Homemaker Case

The biggest personal decision I had to make started about seven months ago. I was approached by my father who has a mechanical contracting company. He inherited this company from his father and asked me to work for him. My role in the company would be eventually to take it over, but the immediate plan was to learn the company.

I am a single mother with an 18 and 10-year-old daughters. This would be a major change in my life as I would have to move an hour away. I have been dating a wonderful man for six years so this would affect our relationship as well. To seal the deal with my father, I would also need to finish my degree in Accounting and Business Management.

I was in a position that I was not very happy in, so this seemed like the perfect opportunity for me to get out of where I was and get back into doing what I loved most. My boyfriend was also in a position that he was unhappy in and had been contemplating a career move for some time, just had not had any luck in finding a new job.

First, I discussed the opportunity with my boyfriend. I believed that it was important to continue our relationships as were are in a very happy place together. After many discussions, he agreed to explore employment opportunities in the area we would need to move to. It was important to both of us to make sure he found a position first, and he would commute in the meantime until we could make everything else come together.

Next we had to consider the timing of the changes and my girls. My oldest was graduating in June and was living with her father. She would not be affected by the change because she would be going off to college after high school. My youngest was in 4th grade and had just started a new school that year. The other roadblock with my youngest was moving her away from her father. We decided that we would not discuss our thought process with either until we knew for sure what we were going to do.

The final roadblock I had to overcome was completing my Accounting Degree. I researched the local colleges and a few online Universities. I made my choice to complete my Degree online through University of Phoenix. My primary reason for this was my time constraints of working 40-50 hours per week as well as the time needed for my daughter. Online would allow me the freedom to work during off hours and still be there for my family.

My boyfriend and I decided that this was the road we wanted to take. This change would allow us both to pursue careers doing what we want and in an environment that was stable and growing. A huge leap of faith and my boyfriend secured a job with my father's company as well. Once his job was set, we decided to let our families know, discuss the change with my daughters and discuss the move with my youngest daughter's father.

The pattern in which we evaluated these life-changing decisions was one of pro's and con's and how