As I posted in my 2022 Year in Preview on Saturday among other goals, I had decided to work towards a career change. On Facebook and elsewhere I asked folks to read it and by extension, for support.

Wow, I got it in spades. I’m humbled and thankful. Now if I could say I wasn’t nervous or even already feeling a bit overwhelmed.

I thought I’d provide a quick update.

One of the first steps I need to complete before I can even apply for PA school is to fulfill a bunch of prerequisites. This means taking a fairly full class load at the local community college. To do that, I needed to actually register for classes. I figured that would be the easy part, so I set off full of hope yesterday morning to do so. Their offices were closed last week, so yesterday was my first opportunity.

And I hit my first roadblock. I was told I needed to prove my vaccination status to the health office first. Well that’s a bit of a problem because for various reasons, I didn’t have access to my health records from when I was a kid, when I would have received the required vaccinations. After series of calls to various providers and the community college health office, I learned I could, if necessary get the shots from the health office. But, I needed to be registered for classes first. So effectively I couldn’t register until the health office said everything was OK, and the health office couldn’t say everything would be OK until I was registered for classes. Welcome to the classic Catch-22.

Eventually I was able to cut some red-tape and am registered and on the way to solving my vaccination status issues.

So, first hurdle cleared.

Then another one hit: I may have underestimated what prereqs I need and if that’s true, will have to 100% definitely push back one year for the whole process.

I’ll admit that gives me very mixed feelings. One one hand, it may mean a lot less pressure to get everything done this year. On the other, it definitely means another year before I can fully change careers.

So, yesterday was a roller coaster of emotions.

And it was just the first week. But I didn’t expect it all to be roses and flowers. But I’ve decided to t least share most of my ups and downs with my readers.

Oh and one upside: I finally got a Christmas present that I had wanted for two years: the Lego Saturn V. Thanks Ian. I’m going to take my time building it, spread out the enjoyment.