The realities of selling everything and moving abroad!

First, let me just say that I have been "downsizing" for YEARS. I know that I have a problem, its called "Home Goods Addict," but seriously, I was so disappointed in myself the last few days of our move. We looked like this GIF over here once everything was loaded onto the moving POD. I was certain we would each only have our carry-ons and backpacks. Boy was I WRONG!

HERE'S HOW OUR LAST WEEK WENT DOWN:

Izzy had her states competition the weekend before we left so we were still shuttling her to and from gymnastics several days a week. They also were finishing up swim lessons. As for our actual homeschooling curriculum, that was shelved the last month to allow us to prepare for our move and allow them time with friends and family. On Thursday, exactly one week before signing papers on what I thought was going to be our family home, the reality set in HARD. I remember going to bed that night and thinking, "This is the last Thursday evening in our home." I didn't realize how emotionally attached the house I was. The next few days we had long time friends make their way to our home and spend time with us. A couple of them we hadn't seen in years and it felt so special that they would drive HOURS to come hang with us on a weekend during a pandemic. We reminisced around our dining room table and enjoyed each other's company. My kids stayed up into the early morning hours with us while we talked, laughed and daydreamed about what our futures looked like. After all, we had all rode into MD on military orders, naive to what our lives were about to look like. We left there however, with lifelong friendships, great memories and many stories. That weekend was definitely special and I will never forget it.

I woke up on Sunday morning and did not feel good, not hungover, but legit feeling like a might have strep throat. You see, that last month in MD I was redoing Celiac labs so I was eating wheat and it makes me pretty sick. Worst timing for sure, and it was definitely beginning to take it's toll on me. That day I went to Urgent Care and found out I had something called a peritonsillar abscess. (Don't google it, it's GROSS) I was in a lot of pain and felt like complete CRAP. I went home and tried to get as much as done as I could before I took my meds and went to bed. The next morning was Monday, which is the day before our POD was set to be picked up. I had planned on completely loading it this day and emptying all of the rooms. Except... I woke up feeling 1000% worse than the day before and went to the ER. 7 hours later, I returned home. With new meds and feeling like we were never going to get things done. We stayed up all night packing, cleaning and loading. Luna was not sleeping well and I had to stop several times to nurse her. At 0830 I laid down with her for 2 hours because I just wasn't feeling well and she wouldn't sleep without me. At 1030, I got up. Hubby had loaded half the pod and we still had several things that needed to be packed. The Pod pickup happening 2 hours early and I was placing the lock on it as he was coming into the area for pickup. As soon as he got there we left to sell our car to Carvana. We got home really late that evening. EXHAUSTED. We went to bed instead of finishing up things in the house.

BEFORE THE POD:

AFTER THE POD:

Wednesday: We spent the entire day running last minute errands, dump and goodwill runs and packing/cleaning/purging what was left. The night before our oldest son flew in and stayed with us. He was such a huge help and the little kids absolutely loved hanging with him. We ended up in another Doctor's office and found out one of the kids had strep throat. While this was frustrating, we had to keep moving. We spent yet another night getting the house ready. The next morning we were set to sign our papers at 1130AM.... or so we thought.

At about 0530 AM I made the decision to let our house cleaners know that we weren't going to be ready for them to come clean at 0730 like we had planned. We stayed up all night again and hadn't slept. Hubby was working during the day and packing all night so he was more than tired. Surviving on Monster and fast food, we were so tired and just not feeling well. My oldest son came over that morning to help out and woke me up around 0800. At this point we are loading up the mattresses and last of the trash to go to the dump. We still had one more donate run to make and then clean up the floors. My neighbor and close friend came over that morning and helped us clean. At 1000 AM I hear my husband say that the buyers were there and that's when I hear someone open my front door. IT WAS THERE REALTOR!!! He had the nerve to not only remove the keys from the lockbox, but use them on a door that they did NOT own yet unannounced. We were not notified that they were coming that morning and I basically went off on them. CUE THE TEARS. At this point I began crying and could not stop. I was devastated. We still had what I thought was an hour to finish, say our Proper Goodbyes and be done. They ruined that for us. I don't blame the buyers, I blame both agents for not communicating well and taking this away from us. We were in such a rush I had to leave stuff, trash, WINE!!! I apologized to the buyers for yelling at them and thanked them for being patient. They graciously offered to help. We began throwing everything that was left into my car and into the back of the small U-Haul we had to rent last minute because we couldn't find a van to rent. So my last memories in that house I was full of tears and didn't get to say bye. I drove down the street to say bye to some neighbors, but didn't get to say bye to everyone like I had planned. We have one family photo of that morning, and I am CRYING.

WHAT HAPPENED NEXT

After we signed papers I decided to get us a hotel because we were just too tired to begin the next leg of our journey. But because we have a large dog and an Akita, we had to rely on our dear friend Kim to keep him over night. He loves her house and she loves him so it wasn't too big a deal. But first, we had to get the other two girls to urgent care because they were up with fevers and not feeling well. So a few more hours at the Doctors and we had 2 more strep throat cases. FUN TIMES! We spent that evening at the hotel. My friends and neighbors took Romeo back to the neighborhood to hang out with friends and say proper goodbyes. They got lots of great pictures of them and I forever grateful to them for giving him that. He has talked about it so much this past week. That night we ate dinner with Kim and went to bed. We got up early, my son came to the hotel to say Bye and we all ate breakfast together. I made a run to Walgreens to stock up on all things strep/cold/allergies and road trip snacks. We loaded up, said our See Ya Laters and headed for GEORGIA.

CONCLUSION

While it was not the Goodbye that I wanted I keep telling myself that it was God's/The Universe's way of keeping me from having a complete emotional breakdown. I was too tired to really think about everything that was happening. There are so many people that we didn't get to see. So many pictures I wanted to take, hugs to give and things that got thrown away I wanted to keep. But here we are, a week later, in an AirBnB and enjoying time with family. I can't live with this regret so I am working on letting it go and being thankful that we made it here safely and everything worked out. We are so much closer to our dreams today. Thank you to everyone who made my last week in MD more bearable. I TRULY MISS YOU ALL!!!