a little torn

While randomly searching job openings in my area, I came across two of my dream job positions that are currently open.  They are both at a major university near our city, and I am qualified for both of them.  Latin American Studies and Study Abroad positions.  I have a graduate degree in Latin American Studies and am fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.  I love the job I have now, but the hours are not good (I usually end up working 10 and 11 hour days every day), and I do community outreach in a really unstable school district.  So it's been in the back of my head for awhile to look for something else.  Except then I was pregnant and I wanted stability and needed health insurance, and was trying to figure out how I was going to be able to stay at home with my baby.

So now I am not pregnant and there are two really good jobs available.  I felt so excited just reading the job descriptions--a part of me has always longed to be back on a college campus ever since I finished grad school.  But here is where I am feeling torn.  First, I feel like maybe I should not even apply because I am trying to get pregnant again and won't want to be starting a new job when I'm in a new, anxious pregnancy. (If I get pregnant again anytime soon--I am just not assuming anything these days).   Second, I felt a pang of guilt when I started thinking about different career moves and getting excited about new possibilities. It felt like I was betraying Kayla someone in being excited about something that has nothing to do with being a mother. I thought I was so ready to be a stay at home mom, so how can I also feel excited about applying for an academic job?    Third, I have read  a lot of books and articles that all say not to do anything drastic in the first months/year after a major loss.  Getting a new and demanding job could potentially just be a reckless reaction to my grief. Fourth, we are about halfway done building our house in Brazil  and in our ideal world we will move down there at the end of 2012 with a completed home, car purchased and a new baby in our arms (this plan was supposed to happen at the end of 2011 but obviously that didn't happen).  So part of me feels like WHY BOTHER looking for anything new right now.

For all of those negatives, I also have a positive to counteract with.  Of course I shouldn't put my whole life on hold because I MIGHT get pregnant or I MIGHT move to Brazil or it MIGHT just be a reaction to my grief.  Everything that I do now is a reaction to my grief, so that's not a good enough excuse.  Anyone who has lost what I have lost knows that life is precious and we don't always get a second chance.  Also, a teeny tiny part of me is happy that I am even feeling enough like myself to look at jobs online, reminisce about my grad school days, and even hope and plan for the future. 

So, I'm just kind of torn.  And I may or may not apply for these jobs, but I do need to keep working with myself as I evolve into this new version of myself.