In 1995 I found a wonderful job that was very well paying. However, John and I believe that children NEED a parent at home. We discussed for some time what would be best for everyone and decided that he would stay home with the children while I took on this new career.
John was a wonderful stay at home parent. And though even his family gave us a hard time about this decision, we were happy that we did it.
For 2 years I happily worked at this company and John dutifully stayed home and cared for the house and children. He would even stay up until I got home sometimes and cook for me. (I worked 5pm to 2am)
Suddenly, one day on the way home from work, I felt like I was having a heart attack. I pulled the car over and laid down in the back seat. I was having a hard time breathing and the pain throughout my body was frightening. When it passed I continued on my way home.
Over the course of a couple of months I began having worse pains and more odd episodes that varied in symptoms. Finally I became unable to continue working.
Now, if you have ever had to fight for disability then you will understand why I said disability round one. I began seeking medical help. At first I was told that this was all in my head and that I just needed to stop. WHAT?!? I was made to feel like I was faking and/or crazy. This brought on a major depression. (read articles in Fibro Frustrations section for more information)
For years I tried to figure out what was going on with me. Sometime during this experience I finally applied for disability, as it was becoming apparent that I would not be able to return to work.
Finally I found a doctor who cared and who understood. She did a full physical, the first one I had gotten since this all began, and told me what she thought it might be. She referred me to a specialist and they confirmed her belief that this was a severe form of fibromyalgia with all the trimmings, meaning with every imaginable side effect, symptom or accompanying issue that goes with it.
During this process I learned that most doctors do not care if you are in pain. I learned that some doctors prefer to blame you. I learned that most doctors will not do anything for you to make your life more tolerable. And I learned that no matter how bad you feel, you can be made to feel worse.
It still took several months before I finally got approved for disability but it did finally happen.
At the same time that I was approved for disability and we were finally feeling like life might get back to normal, our family was hit by tragedy.
I was in shock for weeks. Thank heavens for good friends and family because I couldn't have dealt with all the details that inevitably come up without them. Although I have to say that there are also others who were not helpful. Some people said the most horrible things to us and about us. People made comments that simply made things harder. But mostly we were surrounded by those who loved us and would protect us from these types of things.
After the funeral, my mother called a lawyer and began proceedings against the man who hit her. This man told 5 different stories that varied so much that I'm not sure how he got off scott free and with almost no repercussions.
This was a process that is horrible to go through when you are already grieving and barely surviving a tragedy like this. Lawyers are cruel and insurance companies are even worse. They tried to say I didn't love my kids and that I didn't care well for them. There were such horrible things said that it nearly put me in the loony bin.
I finally called the lawyer one day and said SETTLE. I can't do this anymore just finish it. So he did. The amount we got was a slap in the face amount but it was over and though NO amount of money could ever replace her or bring her back the amount we finally got was just insulting. However it did allow us to move from the area we lived in and build a house in the middle of nowhere where I could lick my wounds and start to heal.
That healing took years. There are 3 years after the accident that I can only barely remember. My kids are still healing. And, as you will see in future posts, John is still suffering with severe after affects.
So even though the money received from the settlement was atrocious we did get enough to move. This was what I needed desperately. I was so traumatized that I couldn't let the kids go outside to play. I couldn't stand to hear cars pass by the house. I was losing my mind.
John and I began our search for a piece of property that we could all live with. Someplace the kids could go out to play without me having a nervous breakdown. Someplace with lots of room to build a nice house.
We found it in Frankfort Maine. The property was lovely with the most amazing energy. We quickly put a down payment on it and signed papers. Then we began planning our dream house.
John is a very talented carpenter and we knew what we wanted. He drew up plans, cleared the property and began building our new home. It seems like it took a moment now but then it seemed like forever.
We moved in well before the house was finished. We had to. I couldn't be at the other house any longer.
When we moved in we had no electricity, no running water and not even a septic. We had a porta-potty outside and we lugged in gallons of water from other sources. Candles and board games were our only entertainment. But the kids didn't care. There was lots of property to explore and I felt comfortable letting them go outside to play.
Living in a house while you are building it is not very conducive to the process but it did a lot for all of us in the way of healing our spirits and making us comfortable.
John was not only working on our home but he was also running his own little construction company. He was building garages and decks for people. He was doing roofs. He was even out doing odd jobs. And, I might add, he was doing very well with it.
We did by the end of our first summer have a septic and electricity. It took another year before we had money for our own well but still we were happy.
For a very long time we lived in our dream home with no interior walls and only sub-flooring In about 2006 we decided it was time to get a construction loan and finish the place up. During the finish on this place the loan company told us that if my husband wanted to build houses to sell they could help him with financing. This was my husbands dream come true. We jumped at the opportunity. First we refinanced this place to take care of old credit issues, get me a decent car, and buy a piece of property to use for the next house. We wanted to buy and RV as well but chose to put some money into the property to get things rolling instead.
It definitely seemed that things were beginning to turn around for us.
John had actually been running his own business since shortly after our daughter's loss. But this was a new direction.
We were using the money from our own home mortgage to buy property and get the land setup for building. Then we would be getting financing to build it.
John drew up the most amazing house plans but kept them within reason for a decent budget and to keep the house affordable for those living in Maine. We found a piece of property and purchased it outright.
Then my husband, who has worked his whole life and never gets sick, began developing problems in his back and joints. Until now he had pretty much struggled through them. The doctors keep telling him it was nothing. Now, however, he could barely walk up the front steps without a little help. He was in pain all the time. This too began depressing him.
We started seeing doctors more often but they would say things like "It's all in your head" or "We can't find anything physically wrong". John couldn't do the work required to finish the house. The loan company was breathing down our back. We were getting very concerned.
John was becoming more and more depressed. The pain throughout his body was almost unbearable many days. We finally sought out the assistance of a psychiatrist. He was diagnosed with Severe Major Depression, OCD, Severe Social Anxiety and PTSD. I knew about the depression, the OCD and the Social Anxiety. We had been dealing with those on our own for years. What I didn't know was the PTSD. He was and is still suffering horrible flashbacks to the loss of our daughter. He was the only one of us to see her at the scene of the accident and her face haunts him. The psychiatrist started him on medication immediately and monitored his progress often.
Our financial situation was still a big factor in both of our mental states and something had to be done. Finally I contacted the loan company and the owner of this company did us a great favor. Of course it worked out well for him too. He gave us $5000 cash for the house John was building and paid the loan off. So basically he bought the house for the amount of the loan and $5000 to get us on our way.
So here we were with John unable to work and living only off from my disability check each month. We became totally unable to pay our mortgage on our house that we had taken the mortgage out on to get this all started. We were both depressed and getting extremely worried.
We had the $5000 from the sale/deal we made on the other house. The choices were limited. We could make 3 or 4 months payments on our home. We could pay down other bills we owed. Or we could make a decision that would change all of our lives but would keep us going in the future.
John and I had always dreamed of becoming Full Time RVers since we lived on the streets back in 1988. Over the last couple of years we had researched it and started planning for a time when we could achieve this dream. We had even made a plan. John would build and sell 5 houses and a little from each house would go in the bank to be our nestegg for this new lifestyle.
Now, however, things had changed. John couldn't build houses anymore. We were just months away from being homeless.
John had applied for social security disability but this can take a very long time and we weren't sure if we could hang on until that came through.
At first we simply held on to the money and kept talking about our options. For a while we even just shut down and couldn't do anything. Finally we decided that it was time. We would begin our search for a camper and move into it.
We talked to several of our friends. Our plan was to move the camper, once aquired, to one of our friend's houses and live behind them for the winter. Come spring we would re-evaluate and see what was next for us.
Our friend, Wayne, offered to let us stay there. He and his girlfriend needed the help and the situation would be beneficial to everyone.
We began our search. We looked in the local classifieds and in the Uncle Henry, which in Maine is a local magazine that people list all their items for sale in. We went to look at several different campers and RVs all over the state. We found one that we really wanted but the people wouldn't accept less than what they had listed and we did not have enough to buy it. So our search continued.
As the weeks passed we began to worry and I became very stressed. Finally one day we found 2 possibilities that we could afford and that looked promising. One was a 30' tag-along camper and the other was a 34' tag-along camper. The 34' was a very long distance from us but the person selling it would deliver it to us for an extra $400. John was not thrilled about this and insisted that I go look at the 30' before making the decision.
So we traveled an hour and a half away to look at the 30' camper. John, not wanting to deal with the one further away, immediately began to work on me. I wasn't thrilled with it but it was ok. John asked me if the guy would accept this really low ball offer, would I be ok with it. I of course didn't think this man would take this so I said sure. Well wouldn't you know it, the guy accepted it. So, this would be our camper, our home.
Our friend, Craig, got a truck and took us up to get the camper. We hauled it to our house and began the process of moving into it.
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