In the dead of winter in 1987, on the very first day of the year; I graced the world with my presence (although my sisters probably would beg to differ). I am the third out of four girls all born and raised in the Old North End of Burlington. Our father was born and raised here in Burlington and our mother hails from Finland. We all attended H.O. Wheeler Elementary, Edmunds Middle School, and Burlington High School. After high school I did my own thing, I bounced around from apartment to apartment, part-time job to part-time job, always landing back at my very first job at a local family entertainment center/pizza restaurant. I was carefree, paid my bills late, stacked up some credit card debt, all those things the young and oblivious do. I didn’t go to college right after high school, not because I questioned its value but because I had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, and I thought by living life I’d figure it out.
The year 2007 rolls around, and I become pregnant with my first child at the ripe age of 20 with a guy I had met through mutual friends. It all worked out though, we spent the first 3 years co-parenting as friends, 50/50 custody (we got along most of the time) and something just happened in the spring of 2010 and we went to a mutual friend’s birthday party together and ended up hitting it off like some kind of romantic comedy. Through good times and bad and some rather hairy moments we survived and slowly moved our way up to bigger and better things, I took a stab at community college but was still unsure where I wanted it to take me. I “took time off” for a couple semesters, lost my job, worked in fast food for about a year (an experience I’m glad I got to have) and eventually found a job at a great hotel (with truly wonderful people) working in housekeeping. The same day I started that job I began an LNA training course at a local technical school and things just kept getting better and looking brighter. I had big dreams of working my way up the nursing ladder and even a positive pregnancy test the day before my written and practical exam didn’t rain on my parade.
It wasn’t until I went to my first OB appointment that I started to lose hope. There they were, two babies. I was utterly terrified, I had warmed up to the idea of having another child but TWO!?!?! Shortly after this I received my official LNA license in the mail, hung it up on my wall and just stared at it for a while. It just simply wasn’t the best time to go out and find a job, especially one that would trigger my senses the way nursing home jobs do as I had already switched from housekeeping to laundry because the smells of people’s rooms was making me gag and I was just too darn tired to push that cart around anymore! My new plan was to wait until after my maternity leave ended to start the search for a position. I stopped working around 28 weeks because although my doctors said everything was “fine” and “great” and I was doing “spectacular” I was terrified that something bad was going to happen and was also just tired of the daily grind and wanted to enjoy the rest of my pregnancy. I ended up having a scheduled C-section at the end of January 2013 because baby A was refusing to face head down and preferred to be on his side or upright (more specifically transverse or breech and sometimes even transverse-breech) ANYHOO out came babies at a whopping 5 lbs. 11 oz. and 6 lbs. 4 oz. Beautiful, healthy boys, one week later we were home and the real adventure began!
We are now almost 8 months in and the little “chub-a-dubbers” as I call them are rolling around, sitting up (almost unassisted), sporting 2 teeth each, and love it when I make animal noises and make up songs for them. Our oldest son just began Kindergarten this month and absolutely loves it so far. After putting in quite the effort to find an LNA position at a location and time that worked for me and striking out, I am back working full time at the same wonderful hotel with the wonderful people. I am also pursuing my Associate’s Degree online in Information Technology, as of today I am about 2 weeks in and I’m hoping the part of my brain that tells me I’m taking on too much will soon cease to exist! I am looking forward to sharing all of the highs and lows of these experiences with all of you and thank you for having me here at Burlington VT Moms Blog, it’s truly an honor.
