It's May, and this year has already been so wild. For one thing, I can't believe that it's already May at all - they say that the years go faster the older that you get, and I'm really feeling that this year.
This year has brought some incredibly major life changes into my life, some which have happened already - like the fact that both myself and my fiancé started new jobs in different fields, (both to each other and to our respective prior jobs), last month. Some that are ongoing like Stephen beginning to move over to the night shift rota permanently, and some which are happening this month - like our wedding in two weeks!
I'm going to write a dedicated post on what planning a wedding during a pandemic has been like, and that will be up next week, but for this post, I wanted to talk about how we've been coping with all of these major changes, in case anyone else is going through a lot of flux at once and is finding it overwhelming. First of all, that's okay. It is overwhelming when life is changing so much, and so quickly.
For us, a lot of these changes fell on top of each other - and what we found was that as soon as we prepared for how we'd adjust to one change, another occurred, and that was tricky.
For example, Stephen started his new job on the day shift, while I had been hired but hadn't started my new job yet, and wouldn't for a further 3 weeks, so this became the new routine for a while - I'd do the groceries, household maintenance, and enjoy my hobbies during the day, and then we could spend the evenings together when he was home, as everything was done. Three weeks later, that changed as I was now also working during the day when Stephen was, so we spent a lot more of our weekends and evenings ensuring that all of the groceries/household stuff was done, because neither of us were free during the day for that side of life, anymore. I personally loved this part of the changes because my office does a step challenge, and meeting Stephen at the station on his way home, after my shift ended meant we could go do the groceries together, followed by a nice long walk and I could get my steps in.
Now we're at the point of the lifestyle changes where Stephen works between 8pm and 8am, so he is at home during the day during my shift, which is lovely however he isn't really awake until around 3pm - so it's like he's here, but he isn't. Luckily though, I finish work at 4pm, (from home, so I don't have a commute which would take up more time), and he doesn't have to leave the house until 7pm, so we still get time to spend with each other in the evenings. I absolutely hated sleeping alone at first, but now that I'm working and trying to rack up over 5000 steps a day, I am so tired at the end of a day that I do just fall asleep regardless, so that helps.
The best advice I have for a quick succession of changes like this is to communicate. I found it really hard when Stephen started working and while I had been hired and would be starting soon, I hadn't yet, so being home alone all day suddenly after seeing each other 25/8 since December was really weird, and I could've bottled it all up and resented him for getting a job, but instead, we talked constantly about it and listened to each other on what would make it better. I'd also advise that you remember it takes roughly 3 weeks to form a habit, so it can be tricky when you've just gotten used to an arrangement and then it switches up again, but just remember that that's all it takes to form another habit entirely, so you will get used to the next change, even if it feels like the end of the world at the beginning.
Stephen also works weekends, so it also means that our fortnightly Saturday date night now takes place on a weeknight where Stephen has the day off, and it's still just as fun. On the day that this blog post goes up, we'll have just had our last date night as an unmarried couple, (we went out for an outdoor evening of dinner and drinks at the restaurant that we celebrated our engagement in), which is so exciting, and leads me on nicely to our wedding!
On the day that we get married, we'll have been engaged for 678 days, so it has been a fairly long time of waiting for our big day, and having our plans made, remade, and then remade again due to the pandemic. I'll go into all of the details on next week's post on what it has been like being a 'covid bride', but for now, I just wanted to say that all of the changes have been worth it, because it means that we still get to have our big day, even if it's not what we imagined when we both said 'yes' in July 2019. We're probably even more excited now than we were then just because it has been such a journey to get here - and we know how many of our plans have changed, but ultimately, we both get to marry our best friend this month, and I cannot wait.
I'm going to end on the fact that sometimes, (I know, not always), but in terms of our experience this year, change is good. I needed to change my job because I despised my previous one, and it was making me so unhappy. I'm now in a job that I love, and so is Stephen, even if it did throw some of our already formed routines out of whack, that's okay, because it's worth it. I feel the same way about most of our wedding changes too so ultimately, the universe does know what it's doing. Trust it.
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