wonderful mother-in-law, June, had come right away and was a fabulous help. She stayed for several weeks as I recall. It was a great help, as little Michaela had colic for the first several weeks. Luke adjusted very well to his new sister. 

However, three months later, postpartum depression hit me hard. This time of my life ranks in the top few most difficult times of my life. I couldn’t sleep and felt like I was in a very deep, dark pit. At the advice of a friend, I went to see an APRN (I think that was her title, I recall she was not a doctor, but she was well versed in women’s health). She took one look at me and knew I was depressed. They were able to identify hypothyroidism as a contributing factor and put me on medication to treat that as well as anti-depressants. She and the medications were a godsend.



You can see in this photo the old linoleum and cupboards. Our first apartment was new and fairly stylish, but what we were learning was that our little family and not things were what mattered most. Yet, always in the back of our minds was this idea that better things were coming. We could be patient, because we knew that Bill’s hard work getting his PhD would surely pay off very soon.

Hah! Nope! What we found was that he was in a dying field. As time went on, our hopes of Bill getting a professorship in soil science began to evaporate like the morning Mississippi dew burning off in the daily 95 degree + afternoon temps. We had spent the first 7 years of our marriage with Bill in college aiming for this goal.


Even when he graduated, we held on to hope that he would soon get that call. But it never came. And the longer we waited, the more we began to panic. Bill was getting a small stipend of just over $17k per year and while his guiding professor said he could continue to stay on, we didn’t feel right about that. We finally made the decision to move back to CT where Bill would begin to look for work outside of academia. He eventually was able to get an entry level job at an environmental company, where he commuted over an hour, one-way. We were both still convinced that it was best for our family for me to stay home with the kids. We continued to pinch pennies to make this happen. We were also grateful to be able to rent our home from family at a price we could afford. 

Whew…that was a lot to get through. But what about the subtle truths gleaned along the way? Here are a few that I’ve come up with.

  • Life doesn’t always work out the way we hope and plan, but that’s ok. Looking back, I probably wouldn’t change anything about the decisions we made. Bill may beg to differ…not sure. ;-)
  • Having loved ones to walk the road with us can make all the difference.
  • Challenges really do make us stronger. While I wouldn’t recommend seeking them out, I wouldn’t avoid them at all costs. So much is missed by those who do.
  • Having lived in a very different culture, I have come to appreciate the differences and to be open to exploring the new and unfamiliar.
  • On the darkest days, do whatever you can to cling to hope, because it is there. Things do get better.
  • Money and material things aren’t necessary for happiness. (As long as basic needs are met.)
  • We are not alone or ever forgotten. (I am thinking of a few instances at my darkest hours where I felt impressed with certain thoughts that I don’t believe were generated solely by my own mind. The words gave me hope to press on. This relates to my faith.)
  • People who walk with us through difficulties are so very precious. We are all in this together!
I just want to say, that having children was truly a joyful experience for me, despite the challenges of those early years. This joy surely sustained me through tough times as well!




This post is probably long enough. I’m not even sure who or how many people read my blog posts. But if you’re still reading at this point, I wish you much love for whatever turbulence or difficulties you may be experiencing right now. You are not alone. You will make it through stronger and better for the journey.

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