Tuesday's Display Chain - Personal Pride

This is my first time joining in on the display chain although I always check out the postings when Misi does one of these   : )

This one & only photo I am sharing was taken of me & my husband back in November 2008.

What am I proud of???  I am proud of the fact that I am still here & functioning!

In 2009 we moved into our current home.  It was a nightmare from the start.  Our real estate agent brought her husband along on all our viewings.  They both professed themselves to be good Christians & acted like they were our friends.  Her husband was a contractor.  Every time we viewed a home he would point out things & say how they were done below his standards.  He stated that he was a "perfectionist" who used only the highest quality of materials & when he built a home or remodeled one.  They even took us to their own home, which they said he built, to show us the great work he did.  Based on spending time with them, seeing their own home, & the fact that they were Christians, we hired him to do some remodeling work in this home when we purchased it.  We stayed in Tennessee while the work was being done & only saw it the day we moved in.  I won't go into details but we ended up paying him $20,000 for what turned out to be absolutely horrible workmanship.  I had other contractors come to give us an estimate of what it will cost to fix the damage he caused.  It will cost a lot.  I've gone to 3 attorneys, the BBB, & the state attorney general's office.  No one can make him pay for what he did to us.  

From that first day we moved in I fell into a deep depression which lasted for a total of 20 months.  The fact that this man got away with what he did to us haunted my every waking moment.  I lost interest in all the things I always enjoyed.  I was depressed all the time.  I was miserable when I woke up in the morning because I had to face another day, & I looked forward to when it would be time to go to bed again so I could escape the reality of my life for a few hours.  I didn't want to go anywhere or do anything.  I even tried counseling but that was a waste of time.  What finally turned me around was a candlemaking forum acquaintance.  This poor woman had suffered from depression in the past & when I mentioned I was depressed she was very sympathetic & asked me to talk with her about it.  After hearing my story, she pointed out that I & my house were victims of this man & that I needed to stop letting him victimize us again & again & again.  I had never looked at it like that before.  It really helped me to start conquering my depression!

Here it is just 3 months later & I do not have depression hanging over me 24 hours a day!  I am working out in the yard, gardening, losing weight, exercising, collecting things, studying gemology, learning German, planning craft projects, thinking about making a selling blog, thinking about ways to make this house a home, & good grief ... I'm even considering staying here instead of moving away!  I'm smiling for Pete's sake!  I see the good in life!  Dare I say it ... I am happy!

I have many, many things to be thankful for ... my salvation, my health, my abilities, my possessions, a roof over my head, food to eat, good friends, & family members who love me, not the least of which is my wonderful husband of 35 years ... my high school sweetheart who I met 43 years ago.  He grows dearer to me every day.  These are all wonderful blessings which I lost sight of because of depression.  Overcoming that depression is my source of personal pride   : )