I've come a long way baby!

Yesterday started out to be a stressful day.

My car has always been a loud car.  We purchased it used and have always noticed that it's louder than our other car (which happens to be the exact same year and model).  We've just learned to talk to each other louder in my car than in Bryan's.  A couple of weeks ago I decided that it had now gotten so loud that I was afraid that pieces were going to start flying off as I was driving down the freeway.  We took it to the mechanic.

He found all kinds of general maintenance things wrong with it.  $1200 later we had a much quieter car.  I love driving my car now.  I can actually hear the kids talking in the back seat.  They don't have to scream at me anymore.....not that they don't just for old times' sake;)  It's an 11-year-old car.  It has over 130,000 miles in it.  We are going to run it into the ground.  I'm hoping for at least another 3 years of service out of it.

Saturday evening Bryan says that we need to drop his car off at the mechanic's now.  What?!  Bryan is always telling me about strange noises his car makes. We have learned to laugh it off unless it appears serious.  We often joke that it's Christmas all year long in Bryan's car because of the many lights that are on his dashboard.  He said it really needs to go in this time.

We love our mechanic. He's honest and tells us when something doesn't really need fixed as long as we don't mind staring at the light on the dashboard.  He knows we can't afford to spend a lot of money fixing things that don't need to be fixed.  He know that we don't drive cars that are dangerous so if it's dangerous we will fix it.  If it just means that we just have one more light on the Christmas tree, then Merry Christmas!

Yesterday I called the mechanic to see if he had any answers for us yet.  He had the car for over a day now and I hadn't heard anything.  That scared me.  I was seeing dollar signs.  After a couple of conversations with him and his diligence in trying to find us some cheaper, used parts we came to an estimate of $1900 to fix Bryan's car.  Uggggh!  My mechanic know we are trying to drive our cars into the ground.  We don't have the money to purchase new ones any time soon.  I asked him what his opinion was and he gave me the opinion that we still had plenty of life in this car.  We just needed to fix some of these general maintenance issues that all came up at the same time.

So he's going to fix what needs to be fix and ignore what can be ignored.  We will still have some our our Christmas lights on the dashboard.  This means that we will be able to drive Bryan's car for a few more years I hope.  The bills are adding up and credit card companies are loving us.  Yuck!  I don't like supporting the credit card companies but we have to do what we have to do.

Money issues are one of my biggest stressors. This is an instance that would have led me right to the kitchen cupboards in the past.  What I realized yesterday is that even though I was stressed I didn't run to the cupboards.  I didn't use food to comfort me.  I exercised a little bit and went on with my day as usual.  I thought about eating because that was a habit at one time in my life but I quickly dismissed it as foolish.  What was the food going to do to fix my car or my finances?  Nothing.  If anything, that food would just upset me more because I would then be stressed about that decision too.

I've come a long way and I 'm proud to say that I saw it and conquered it yesterday. I'm sure it will rear it's ugly head again and I will be forced to make a decision about how I am going to use food but I can say that yesterday was a true testament as to how far I have come and how different I am today than I was earlier in my journey.

Take care everyone and Merry Christmas?!;)

Corinna

"'Blessed be the Lord your God, who had delighted in you and set you on the throne of Israel! Because the Lord loved Israel forever, he has made you king to execute justice and righteousness.' Then she gave the king one hundred twenty talents of gold, a great quantity of spices, and precious stones; never again did spices come in such quantity as that which the queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon." -1 Kings 10:9-10