We're getting nervous about finances.

Mike's company has been great to us. When he got hired, they gave a lot of good stuff, including stock options which he could cash out on the anniversary of his hire date or hold onto for up to a decade. The stock has split since we owned it, which means we've got a lot more of it. We used one year's stock to have money together to buy our house. We used stock to pay medical bills, clothe my friend's daughter, feed/entertain children, and a few other things, last year.

Because the stock was worth so much, we planned things. We planned on me not going to work or school and being able to start taking care of myself; we planned on paying off all the cards, but one; we planned on putting Genny in preschool; we planned on having cards paid off for backup money for our trip to Orlando in December -- for which we've already bought $1200 in unrefundable tickets for.

Recently, the stock has lost half its value -- mostly due to nervous nellies -- but that loss is kicking our ass because I don't know what the hell we'll do now. We were going to part with some of it and retain some of it in reserve, but we've lost over $6K. There's no reserve. We don't want to cash out all of it because we know it'll come back up, but we can hardly afford not to at least cash out some, which means we'll be losing our butts.

The problem is that if I still have the credit card bills this fall -- we're pretty hosed. I've got absolutely no extra money for anything or anyone. I promised Russell something special for his birthday and Genny preschool in the fall. Now, I'm juggling the budget like a circus freak to keep my word.