Hey guys! I haven't written a post on here in a little over a year. A TON has happened since I last updated everyone about my life, so here are the highlights:
-Once I returned home from Cape Cod, I had a month and a half of FULL TIME job searching. It sucked. I was stressed, depressed, and all around just not feeling great about myself.
-Eventually, I was hired by a local social service agency dedicated to helping seniors in the community. I work as a Case Manager which is PERFECT, because that's exactly what I went to school for. :) It feels great being able to put my degree to work for me and get a little ROI (return on investment).
-Oct. 15, 2012 is when I started this incredible new job. I'm almost coming up on my 1 yr anniversary here, so life has been wonderful. I've learned a ton and absolutely love the work I'm doing. Perfect fit!
-Ryan and I are no longer a couple. But it's okay, I promise! We're still extremely close and went back to being besties.
-In Feb. I had to get a new car. Space needed new roters, brakes, brake pads, etc., etc., and it just wasn't worth it to keep throwing money into a '99 vehicle. I ended up getting myself a silver 2010 Dodge Journey which is a large SUV. The only 2 drawbacks are that (1) it is an automatic (I prefer 5 speeds), and (2) it is only FWD. Since my job requires me to do home visits to many (most) of my clients, I am often traveling up back roads and up mountains, even in the middle of winter. I wish I had advocated more for getting a 4WD vehicle. Oh well, next time. I am proud to say that I was able to get the loan for my vehicle all on my own (didn't need a co-signer!) so now I am truly able to say 'my' car and mean it! :)
-I've been to Washington, D.C. with Ryan last year for my birthday (my first time there)! We stayed in a hostel for 7 days which ended up not having running water for 3 of those days, so we ended up having to get a hotel room about 2.5-3 days into that madness. I think we almost reached our breaking point in seeing how long we could go without showering. It was bad. BUT we were able to see all of the main highlights and tourist attractions, so it felt great to cross all of the main monuments and museums off my bucket list.
-I've been paying HARDCORE on my student loans. I crunched the numbers last night and by the end of this year if all goes well [I'll explain in my next bullet point], I'll have resolved $11,430 in my student loan debt.
-"If all goes well...." Okay, here we go. I have 3 different lenders for my student loans. My federal ones through the US Dept of Education, some through VSAC, and one through this other loan mgmt company on behalf of my college called MyCampusLoan. They are managing my Perkin's loan (instead of Champlain having to hire staff to work directly on managing every student's account). Here's the deal. There are certain circumstances in which you may be able to get your Perkin's loan forgiven. You also have to have worked at your job for a minimum of 1 year. I applied for deferment a couple months ago (because I only just found out that this might even be a possibility for me), and was approved--so right my now loan with them is not accruing interest. YAY! Before applying for deferment, my Perkin's loan was my first smaller loan I was really going after. I wanted to get that totally paid off so I could snowball my payments and put the rest of the money that was going to my Perkin's payment toward VSAC or my federal loans. But, since my Perkin's is in deferment and is not accruing interest, I'm working hard on my VSAC loans since they are still accruing interest. Anyway, once I meet my 1 year anniversary at this fantastic job, I can send in a Request for Cancellation form. I don't know if I will be approved, but I really hope so. My other hope is that they will refund me the $1800 or so I've already invested in that loan. Because I can put that towards another one of my loans. So, if all of this goes my way, I'll be $11,430 out of student loan debt by the end of Dec. 2013. GET IT.
-Ryan moved to E. Boston to continue his studies and get his Master's in Community Theater at Emerson College, so that's exciting! I can't wait until I can go down to visit and spend a few nights with him. I don't know Boston that well, but I imagine I'll be learning over the course of the next few years.
-Lastly, I'm trying once again to lose weight. Now that I have health insurance through my employer (although I'm not sure how that's going to change once the Health Care Exchange takes over Jan 1), I have successfully lost about 30 lbs since mid January of 2013. I went to Physical Therapy to have them train me in how to push myself, how to do which exercises with my body, and how to execute proper form with many of the different exercises they gave me to work on. Besides exercising and trying to be more active in general, I have almost completely done a 180 on my diet. I'm trying to stay away from processed food as much as possible, and focus more on fresh fruits and veggies, whole grains, protein, etc. There are still the days when I need to stop at McD's for a breakfast or lunch, because my job often has lots of time constraints, but I'm not making that the foundation of my diet any longer. I can't wait to continue with this journey now that I have support from my PCP (primary care physician), and other local community agencies to help me reach my goals. :)
Annd...that's really about it. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few different highlights, but that's most of what has happened to me since August of 2012.
I hope I didn't bore you with all the minute details of my life for the past 13 months. There's lots of exciting stuff going on, and I love being able to share all this with you. :)
What are some of the main highlights of your life in the past year. In what ways have you grown? What can you do this year that you couldn't last year?
Happy September, everyone! Here comes the next holiday season!!
x.o.x.o.
Megan
