Best Intentions

There's a saying, it goes something like, "if you want to see God laugh, tell him your plans", that's how I feel lately.

In my last post, I alluded to some stuff that would cause complications with our debt repayment. My dad spent a week in the hospital in the ICU and now that he is home, he needs a lot of help. My mom fell and injured herself very badly while she was caring for him, and then to round out an already crummy new year, my grandma died last week.

It has made for a difficult 2017 for sure!

We are driving out of state to my grandma's funeral this week and staying to visit family for a few days; that's 5 days of unexpected expenses. We have to pay for gas, obviously. But in addition to that, we need to pay for 4 nights in a hotel and food for five days. Because it's my grandma, I get bereavement leave so I don't have to use my sick time, but the same can't be said for my husband. He's taking at least one day off work, and possible more. We are very lucky that his work and bosses are so awesome that they are allowing him the time off and supportive of us in every way. The downside is the loss of vacation time that he has to use to attend a funeral.

Grand scheme, this will only push our credit card debt free date back a month, but we already had a stretch goal so this definitely puts a cramp in our style, so to speak.

The last several weeks have really forced me to focus on family and what's important to me. Debt freedom is definitely high on the list, but if falls way below family, friends, and experiences. I think the next few months will really see a shift in my priorities. The one thing the last 3 weeks has taught me is, as cliche as it sounds, time is precious.

I've never been one to give something up in order to speed up debt repayment, and I don't see that changing any time soon. In fact, I see myself willing to stay in debt longer in order to spend more time doing "things" and creating memories with out kids. They only belong to us for such a short time that I want to make that time memorable, debt be damned.

I know this isn't a usual post for me, but it's what I'm feeling right now.