A year ago last May, my husband and I opened a dental practice. For the entire time he was in dental school, I never once thought we would end up working together. For one thing, we think and problem solve in completely different ways which often leads to debate. He is very smart and very logical. I am more creative and passive. Not to mention I had zero dental experience. But life takes turns you don't always expect.
After Dr. S graduated from dental school we moved in with my in-laws and he started the job hunt. It turned out the best offer he got was actually close to home. Obviously there are pros and cons to most of life's major decisions. The pros to this one being close to family after being so far away for four years and the significant pay check didn't hurt either. For me the cons seemed minimal but at the same time important. I knew I would really miss the culture and diversity of Louisville, and there aren't very many design jobs in small town Georgia. But we knew it was the right decision and packed up the uhaul!
Fast forward six months and it's Christmas Eve. The only design job I could find was working for a furniture chain. Long hours, low pay, and even less actual design work. For the first time in my life I was working on Christmas Eve instead of baking cookies with my family. Who goes furniture shopping on Christmas Eve you ask? Absolutely no one! So with the whole day to sit and reflect I realized the pressure of having to get an email from everyone I talked to and force feeding protection plans to people is not what I had in mind slaving away in design studio for four years. Apparently my husband was having a similar soul search. The practice he was working for was a perfect learning experience, but he was having a hard time imagining working there for the long haul. And we were also faced with having to start buying into the practice in a few short months. The issue with that besides the fact that it was a tremendous amount of money to only own one third of a practice (not including the building), he wouldn't get it back if we decided to leave. Talk about pressure.
Us being completely out of our minds decided to quit our jobs and go into massive amounts of debt to open our own practice. When we made the decision, it was one of those epic moments in life when everything seemed clear. Everything aligned in the most perfect almost fated way. We found the perfect building. A great builder. Getting the loan was suprisingly easy. The design was on paper almost as fast as I could draw it. We were on the same page, and it was us against the world!
To be continued ....
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