Keeping it Real

In an effort to keep myself honest and with full disclosure, I present the following rant on my lack of money. I love real numbers from real people. Here they are. Enjoy.

 

It’s been a rough couple of weeks. Even though I am only working 2 or 3 days a week. I have not had a minute to spare.

The VW Roatan has been on the fritz for the last couple of weeks, so I finally took in to the shop yesterday. Luckily it’s only a cracked hose, but driving my back-up car: a 2004 Land Rover Discovery proved dangerous this morning as it started smoking as I made the final stretch home. It started smoking and hissing and overheating. After several phone calls, help from our local shell gas station attendant and my dad I was able to coax the old thing home one last time.

Thermostat? Water pump? Broken hose? It will be a few weeks before we find out.

Money is tight.

Every week for the past few months one of our FedEx trucks has been out of commission. We need 2 new trucks, but can’t afford the payments, so instead we keep credit carding repairs in the hopes that a miracle will occur; either we come into a chunk of money or the trucks decide to work and not break for a while.

It’s risky business.

It’s propane season. That runs us around $800- $1000 a month right thru April.

The dog got sick last week too. A little roughhousing with my parent’s dog turned into a neck bite that got infected and swelled up like a balloon.

So let’s summarize:

2 broken personal vehicles

3 broken Fed Ex trucks

1 sick puppy

1 500 gal propane tank

1 Federal Education Loan

All that equals no cash.

Now you might argue… Emily, but you are only working part time. Why don’t you go back to full time? I torture myself with that question, but my income is so small regardless of whether I work 3 or 5 days a week that the impact is small on our finances. However, my mental health, taking into account of whether I work 3 or 5 days a week, varies a great deal. I feel fully in control of my life working 3 days a week. Working 5 days a week I am on the edge of mental health. It is simply that I value my mental health over my financial health.

There are 3 things that are making it tight. The most recent is my student loan that I just started paying in July. Since then things are ridiculously tight. I had imagined that my loan payments would be around $300. They are actually at $460. Add that to the $550 VW payment and I won’t even tell you how much the credit card payments are. I would embarrass myself.

There has to be a way to bring things under control financially again. I’m working on it.

Student loan forbearance?

Car refinance?

Credit card refinance or consolidation?

Sell a book idea?

Win the lotto?

Better part-time job?

These are all viable options.

Things are hard and I don’t see an easy solution on the horizon.