Today, at the ripe age of 23, I have retired. Now I suppose I will be working again at some point in the future, but I have no immediate plans to return to work. I'm going to completely play it by ear after the baby gets here, but in an ideal world (you know, one where money grows on trees), I could stay at home with my baby and not have to miss out on her growing up at all. I mean, eventually I will be going back to work, but I hope it will be once my kids are all in school and I have nothing else to do all day long!!
Now you might be curious how all this is going to work financially for us... long story short, it's going to be tight. Really tight. Mark is a phD student, and he is on a scholarship which helps A LOT, and he makes extra cash by teaching and grading at the University, but he's not making a ton of money (such is the life of being a student). And now that I will no longer be making money (starting October 2010 thanks to paid maternity leave!), things get a little tricky. We will definitely be spending more than we are earning each month, which is hard, but we have enough money in the bank to get us through to the end of his phD (about 2 more years from now). We're going to have to use some strict money-saving techniques, but I think we should be just fine. It's crazy to think that right now (after you convert into equivalent currencies) we are making about 15-20% of what we were making when we were in the US!! But we are managing just fine, and obviously once Mark gets his phD (and then completes his post-doc) his salary will be significantly higher and we will be just fine. And maybe I'll even figure out what kind of job I want, and then I can contribute to our bank accounts as well. But for now, I plan on enjoying my retirement, and making the most out of this time where I am without a job! And technically I'm still getting paid until October so I don't have to worry until then! And who knows, maybe in my newfound time at home, I'll have some kind of revelation and figure out new ways to make money doing something I love!
Now you might be curious how all this is going to work financially for us... long story short, it's going to be tight. Really tight. Mark is a phD student, and he is on a scholarship which helps A LOT, and he makes extra cash by teaching and grading at the University, but he's not making a ton of money (such is the life of being a student). And now that I will no longer be making money (starting October 2010 thanks to paid maternity leave!), things get a little tricky. We will definitely be spending more than we are earning each month, which is hard, but we have enough money in the bank to get us through to the end of his phD (about 2 more years from now). We're going to have to use some strict money-saving techniques, but I think we should be just fine. It's crazy to think that right now (after you convert into equivalent currencies) we are making about 15-20% of what we were making when we were in the US!! But we are managing just fine, and obviously once Mark gets his phD (and then completes his post-doc) his salary will be significantly higher and we will be just fine. And maybe I'll even figure out what kind of job I want, and then I can contribute to our bank accounts as well. But for now, I plan on enjoying my retirement, and making the most out of this time where I am without a job! And technically I'm still getting paid until October so I don't have to worry until then! And who knows, maybe in my newfound time at home, I'll have some kind of revelation and figure out new ways to make money doing something I love!
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