Ugh.

Brace yourselves...I'm trying to unscramble my brains before going to bed and regain some positivity.

Over-all, things are FINE.  No one is sick, I haven't been kicked out of school, no huge catastrophe.

It's horse/money/house woes.

First off, Dax isn't sound, as I mentioned before.  She pretty much isn't ride-able (15 min walks don't count), though she is pasture sound and happy (and still fat).  However, being not ride-able doesn't mean she doesn't cost the same amount as when she is ride-able.  I don't know how much of a lost cause she is in terms of ever being ride-able again until I talk to a vet, but for now as my main stress-relieving-hobby, she's out of commission.

Then add today, when I discover that my paycheck amount I was told I'd be making turns out to be the amount before taxes....even though I EXPLICITLY asked months ago and was told that the amount told me was the amount after taxes.  So I get my paycheck only to discover how much less I'm actually bringing home than I thought I was.  Don't get me wrong, I'm a student bringing something home and I'm not complaining about that.  It's just a problem when we'd already drawn up budgets and made plans based on a larger income.  And I'm not even going to get into the $800 student "fee" PER SEMESTER that was never mentioned before I started....oh no, all I heard was how tuition was covered!  Nothing about that fee.

So yeah, we had ourselves in good shape to handle the little house mortgage with a decent cushion each month then suddenly WHAM, there goes the cushion!

Sooooo the jist is we can't afford the little house after all b/c of my stupid student crap AND because I have a fat, expensive and useless horse.  Which officially makes me the worst wifey in the world b/c my hubby doesn't have anything to do with the horse-habit but still supports me for some unknown reason!   However, understandably, this is about one straw away from breaking the camel's back.

But what can I do about the horse expense??!?  She's certainly not unsound enough to put down - it's completely indefensible.  She can't be used for much of anything, even a therapeutic riding horse (they get inundated with people trying to off-load horses on them, and Dax is probably too hot-blooded).  Horses can be donated to veterinary colleges...but sounds like most of them are put down almost immediately for anatomy labs or are used for terminal surgical training.  These are worth-while causes, and for a horse that is near the end of its life or is ill, I think this is a very viable and humane option.  But Dax is only 10yrs old, not even half-way through her life, and like I said before is happy and sound in her field.  Do I try to find some field in the middle of nowhere with cows she can live with and put her in retirement??  What if she gets hurt in the crappy conditions?

If it were just me, I'd simply suck it up, eat ramen noodles for the next six years, live in a studio and be fine - scrape and save to try the stem cell injection.  But I can't ask my hubby to make sacrifices like that for something he never has and never will get anything out of (horse keeping, that is).  The problem isn't that I'm keeping myself from owning a home, it's that I'm keeping HIM from owning a home.

Or, are we both too obsessed with home-ownership?  Haven't I mentioned repeatedly how much we like our little apt, how easy it is to care for, convenient to things, etc?  And did I mention cheap??  It's pretty freakin' cheap!!(even with the cost of the storage unit for all the extra crap)  We have our tomato and pepper plants outside, just enough space for a grill.  Hubby could still do his home-brewing on the back step.  We can shop at the farmer's market and join a CSA instead of having a garden.....being in an apt leaves more time for studying, bike riding, hiking, exploring in general.  Not to mention extra income for the occasional trip, etc.

But owning a home is an investment, right?  Good time to buy and all that, right?

But we know we'll be leaving the area almost for sure in 7 years.

But it's a college town and we could rent a house out, if we wanted to deal with that hassle.

This is not even getting into the fact that after three years of PhD work with a stipend, I'll drop to absolutely no income when I enter the DVM, plus have to actually pay $10,000 of tuition each year (that's only %50!!  And that's in-state!!  Can you believe how expensive vet school is??!? Next time you take your dog/cat/horse to the vet and wonder why it costs so much, it's because you're paying their student loans!)

Now I did know this when I applied, and I am planning on having a career that will cover those loans...like a long term investment in my brain :-)  But knowing it in advance doesn't make the cost any less staggering, in my opinion.  And it doesn't make it any easier to ask my hubby to make these sacrifices when he's not the one in school!!

I know nothing is going to get solved tonight, and I've already got some ideas of money-saving things to look into (Dax might become a professional blood-donor yet.....) AND I'm planning on applying for some fellowships that will cover the PhD if I get them - they come with a better stipend plus all the scientific glory of having gotten a fellowship, but who knows if any of it will work out. *sigh*

It always sucks when a beautiful happy image of one's future gets popped like a soap bubble.