I had so much fun hearing about your hubbies and what they do for a living, I want to do this again to learn even more great things about you, dear readers, so I hope you'll join in!!
This week's question, and I'm excited to hear everyone's answers {and certainly not because I think anyone's better than anyone else but just because I'm curious!}... What did you do after high school?? College, married, job, military??
This week's question, and I'm excited to hear everyone's answers {and certainly not because I think anyone's better than anyone else but just because I'm curious!}... What did you do after high school?? College, married, job, military??
I'll go first... I went to a small private college and ended up majoring in Music Ministry. I say "ended up" because I never did really know what I wanted to do. All the while I knew I just wanted to be a mom. But I stuck with music because I knew if you wanted to do music you had jump right in because all the classes are in a particular order and only offered certain semesters. {I played French horn and medium-level piano, by the way} No other major came to me so I kept going with it and finished. I pushed through to graduate a semester early so I could get married. After I graduated I got married about 3 weeks later and moved to Virginia, then a few months later to Connecticut where I worked part-time as a remedial reading assistant with 1st and 2nd graders for a year before Eli was born that summer. I never have {at this point} used my major and don't exactly intend to (sorry, Mom and Dad!!!!) but I never regret my decision to do college, because some of my very best friends I met there, it was a place for me to experience independence, and discover myself!
How 'bout you?? What did you do after high school??
15 comments:
After high school, I went to that very same nice little private college you went to and was blessed to meet you in a very scary "war and peace" class that I worked my tail off in to get a B. I digress... :) I majored in Math and Math Education, got married shortly after graduation and we moved to Minneapolis. I got a teaching job with 8th graders at a fabulous middle school where I have worked for the past five years. This year I transitioned into a new position teaching high school math within that same district. Algebra II and III to be exact. My husband and I were blessed with our daughter Anna after 4 years of marriage and have really enjoyed the awesomeness that is being parents for the past 16 months. I love love love being a mommy. I do still work and I like the flexibility of my job, holiday breaks, summers off, so I can enjoy that extra time with her and future children.
Fun! I went to Liberty University, met my hubby there and we got married 2 weeks after graduation. I have a degree in Elementary/Middle Education. I taught 7th grade math for one year after college and it was pretty much the hardest year of my life! I went to work for a food distributor after that year doing Human Resources/Accounts Payable/Payroll (jack of all trades, really!) for a year and a half and then quit to stay home with my daughter when she was born. :)
I ended up 4 hours from home at Peru State (close enough to home yet far enough away). I wanted to play softball and be a high school English teacher. They let me walk on (and then have a small scholarship 2nd semester) for softball - I only played one year because the Lord just put it on my heart that I needed to quit. I met my husband about a month into college (2004); we've hardly been apart since. We were engaged that following summer (2005), married the next summer (2006) and Anthony graduated with his degree in wildlife ecology (also '06). Tristan was born in 2007. I graduated, not with a teaching degree (same here - sorry mom & dad) but with an English non-teaching degree in 2008. We moved to Virginia (and back to Nebraska) in 2009, Isaac was born 2009. Here I am. I've never used my degree except blogging (does that count?) and teaching my son his letters.
I do not really intend to go back for my teaching certificate (although I only have to student teach). I don't know that I want to teach high school English right now, but like you, I don't regret college. I never would have met Anthony had I gone elsewhere.
I know my mom is really disappointed that I don't teach or use my degree, but this is God's plan for me and I'm completely happy with it. :D
Ooo, I just love this! Thanks for participating, you guys!!
"What did I do after high school?" Well... that's a long story.
I went to a small private college thinking I wanted to major in nursing, and the college I went to was one of the best in that field... plus I had a full scholarship for my freshman year and a big chunk after that. During the first semester of my freshman year, God changed my major. He told me to change it to education, so I did. It "just so happened" that the college I was going to was also very well known for education.
I graduated after 4 1/2 years with a double major in early childhood education and elementary education with a minor in music. I graduated in December and got a job teaching in February at a local, private, Christian school. I did not last long at the school. I became too emotionally attached to the kids and wanted out because I cried for each of their problems each night.
While in college I worked in the school's library and kept kids through a local nanny service. So, while I was teaching, I continued to work for the nanny service. When I quit teaching, I kept working for the nanny service.
I was a full time nanny for several months, but encountered the same sort of problem. I was working 70+ hours a week, and when the kid got sick, he preferred me to the parents. They did not seem to mind that, but I was working too many hours to have any significant relationships outside of work, and I wanted to meet someone and raise my own kids...
So, I went back to the library at my old college and got a full time job with them. It was a great period in my life. It was a time of healing and growing closer to the Lord. I developed some life long friendships. But, I reached a point where I needed to make more money, and the Registrar came over to the library and offered me a job as her assistant making more money, and I took it.
I know God used the next couple of years to toughen me up. The registrar's office was HARD. God taught me a lot there. It was a period of the harder kind of growing that is not as much fun. But, I can so vividly see how God had a purpose and was preparing me for the next step in life.
Then... God offered me a great job with the public library. They needed a Children's Services Associate at one of the local branches, and they would accept my bachelor's degree as enough education. I enjoyed that job for six years. I'm still doing it (eight years later), but for the last two years I have also been acting manager at my branch... and I don't get to focus on the kids programming and the kids books... and that's the part of the job that I loved.
While I was in the library at my local college and in the registrar's office, I had the opportunity to live with my brother while he went to the same college. He brought this interesting friend home one night after church. The interesting friend and I hit it off, but I thought of him as a friend of my kid brother... even though he was quickly becoming one of my best friends. Life happened for nine years, but one year ago last month, we got married. We are still waiting for God to give us children.
Wow. High school seems so long ago! Is there a character limit on these comment boxes? The last 11 years of my life have a definite pattern of school, then work, then baby...repeat...repeat.
SCHOOL: I went to ISU for a year and really hated it. Transferred to the the "small private college" (you rah rah rah). Tony was one of my best friends for the two and a half years I knew him before we started dating.
WORK: We lived two hours apart during our engagement, and then I got a job at the same school he was at. (We shared a room, had offices right next to each other, and the offices seriously had windows that joined them, so we literally SAW one another all day long. It was awesome though. I loved working with him, and it was such an honor to get to watch him work.)
BABY Aiden: After our first year of marriage, I was told I would not be able to have kids, and my world collapsed upon me. Like you, all I had ever wanted to do was be a mother, and so my mind was quickly trying to grasp onto this news and find out what we would need to do to adopt. One month after I was told I wouldn't have kids, I found out I was pregnant, which was also one month before the surgery that had been scheduled to remove an ovary and part of my uterus. Crazy. I spent 10 weeks on bedrest in preterm labor before Aiden was born, still five weeks early, but healthy!
SCHOOL: I started my masters degree when Aiden was ten months old.
WORK: Another year in the same school district. I worked full time, and hated every second of being apart from the babe. I realized that while some moms can make working and being moms look like a breeze, I was wired differently and just couldn't handle it.
BABY Preston: We moved so that Tony could help his dad in their family business building custom homes. I found out that I was pregnant two days after we moved into our new house. I worked at a school near our house for a year, and didn't like working there at all. After four weeks of bedrest for preterm labor, Preston had a stroke in utero, and was able to be resuscitated after an awful emergent cesarean. Worst experience ever. Terrible. We've been fortunate that he has had no residual effects of the stroke, and is a spunky and ornery little boy now. After his birth, I decided I could not be away from these little gifts from God, and so I resigned from my position at the school and did daycare and preschool from our house.
SCHOOL: I finished my masters degree!
WORK: I took a job working part time, and arranged my schedule to work four afternoons a week. It rocks! The balance between work and mom is so perfect. I love working part time.
BABY: Pregnant with Tate in the fall, and so super duper excited.
SCHOOL: Started working on my PhD.
WORK: I continue to work four afternoons a week, and just went back to work last week after an almost four month maternity leave with Tate. It was awesome, but I still wanted more time!
BABY?: Well, there's a pattern to all these happenings since high school, but Tony has made it clear that he thinks the pattern ends. He does not want another baby, but I still do.
SCHOOL: I will graduate in another year or so.
WORK: After the kids are in school, I assume that I will work full time, but part of me thinks it would be awesome to work part time. I love being at home, keeping it clean and organized, getting meals ready...just love it. But, it would be kind of weird to think that I spent so much time studying and going to school for graduate degrees, and then only work part time... But who cares!
I went to a small Bible college in Iowa for 2 yrs where I met my hubby. After 2 yrs I went home to FL to work, he went home to CT to work. We dated long distance for about a yr. Then got engaged and married the following year and then I worked for 5 yrs until we had our 1st child and then I stayed home. Obviously this is the condensed version but it covers the basics! I never graduated college but am thankful every day that I am doing my dream job in raising our daughters. =)
After high school I attended college (with you!) because it was just assumed in my family. Although, I know that if I had chosen another path, my family would have been okay with that. I originally was a pre-optometry major but after 1.5 yrs discovered that truly wasn't something I enjoyed. I switched and became a social work major - I had found my niche. I didn't want to graduate and go into a high burnout position as a caseworker, though, so I chose to pursue graduate school. So I took the LSATs and was accepted into a small law school in Iowa. The summer after graduation I married my husband and we moved down to southern Iowa for my school. We were there for 3 years, enjoying our life with my dog and DH's cat. :) After graduation, I took the bar and moved back up closer to home.
Soon after we learned we were expecting our son, Xander and made the decision to start the search for our own home. DH found a job up here while I worked for my parents. We bought a house in my hometown and I started working for the school district as a K-12 juvenile court liaison/at-risk coordinator. It's a decent job with great hours and vacation as a parent. Our son attends daycare half of the week while hubby gets to watch him the other half.
In the last year or so I've rediscovered my love of sewing and have taught myself to knit. Now I almost always have something on the needles for someone! :) I hope to have more kids soon, and we'd really like to move back to Waverly in the next 5 yrs or so.
Great question! :)
~Rae Lynne
I went to college at a small school about 1 1/2 hours from home. I knew when I went I was going to major in elementary education. I met my husband our freshman year and we started dating. We got married three weeks after I graduated, he still had a year left so we stayed there a year while he finished and I taught 2nd grade.
I think some people think the education is wasted if now you're staying home, like I am. I agree with you though, it wasn't wasted. I taught three years and people always ask me, "well, you are going back to teaching someday aren't you?" They say it like it's a bad thing if I don't. It's okay and I understand that some people just don't understand.
I like your questions!
Went to Dixie State. Dated Mr Paul Melessa. Married him. Went to work for an orthodontist for 3 years and put Paul through school. He joined the navy which sent us afar. Became a navy wife. Became a master Esthetician. Became a mom. And a mom I still be....:)
After high school, I continued traveling with my family, and I went after a degree in Bible, studying by way of mail. :) After earning my degree, I began writing more and traveling.
After high school, I went after my Bible degree by way of mail. Upon earning it, I continued traveling and singing and writing.
Oh boy this is definitely a long story much like your other readers.
After HS (2008) I went on to college in PA just about an hour from home in NJ. I attended Lehigh University and was a competitive swimmer. It was after 1 year of swimming and trying to have a normal college experience that I realized swimming wasn't a huge priority anymore and thus I quit the team looking to expand my horizons and enjoy the college life a bit more. I did and that's when I met Scott, my best friend and now husband of 5 years. We were basically inseperable for the next 2.5 years and we graduated in 2002. I have a biology degree as Science and Math were just subjects I was really good at. I was "supposed to" according to my parents go on to Dental school and take over the family practice. That was their hope and dream, but definitely not mine as I have no passion for looking into peoples icky mouths all day long as a living. Plus, I knew my whole life that if possible I never wanted to work a day - ever - instead hoping and dreaming to always just be a mom.
So anyways, I graduated Lehigh with a biology degree and no desire to use it. Instead I had a passion for children and all that surrounds them so I went on to pursue a teaching certificate. I took the Alternate Route method joining "Teach for America". A group formed to meet the needs of teaching in rural and inner city schools. I did just that teaching 4th grade in the South Bronx, NYC! Yes, that's right, PS (Public School) #1 and yet I knew that's not where I would wind up with gunshots going off throughout the day outside my classroom window. But, it's what I needed to do to get my foot in the door without having to go back to school to get my degree in teaching.
In 2003 Scott took a new position with the company he was working for (which is who he still in fact works for) and was going to be in sales covering the territory of CT. Hence how we wound up here. I knew that he was the one for me and thus I wasn't going to start my life in a different state so we up and moved together to CT. But, being just out of college we were totally poor and so we lived on our boat for 7 months. I finally told him we had to find an apartment when I nearly slipped off the dock in a snowstorm in November. ha. Ahh memories. All this while I had found and was teaching Kindergarten at a private school in CT b/c my teaching certificate from NY/NJ wasn't reciprocal with CT. Bummer. I either had to go back to school for 2 years or deal with the major pay cut and teach in a private school. Unfortunately sometimes money causes issues and with that the small salary just wasn't cutting it and so I had to seek other alternatives.
I was talking to an old college friend who was leaving her job in CT to go back to get her Masters in Music. I actually ended up taking her job totally changing careers at this point and joining a company who focuses on internet banking. I was basically a teller behind the scenes but b/c there was no branch bank I went to work in jeans and a t-shirt. awesome!
We finally had some money in the bank and Scott and I bought our first home at this point. 2004. It was a 2 family so we could rent 1 unit and live in the other saving money that way. We still own this home and it has set us up with a good financial future having assets but letting it pay for itself by renting both units now that we've moved out.
Later that year in july 2004 Scott proposed and we started planning out wedding the following year.
At some point working in the banking department of Higher One, i got bored with my job. I was yearning for something more of a challenge and luckily the company was willing to work with me seeing potential. I moved to the IT department and became a Quality Assurance Analyst and loving it. My anal rentiveness and zest for perfection was a perfect fit for this position.
In 2005, Scott and I got married and started planning our future for a family.
Here's the 2nd part after it told me no!
At some point working in the banking department of Higher One, i got bored with my job. I was yearning for something more of a challenge and luckily the company was willing to work with me seeing potential. I moved to the IT department and became a Quality Assurance Analyst and loving it. My anal rentiveness and zest for perfection was a perfect fit for this position.
In 2005, Scott and I got married and started planning our future for a family.
We built our current home in 2006 and what an experience that was. It was during this time that I found out I had fertility issues and may have trouble conceiving. I was totally crushed because really having a family was all I had ever wanted. I went on some meds to stimulate hormone production and about 8 months later found out I was going to be blessed with our first little boy, Colby. He was born 7/2007 and unfortunately because we had just built our home I knew I needed to go back to work full time after he was born.
I did that and began working from home 1 day a week so that I could at least keep him out of day care that day. Unbeknownst to my boss he was home with me while I was working on the computer and doing my best to balance all that. I felt horrible, it wasn't right for me. I cried every day and every night because I wasn't being the mother that I'd always wanted to be. I hated commuting and having him in daycare all the time and basically only seeing him awake about an hour a day. It was not my idea of being a mother and I was pretty miserable.
That went on for almost a year until I began talking to a close friend of ours. He owns a marine rep group and needed an office employee. I didn't want to commute anymore and so after working the numbers for our finances and a schedule to 4 days a week with 9-4 hours I knew I'd at least be happier than I was.
I put in my notice to my other company and started working for our friend. Colby now only had to be in daycare p/t and I was home for breakfast and dinner... a lot nicer.
At this point I found out I was pregnant with PJ. Clearly 1 pregnancy had jump started my fertility issues as he was a 1 shot try! ha. TMI perhaps! :)
Well, good or bad the economy turned on all of us and this company I now work for (my friend) took a hit, but he knew he couldn't let me go bc they needed me and I needed them. Instead we worked together to crunch numbers and closed our "physical" office opting for home offices instead. This would actually turn out the best for everyone.
I now work from home, answering calls throughout the day as the noise level permits, return emails and do paperwork and pay bills when the boys are napping or Colby is at preschool. It is the best of both worlds. I have and still do yearn to be the traditional stay at home mom, but for now I actually don't really mind this format all that much. I get to earn some money for our family and put it towards time together and vacations and splurging and yet still can be at home with my boys every day. PJ won't ever go to daycare and Colby really loves his preschool 3 days a week so working between all that has managed to be just fine.
Someday perhaps I'll not have to work at all, but even then I'm not sure I'd be able to not do 'anything'. Volunteering, maybe substitute teaching or who knows maybe start an organization business! ha.
Well, all that in a nutshell and thus we're in the here and now and I'm not really sure how we got here. Boy was HS a long time ago. :)
I'm a week late but I wanted to chime in too! After graduating in 2000 I began attending Northern Kentucky University near our hometown. I started as a nursing major, then changed to social work, then theatre, then I was undeclared and then finally buckled down and got my degree in Middle School Education, with an emphasis in math and science.
During this same time I got married to my HS sweetheart when I was 21 (he was 25). One year after we were married (13 months almost to the day) I had our first child. 25 months to the day after she was born I had our second. I found out I was pregnant with our third while I was doing my student teaching. I graduated in December 2008 and gave birth to our third child in July 2009.
I also held odd jobs here and there (Delta, a car refinancing company, Kroger, US Bank) but once we had our 2nd I just stayed home and focused on them and finishing school. Now I'm a full time SAHM which what I always wanted to day anyway!
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