Is Dad in Mi-Chicago?

This is the post that I've been avoiding for the past few months... I think it's one of the reasons why I've had a hard time keeping up with my blog..... but I just need to get it over with.  Funny though, I should have written in when I was in my "dark place" cause now the sun is shining, I've gained 5 happy pounds, and my girls are all smiling.  Life's getting back to normal.

It's funny how a blog is supposed to portray a snapshot of your family - but it doesn't. No matter how hard you try, you always hold something back. The vulnerable side that you're not willing to share. Often we see other people's happy lives and forget that they are going through their own struggles that we are unaware of - people will post about the really good and the really bad. But most days are somewhere in the middle. I think that skews our perception of what is "normal" and can cause us to all have unrealistic expectations about our own lives. I have looked back at several posts from this past winter and no where in the text can you see the burden that I was carrying or the stress that was pressing down on me. But it was there, in my cold sores or my unhealthy weight loss, but never outspoken, not really.

I feel foolish that this journey weighed me down so much, so many go through so much more and come out unscathed. But other people's pains or triumphs don't take away from what I'm feeling today, right now, in my own body. Someone will always have it worse, someone will always have it better, it's ok to feel for yourself when you're going through something - whatever that may be.

As you may remember, Jake got hired into the Ford College Grad Rotation Program, where he spent 6 months in different areas of the company, moving around and getting exposed to various elements in the auto industry. Well his 3 year completion date was rapidly approaching, there was only one rotation left, the rotation we had been avoiding: the launch. To go "on launch" means you move to the location of the assembly plant for that new car and you are there during the initial builds. There are always issues with a new build, so being on-site is critical to finding solutions quickly. Time is money - and those plants lose a lot of money when the builds are on hold. There are a few plants close to our home, and I was praying that there would be a launch in Michigan. But the way the timing worked out, the only option was the new Explorer launch at the Chicago Assembly Plant.

Jake took this photo from his apartment in October.  The city was lit up in pink lights for Breast Cancer Awareness.

Chicago, or "Mi-Chicago" as it's referred to in our house. Oh how I hate this city. I mean, I really have nothing against Chicago, just what it meant to me. Chicago is a 4 hour drive from our house. We considered moving our whole family to Jake's swanky downtown high rise apartment. But there were soooo many reasons why it didn't feel like the best decision for our family. So, last September, Jake packed up a bunch of his belonging and moved out.

It's funny, before Jake left he was the Webelos Scout Leader. I remember how I dreaded Tuesday nights... those days just seemed to drag on forever. Jake would come home for a quick bite, change his clothes, and head over to the church. I would feel sorry for myself as I bathed all the girls and put everyone to bed all on my own. Oh how I laugh at that Jenni. Oh how I wish I could still be that naive Jenni.

I am thankful that the build schedule was rearranged such that Jake was able to come home most weekends. I am grateful that the girls and I got to go visit him in October. It helped to live the "city life" and see how difficult it would be with 3 small kids. It helped me to know that we were making the right decision for our family.

I was surprised out how hard it was to be alone all week with my kids. I love my kids, I love being a stay-at-home-mommy, but I also love having a companion and best friend who helps me through it all. So when Jake wasn't there physically to help me, it was tough. I'm not really a crier. Don't get me wrong, a good story about someone rising to their potential will always make me tear up, but I don't cry as often as I should. Stress needs to come out. I cried almost every time Jake drove out of our driveway. I felt pathetic that it still affected me week after week. But the more he left, the more I wished he was home. But during the week my stress had to come out - it came out in cold sores, headaches, insomnia, heart burn, hives, weight loss, or on my bite guard. My mind was always racing and my body was suffering. I got Molluscum. I visited my family doctor frequently. I felt ran down.

Everything was hard. Grocery shopping was hard. Doctor's appointments were hard. Getting sick was hard. Emergencies were hard. Feeling safe was hard. Falling asleep was hard. There were many nights I needed to take a Benadryl and I just had to ask Heavenly Father to help me wake up if there was an emergency in the middle of the night. I would hear noises and feel nervous, I thought about buying a gun. I finally settled on buying pepper spray.  One time Jake was home over the weekend and my arm touched his face while I was sleeping - I jumped a mile!  I was woken up by a presence in my bed.  It made me sad that I was so used to him being gone.

But we were never alone.  Not really.  I felt the Lord's presence in our home. I remember one night I was reading my scriptures and feeling overwhelmed at the thought of being alone. I felt this warm blanket envelope me as I remembered that with the gift of the Holy Ghost we are never alone. I felt so much comfort in that blessing. Even when rough days did come, like our furnace going out or Jaide braking her arm, I saw the Lord's hand helping, guiding, protecting our little family.

We had so much support from our family, our ward and our friends. I had visitors come stay with us several times: Carolyn, Jami, my mom, and my dad. Their visits really buoyed my spirits, and my children's. One time when Jami arrived, I took a trip to Target to get some stuff.  I realized that was the first time in over three weeks that I was by myself.  I mean, I'm alone when the girls go to bed at night.  But not really.  I'm still "on duty".  If anything happens, if anyone wakes up, if anything... I'm the one in charge.  So having guests was a break from that stress and I got to wander around Hobby Lobby by myself for as long as I needed to recharge. I was so sad when they would leave.  And so were my girls.

It was hard to watch the girls deal with all of this. They would cry and cry when Jake would leave. Even if it was just to go get the mail, they were always afraid that he was going to be gone for a long time. The would yell "dad! dad! dad!" and run and jump all over him when he would get home. Sometimes I was right there with the girls vying for his attention like a kid!  We would video chat during the week - as often as we could (sometimes Jake wouldn't get home til they were in bed - long hours at the plant and a one hour time difference). The girls would have nights were they were frustrated and crying - and I just knew. I knew that they wanted their dad. We were all ready for a break from mom, but dad wasn't home. One particularly hard night Scarlett told me "Sometimes it's hard when Dad goes to Mi-Chicago. And sometimes it's fun being alone with you Mommy!" Scarlett really helped me through some rough times. Her sweet prayers always included dad and she would save her treats to share with dad when he came home.

WHAT I LEARNED...
I look back over those months and I really did learn a few important lessons:

I learned to push through the hard times. I found a way to have patience and be kind when I had nothing left to give. I felt courage to keep moving forward when I just wanted to stop. The end of the days, that lovely time when you try to make dinner and everyone's sick of each other, followed by bath time and bed time - those were the hardest. I let my children watch TV during every meal. I stopped making food I knew would be thrown on the floor. I allowed myself to leave the dinner dishes on the counter til the next morning while I sat on the couch and watched TV. I found ways to give myself a break and just survive. And I learned I could be kind. I worked hard at it, and I'm still far from perfect, but during those moments when I just want to explode - I took a deep breath, prayed for strength, and pushed forward with a kindness I know came from heaven.

I learned to really trust in our marriage. I trust Jake wholeheartedly. But it was challenging to be apart so much and not somehow resent him for leaving. It sounds weird saying it now, cause I know that he hated leaving just as much as I hated it. But I really had to adjust my thinking and not project blame on him for something he didn't do. I had to trust my husband in a vibrant, urban city - that he would make the best choices for our family. I know that Jake wouldn't throw his life away for trivial things - but being apart leaves a lot of time to imagine scenarios. Especially when is seems like everywhere we turned there were stories of infidelity. But it wasn't one-sided. Jake had to trust me too. It was a "crazy trust exercise". My dad travels a lot for work and he has told all of the kids that true fidelity in marriage starts way before you cross any lines. It starts by talking highly of your spouse to others, keeping work relationships at an appropriate level, having transparency in your communications with others (ie: knowing each other's passwords to email, facebook, cell phone), keeping personal details of your marriage between the two of you, not riding alone or eating alone with someone of the opposite gender, etc. The trust you have with your spouse comes by safeguarding your marriage and protecting your spouse - keeping Satan far away from that sacred bond we hold so dear.

I learned how much Jake really loves us. I can't believe how much driving Jake did - back and forth, 4 hours each way. One weekend home meant about: 8 hours of driving, 17 hours of sleeping, 3 hours of church, leaving 16 hours with the family. But he came home, every weekend he could. There were many times I expected him to say "I'm just too worn out, I need to catch up on sleep this weekend." But he didn't. If he was really worn out, he would just drive home on Saturday morning, cutting the weekend even shorter. It was a long and boring drive, but Jake came home. And I love him for that.

I learned that I am not alone. Not only do we have the Holy Ghost if we are living righteously, but Heavenly Father provides so many other angels to help us in our times of need. I really have a testimony of Home Teachers and Visiting Teachers. How wonderful to have ward members charged with taking care of each other, like one big family. Are we not all brothers and sisters in the gospel? There were a few rare occasions that I had to go to church alone. I was pretty nervous about going to church without backup. The twirls are at the age where Sacrament Meeting is just a little too much work. But we still go. Cause that's what we do. One time I was joking to our late Bishop Gillespie that it's almost not worth coming at all with small kids (hey - don't judge me - I know we've all thought it before). He said something that really changed my perspective: "Yes, but you're setting an important example for other members of the ward. They see how hard it is. They know you're struggling to keep everyone happy. But they see that you're still here." So away to church we went. That first Sunday by myself, I was getting the girls out of the car when my home teacher met me in the parking lot and asked how he could help (how did he know when we were arriving!?) Then after I got inside he sent his 13 year old daughter to come sit with me and the girls in the back. Then another lady "Grandma Gina" came and sat with me too (good thing, since Scarlett had to pee twice!) I really felt like Heavenly Father sent these angels to help me in my time of need. Then that evening my VTing comp brought me dinner. One young couple offered to come sit on my couch at night so I could go do whatever (like grocery shopping). I've had countless offers of help and service. I'm so grateful for my ward family! My next door neighbor, Don, would bring in my trash cans. My friends would show up with smiles and distraction. A few rough days I had friends bring me milk or whatever I needed. I never was really alone.

I learned why we have food storage. During the winter months grocery shopping is difficult enough, but add 3 small whiny kids, it's almost impossible.  I normally would go after the kids were in bed, but without Jake there to watch them, I relied heavily on our food storage. It wasn't the zombie apocalypse that I thought I was preparing for, but I know that we have food storage for all these unforeseen moments. There are a million reasons why we might need that extra comfort, and it was comfort. My children were never hungry, no matter how rough it was. And I'm grateful for that.

I learned it's important to serve and be served. It's so hard to accept service when you're feeling vulnerable and incomplete. But I am thankful for everyone who helped us. I'm also thankful for all the opportunities I had to serve. Sometimes I felt like I was at. my. limit. Then someone would ask for help with whatever - and I got lost in helping them. I forgot myself and focused on something outside of my head, for just a split second. And it helped.

I learned how grateful I am for the family unit. I'm thankful that my children have a mom AND a dad to raise them. I'm grateful that I have a spouse to help raise me. I have thought many times about the single parents I know. For whatever reason, they are both the mom and the dad. How exhausting that must be! How heroic they seem now. Now that I know. Now that I've tasted just a sprinkle of what they must feel. To be raising their family in the gospel, alone - I have so much more reverence for their journey. And not just the single parents - but all the parents who are carrying the burden of raising their family alone for whatever reason. Illness, military service, work travel, etc. I think back at how dark these few months were and I feel for them. My dad traveled so much for work. I don't think I understood what a sacrifice that was for both of my parents until now. I will never really understand, but I hope I have a little more empathy.

I learned I could do it.  It was hard.  It wasn't always pretty.  But we did it.  We can do hard things.  I gained a confidence in myself, and my relationships.  I learned that when hard times come - and they will come - that we will find a way to push through.

THINGS THAT HELP ME SURVIVE...

After Jake moved out and my new reality set in, I realized I needed to do change a few things to help me survive.

Snow Kingz. I hired a snow plow service to shovel our driveway, porch, and sidewalks for the winter season. I talked to the owner on the phone and told him I would be happy to send him a check for the season, but I noticed that his website says "under construction" and I wanted to know if he would like to trade services. Snow plow for a new website. He was totally on board! It's a negotiations strategy I learned from Jake's MBA class. Yes, it would be easier to just pay him.  But I really thought it sounded like fun to help him with a new site. I'm excited to help him develop his small business - we're working on a bunch of fun ideas!  We are going to work on it more now that the winter is over.  I'll post about it when we get to that point... But it was nice to hear his snow plow at all hours of the night. Nice to not have to wait til my girls were in bed and go plow it myself.  Especially when we got 17" of snow one day!

Summit Gym Membership.  I really liked going to the gym. I think it made a huge impact on the twirls' transition into nursery and helped me get out some of my stress. Once the weather got really bad, it wasn't worth the effort to get out the door and I didn't go as much as I should have... But when I did go it made a huge impact on my sanity.

Maid Pro. When my parents came out in the fall, my dad helped with bath time one night and after he said "holy cow, that's a lot of work!" I think they felt for me, knowing first hand what I was going through. They surprised us with a cleaning company that came once a month. They vacuumed everything, deep cleaned the bathrooms (do you know you're supposed to clean the inside the shower? and not just when someone poops in there!?!) AND scrubbed my kitchen! I like to clean, but it was so nice to have one less thing to worry about. Especially cause cleaning with chemicals is dangerous with toddlers right at your heels. Oh how I miss "the ladies" - that's what we called them. When Jami was here this past January, she was brushing Scarlett's teeth. Scarlett dropped one of her gummy vitamins on the floor. Jami bent over to pick it up and Scarlett told her: "That's OK, you can leave it, the ladies will sweep it up." haha! Oh my! I promise that is NOT the way we talk about the cleaning ladies. If anything I discuss them with reverence, like royalty. But it's funny how just a few times in our home and our children were already feeling entitled. So I guess I'm glad that they're gone now. *tear*

Abby. Abby is our Home Teacher's daughter. She is one of my favorite people - even though I hardly know her. Last November I got the idea to hire her to come watch my girls. She's only 13 and my girls are a lot to handle. So she stays downstairs with them, while I hide in the office (like right now). For 2 hours every week I know that I get to do something fun just for me. I try to use this time to work on crafts, blog, browse Pinterest, etc. I do NOT clean, cook, or do any chores while she's here. I'm paying her. I'm going to enjoy my time. The girls love having her here. She has so much more energy and she plays fun games with them. They like the break just as much as I do! Eventually she'll get bored of us and quit, or maybe I'll just have to give her a raise, but we love Abby. One day she was helping Scarlett put away her marble toy, I asked her if she needed help putting it away - since it goes on the top of a tall shelf. She looked at me a little funny and said "no". Then I realized - she's two inches taller than me!!!!! haha! She's closer in age to Scarlett than to me but she's taller than me!

SOME STORIES FROM JAKE...
Jake is a hard worker and his boss was really impressed with him.  I'm proud of how he really jumped in and figured it out - especially in such a high stress (and rough) environment.

His coworkers would say "hey, it's Jake... from State Farm!"  or they would ask "What are you wearing, Jake from State Farm?"  That was a really smart marketing campaign from State Farm, and it's followed Jake around ever since.  Even on his TV interview.

On the weekends that Jake had to work or be "on call" he would attend the ward out there.  One Sunday - after the new year when the schedules were all different - he accidentally went to the single's ward.  haha! He said there was a group of like 4 girls that came up to him right after Sacrament meeting.  I bet!

The novelty of the city life wore off quickly.  Luckily he was walking distance from a TON of cool restaurants.  And since Ford payed for him to eat out every night, he got to try all sorts of cool cuisines.

The drive got boring, real fast.  He was going to use the train that goes between Chicago and Ann Arbor (like 20 min from our house).  But the timing never seemed to work out.  One weekend we were going to try it, but for whatever reason Jake decided to drive.  That same weekend 4 people were stabbed on that train!!!  YIKES!  I think Jake was fine driving after that - expect, a few weeks later the freeway was shut down due to a 193 car accident involving a semi full of fireworks.  Let's just say we're grateful that he doesn't have to make that commute anymore!

This is the Lincoln they gave Jake during the launch, and his swanky upscale 2 bed/2 bath high rise apartment.  Where the monthly rent is more than our house payment.  Luckily Ford pays for it!  They furnished it and even had a cleaning service come every other week.  They gave him a parking spot (where parking costs like $30/day) and the building even had a doorman and a concierge.  Fancy!

This is a snippet of an email Jake wrote about his first week in Chicago, I think it helps paint a picture of what he did there:

On Friday September 26th I headed out to Chicago.  It's about a 4 hour drive and I wanted to get there kind of early to meet my new boss. About 40 minutes into the drive I decided it would be a good idea to make sure I packed my badge. Sure enough as I searched through my bag I couldn't find it, so I pulled over (safety first!) and gave Jen a call. She was headed out to the gym, but lucky for me she hadn't got to far. She was nice enough to turn around and check to see if I left it in the Mustang. Of course I did. My plans to be a responsible employee were crushed and I headed home. By the time I got there it was nearly lunch time, so I enjoyed some leftover pizza and headed out on my journey again. The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful except that there is all sorts of construction going on around the plant, so it took me an extra 45 minutes and the patience of a grumpy construction worker to get me out of the "restricted zone", whatever that means, and to my proper parking spot.

The plant makes the engineers park way in the back even though we all drive Fords or Lincolns. As I made the trek inside I passed lots of foreign cars. Who do they think they are?! (I realize many of you who might be reading this drive foreign cars, which for the record, I don't mind, but if you work for an auto manufacturer you should either buy one of their cars or in the very least a fun-to-drive competitor's car. Don't be driving no Hyundai....sheesh!

I made it to the security turnstyle and sure enough my badge didn't work. I was told it was ready to go, but oh well. Luckily one of the line workers was leaving and swiped his badge to let me in - not quite secure, but who am I to complain, since it was to my benefit. As you can imagine the plant is pretty huge and I had no idea where to go. I wandered around a bit until I got to the floor, where I wandered around some more (rhyming!) and eventually I found some guys who looked a lot like engineers... khakis, button up short sleeve shirts, and very little muscle tone. I followed them and sure enough was led straight to my boss. We chatted for a bit and he took off back to Dearborn to see his family for the weekend. By then it was late afternoon and I really wanted to get into my new digs.

I have to say that for a big city, Chicago is pretty nice. My apartment seems to be in a hoppin' area and some of my neighbors are Bulls and Dee Snyder (Twisted Sister). When I pulled up there were tons of people eating in outdoor cafes and looking like they were headed somewhere nice. I found my building's security desk and told them I needed keys, as I was moving in. All they asked was which unit I was moving into and they handed over my keys. Again, not very secure, but still to my advantage, so I can't complain.  I really like my apartment. It is pretty new and I think only one other family has lived here before. It still has that new house smell, which is nice.  

The next day I got some grocery shopping done and found a delicious hot dog restaurant a short walk away from my place. I'm realizing that I'm not a great grocery shopper. On Sunday I had a cup o' noodles for lunch and for dinner: cheese, an apple, and pop corn. 

I found my ward online and considered looking for another one. Google street view made it look a little sketchy. In reality its only a couple miles from my apartment and in a really nice area. The ward meets in an elementary school... how nostalgic. Since we share the school with two other wards (a singles ward and a Spanish branch) we had Sunday school first. It was held in one of the classrooms. It took me back to when I was a wee lad; in fact, it was likely built around the same time as my elementary school in Ogden. I forgot about all the decor that elementary school teachers use to spruce up their classroom. Elder's quorum met in another classroom and I could tell the school teacher who uses it must be pretty strict. He or she had put up a ton of rules for the kids and even had a hand written list of forbidden words, such as "really", "bad", "good", and "very". That teacher would have been my demise, since I'm not much of a wordaholic. Sacrament meeting was held in the school auditorium, which was pretty fun, except the bishopric didn't take advantage of the stage and no one sat in the front half of the room, except me. It was pretty obvious who the new guy was.

On Monday I started my first real day at work. The factory was building one of our first new Explorers, so all the engineers followed it around to make sure their parts weren't giving any issues. Not too exciting, but when one of my team's parts gave the operators some problems we all got excited. I learned that basically my only job is to find problems and get them fixed as soon as possible, so we can test the solution out on future prototype cars. Eventually we will have to go through 5 straight shifts without any problems before we can start shipping cars to dealers. That won't happen for at least 6 months, so hopefully we'll have time to figure everything out.

JAKE MOVED HOME...
Jake started looking for a his permanent assignment in January.  I wanted to know his end date more than anything else!  I longed to know the exact weekend that he was going to be ours again.  Finally one group said they wanted Jake ASAP (luckily he has a great reputation) so he got to move home -wait for it - a month early!!!!!!!!!  Six months became just over 5.  Toward the end it was dark.  So coming home early was such a tender mercy!

It's weird to think that ~10% of our marriage we weren't living together.  I know lots of people are apart more, and some less.  But Jake and I really like being together, so I'm glad he's home now.  But it's been an adjustment.  It's been weird having to get used to each other again.  I have had to ask for his help and not just do it myself.  I have had to figure out how to make dinner again (these people are always hungry!)  I've been trying to cut back the amount of TV the girls watch.  I've been trying to teach them and put more variety into their days.  I'm in a much better place.  And the girls just soak up whatever I teach them. Sometimes I feel guilty that I haven't spent as much time teaching the twirls shapes, colors, letters, etc. that I did for Scarlett.  But we were in survival mode.  Now we're in joy mode.  So we're working on adding more joy to our days.  Scarlett still occasionally asks "is Dad in Mi-Chicago?"  I think she knows the answer, but she just wants to make sure that he's coming home that night.

This was a rough time for our family.  But now it's over.  I hope we learned a little and got a little tougher in the process.  I'm grateful that Jake has a great job, even if it means sacrifice occasionally.  I am grateful that I have a husband that I enjoy hanging out with.  And I'm grateful for our support network of friends and family (and "the ladies") who got us through this time.