Count down to out of office

Last day of work prior to Christmas.  I can feel the interest in work dying away and I hear more and more good byes from the few people here today.  I still have work to do, too much to do with that mapping project due next week, but today I'm just going to do what's needed and put that to the side.  The fact I can't connect to my employers office may be a deciding factor. 

Christmas plans around our house are 3 dinners in a row.  Christmas Eve my parents are coming over and we'll have tourtiere and cabbage rolls.  Odd combo, but tourtiere is a tradition from Dad's Quebecois side of the family and I love it.  Mom only makes it once a year (although usually 3 pies) so it's super special treat.  She's made people cry with her tourtiere.  I linked to two recipes above, they are similar but not the same as hers, I'll have to get it and post it.  Cabbage rolls are for Mr. Lina.  His mom's side is Ukrainian, it's a nod to them.  We usually do perogies as well, but with just 4 for dinner, it seems a bit of overkill to me.  We'll have perogies another day.  Christmas Day is at my aunt and uncles (Mom's brother).  My cousin will be there, Scot and his wife, but Clone and his wife are still with her family.  It will be a civilized dinner of adults.  My aunt is nice, but um, let's say relations are a tad bit strained with them, they hurt my mom a lot over the years, mostly accidental tactlessness, but she's slow to forgive.  The saving grace to this is I think Mom will not tell them about Clone's wife being pregnant.  This means I will keep my sanity because there will not be baby conversation.  Mom has still yet to mention it to me, I think she's waiting for me to say something.  I'm in happy fantasy land where nothing is going on there to speak of.  It's working well so far. 

Boxing day (26th) will finally have both of my brothers in the same room so we can have our family Christmas.  Turkey dinner, gifts the whole she-bang.  My SIL parents are going to be there and I know she's mentioned to them about my infertility, but I'm suspecting no one is going to be tactful about the happy pregnancy around me because I'm suppose to be happy.  I think I'm going to arrange to drive on Christmas day so I can drink on Boxing Day.  I plan on walking away from any baby related conversation.  My therapist actually has asked me three times if there is a way to get out of this dinner.  I don't think I can without it making a bigger deal of it than just going.  Mom would want to rearrange things to make it work for me, the whole point of this dinner is having us all together, Clone and his wife would feel bad and that makes me feel like crap.  Nope, a little wine, many trips to the opposite side of the house, I'll survive.

The cafe tea towel is done, the Paris bridge is started.  I'm actually feeling pretty good on that front.  I know I still have a lot to do, but I will not be giving these gifts until Boxing Day.  I do have dinner plans, but nothing in the daytime prior to then.  It's actually good to have with me while working on those maps, it takes a while for the computer do redraw the window at times, this keeps me from hitting too many buttons and making it freeze up.  So there is time to do it and I really am finding it soothing.  The only things left to do are buy underwear for Mr. Lina (such an exciting gift, but it's what he needs, his coffee maker is already under the tree), wrap presents and finish the tea towels.  Some house cleaning, but even that's not going to be too bad, it's just my parents and whatever we get done will help for NYE house concert.  So all told, I actually feel less crazy about Christmas approaching than I do most years, so long as I don't think of the 26th.

So mental health update, therapy was AWESOME on Tuesday.  I wanted another session prior to Christmas but the only time that worked for our therapist and myself didn't for Mr. Lina so I went alone.  Previous session, she had asked if we felt trapped, holding back on life because of infertility.  Mr. Lina said no, I said hell yeah.  We can't move, I can't quit, I don't want to change jobs and find they aren't flexible to the multitude of appointments I have when doing FETs, added stress of a new job is probably not helpful to fertility, etc etc.  I picked up this thread again this week.  I realized that the last time I remember feeling happy consistently was about August.  That's when I got my promotion.  Now promotions are cool, I got a little salary bump, my title changed, but not one thing changed about my job.  Nothing.  I've had bumps in pay, changed clients, but this was my first title change.  So good for internal recognition, but I think some of this stems from the fact that's not the job I want.  I want to be a Mom, neither corporate ladder climbing nor money (to a certain extent, I don't want to worry about paying the mortgage) is motivating to me.  So yes, it's infertility behind the depression, but the catalyst to a certain extent was possibly the frustration that nothing is changing even when something changes.

We talked about what I could do about that.  It's amazing how much better I was feeling just talking about possibilities.  In no particular order, here are the thoughts, opportunities and constraints I'm going to mulling over.

• I like mentoring and teaching.  I like it when people come to me with problems.  We have a few new-ish people on the team and they seem to come to me for answers.  My managers manager actually books time with me like this so he can learn about our software by doing projects himself (that he could sell and then pass the work to me).  He's commented many times that I'm effective at this, he enjoys learning with me.
• So training is an avenue to look at.  The training needs for my specialty are met by 2 US trainers coming up about 4 times a year, not enough for one person full time. 
• My company offers a lot of training for our staff and clients. I may need to learn other products to be a trainer for my employer. 
• I don't want to work at my employers office 5 days a week, it's too expensive on the toll highway ($12 one way, that adds up quick) and in the opposite direction of where we'd want to move.
• A lot of US counterparts seem to be working from home (like moving to Florida when their office is in Pennsylvania), maybe there are roles that I could work remotely, then we could move further west if the right opportunity came along.
• I'm not sure 100% at home suits my personality, but we aren't looking to move to Florida, so a day in the office may still be feasible.
• I could look for work in the consumer packaged goods industry, but honestly, my skills are really niche.  I need some training on broader software to be more attractive for more types of positions.  I've taken the intro and advance courses before, but I don't use the software in my role so I forget.  At least saying it's recent training on my resume would help. 
• If I did change jobs, maybe I should look at teaching in some capacity (not kids, no interest there)

I didn't come out with answers, brainstorming isn't about answers.  I came out with a whole lot of food for thought that for once felt like a step forward.  Understanding why I'm feeling like this now really helps.  No random tears this week, no crying while driving, only a little bit of  "I don't want to be here" thoughts at work and that's while I was doing something I didn't understand the process for rather than just going for tea. 

So, time to wrap up a couple of things, do up my project log and pack it up for the day.  I'll stop for the last gift on the way home (tried at lunch and they didn't have the style he likes, harumph) and let the holidays begin.

Side note, I seem to have gaming on my mind, I wrote the wrong role/roll all the way through this.  I hope I caught them all.