Refractory Period

There's probably a German word for that particular kind of depression that sets in after you've finished a really good book or completed a long-term project and feel a certain pang of loss, sorting through what to spend your time and energy on next.  Hell, I remember being fortunate enough to get my dream car when I was still in high school (yellow VW Beetle; it was a great little car and my dad joking that I had nothing to look forward to now.

We reached a big milestone in paying off Andy's student loans, overstretching the budget considerably for that final push. Now we're in a refractory period, assessing our goals with fresh eyes and catching up on things that we let slide in the meanwhile.

Compared to all of our other spending that month, yeah,
"Education" by means of Student Loans was definitely the kicker.

So we've been waffling between celebrating and sorting through that post-goal depression. The last couple of weeks, we've both been eating terribly and eating out frequently - - the budget was already blown, so what was another restaurant? Additionally, now that I wasn't plotting out how many more payments before we could close that chapter, I felt more inclined to just say "sure." But that's not sustainable. We have other goals to attend to now.  And in the same breath, we need to flounder for just a moment as we find our footing again.

So the end of April became a time I was excited to see, if only to welcome May with fresh attitude and eyes. The best way I've found to pull out of this funk is to start on a new project. The budget was changing to no longer anticipate paying as much in student loans and feel a fresh slate, sure, but also a good time to bring other elements to focus--we need to declutter the house  for example. I want to refocus how I eat and track my health. And we want to meet on the same page of what we're looking forward to as a couple.

This means that we're in credit card catch-up while trying to truly stick to our budget again. We're getting back to cooking. We're considering how we might want to rearrange parts of our home. And to keep us engaged in our current saving goal, we did give ourselves a couple of things to look forward to:  in honor of our anniversary and paying off Andy's loans and the general proximity of our mutual birthdays, we found non-egregiously priced tickets to go see Hamilton in Chicago.

Super pumped!

So the mourning of a goal met, odd as that may seem, is starting to fade. The first paycheck of a new month starts us on the next step, wherever that'll take us.