Are you ready for some.....retirement?

HImom
Wed, 14 Dec 2016 17:35:19 +0000

H loved his job for most of his 45 years. As there were more and more funding cuts, he ended up doing more and more folks jobs as the left due to retirement or transfers. Finally at age 70, he had enough and it was the sweet spot in his salary being the highest it was getting for a long time and his pension maxing out, so he decided it was time to leave. They begged him to return for 6 months to train folks to do his job, so he did. They have asked him to meet for lunch from time to time when they are stuck with something but mostly muddle on. He loved that he got training with his workplace and had a lot of autonomy.

I created a nonprofit that I run 10 years ago. I enjoy it and do as much or little as I want. It has allowed me to travel, meet national and international leaders in the field, attend national conferences, speak at international events and serve the people of our state. I’ve gotten to know a lot of public health and healthcare folks and scientists whom I’ve never known before. The pay was enough to help pay for my kids college expenses when they were in college but is a pittance now because I don’t enjoy grantwriting. All in all, I am very content with what I do.

H retired fully a bit over 3 years ago. We thought we’d have a significant drop in income and get in each other’s hair, since I mainly work out if my home but really it’s been fine and we enjoy spending more time together. To us, it was key to finish paying for the kids college and our mortgage before H retired. It gave us great peace of mind and lowered our non discretionary expenses tremendously.