I'm going to trust that "things" will work out ok by-and-by.

Even though I had begun to tell clients I was leaving, I held off handing in my resignation to the Division office after accepting the new job - afraid if I gave too much notice, I'd get kicked out early. I was typing my resignation Friday when I decided, merely as a precautionary measure, that I should find out what I was going to have to pay for medical benefits when I made the switch.

Good thing I did. It was a deal breaker. When the agency divested the clinics to the private company I now work for, they suddenly had 1/5 the number of employees, so their medical insurance costs skyrocketed. It was going to cost me $500 more per month than I pay now. Combined with the pay cut, I just couldn't swing it unless I dropped coverage for my estranged spouse.   While the risks of being laid off where I am are significant, it might not happen.   He is 62 years old and meagerly self-employed. After 25 years together, I can not, in good conscience, drop him from medical coverage while I have the ability to provide it when he is only 3 years away from Medicare.

So, I'll just hope I don't get hit by another round of lay offs while I build the private practice, and be grateful that, at least for the present, I can continue to do the work I love and believe I am called to do, the sleaze-bag Company be damned.

I run a small dual diagnosis Substance Abuse group, but don't have a strong background in Substance Abuse treatment. It is a motley crew, most of whom entered the group because of legal woes and/or positive drug screens by probation and parole officers. I sweat bullets in that group each week, trying to get them to utter more than 2 word sentences and talk to each other or to me. It is the toughest group I've ever facilitated, and each week I walk out of there sorely questioning my own efficacy and competence. They mostly stay clean, but I attribute that to the increased frequency of drug tests their P.O.'s usually initiate after the first dirty screen. I neither saw nor expected much reaction when I told them I was leaving at the end of the month.

I was taken conpletely aback when they stood and cheered and high-fived each other today when I told them I was staying after all. I have to say it felt pretty good.

Janie