Ready for the rebound

I've been patiently biding my time since July, trying not to freak about the losses to our portfolio. Our gains went from a 15% return for the year to less than 1% in one day. Needless to say, there isn't much you can do but grab your backside and hang on. Now that things have started to stabilize *knock on wood* and we are back to a 6% return for the year, I'm breathing a lot easier, and beginning to sleep again. Apparently, I am getting more risk-adverse as I get older. Five years ago, I would never have blinked at the downturn.

Analytically, I understand there are ups and downs, and that being invested for long term growth means you sometimes have to deal with the downs along the way. Emotionally, it's a different section of the bookstore. There is something gut-wrenching about watching a 401K go from $56K to $43K in the space of a few hours - and being helpless to do anything about it. By the time I realized there was a major market slide, I was simply along for the ride, no matter where it took us.

By August, I'd started reminding myself that this is really good for us in the long term (after all, everything I'm buying now at a low price has no where to go but up, right?) I even moved my monthly purchase week at Sharebuilder up to the second week of the month, instead of the third (because I was going to time the markets and they'd been down almost a month... so if I waited longer they'd be rising again - look how well that bit of logic worked. NOT.)

Now I worry about things like recession, and the bursting housing bubble, and what that means for my own assets and security. I feel poor. I fear for the future of the country's economy. Although, I'm not quite ready to start re-using aluminum foil or rinsing out ziploc bags yet. I just have this sinking feeling things will get worse, before they start to get better.

That whole thing about rising tides lifting all ships... it works both ways (except during the last recession I was blissfully unaware that my personal financial boat was even moving... I was on the party barge, with the keg and the reggae music and I was happy there.)