Transition in a New Town, House & Life

This is a personal post where I am sharing my feelings on transitioning to a new town, home and life.

I am going to be honest and vulnerable here and I don’t want anyone to think that I am not thankful and that I don’t recognize my blessings. I truly do. But transition is hard.

I have realized something about myself that I don’t think I fully understood before we moved.

I am married to a man on the spectrum and one of my sons is on the spectrum. There is no coincidence in that. One of their struggles, especially my son was/is transitioning from one task to another. They cannot multitask ..at all. Even as far as Putting a load of laundry in before going to go do another task. It drives me crazy that my husband cannot do that. How can you not just take advantage of the fact that machines can do majority of the work and schedule things out? but they don’t. It took us until my son was in the third grade for him to not have a melt down in the classroom between subject changes. Middle school was a dream come true for him because he had to leave one classroom and go to another for subject changes. But we got called into the second grade several times because he would break down in tears if he was asked to put his math book away to go to another subject and he was not finished or something. We had to really work with him.

Anyway…I am sharing all of this to explain that there is obviously a reason that I have been able to live with people like this…and that is because I also THRIVE in structure and routine. I knew that I was going to struggle. I had a real talk with Rob before we left to say that I am not going to be “myself” for awhile because my routine is going to be amiss and I know that is a struggle.

So even I expected some struggle. I didn’t fully understand the struggle that I would have. I have created a security “bubble.” The 20 years in Ephrata were very formative for me. It’s where I learned who I was, I found out how to really live life. My broken parts were loved together there with Godly women who took me in and taught me how to be human. I surrounded myself with healthy people and I had my routine and structure. It was the place I had lived the longest and it was filled with all the memories. I knew or recognized all of the people in my grocery store. The gas station, the post office. The bank…they were cheering me on when I would make an extra payment on my house. ( while I was trying to get it paid off). Virtually everywhere I went was a familiar face and that offered me security. I loved that security. I cried on the last visit to the post office. Honestly, it was the only stop I went to during the pandemic where I had human interaction every day. I made myself go instead of online postage.  Every day was planned ( pretty much) I have been meeting with my friends for breakfast every week on the same day for …I don’t know how long. They called me on a FaceTime last week and I immediately started crying. They have no idea how much I love them and relied on them.

Now I am in a new town. No routine. My support system is gone. My surroundings are new. I am sleeping on an air mattress. I don’t have a “home”….with a comfortable place to rest. I have a house that has not been formed into MY home yet. I don’t recognize anybody, anywhere.

I am working non-stop to create that home ….and I am reassuring myself that it will all come together and that I will have routine once again.

Even going to our nearest Walmart or Home Depot is anxiety ridden because there are so many people there. It’s not as well kept as the ones “back home” …I keep having to correct myself. There is nothing familiar. You would have thought I moved to Mars ( in my mind). But I didn’t.

Then that first week Elvis killed a few chickens and every night seemed like there was some ER that we had to fix just to survive because of the dogs ect. House issues…ect what ever they are/were. All of the things you don’t think about when you move to a different place and took for granted at the old one.

I was so heartbroken over the chickens. I know how the food chain works. I know some people will feel differently ect. But I wanted these chickens and I feel like it’s my responsibility to keep them safe. I just could not handle them being killed….and it really shook me. Especially because I kept trying to find the solution to keep them safe and Elvis was working to so hard to find the way. Thankfully the pen is Elvis proof now.

My car also broke down, My computer broke down ( with all of my design work and patterns), Rob has been having to work a lot of overtime at his job …which means I am doing a lot of work on my own. Our field is growing crazy fast because it’s raining buckets here and then we might have a sunny day. We ordered a riding lawn mower ….someone literally lit the store on fire and our lawn mower was burned up. LOL! Seriously! We had to wait an extra week…which was no big deal ( in the grand scheme of things). But I had to learn how to use the riding mower and mow the field because we can get in trouble here if we don’t maintain our fields and it was getting so long. So along with the transition and learning new things we were having other issues. There were more….but you get the idea.

But when you think about all of the anxiety and everything I have been dealing with…I was trying to stay focused. But there must have been 500 times in a day that I wanted to break down and just go “back home” and forget about all of this. I feel like that is such a terrible thing to say and that I do know how blessed that I am. I would then feel guilt and try to carry on to the next chore or obstacle. Then I had doubtful thoughts…like “Am I truly this fragile?”…”Why can’t I be normal?”…”What is wrong with me?”

Rob and I are a team and we are figuring it out. I feel bad for him. I would like to be this supportive spouse that can weather the storm. I am typically the one who does that. I have been taking care of him and his life most of these 20 years. In this time he has really had to step up and do a lot….for his mom and for me because my whole world was shook up.

The good news is that it is getting easier. All of those things have not changed. But I don’t have a choice. My old house has sold and I have to make this new house/plan/town/life work. My break down thoughts are happening less and less. The chickens that were injured in the first week are healing very well…along with my heart. The upper floor is coming together. The flooring is done…YAY!! Now we have to work on the trim and completing the laundry room. I would really love to avoid having to go to the laundry mat again. LOL!   How can I multitask if I have to keep doing that?

I am slowly but surely clearing out the flower beds and making it look more “homey” here. That seems to be the therapy and the cure for my “homesickness” ….There was a time when I would have cringed to think of Ephrata being my home. I have been craving the trees and green. Those do offer me comfort and last week when they were having 85 degree weather I can’t say that I wished I was there. LOL! I guess I prefer the rain. I don’t miss the desert. But I do miss my comfort and security.

I do like that I get to see my kids more often. It’s been nice to have a few of my sons come and help me. I get to talk to them a little more and spend time with them in a different way, which is nice.

I did meet someone who already invited me to church. I am going to go and hopefully meet new people and start to build my “bubble” here with new people and discover all that Deer Park has to offer. :)

I just wanted to get these thoughts down for a few reasons. One is that I want to remember this when I might struggle later ….I am making progress. Two is that I know some of you may have been through this or are going through it as well and you are not alone. This is hard. I am not a person who takes big uncalculated risks. I don’t like surprises (my childhood was full of terrible ones..that would cripple me) and I try to control so much of my environment. This transition is a good thing. I know that I am never truly in control and that I can’t truly find security in a town. It comes from God and he will take care of me.  He is where my security needs to be…and I needed that reminder.

I pray and face each day and hope that I can remember this when I feel weak.

I hope you all have a beautifully blessed day!

Charisma