Life after retirement
All those years of working, dreaming, planning for retirement then one day I woke up, I'm retired, and I don't have a clue what to do. It's not so much that I'm frightened, it's more of a lost feeling. No longer do I need to wake up at un-goshly hour, drive to work and to ern a bi-weekly paycheck and weekend filled 'to-do' lists ~ Monday rolls around, and I do it all over again for 34 plus years. How do I break this routine ~ that mind set? On top of that instead of being away from my husband for most of the day, now we're together 24/7 😕
When I first retired, I had to figure out how to plan or not plan my day. Sounds crazy right, but you can't break a 34-year work routine overnight. I felt like I had to get everything done today when in reality I have the rest of my life to get it done ~ it's a hard mindset to break. I started to make a list of things I wanted to accomplish each day, then I made a realistic list of things I wanted to accomplish, over time I ended up with a list of things I wanted to do. I've been retired for almost 4 years now and I still struggle with this sometimes, I feel guilty if I'm not doing something. I have to remind myself that I don't have to be doing something physical, that writing a letter, reading a book is doing something. We worked hard to create our little sanctuary at home and now it's time to sit back and enjoy it. I did start a journal, but I do still make my lists and sometimes it just says ~ enjoy yourself 😊
Going from a bi-weekly paycheck to once-a-month wasn't a difficult adjustment to make, it was really just another mind-set thing and once I could mentally switch gears I did alright. I'm not going to kid ya' it took about a year to undo that thought process.
What to wear? Now that I am retired, I don't have to get dressed for work, but what do I wear? It's funny because my work clothes were semi-casual, and one would think I could wear them out shopping or hangin' out. Nope. just couldn't put them on, no matter how I tried to change them up and call them hang out clothes ~ to me they were still work clothes. Of course, I couldn't just donate them right off the bat, I might need them one day ~ but I didn't need them. I made 3 piles ~ nope, maybe and keep, I would repeat this process several times over the next couple of years. Now when I go to the grocery store or shopping, I like to dress up a bit 👗
Speaking of grocery shopping, that too changes. No longer am I shopping for weekend food, dinner and an occasional lunch. I'm shopping for breakfast, lunch and dinner ~ for each day of the week. If you live near a grocery store this may not be a big deal, but we don't. At first figuring out what to buy was easy because it was all sort of new but after a while the newness wore off, we were at a loss, even leftovers were getting old. We do go out to eat but that isn't any different than the grocery store ~ we have a diner close to us that serves great food ~ everything else is a bit of a drive. There were a few grocery items that caught me by surprise... mayo, we seemed to go through a lot of mayo once we retired ~ all those lunches 🥪 Next was toilet paper. Yep, think about... you're not using the bathroom at work anymore, all your business is done on your throne at home, and you need toilet paper 🧻
What do you want to eat ~ I don't know. Where do you want to go ~ I don't care, wherever you want. Anything you want from the grocery store ~ food. For whatever reason when we retired, we seemed to have lost our ability to make a decision, we have become non-deciders 😊
I used to wonder why couples who had been together or married for years would separate or get divorced ~ then we retired and now I completely understood 😊 We went from being an evening/weekend couple to a 24/7 couple and that was a substantial change. I'd say, think about it but you really can't just think about it, you have to experience it to truly understand the full impact. It's not all bad, it is just a tremendous lifestyle adjustment though. Makes you think about that whole 'for better or worse' part of the marriage vows 😉 If you are interested in how we are working through the 'for better or worse' part of our relationship you can read my story ~ 'Waffle and Spaghetti'.
The truth of the matter is ~ that even in retirement we still have some work to do 😊
Peace and Love