#idk we might have a crowdfund up soon depending on how much help I'm actually able to get from my housemates

[samwiselastname]

Samwise Lastname Life Update (Negative)

I moaned and groaned in that selfie a bit already but like. I have many people who have offered to help me with many things. Truly thankful.

At the same time I've always been The Person with the stable job and full time wage, like, pretty much since I finished DBT halfway through college that's been my defining character trait. Even before then, it was "person who is a prime target for financial exploitation."

My current situation is a shared living space where I am covering about 4/5s of our expenses, by virtue of being able to mask my disability well enough to work full time. We are still coming up $400 short a month. I've just gotten assurance that should change, a housemate is seeking work, but. It hasn't changed yet, and even once it does, I will not feel secure until we have an emergency fund for housing, and I won't feel safe keeping any personal savings until that's settled. Which is a couple years out at this rate - even farther with some necessary home repairs, which will push our deficit even higher.

We only get takeout once a month at most, our expenses have been essential housewares and home improvement items - pest control, plumbing maintenance tools, repair supplies. A few hundred of that deficit is just repeat homeowner shit. We planted a garden this year which was an expense but, not exorbitant. I don't know how to cut down more without like. Eating less? Historically that approach has turned into dangerous weight loss & migraines pretty quick. As it is we're only spending about $100 more a month than the FDA's recommended frugal grocery plan.

I can stop buying alcohol & weed and save... about $10 a month. I could cancel some of my subscriptions and save $20-50. Anything I can cut back on at this point is not financially worth the detriment to my well-being, especially when things like "watching youtube on the TV" and "playing FFXIV" are like. Some of my only safe and passive low-pressure recreational activities.

Don't really know what to do about this other than keep grinding. I'm making myself sick. Tacking on any extra work - hobby creative pursuits that might one day turn into commercial creative pursuits, any amount of job hunting, even a shot at adult content creation - feels unbearable.

I am trying to stop "working overtime" because even the 40 hours fucks with my ability to do anything else. I tried to work around this by job searching and side hustling. Now all my hobbies feel like jobs and every day I'm not working on income feels like self-sabotage. It's stupid - I can get better compensation at my current job picking extra hours. At least when I do that I don't go into a neurotic spiral and stop sleeping. As much. It's at least effective.

So I have this limbo - working over 40 hours physically destroys me, and it's the only way to tip the scales at all right now. I know one can often get a pay raise by finding a new job but - yall the market sucks. I'm trying. I need full time remote WFH and good god is it bad out there. Plus my current insurance rn is killer - I have a 3k out of pocket max. My medical costs would outweigh the raise at any job I've successfully applied for thus far, because my current employer affords me this bizarrely fantastic health insurance with HSA deposits.

Just feel hopeless. If I've gone dark on you that's why. We have four months to get this shit fixed before we're totally fucked and I'm doing everything I can to buy us time.

[blackbird-brewster]

Idk what to do. I can’t stay in this state. They haven’t passed any new anti-trans laws here yet, but it’ll happen soon. There’s also just so much trauma and shit here and it’s killing me slowly to stay, but I’m terrified to leave. All my family is here. My lost pets and loved ones are buried here. I know it’ll kill me to stay, but the fear of moving is just so big. The fear of what my family will say or think terrifies me.

Hello Anon,

First off, thank you for trusting me with your worries. You're absolutely not alone, I've actually been through this exact same thing. I'm going to put my reply behind a cut because it involves mental health stuff/homophobia/etc. <3

I want to share my story, because it might help you. Or at the very least, I want you to know you are in good company here. I understand completely. I spent about 90% of 2014-early 2016 in and out of psych wards, hospitals, and ICU. I lost someone very dear ot me at the end of 2013 and it was the catalyst for a complete psychotic break and then a subsequent series of horrific mental health crisises.

At the time, I was living in Texas (born and raised). My family is super conservative (I have since cut them all off), it's the American south, super conservative, and I had been out as queer since age 15. It was never a place that was safe for me. But it's where I ended up.

Due to my mental health, I lost my job, then my apartment, and I ended up being homeless. Which obviously didn't help the mental health issues. I lived in my car for over a year, everything I owned in the world fit in a tiny Chevy Aveo compact.

My circumstances, my location, everything -- (as you said) was killing me slowly. I attempted to take my own life multiple times because I just saw no other way out of my situation.

I knew if I stayed, I wouldn't survive. I knew if I stayed there, it was a death sentence. Like you, my family was there, my past loved ones were buried there (I've seen too many deaths in my life, so this was doubly true and important), my life was there. But it wasn't much of a life at all.

In early 2016, my car got repossed while Iw as out of town. I was very lucky that the repo company allowed me to collect my belongings (since it was literally the only things I owned, since I was still living in that car) So what was I to do when the car I lived in was gone? I had nothing, I had nowhere to go. That place was suffocating me day by day. I had met a woman on here and we'd been in a sort of long distance online relationship for a handful of months.

I decided there was absolutely nothing worth staying in Texas for. I ended up selling what little I had, clearing out my tiny bit of money, crowdfunded the rest -- and I bough a one-way ticket to Aotearoa. My flight was 10 days after I bought the ticket. I gave everyone in my life a 10 day notice that I was moving across the globe on a whim. My family scoffed, they thought it was stupid, told me I'd be back, told me just like everything in my life 'it was a phase', etc. But I did it any way.

And you know what, Anon? Eight years later, I'm a permenant resident here, I'm thriving, my life is so fulfilling and beautiful. While the woman I moved here for wasn't my forever, this country was. My current partner and I have been together for five years, and they are my forever.

I will NEVER regret buying that one-way ticket. It literally saved my life. My handful of friends in the US know that if I had stayed, I wouldn't be here today to tell you this story. It HURTS, god it hurts deep in my soul, to be so so so far away from those handful of people who will always be my best friends. It really hurts to know how many huge events I've missed because I live a world away, but at the same time, we all agree that it's much easier to long for each other than for them to mourn my death.

So I'm not sugar coating it, moving away from people you love is SO difficult, and you will miss them always. But (depending on where you move to) you can visit them, and if not in person, technology can connect you with one click. I talk to my friends every single day and we make it work. (I'll never go back to the US)

It's a VERY hard choice, but ultimately you need to ask yourself what's more important: your life or other people's opinions.

I hope you choose your life. Because the world needs you, Anon and it would be a dimmer place without you. Don't let your location hollow out your soul, don't let your location take your life, it's just not worth it. Move, relocate, start over in a safe environment. I am so very proud of you and I love you, I know you've got this. <3