There just aren't any guarantees. Really. I know people who have had children from frozen eggs and some who never had a pregnancy take. I put off career for babies and ended up homeschooling which had entirely tanked my music career. Concert pianist is not something one just "picks up on" at forty nine when homeschool retirement looms. I am living with my decision, and do not regret what I did for the sake of the kids. On the other hand, it is VERY hard on me. Some careers simply do not have a pause button. You either do it when you are young or not at all because you can't break back

If my car accident injuries are any indication, then yes I do think many of these victims will suffer lifelong chronic pain.

I think that is too old. I went to college at sixteen and had my degree at twenty. I do think that more opportunities to learn life skills through the community might help. We have a plethora of parents here that are so busy working multiple job, extra hours, double shifts that they don't have the time to teach some of the basics. These young adults do not how to navigate the complexities of life adult life and often feel lost and then flounder.

Thank you so much. I haven't another 2 lbs since I posted which was five days ago. It seems too fast. But I feel good, really good, in better spirits than I have in a long time. Mom is very chipper, and she seems to be coming around from her own depression. We watched some of the Olympics together and that was nice because our relationship has been on the ropes. I think maybe the biggest contributing factor is Dh and I had a heart to heart and I finally admitted how much I have internally floundered since largely giving up my music career. With ds graduating and going off to college

Dh is my best friend with benefits! :D We are super close, and love spending time together. But yes, like Arctic, sometimes a girl needs another girl, so I have a female gal pal for that.

My Dd is a paramedic. She says it has to do with how many gunshot traumas that any one hospital can handle at a single time. This depends on the staff, number of trauma surgeons, and such. In a busy area you have to remember that they will have heart attack victims, strokes, car accidents, you name it all of which they are dealing with at the same time. Sometimes they get on the radio and tell EMS they are refusing any more patients.

This. We had to do this for in laws who would have stayed forever and did expect a lot of extra special attention. That first couple of years of their retirement they would just hit the road and show up at our house. No warning. Then they would complain because Dh didn't have time off from work. And they expected the homeschooling to come to an end while there. Ai yi yi yi yi! So we started telling them. when they arrived that they were welcome to stay, but life wasn't coming to an end and that there would be some meals that would be fend for themselves because I had performance events, o

We are going to London, Ont first to the Archaeology Museum. Then to Toronto, from there to Montreal, then dropping down into Vermont and going to the Ethan Allen Homestead - related on my side - then to Albany, NY to see our daughter and son in law and awesome grandson. Then home through Niagara which the kids have seen, but we will run down to the park anyway because it is so pleasant in the summer. We love history, science, ruins, museums, and wildlife and don't mind a little hiking, kayaking too. Recommendations and best part of the city to stay in for ease of access please!

My dad has a degree in chemistry from U of MI. All I can say is that it was a very challenging degree to compete. On the other hand she loved every moment of it. Since your dad is in 11th grade, I would suggest AP Chem for next year to see how she likes the work load and math intensity as it is more challenging than standard high school chemistry. She can declare the major for college applications but since she is not likely to be offered departmental scholarships until after she completes her freshman year of prerequisites, she could change her mind and choose a related major like biology,

Chicken Alfredo, steamed broccoli, salad, and oranges.

I should state that we do not have a mortgage. So we don't know if it is possible to pat that way or not, or if there would be fees, or whatever.

Yes, semester tuition here. We put it on the card, get the points, then pay it off because we put money away each month for each boy in the amount they need after scholarships and federal student loans. We have earned A LOT of Amazon points but also when we do put it on the Cap card, free hotels, plane tickets, and discounts. I am sure the credit card companies are banking on most people not paying it off in full so they make a profit on the interest. But for us we have been determined not to spend more than we can pay off each month so it has been a very welcome system of rewards for us.

We do this with a Chase Amazon card. We buy from then so much that the reward points for using it to pay bills are worth it. It takes discipline to not carry a balance, but we stick to the budget. The only thing we don't put on it is travel. That goes on a Cap 1 Venture card which is a good one for travelers. This way we get specific points towards hotels and airfare plus some discounts.

We have received these too. I have to say that the one from MSU was laughed at openly in this house. After the Nassar horror came out, no one thinks that State cares particularly much about the actual safety of students, just the appearance of it and the spewing of standard rhetoric.

I have always wondered about this myself. A pastor did that here locally about five years ago, and again, the worship service was supposed to end with vow renewals in a church where I knew there were numerous widows/widowers, divorced individuals, some single people who had always wanted to marry and never found an s.o., survivors of domestic violence, you name it. He wanted me to provide the wedding music, but I declined. I was very uncomfortable with the idea that a Sabbath worship service was being devoted to something that wasn't worship, not necessarily rooted in solid theology, and would