Reboot
I am hoping to start making regular posts to this blog. In the category of “Life marches on…”, the last 3 years have been very challenging: unexpected extra costs for the house repair, staffing shortages at work, health issues, and now the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact. Below is a quick outline of what’s happened and where I hope to be starting from.
When the work to repair the damage from the burst water pipe was evaluated, it was discovered that our house had Quest piping and the recommendation was to replace the piping that could be accessed through the damaged areas (versus risking the pipes rupturing again and having to repeat the repairs). This also involved cutting holes in other walls to complete the repairs. Of course insurance only covered the repairs necessitated by the damage and the rest had to come out of our savings. Piping was replaced for all the bathrooms (2 upstairs and 1 downstairs), the water heater in the garage and 1/2 of the kitchen. Since we were unable to live in the house during the repairs, we made the decision to go ahead and make some additional upgrades – replacing all of the toilets with chair height low-flush toilets and since the walls had to be torn out in the upstairs hall bathroom – upgrading the walls around the tub with 12×24 porcelain tiles with a contrasting accent. Fortunately we had enough in our savings to pay for everything without having to finance the work.
I work in the Immunohematology (Transfusion Service) section of the laboratory in a hospital with a Level 1 Trauma Center. We have had a lot of turnover in our staffing the last few years and it is getting harder to replace the staff that leaves because fewer and fewer people are coming into the field. Five of my section’s staff have retired, quit, or transferred to less stressful positions in the last 12 months. In addition, for the last couple of years, we have been regularly been covering 24/7 with 3-4 positions open in a technical staff of 12. Unfortunately, our workload seems to keep increasing with no sign of relief in sight. We all all trying to balance our work schedules (starting times, number of hours scheduled/day, and days to work vary day to day and week to week) with some downtime to try to prevent burn-out. I have had very little time to do anything but grocery shop, cook, clean, work, and sleep.
On the health side, I had the misfortune to have Shingles ~4 years ago on the left side of my face and it migrated into the eye. After multiple complications, I am now essentially blind in the left eye. I have a very good Opthalmologist and he is keeping up with the latest treatment options to try to restore some sight to the eye. At this point, I am not very optimistic and have learned to make the necessary adjustments to compensate for the loss of visual field and depth perception.
There are very few aspects of life the COVID-19 pandemic has not impacted. Like most people, I have adapted to wearing a mask for my own protection as well as those around me, maintain social distancing and take advantage of special hours for seniors/healthcare workers. When masking and social policies were relaxed for many in the public; because of critical hospital staffing shortages, hospital staff was required to continue wearing masks and social distancing unless with their immediate household group. My husband and I have been fortunate in getting vaccinated and not contracting Covid so far. Meal planning has become more flexible, based on what is available when I go shopping (though we still eat out occasionally). There is definitely a tendency to stock up on items that seem to come and go without actually hoarding. The current plan for the “pantry” is to maintain an inventory of 3 months of non-perishables that are used in my regular cooking rotation.
My husband made the decision to retire unexpectedly last October and I hope to include some posts about how that has impacted our finances and the decisions we are making going forward. Fortunately we were covering his health insurance on my work’s plan, so the main budget issues we are having to adjust are the bills that his income was covering.