Choices

Six weeks ago Chris and I lay in bed one night going over and over the figures into the wee hours of the next morning.

We spoke of due dates, m*rtgage adjustments, market losses, credit card cash advances, liquidating retirement accounts, personal loans, listing times, price reductions. We mentally clung so tightly to the hope that we would be able to get an offer that would pay these m*rtgages and make us all whole again if we just pulled on all of our resources.

Extracting ourselves from that hope was physically painful that night.

That night we came to the realization that we would face f*reclosure if we didn't sell.

"We're running out of time" I said into the darkness.

My heart literally ached inside my chest. I couldn't believe that we were going to be "those people". I thought "those people" didn't pay their bills. I thought "those people" bought flat screen TV's and jet skis and black leather couches while they ignored their credit card bills. I thought "those people" were lazy. I thought "those people" were looking for a handout. I didn't know that those people are people who can have ten years of impeccable credit. That those people can have degrees. That those people can get up at the crack of dawn every morning and go to work. That those people can get up in the middle of the night and open bills, so that their spouse doesn't have to see them crying again.

I lay there that night six weeks ago and the sobs just came.

I had spent almost a year hoping beyond hope that hard work would get us the offer we needed on the house. And now, here we were. We had failed. I had failed. We were going to be those people.

Chris tried to reach out to me and I leaped up and ran to the bathroom where I sobbed with such intensity - such grief - that I shook uncontrollably. I saw everything, everything, Chris and I have worked so hard for being pulled out from under us like that. In just a handful of weeks' time.

It was the next morning that Chris saved us.

He woke me up. He sat very still at the end of the bed and I got the impression that he had been up for hours.

"This is what we're going to do" he started. His tone was unrecognizable. Calm and resolved.

From that moment, he and I put together a two-fold plan. We would walk away from the house and secure a new roof over our heads. Then we would attack the selling of our home with a fierceness. We would be relentless with out realt*r. We would be unstoppable with our m*rtgage companies. We would not take no for an answer (and we were told no plenty of times). We would offer creative s*lutions to the m*rtgage companies. We would write long letters appealing to their good nature. We would fill their inbox with our pleas.

We knew the numbers were against us. But, we would not go down without a fight.

Our fight made this morning's phone call all the sweeter. Everything has been approved. We close August 31, maybe sooner.

F*reclosure was set to begin September 1.

I'm going to take a nap now.