bad week - trying to bounce back

I have had a horrible week and I feel like I'm just reeling.  I want to cry but I still haven't been able to figure that out.  I want to scream and yell some moments and just go blank the next.  I'm exhausted just trying to mentally deal with it all.  I will start at the top.  On Friday morning we received a letter from our condominium levying a special charge of $3,500 plus against us to help cover the cost of putting in the new windows this summer.  They want three post dated cheques by June 15th or one lump sum.  If they do not receive it, they will be putting  a Construction Lien against our house on the 16th which will incur us more costs, not to mention mess up any gains we've made on rebuilding our credit over the last few years.  We do not have the money.  The total amount is more than my husband and I make in a month combined and we have two young children to clothe and feed.  We have no choices, no options.  I feel like we are being held ransom in our own home, black mailed.  I understand the need to change the windows, they are 20 years old, but I think they could've come up with a much friendlier payment plan.  We aren't going to the east coast to visit my husband's family this summer cause it was going to cost us $1,400 plus to make the trip and that's without spending anything on souvenirs or little extras as needed.  And with the price of gas starting to really climb, it would probably cost us more than that.  So we cancelled our planned trip and now we are being asked to come up with $1,200 approx. for three months in a row.  I just want to cry.  And because our credit is so bad right now due to a failed business three years ago, rolling it into our mortgage will be difficult plus it'll wake up another bad debt that we really don't want to wake up.  So my husband and I are extremely frustrated.  We would move in a heart beat if we could, but we can't.  I just want to cry...  Every time we start seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, and things are improving, it never fails something pulls the rug out from underneath us and sets us back again.  I'm so tired of it and I'm trying to stay positive, telling my husband that we've survived before, we will again.  But I wish I could believe it.... 

And then on top of that, issues with my son came to a head this weekend.  He's ADD and has no control over his impulses.  He not only lied to us, but stole $32, $12 of which was fundraising money that was supposed to go to the school for the fundraiser they were doing.  He and his "girlfriend" (They are 10 and 9 - I'm not sure I'd really classify it as dating!) snuck off to the Mac's Milk (a corner convenience store in the area that they are not allowed to go to without parental accompaniment) and spent $50 on miscellaneous items - candy, Bionicles and Pokemon/Yugioh cards.  $32 of which was stolen money.  He attempted to steal $20 off my husband's dresser two weeks ago.  He just can't keep his hands off of the things that don't belong to him and I never know when he's telling me the truth.  I want to trust him but the bottom line is, his behaviour makes it impossible to do.  I know that our current lifestyle is hard on him.  My husband works shift work and is hardly ever home.   I have a three year old as well that well, as with most three year olds, occupies a lot of my time.  I think my 10 year old is feeling ignored and this is his cry for help.  And I'm trying to get him help but it's finding the right help without it costing a fortune.  Especially in light of the "special charges" by our condo.  We are trying to make some adjustments to our lifestyle so that he gets what he needs but it's hard, I am one person suffering with my own issues, trying to get by.  I've been on sick leave since the end of February.  I went off the 275 mg of Effexor XR I was taking which was not helping anymore.  It was a difficult weaning process.  I started on Wellbutrin within 24 hours of my last dose of the Effexor which helped with some of the withdrawal symptoms.  But it's not obviously the level of medication I was used to and I am dealing with anger issues again. I am constantly snapping at the kids.  I have no patience.  I get overwhelmed very easily.  And all of this in the last 4 days is just too much.  I want to cry but I still can't do that.  The muscles have been so trained to hold in the tears that even without the high doses of medication keeping everything locked down, I just don't seem to be able to let go, to really let go and have a cleansing cry.  So I finally called to make arrangements for starting one on one counselling today.  We get some short term counselling covered under my husband's work place.  We'll see if it helps.  I'm hoping it can at least help me find some coping skills. 

Anyways, I just needed to vent.  And there it is!  I know it's a bad spell, but sometimes those bad spells just seem interminable when you're stuck in them.... 

slowlygoingcrazy

My father's a lawyer so I have legal "help". Problem is there's an article in the by-laws that allows them to do this, so we have no recourse. They are holding all the cards, and the noose to hang us! So there is no legal recourse. We just have to figure something out. We are sending them a letter asking them to consider a more reasonable payment plan. I can't imagine we are the only ones in the neighbourhood that are feeling this way. Problem is, there's a lot of rental units so finding the ones that actually own their own place is hard. Anyways, just thought I'd clarify that point.

Just went for a long walk, cleared my head a little. I'm going to try to get a few things done today, particularly laundry. Everybody is running out of clothes! And hopefully I'll get some of the retun calls I'm waiting for. I hate waiting!

slowlygoingcrazy

Well, we're still trying to cope. Our parents have each decided to loan us half the money for the windows, but again it's another debt. This whole scenario has made me realize how fragile our financial situation is. And I want to make steps to correct it, but it feels like no matter what I do, it just doesn't get any better. To provide a little background. 4 years ago, my husband decided to try a franchising opportunity called Nerds on Site. Basically computer technicians who come to your home. My husband was desperate to escape the call center so we were willing to try it. As part of being a "Nerd", it's highly recommended that you get yourself a red VW Beetle. It's the signature car for Nerds on Site. Well, we decided if we were going to do this, let's make a good run at it, and we found a car and managed to purchase it. To this day, I'm not sure how we qualified! Anyways, to make a long story short, the business went nowhere. My city is considered the high tech capital of Canada, and well as it turns out everybody knows someone who can work on their computers. And Nerds' prices were really high - which we didn't know before spending the franchising fee, at which point it was too late. about six months later our mortgage came up for renewal. At this point we were still barely managing to keep our heads above water and had our mortgage been renewed properly, what followed could've been prevented. But they screwed up our re-mortgage. I had a VISA card with the bank that was supposed to be paid off and the limit dropped. My plan was then to switch the balance from one of our other outstanding higher interest rate cards. Well, they didn't pay out the VISA and they dropped the limit, so I went from being $2 over my limit to $502 over my limit and I couldn't come up with it so the card defaulted, and our credit rating plummetted. At this time we were also trying to sell the VW Beetle but less than a year after buying the car for almost $22,000, we were lucky to get $13,000. We needed a loan to cover the difference so we could release ownership on the car. Because of our now crappy credit rating, the bank wouldn't give it to us. We even tried going back to the dealership, who tried very hard to help us but when it got to the bank we were turned down. We were left with no options at this point. We couldn't sell cause we couldn't release the interest in the car. We couldn't keep it cause we couldn't afford the monthly payments anymore. And now our second child was on her way. Plus we were coming up on winter and had no place to store the car that wasn't going to cost us more money. So we walked into the bank and handed them the keys. The car was then sold at auction and they got a measly $9,000 for it, not even after costs. So we were now on the line for the difference. My father is a lawyer as I mentioned above and he represented us. He tried to get the bank to come to a deal. We wanted credit for the $3,000 we lost on the sale cause they wouldn't help us before hand, and then we set out a repayment plan. The bank would not agree to it. They wanted it all or no deal. Now if we could've come up with $17,000, do you think we'd have turned the car over to them?!!!! Anyways, the bank played hardball and to this day there hasn't been a single payment made on the car. Without a deal, we'll be paying forever so we're better off to pay nothing cause there comes a point where they won't be able to collect on it anymore (Statute of Limitations on Debt Collection). But it's killing our credit. I want to make a deal. But the bank won't play fair or even reasonable. With the windows issue we tried to renegotiate our mortgage but had to back off because there was a very big chance it was going to blow up in our faces because the car loan is with the same bank - unfortunately! So we've been forced to borrow the money from our parents. But this on-going issue with the car is preventing us from moving on. I can't get a loan to go back to school. We can't move. I want to start my own craft business and I can't do that cause there's no way I could even get a loan for $1000 just to get me started. I don't need a lot but a little capital to start for supplies would be helpful. My husband can't even consider jobs outside of Ottawa unless they are in the 50,000-60,000 range cause that's the only way a move wouldn't bankrupt us right now, and his lack of experience in certain areas keeps hurting him. So I'm feeling like we can't move forward and there's no going back! And the world around me is this gaping black hole that won't go away. I have no opportunities cause all I have is high school. I have my experience, but there are places that you can't even submit your resume unless you can click off that you have a post secondary education, and clicking it off just to get my resume in would be lying and I'm not sure that would help my cause either. So I'm stuck working in an office doing a job I very much dislike, or retail where I wouldn't make as much money, and therefore would make paying our monthly bills more stressful... I just feel like we're constantly in a loose-loose situation. By the time I'm able to go back to school, I'm going to be so old.... And that's depressing. And then there's the issue of the fact my husband would like another child. I'm not entirely opposed to it but I'm so tired of giving everything up, but at this point it's like, well I've got no other options anyways. But why should mom be a default. I love being a mom when things are good. Right now I'm so stressed, parenthood is not enjoyable. Monday night I lost it with my kids, and I think it just confused the hell out of them. Words came out of my mouth that were not nice. I actually almost had a good cry but it scared me so much to let myself go, that I hopped on the computer and played mind numbing games til I couldn't feel anything anymore. I am not cut out for single parenting, and yet, again, I have no other options. My husband has to work to pay the bills. And I know it's not easy for him either. He feels trapped in a call center world and it bothers him he can't be there to help me. I just don't know what to do. I want to do the right thing, and make things better for us, but nothing seems to be the right thing.... Everything we do, we're screwed in some way.... And so I feel like crap. How do I get over the depression, when the world seems to hand it to me on a silver platter! I go back to work in a little less than 2 mths. I honestly don't know how I'm going to handle it, particularly when it all just feels like a long, unrelenting road of frustration ahead. For a little while there, I thought we were starting to see the light, but now I realize that light was the headlamp on the train coming right at us.... Anyways, I know there's really nothing anybody can say. I just needed to vent. Thought it might help me sleep to get this off my chest. I hope so. I have to get up in less than 2 hrs. to get the kids going, although my husband is around, he could deal with it and let me sleep in a bit, but I have plans for tomorrow so I don't want to sleep in too much either. Anyways, it's starting to really brighten up outside, I should try to get a couple of hours anyways. Thanks for listening.
slowlygoingcrazy

We are for everything but the car. Because of the nature of the car loan, we went through my father who is a lawyer. But the bank has never been co-operative. And thus we are where we are now. In fact with the debt counselling we're down to the last two creditors, one of which we voluntarily added two years ago to make it easier to pay (student loan). So yeah, we're doing that too.... That's why it's so frustrating. We've done everything to try to make things right but because the bank wants all or nothing, it's tough to negotiate something reasonable.

Well, it happened. I just lost it this morning, about an hour and 1/2 ago. After being accused by my husband of not appreciating what his father does because I'm upset he won't meet my parents half way on the window money loan, particularly since my parents are taking it off credit cards or out of business money (it's not like it's easy for them either and half way would've been nice), I just outright lost it. I just let out a scream and had a temper tantrum and then cried for almost 1/2 hr. I'm still trying to get it under control which is why I cancelled my visit with my friend today. I was looking forward to it, but I just feel incredibly unstable at the moment and not up to facing anyone. The floodgates openned and I'm having a hard time closing them right now. I see my doctor tomorrow and my next appointment with my counsellor is next Wednesday. Maybe now that I've let down the barriers I can start to deal with things but we'll see.... I'm just shaky right now. I hate feeling like this. Especially when there doesn't seem to be any solutions to the issues. The money problems aren't going away, the rift between what my parents do and what my husband's dad/family does isn't going to change, my husband's shift work isn't going away or getting any better, and so on and so forth. When you're faced with all that certainty of craziness, how do you get through your day? Without losing it? I've been doing a good job of it til this week, but I guess I couldn't keep doing it anymore this week.... We'll see what happens. I think my husband got a good look at my pain and anger for the first time in years, maybe it'll change something there, maybe it'll help him understand. I don't know. We'll see.... I keep saying that but that's all there is is we'll see....