December 13th -- My Christmas!

Yesterday was my Christmas.

I honestly would be perfectly happy receiving not one gift at all this year.

I am so very blessed and could not as for anything more.

The student that I tutored for Pharm this semester got 100% on her final yesterday! I am so happy for her because she was failing pretty badly after the midterm (I think a 71% -- failing is anything below 80%), and she could only get 6 wrong and still pass. She was so nervous and then she didn't even get any wrong!! It also is an amazing feeling to know that I can help someone like that! Paula (the instructor I tutor for now) gave my name to the person who runs GTC's tutoring for pay and next semester I am going to do it for money for CHA and Pharm. I love it, and it's made me more sure that somewhere far down the road I want to get my Masters and be a nursing instructor.

I finally got the official offer about the new job yesterday!!! 

I posted awhile ago about this HERE. I am now a Nurse Extern in OB, and I cannot even believe it. This is honestly LIFE CHANGING and is going to be the start of a career that I'm going to have forever. I have wanted to do OB for so long, and this opportunity is literally a blessing because most places will not hire new RNs in OB because of lack of experience. 

My last day at UHS was Wednesday, so I was really getting anxious waiting for them to offer me the position officially. I prayed and prayed for patience, and it helped. But getting the offer finally was just so relieving and exciting! They do not have any orientations before Christmas, so I am going to orientation on January 13th, which actually works perfectly because I was summoned for jury duty January 6-10th, so I was all worried that I would lose that time I could be training. 

From what my manager told me during the interview, she is going to train me in labor and delivery and postpartum. They also have NICU, which she said I can learn over time. She also told me in the interview that I would have a job waiting for me after graduation, assuming everything goes well as an Extern. I honestly just still can't even believe it. I'm so grateful to Paula for saying great things about me, I don't know if I would have gotten it if not for her. I can't wait to start!

The last gift yesterday was getting a phone call from our immigration lawyer letting us know that our petition is approved and D will soon be a legal resident! This isn't something that I've talked about with many people, but my husband came here illegally in 2006. I myself was definitely not for illegal immigration before I met him, but knowing him, his family, and some of his friends over the past 8 years has redefined my views on this issue.

My husband works 80 hours a week at two different minimum wage jobs. He is the hardest worker that I have ever seen. He has never been in trouble with the law and he has paid taxes for 8 years. He also has learned English (not speaking a word of it before he came here) and is now fluent. I know that there are immigrants here that do nothing but refuse to learn English, do not work or contribute to the community, and live off of others. However, my husband is not one of those people. But he cannot get a drivers license, travel anywhere by plane, go to school, or get a decent job because he came illegally. 

We began this process to get him residency (and eventually citizenship) in June 2012 and it has been a long, tedious, stressful ordeal. Contrary to what most people think, being married to me does not give him a free pass to residency or citizenship. We had to hire a lawyer and go through months and months of paperwork and also putting roughly $7,000 into the lawyer and filing fees for the paperwork. Long story short, we submitted the final waiver in August and were told it would be probably 6 months before we heard if it was approved, but at just a little over 4 months, we got the good news yesterday! 

We are so thankful to all of our family and friends who have supported us during this difficult time and we could not have done it without them! 

I have prayed and prayed about all of these things for so long and I am so thankful and grateful to God for listening and always being with me and giving me strength and patience to wait for His answer.