Crawling when the desire is to run

Long time no blog…things have been at a standstill. There isn’t much to report and for once I didn’t feel the need to vent out an emotion that practically the whole world is feeling- financial frustration.

The cost of living is at an all time high because in every facet of our lives prices have gone up with the exception of our paychecks…if we are blessed to be getting a paycheck.

Back in March my company issued a pay cut of 15%. For a person that was already living paycheck to paycheck it didn’t seem to matter much…at first. How do you miss what you already didn’t have. I was already drowning in debt, had a garnishment against my pay. I was new at the company and truly felt (still do) blessed that I am working and have the option of benefits.

But as the cold months of winter turned into the murky days of spring and then the steamy days of summer what I saw as blessing began to take a new form.

I’m a person that has seen depression from many different sides and I can usually escape its clutches when I have an outlet or a source that gives me a tiny bit of pleasure. I got a part time job, felt I was doing something about a situation I had limited control over. Within two days of working I felt depression nip at my happiness. To say I was miserable at retail is understatement.

I have worked at a job where misery was my companion…but not two. With my full time job I learn to ignore because I work with good people, it is the work itself that gnaws at my spirit like a dog gnawing at the marrow of a bone, sucking me dry. But to spend my free time working in misery for an amount that wasn’t making a difference I couldn’t do. So I quit, fell to my knees and began my crawl.

I cut back where I could which wasn’t far because I didn’t have much to begin with.

My paycheck is gone before my pay week is over. I spend the next week and a half usually with nothing. Fed up with the way things were going I decided to make a change that is going to follow me for 7 years at least…I’m filing for bankruptcy.

When I went to meet with the lawyer I felt a rock of stress lift from my shoulders. All the shame and negativity that can be associated with filing I ignored because at the end of the day I knew without a doubt that I wasn’t making enough to really live let alone live and pay off my debt, and worse that wasn’t going to change any time soon.

Maybe if I acquired my debt by partying and being silly I would feel differently. For a year I lived off my credit with the full intention of paying everything back. As I should have learned the first time around I cannot, should not, will not predict the future. I didn’t know that the job I would get after the one I lost would let me go pushing further back. I didn’t know that the job I would get after would follow the economy and make me suffer for the ill management and greed of others.

I will be 32 this month my knees are blackened by the amount of crawling I have done. But don’t think that in filing it is POOF done. Bankruptcy is a costly process and yes you guessed…if I don’t have money to pay my creditors outright how do I have the money to finance a fresh start? I don’t. So in getting my fresh start I’m crawling, like always, but I’m crawling on glass. Because with each chunk of cash that I hand out I think of all that I need and have needed for months and years, really. And I doubt myself, I doubt whether I can do this and make it through.

How much strength do I have to crawl for a bit more till I am up and running.