Family: How do you handle a big change?

Follow along as Jennifer Pinarski shares her experiences about giving up her big city job and lifestyle to live in rural Ontario with her husband, while staying home to raise their two young children.

There’s no other way to start this post: my husband has found a job!

Nearly nine months after being laid off, dozens of applications and a handful of job interviews, this comes as a huge relief. We know how lucky we are in this challenging job market.

Read more: My husband lost his job >

However, the new job is in Kingston — several hours away from where we currently live. It’s an amazing opportunity that we’d be crazy to turn down, but it also presents so many changes and challenges. So, while everyone we know keeps telling us how great it is to have this exciting adventure ahead of us, I really just want to hunker down in our tiny cottage house and beg my husband to commute five hours a day instead. But, in our new reality, he’ll be living in Kingston while I work on selling our house and pack up the life we have made here. With a depressed local real estate market, it could be months until our house sells. Did I mention that I don’t like change and I like moving even less?

So, while I work hard to muster a smile when people congratulate us on this next stage in our lives and try and suppress my anxiety about finding new schools, doctors and, of course, a new home, it’s not always easy. But then I remember I’ve been in this situation before and, in some ways, this is very much like when you first find out that you’re pregnant.

For example: It’s something you’ve always dreamed about and planned for, but you're still always shocked when it actually happens (I know I’m not the only who bought several boxes of pregnancy test kits to double check the results).

There are a lot of surprises along the way. My pregnancy tests were false negatives for the first several months, which meant that my due date ended up getting moved ahead by a full month.

It’s OK to admit that you have no idea what you’re doing and to ask for professional help. During my pregnancies, I had doctors and books. Right now I have my real estate agent and bank manager.

It’s painful. So moving isn’t a physical pain like childbirth is, but I could really use some nitrous oxide right now.

The end result is always worth it.

What big things are happening in your life right now? Are you excited or nervous? Tweet me @jenpinarski.