An Announcement

To start things off, let me say that I will be discussing our trip to Denmark this week, but I've been trying to decide over the last few weeks when would be an appropriate time to discuss what's going on in my world and I thought there was no time like the present to discuss it.

Before you guys get all excited thinking I'm pregnant, I'm not. That's not the announcement, although I hope in the next year that I will be sharing news like that, but it's just not in the cards right now and in this blog I'll tell you why.

Some of you probably remember my post several months ago about Sean visiting the doctors in Germany about his back and how they recommended he be medboarded. I was terrified about that at the time and couldn't imagine how different my life would be as someone whose spouse was no longer affiliated with the Army.

Well, a few months have passed and there have been some new developments in the situation. The option of surgery was offered to Sean. He discussed it with several of his doctors, both in Germany and here in Italy and he decided not to do the surgery. Basically we both felt that the risks of the surgery far outweighed anything that could have been gained by having the surgery done. None of the doctors that Sean talked to felt that the specific issues Sean has with his back would be helped by having surgery and most of them felt like it would further limit his mobility, which is not something either of us wanted.

So, after some thought, Sean decided against trying to re-class and instead he is going to try to medically retire from the Army. We will be moving back to Oklahoma, hopefully to the largest city near to where we grew up and Sean will be attending college while I go back to work and hopefully have my photography business on the side. We also plan on buying a house and hopefully starting a family too.

I've actually known we were going to do this for the last few months and I've already been looking at the housing/job market in the city where we will be moving.  I didn't want to share anything on the blog, because quite frankly I didn't know the timeline of when we would be leaving Italy and going back to the States. I actually still don't know, as Sean is still going to doctor's appointments in Germany and has not yet put in his packet for this medical retirement/VA evaluation. We were slated to leave Italy in January 2012, but it appears we will be here longer. Sean is estimating we will leave here in late spring and I have to admit I have mixed feelings about it.

1. I want to have a baby. Like now. However, I don't want to have one in the middle of us moving from Italy, trying to buy a house, trying to find jobs, etc. That's just too many things for me to handle at one time.

2. I miss my family and friends a lot and I'm missing a lot of things at home, including weddings of several friends. I want to be home in time to attend, but there is a chance I might not. It's missing things like that, that make me wish I was back in the States.

3. The plus side of staying longer in Italy is more travel! Instead of leaving in 3 months, I have a bit longer to see some of the places I so desperately want to see.

4. I feel like our lives are kind of on hold right now. I can't do anything with my photography, except build up my portfolio, we can't buy a house yet and there are just a million other things I feel like we can't do yet..because it's not the right time being overseas.

So...now you guys know a bit more of what's been going on with us and why I have been more silent than usual the past few months. There are just so many mixed emotions with this whole process.