In September 2025, I retired from the federal government after 25 years of service.
I had already accepted a position with Markon and planned to continue working as a government contractor.
There was only one problem.
I had absolutely no idea when I was going to start.
Because of a government shutdown, the process of getting me back on the books as a contractor and reactivating my security clearance dragged on for weeks.
And weeks.
And weeks.
Seven weeks, to be exact.
Not that I was counting or anything.
While I was confident the job would eventually materialize, confidence doesn’t pay the mortgage.
Nor does it buy groceries.
Thankfully, hubby and I had built an emergency fund over the years.
Not because we expected this specific situation.
But because we knew life rarely unfolds exactly according to plan.
We Didn’t Always Have One . . .
Let’s go back to the beginning – I grew up very modestly, and honestly, in my early twenties, I was dealing with student loan debt from having to finance my undergraduate degree.
No regrets, though! Having debt early on actually taught me a lot about money.
Hubby and I were fortunate enough to pay off our student loans in our twenties (while we were simultaneously trying to start saving for retirement), and decided a long time ago we wanted to be on solid ground financially.
Fast forward to last year, though, and now I was considering walking away from a stable government job to transition to the private sector.
The Decision to Retire
Honestly? It was only about a year ago that I actually decided to retire. Early in 2025, the federal government was in a state of turmoil, and even as a federal employee, I started to feel less and less secure in a job I originally sought out for security.
In April of last year, I lost my mom, and by last June, was in the throes of moving my father to an assisted living facility because of his sharply declining health.
I decided last May that life is too short, and early retirement programs offered across the entire federal government only come along about once every 25 years.
Without knowing if the government was going to shutdown, which would surely delay my retirement processing, I made the leap to officialy do it.
I left government service on September 30, 2025.
The government shutdown for seven weeks on October 1, 2025.
It was the longest government shutdown in the history of the United States.
Enter the Emergency Fund
Hubby and I had talked about my retiring for months, and we knew there could be delays in my crossover from staff to contractor under normal circumstances.
We felt reasonably secure knowing we had built a buffer of about three months’ worth of expenses.
As it turned out, the government was closed much longer than anyone expected.
And while the government was closed, my retirement paperwork—and therefore my pension payments—were effectively frozen as well.
I started drawing down our emergency fund.
Part of me actually felt pretty good about it because, hey, this is exactly what we had planned for.
But it was also pretty heavy, not knowing when the federal government was going to open back up, and then how long it would take to process my crossover.
But ultimately, I knew this is why we had worked so hard to have an emergency fund in the first place.
And that brought a surprising sense of peace.
And when the government opened up, my crossover was completed pretty fast and I was working in early December.
Our emergency fund wasn’t fun to build, and for years it sat quietly in a savings account doing absolutely nothing.
But when we needed it, it did exactly what it was supposed to do.
It paid the mortgage.
It bought groceries.
And perhaps most importantly, it bought us time and peace of mind during an otherwise tumultuous period of our lives.
🐝 That’s the buzz for today – go forth and make good finanaical decisions!