Grad School

I have been planning on continuing on to grad school since working on my bachelor’s. I had looked into schools in Florida but began a full time job in my field instead. I had gotten most of my requirements for application done then. I had 2 letters of recommendation and had my GRE’s done,
which are the most time consuming part of applying. Once I decided to apply to a school in AR all I needed was 1 more letter of recommendation, my transcripts, an essay, and to fill out their application, all easy enough.

I’ve kind of lucked out that there are schools right here in town. Of all the places we could have ended up, there are 3 schools here- 2 universities and 1 college. Again, I lucked out that the big university here offers a master’s and phd program in school psychology.

I have been accepted into the Graduate School at UCA, which means I have met all the general requirements. I have also been accepted through the first round for my specific program, which means I met the general requirements but still have to pass the interview process. The interview is at the end of next week, here’s to hoping I don’t go into labor too early. Of course if I was in labor and still went to the interview, that would just show how devoted I was and they would have to accept me right?

Of course now that I am on the road to being accepted, I am having second thoughts. I have planned from the beginning to only go part time. Baby will only be 4 months old so I know I am not going to be excited about leaving her. I do not want to put her in daycare so we are going to look into
finding a private sitter/nanny. Either choice of childcare will be expensive. Either choice is going to be hard on me leaving my baby in someone else’s care. Even going to school part time is going to be a lot to take on with a new baby in a new area. I know I will not feel like reading textbooks when I’m sleep deprived and my baby is crying. Nor will I feel like writing papers when I could be taking her out for a walk. And not to mention that I would much rather spend money on anything she may need than tuition. I will just need to keep focusing on the long term. By the time I graduate with my degree and get licensed, baby will be old enough to be in school. I will be ready to go to work and hopefully find a good job that will have a similar schedule to my school aged baby. Being a dual income household again will ease financial pressures and we will hopefully be able to provide anything our child will need or want. This all seems so far away though, I am worried about the here and now.