Even more, realizing that most of our friends who are graduating from college are starting jobs, buying houses and furniture, and having babies. And here I am wondering when any of those things will ever happen for us because all I see is an endless road of school in front of us. I can't see myself ever ready to have kids, perfectly furnish a house, or travel all over the world like I see on social media. I wonder how they do it.
Part of me feels like the post-grad anxieties that we happily skipped out on when we were accepted to medical school are starting to catch up with us. The problem isn't that we don't have a plan, because we do. I love our plan and nothing feels more right then the plan we've set out to pursue together. But something I'm struggling with is our plan being so different from anyone else's that I know. We're trying to live lives that most people don't have, and it comes with fear and anxiety of the unknown. There are lots of people that tell us how rich we will be one day, how awesome its going to be, and how easy it will be to pay off our student loans (given, most of these people have no idea what loan interest rates are nowadays much less what the salary projections are).
As I've been spending the last month or so on the internet trying to figure out our housing. I've been debating about size and cost and how it looks, feeling like we had to have the perfect apartment and feeling like we had to get a two bedroom like so many other friends we have, that it had to be nice. But none of it felt right. All I was worrying about had to do with what other people were saying they needed or deserved, or how nice someone else's was in pictures. So instead we found an apartment on campus, which is much less glamorous but so much more convenient, and so perfect for us. It might have bright blue carpet but we will find a way to manage and just get a rug. but saving and getting something that met the needs that mattered to US as opposed to what I thought they were based on everyone else's life was really our secret little corner of happiness. (Not to mention rent is half price over the summer so....)
So, the answers (most) questions everyone keeps asking us is we don't know. But we have hope that all these things are going to work out because we feel that strongly about the importance of following this path. And eventually one day, I feel better knowing that someone can look at us and find hope knowing because we were able to do it, they can too.
And in the meantime I think I'm just going to take some advice from myself and remember that our life is exactly that: ours. And it doesn't matter how much people think we have or think we should have, be that time, money, children or education. Because what's ours is ours and what is good for us is good enough.
