we are heading for something so seriously bad that i'm not sure there's any way to salvage it at this point. i keep trying to hang onto just getting through the next 6 months, then saxy will be graduated and can work full time, but i'm not sure we're going to make it. the case worker at social security STILL isn't calling me back, and the manager taking care of things while the head manager is on vacation has cut saxy's hours even more drastically than we expected. at this point, forget managing to pay rent, we can't even keep the utilities going. and when it comes to that, the water bill is still beyond outrageous, and the landlord isn't doing shit. and because it's summer and already in the mid to upper 90's, my freaking electric bill is over $200 a month.
and it's very hard to see anything positive right now. not just because we're fighting for survival, but because there are other issues starting to impact me in a bad way. i have mild sad. well, usually it's mild. we've had 2 weeks of overcast weather with more expected in the upcoming week. half the time i'm struggling just to stay awake. and the storms are, of course, causing stupid headaches that only kinda respond to pain killers. those will only get worse because i can't afford my bp meds, and my bp has a huge impact on how bad those headaches get. i also can't afford my iron tablets or my vitamins, so my iron is about to crash again. forget the financial stress. i'll be sleeping a lot more because i'll be too damn tired and depressed to do much else just because of the physical implications of what's going on. and forget exercise. i'll probably be able to stretch, but anything more active would be a bad idea without my bp meds. my bp gets to high when uncontrolled.
i just can't see past any of this right now. my utility bills are about $700/month, my rent is $975, and long gone are the days when food cost us $150 for a week and a half, even with the farmer's market. gas and parking are going to cost us $50/week just for saxy to go to school. we were barely scraping by before and now our income just took a $500 nosedive with another $100 being cut starting august 1 BECAUSE NO ONE AT SOCIAL SECURITY WILL FUCKING TALK TO ME! and of course, the older girls bitch whenever i ask for more money because dammit, they need to go out! they need to buy boyfriends' birthday presents! the idea that if we get evicted or lose one of the utilities or cell phones (which is our only phone service right now; we have internet, but that's the cheapest bill of all and also necessary and not in combo with the phone) it effects ALL of us seems to have escaped them.
they're right about one thing: the only ones failing to hold up their end of the deal is us. when it's all said and done, kitten pays her $600/month and jewel pays her $400/month and both cover their part of the expenses. taz's ssi and child support more than cover his portion (even with the upcoming $100 loss, the child support helps make up for it at the moment), and froggy's child support covers hers. it's saxy and i who can't come up with our $1,000+ per month. we're the screw ups. and, yea, we're trying to fix that by having saxy finish school, but it doesn't do us much good if we can't keep a roof over our heads.
(i do think i finally managed to get oldest to understand that me "getting off (my) ass and getting a 'real' job" doesn't help us. between her daughter and my son, i save us $2000 in child care costs/month minimum, and there's no job i could get that would pay me enough more than that to offset transportation/clothes/etc costs and still give us enough of a profit to make it worthwhile for me to work outside the home. i think. maybe. she gave me this look, but she might have finally grokked it.)
i also can't figure this out. on PAPER, the numbers work. we should be fine. not fantastic, but making it. in reality, even without buying extras, we're crashing and burning every damn month. maybe the food costs are even higher than i thought. the farmer's market has remained fairly stable (gone up maybe $20/month without the extras saxy should be working and practicing with), but the non farmer's stuff has definitely gone up (milk alone is up about $1.50, cereals up about $1, and so on; sounds small here, but damn does it add up). yea, when i look at it that way, we're running a deficit of $200-$300/month, and there just isn't a whole lot i can trim, especially if the frickin' landlord won't fix one of the major problems we're having right now.
i just can't seem to get a handle on things. i'm not even talking about catching up. i'm talking about just paying the past dues/disconnects when they hit and the rent on time. and keeping us fed. and keeping up on my meds (which are a small thing in terms of finances, maybe $15/month on average). and i admit it, this is a bad time for me to be thinking about it because of the sad and whatnot, but it's the major thing on my mind. we have a rent payment coming due, and i don't know if we'll have all of it unless we just don't eat that week. and even then, we may not be able to get it all together because i have to pay another $350 in past due utilities, and we never have $1400 in our hands all at once even on a good week.
and good weeks are going to be few and far between now. once the main manager comes back, i'm sure saxy can get some of his slashed hours back, but he can only work so many, especially this quarter. being in cooking classes doesn't mean there's not homework. he has to prep his recipe cards, practice techniques, read, study for quizzes, and so on. they take time, so he has to have time available to do homework.
it's not just the financial situation spiraling right now. it's me too. i think i better go. i've fallen apart in tears once already writing this, i'm very frustrated, and sleep is looking good again.
i'm just so tired of being in this place all. the. damn. time.
~*~
word of the moment: mummer
an actor in a traditional type of play without words; an actor who communicates entirely by gesture and facial expression; a performer in a pantomime; broadly; one who goes merrymaking in disguise during festivals
