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hiddlestonsbabygirl · 4 years

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Care For Me (Steve Rogers au) SugarDaddy!Steve

•prologue•

An alternative universe where Steve isn’t an Avenger, but rather a CEO of one of the biggest companies in the US. His best friend and business partner Bucky secretly made him an account in an online dating site for sugar daddies and sugar babies, setting Steve up on a date with the only suitable sugar baby he thought was best for his best friend among the million others in his inbox.

It’s you. You’re the sugar baby.

Or,

Where reader is a med student who is badly in need of financial support and resorted to desperate measures by signing up to an online dating site with a little help from reader’s best friend, Nat.

•••

You ran up the staircase, not bothering to apologize as you bumped into strangers along the way. Your heart hammered against your chest as sweat outlined your forehead, thoughts running through your mind as you wondered what could have happened to your apartment. You just got a call from your good neighbor Mrs. Sally that the landlord stormed into your hallway followed by two men in white muttering angry words as he unlocked your door with his duplicate key. You knew instantly why he was there. You were getting kicked out of your own apartment since you weren’t able to pay for your rent in six months. The landlord had warned you beforehand to pay sooner, but it was getting harder and harder each day. You were already broke, all your savings spent on your medical school. You didn’t want to stop your studies—you were already on your third year and ever since you graduated college your goal was straight; finish med school, pass the licensure exams and become a doctor. You couldn’t even last a week on your countless part-time jobs because of your coming in late due to knee-deep work you have to face every single day in school.

Your financial status was making it hard for you to finish your goal. Very hard.

You reached your floor, and, as expected, all your things were outside your door in boxes. Your heart sank as you stared at the mess, your clothes and books thrown aggressively into the containers as if they meant nothing but pieces of trash.

You rushed inside and your landlord was standing by your small kitchen, barking orders at his two men, without even noticing that you entered.

“Please, sir,” you cried as you neared him. “Please give me one more chance. I’ll pay by the end of the month, I promise!”

He scowled at you. “I’ve given you too many chances, (Y/N). You’re too much.”

He turned his back at you and proceeded to march into your bedroom, calling out one of his men to follow him inside.

“No!” You yelled angrily this time. You couldn’t believe him. You may haven’t paid your debt owed to this man but that didn’t give him the right to intrude into your privacy.

You ran past them and stood in front of them before they could get any closer to the door, your cheeks flushed and eyes filled with angry tears.

“You can’t just walk into someone’s bedroom and take everything away!” You cried. “I can pack up myself! I don’t need your filthy hands on my belongings!”

Your landlord looked furious. “Then throw your damn things out of my apartment in the next hour or I’ll fucking rip this room apart by myself!”

You flinched at the loudness and anger of his voice before he turned around and left without another word, his men following close behind. Once you heard the main door slam shut you bawled your eyes out, sinking to the floor as you struggled to think of places where you could find refuge without having to pay. All you had in your wallet was a 20-dollar bill, and you didn’t have any extra cash in your bank account. You considered searching for very cheap rooms in the vicinity without having to ride because riding meant paying. But you couldn’t walk on the streets while struggling to hold boxes of your things. They were even too many for only two small hands.

You sobbed. At this point you felt so hopeless already. You almost convinced yourself that you were going to throw your unnecessary things away and sleep on the streets, while asking for spare change. You’d have to give up your med school since you couldn’t shoulder all the expenses anymore and just look for a job where it pays just enough for food and shelter. You didn’t have a family anymore to back you up. Your addictive mother left you for a stranger, and your father’s been gone even before you were born. You didn’t have any siblings, nor uncles or aunts or extended family members where you could go to for help. You had no one. It was only you.

You wiped away your tears, swallowing your pride as you took out your old, worn-out phone from your pocket and dialed your best friend’s number.

Natasha.

She’s been your best friend since high school, and you both shared the same passion in life. You both wanted to become a doctor. You both have so much in common, and you both agree to almost everything. You’ve been there for each other through the ups and downs, and Natasha has helped you through your own struggles financially. But asking for this big favor from her was just too much for you. You didn’t want to add a burden to your best friend—med school is already hard enough as it is.

But you were already desperate. You didn’t have any more options. This was the only one.

“Hello?”

You felt a sudden wave of relief hearing a voice so soothing in the midst of the chaos. “Nat, hi.”

“(Y/N), have you been crying? What happened??”

You hiccuped. “I-I’m fine, Nat. C-Could you come over? I k-kind of need your help.”

“I’ll be there in ten.”

As promised, a knock came from your door and you stood up to open it, revealing a worried Natasha standing over your disarrayed valuables.

You couldn’t help yourself. Fresh tears welled up in your eyes as she pulled you in for a tight hug and you sobbed into her shoulder.

“We’ll pack up your things and go to my house. You’re staying there for as long as you like. My home is always open for you, (Y/N). And you know that.”

...

“So? How did it go with Katherine?” Bucky spoke up as he stabbed his medium-rare meat with his fork, clearly playing with his food rather than eating it. It was lunch break and Bucky and Steve were in their usual go-to for lunch, Redbird.

“Despite the fact that we called it a night early? It was okay.” Steve replied with a scoff, bringing a spoonful of rice to his mouth and watched as Bucky gave his best friend a deadpanned look.

“And you were the one who ended things early, not her, right?”

Steve nodded. He was slowly getting tired of Bucky setting him up with several women, whom he doesn’t even take interest in. He always has the need to pair Steve with someone because “you always look so bleak and somber,” as Bucky would put it.

“Buck, I really appreciate you doing these stuff for me, being my wingman and all, but I really don’t feel like dating right now.”

“Oh, yeah?” He retorted. “Then why do you always look so depressed? You can’t fucking tell me your wealth and fame is making you distressed. That’s some absurd bullshit right there.”

“Language.” Steve glared at him. He always hated when people cussed. For him it was indecent and dirty.

Except, of course, cussing in bed. He can only tolerate profanity under the sheets. But not often, though. That would be too much to listen to.

“Seriously??”

“And yes, James. Wealth and fame does not automatically make you happy and unproblematic. Do you know how many rich and famous people died because they took their own life? Because they hide their problems. The only image the public sees is the happy and successful façade they show.”

Silence. Steve was almost convinced he had won over their little argument.

“That shit deep, man.” Bucky only chuckled to which his best friend exhaled an exasperated sigh. Steve couldn’t even bother to point out that Bucky said a bad language word again.

“But you’ve got friends. Your family loves and supports you, you make time for sports and leisure...what could possibly make you so sad??”

Steve breathed out. “I told you, I’m not depressed, I’m not sad. I just don’t feel like dating as of the moment.”

“Will you feel like dating again tomorrow?”

“Haha, very funny.”

Bucky only stared at his best friend as he took a sip of his drink, studying him with confusion and amusement. Very formal man, always has a steely look on his face, very dominant demeanor, couldn’t even stand hearing curse words! What could his best friend possibly like in a woman?? Were his calculations wrong? Did he expect differently? Was he looking at it in a wrong angle?

Is Steve gay??

“Barnes, quit staring at me like that. You’re making me uncomfortable.” Steve brought him back to his senses.

And then it hit him.

“Hey, Steve, I think I need to go.” Bucky announced as he stood up and gathered his phone and wallet lying around on the table.

“Oh? Why the sudden hurry?” The blond-haired man asked as his eyes watched his best friend suddenly look distracted.

“It’s nothing. I just forgot to feed my pet dragon.” He then proceeded to pace towards the exit, leaving Steve confused and asked himself how he was acquainted with a weird and funny man like James Buchanan Barnes.

Little did Steve know that his best friend was up to a very stupid but brilliant idea. He knew he was going to get in trouble if Steve found out about it, but it was worth a shot. And his plan involved an online dating site and younger girls.

........................... ........................... ...........................

A/N: New series! Yay!!! Tags are also open, just hit me up! Next part coming soon ❤️

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lesbianaglaya · 4 years

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Please elaborate on that The Idiot essay

Okay anon, ask and ye shall receive. Here is my manifesto on why I love The Idiot (1868-1869). Homoeroticism and me crying over Bakhtin under the cut.

Okay from here on out let me just warn you that there will be discussion of epilepsy, sexual abuse, violence against women, murder, and suicide. I never claimed it wasn’t a messed up story.

Let me start off by saying, this is not a good novel. It was written as a desperate cash grab by Dostoevsky after he and his wife Anna had had to move to Switzerland for financial reasons (they were rather continually in debt due to Dostoevsky’s gambling problem. In fact, they’d met when Fyodor hired Anna as a stenographer to help him write down The Gambler, the completion of which he’d bet all his rights to his published works on). The four separate parts are only loosely linked by narrative threads, things don’t follow the course you would expect from a work of literature, and the protagonist of the novel’s literal schtick is that he was supposed to be “a perfectly beautiful man”. Which, yeah, great in theory but in reality people don’t want perfect protagonists. The morals of the novel tend towards Dostoevsky’s own often troubling views of religion and morality, and it is a distinctly 19th century work.

And yet, it’s still one of my favourite things I’ve ever read. Not only are there some truly insane homoerotic moments in here, but there are some brilliant moments of play with narrative voice, society novel-esque shenanigans, questions about the nature of goodness and what that really means, and, of course, one really hot moment where a woman slaps a guy who’s being a dick in the face with a riding crop.

The loose plot of the novel is that Prince Lev Nikolaevich Myshkin, the eponymous idiot (and a holy fool, or as Dostoevsky once described him, “Prince Christ”), is returning to Russia from a period of many years in Switzerland being treated for epilepsy. On the train into Petersburg he meets Rogozhin, a young man who has just inherited an enormous fortune after the death of his father. They begin talking, and Rogozhin confides in Myshkin about his love for (read: obsession with) a girl known as Nastasya Filipovna. (This seems weird doesn’t it? Just confessing your major life problems to this weird guy sitting next to you on the train? Yea that’s just what people do around Myshkin). Upon arriving in Petersburg, Myshkin goes to meet with his distant relations, the Epanchins, to get to know them and form a family connection. The rest of the novel is these characters cycling through various love (?) plots, more random inheritances, people dying of consumption, going to stay in the country for a while Just Because, and other stereotypical 19th century novel things.

What makes it unique is that each character is their own person with their own thoughts, experiences and world views and the novel is these views interacting and clashing, or as Bakhtin puts it “a plurality of consciousness, with equal rights and each with its own world”. The characters are not there to help prove any thesis or idea; instead the thesis of the novel is how these characters differing views interact with each other. Myshkin is the lens of this, making it a picture of how each different character (or world view) reacts to his inherent goodness.

Of course, that’s all very... meta. Fun to discuss, but it doesn’t necessarily make the book fun to read. That’s where Nastasya Filipovna comes in.

Nastasya Filipovna, the girl that Rogoshin is “in love with” is a young woman who was born to nobility but orphaned and then sexually abused and turned into a concubine by her guardian Totsky. At the beginning of the novel she has escaped the control of Totsky and is in the incredibly tenuous situation of being provided an income from him for not completely destroying his reputation. A marriage has been arranged by Totsky (so that he won't have to worry about her any more) between her and this one asshole Ganya, but she has not agreed to it yet and has said she will announce her decision at her name day party.

At said name day party is where things get Crazy. She goes ham, mocking Ganya (who she knows hates her) for selling himself for the money promised in marrying her, verbally torturing Totsky, and generally saying fuck you to everyone while also tossing in a good amount of self hatred. Myshkin (whom she invited after meeting him once earlier that day for like five seconds seriously just role with it) declares quite earnestly that he thinks she is a good person and if she likes he’ll marry her amd also that he just inherited a fuck ton of money. Nastya is taken aback, and agrees to marry Myshkin. Then Rogozhin shows up (drunk, with the lads) and we find out Nastya has been planning all this. She tells Myshkin that she can’t actually marry him because he’s too innocent and she believes herself to be awful, and then asks Rogozhin for the money he promised her. Rogozhin hands over 100,000 rubles and Nastasya proceeds to toss them in the fire, tell Ganya that they’re his if he’ll reach in to get them out, and then leaves her own party with Rogozhin!!! I said this novel was batshit!!!!

Nastya through out the novel continues to be The Best Character, writing homoerotic letters to Aglaya Epanchina, who I FIRMLY choose to see as a lesbian, smoking cigars, and of course, upon hearing a man say of her “Here you simply need a whip, there’s no other way with this creature”, in return “she rushed to a young man completely unknown to her who was standing two steps away and holding a thin, braided riding crop, tore it out of his hand, and struck the offender accross the face as hard as she could”. Iconique. Of course, her story ends tragically but we’ll get into that later.

To quickly touch on Aglaya Epanchina, because I love her, she is one of the daughters of the Epanchin family, she and Myshkin almost get married, and she ends the novel by running off with a foreigner and becoming (horrified whisper) Catholic. Anyway she and Nastya have a brief but horribly gay dicourse where Nastya confesses her love (platonic of course. That is definitely how I, a lesbian, read this) for Aglaya and Aglaya refuses to believe her. Aglaya says she wants to marry Myshkin specifically because then she wouldn’t have to be a wife and a mother and could pursue what she wants and continue to learn. Also at one point Aglaya adopts a hedgehog. That’s Lesbianism Baybee. Her ending is supposed to be tragic but I choose to believe that her marriage is a lavender marriage and she and her gay husband are having wild fun around Europe. Let me have this.

Now for what you’ve all been waiting for — more homoeroticism.

Myshkin and Rogoshin’s dynamic is, like, fully insane. After their first meeting on the train, Rogozhin says to Myshkin “Prince, I don’t know why I’ve come to love you. . . . Come and see me, Prince. We’ll take those wretched gaiters off you; I’ll dress you in a top-notch marten coat; I’ll have the best of tailcoats made for you, a white waistcoat, or whatever you like; I’ll stuff your pockets with money”. Slow down lover boy you met this man five minutes ago and you’re already trying to sugar daddy him?? It only gets worse from here.

Part II of the novel picks up six months after the name day party. Rogozhin and Myshkin have in the intervening time “often happened to spend long hours together, and there had even been several moments during their meetings that had left an all too memorable imprint upon their hearts”. Yeah. It’s also said that Rogozhin is jealous of Myshkin maybe holding some of Nastya’s affection but like. It just reads a lot like Rogozhin is torn between Nastya and Myshkin, which he is in a way because being in love with friends with Myshkin and Nastya (lavender) marrying Myshkin (that’s not an exaggeration it’s basically out right stated that if Myshkin and Nastya married they would not have sex), would mean giving up the weird destructive obsession he and Nastya have with each other. This is supposed to imply coming to Jesus. I take it as accepting your homosexuality because Dostoevsky is dead and I can do what I want.

So Myshkin shows up at Rogozhin’s house and things are a bit awkward (Rogozhin has maybe been stalking Myshkin??) His “affectionate” smile is described “as if something had been broken, and try as he might, he was unable to glue it back together.” Anyway.

They begin actually talking and oh boy. I’ll just present these without comment.

“I’ve come to bring you peace, because you, too, are dear to me. I love you very much Parfyon. And now I’ll go and never come again. Farewell.” “‘Stay with me a little’ Parfyon said quietly, without getting up from his place and leaning his head on his right hand, ‘I haven’t seen you in a very long time.’”

“When you’re not in front of me, I feel spite for you Lev Nikolaevich. . . . Now you haven’t sat with me a quarter of an hour and all my spite is gone, and I love you like before. Stay with me a little . . .’”

“Nobody’s asking our opinion. It got decided without us. And we love differently too.”

“I didn’t want to come here! I wanted to forget everything here, tear it out of my heart!”

Not to mention the jealousy Rogozhin has for the perceived relationship between Myshkin and Nastya. Hmmmm. Anyway after all That, Rogozhin insists that he and Myshkin trade crosses, his golden one for Myshkin’s tin one.

And THEN Rogozhin proceeds to stop Myshkin from leaving again, and takes him to get his mother’s blessing, which is the same thing he did with Nastasya!!!!!! I feel insane.

After this Myshkin returns to his hotel but then Rogozhin follows him and um. Tries to stab him. With the knife that’s been built up as a phallic symbol through the whole novel. But then Myshkin falls into an epileptic fit and Rogozhin flees. Like this is deeply fucked up but What The Hell am I supposed to be thinking rn??

Anyway the next time they meet it’s in the countryside and Myshkin has fully forgiven him for the murder attempt. Indeed “struck by Rogozhin’s sudden appearance, the prince was unable to collect his thoughts for sometime, and a painful sensation rose again in his heart.”

Rogoshin has apparently not forgiven himself for trying to kill Myshkin, to which Myshkin responds “all that you went through that day I now know as well as I know my own self. What you were imagining did not and could not exist.” *jenny slate scream*

Myshkin proceeds to invite Rogozhin home with him, saying “I have some wine, we’ll drink wine, you must wish me something I myself don’t know how to wish for now, and it’s precisely you who must wish it, and I’ll wish you your fullest happiness. Or else give me back my cross! You didn’t even send it back to me the next day! You’re wearing it? Wearing it even now?” and THEN he says “I don’t want to meet my new life without you because my new life has begun! Don’t you know that my new life begins today?” and then they head home together.

Okay skipping over a bunch of stuff because 1) I havent read the novel in a year and while i know there’s more stuff in there I don’t know exactly where and I don’t want to be flipping pages for another hour and 2) this is already insanely long so. For context in the intervening time Rogozhin and Nastya do end up getting married (which everyone including the two of them kind of agree that it’s just a way for them both to kill each other/basically comit suicide. Fun!). So that’s exactly what happens, and Myshkin runs to their house, arriving too late and finding that Rogozhin has stabbed Nastya and she is dead. Thus ensues a scene that makes me so insane I cant... look here just take this:

“‘So let her lie here now, next to us, next to me and you...’

‘Yes, yes!’ the prince agreed warmly.”

And

“‘I’ll make up the bed and you can lie down... and I’ll lie down with you... and we’ll listen... because I don’t know yet man... I don’t know everything yet, man, so I’m telling you about it ahead of time, so you’ll know all about it ahead of time...’”

And

“But two people could not lie on the sofa, and he absolutely wanted to make up beds now side by side, and that way why, with great effort, he now dragged pillows of various sizesfrom both sofas all the way across the room, right up to the opening in the curtain. The bed got made up anyhow; he went over to the prince, took him tenderly and rapturously by the arm, got him to his feet, and led him to the bed”

And

“[Rogozhin was] laying the prince down on the left, better, pillows, himself on the right”

And

“‘What did you use? A knife? That same one?’

‘That same one’”

And

“The prince would reach out his trembling hand to him and quietly touch his head, his hair, stroke it and stroke his cheeks... there was nothing more he could do! . . . and pressed his face to the pale and motionless face of Rogozhin; tears flowed from his eyes onto Rogozhin’s cheeks”

And

“He quietly hastened to pass his trembling hand over his hair and cheeks, as if caressing and soothing him”

And then the cops show up and there’s a brief epilogue talking about how everything is terrible now and Myshkin goes back to Switzerland because he’s incoherent with grief. Insane.

So there’s also a lot in this novel about what is actually good, and how people react when confronted with goodness, etc. etc. but this is five pages in google docs and I need to. Stop. Anyway if you made it to the end cheers this novel is awful and insane and I love it. Dostoevsky do not interact I hate your crusty ass even if your prose makes me feel things.

#gabby.txt #mail #anon #the idiot #anyway sorry this took so long but ah. yeah.#i have a lot of Thoughts #literature #Anonymous

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pembrokewkorgi · 5 years

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May has been hell...

May has not been a good month for me, and it’s really eating at me. So please forgive me for being a whiny bitch for a moment, because I got to dump all these emotions out somehow, and my usual stuff doesn’t really feel like it’s working, or it’s just temporary.

1. Grandfather passed away, had to attend a memorial service for him, because he didn’t want a big funeral or anything, had to help clean his office and look through his stuff, deal with certain family members being absolute garbage, and an all around unhappy experience.

I’m still not over the fact Grandpa is gone, like part of me still feels completely in denial of that... like that didn’t happen...

2. Some of my long time friends on the internet feel less and less like friends, more like acquaintances, with some of them acting outright rude to me every time I’ve remotely tried interacting with them. Making me feel like we’re not friends anymore, and the real worst time for me to be dealing with that, because it makes me wonder if I should just cut them off from all interactions, or just continue to barely talk to them.

3. Trying to get into better shape. I’ve been struck with extreme loneliness, but due to stuff with my ex-wife, I’ve been left damaged self esteem about my looks. I’m trying to get in better shape, because when I considered joining a dating site, I took a picture of myself, and almost busted into tears looking at how I currently look. I want to be happy with how I look before I feel I can try and start dating with anyone. This realization was still very emotionally upsetting to me. The slow process of losing weight, sure isn’t helping my frustrations either.

4. Financial issues keep piling on me, my now dissolved marriage have left me with a lot of debt that has constantly been piling on me. Add in car problems, medical bills, and the fact my eyesight seems to be getting worse by the day, and it’s been really stressful for me. I’m doing my best to get everything taken care of, but it constantly feels like things are getting worse rather than better.

5. The second most upsetting thing on this list and the most recent is a bomb my job dropped on me. See for several years now, I’ve worked the third shift at my job, from 7PM to 6AM. This was perfect for me, because I’m a night owl. I’m not even remotely a morning person. I always feel more comfortable being awake during the night and asleep during the day. BUT the biggest reason I liked this shift, was since we got less calls at this time, there would be slow periods that would allow me time to work on my other stuff. Comics, ask blogs, art, videos, what have you.

Out of the blue, my job tells me that they’re moving me to day shift and I get no say in the matter. The issue is they want more coverage during the times of 6-11AM, and rather than hire a new person, they decide to sacrifice one of the three people from the third shift, and I was the one selected. I have to start at the beginning of June and I get no say in the matter.

So now I’m paranoid and scared I won’t be able to keep up with all the content I’ve been doing all this time, and it’s really worrying me, because making comics and videos is what I truly enjoy (unlike my job).

But that’s not even the worst part. See, working third shift also gave me a third shift differential, ie I got paid extra for working after normal business hours. Being moved to day shift is going to cause me to lose that, and thus lose somewhere between $100 - $130 out of each of my paychecks, and I already lose $200 because of child support.

I can’t afford to quit my job, at least not for a few more years, because I have child support to pay, and my job does give good medical insurance to both me and my child, the latter of which is diabetic and needs it for all her meds and what not.

There’s some other stuff, but I really can’t think of it right now.

I just feel defeated, stomped on, and I don’t know what I can do but let the world beat me up.

So yeah. May sucks ass... I would say at least the month is almost over, but June already has a shitty start coming... so it’s hard to keep my spirits high.

I’m sorry about unloading all this on you guys, and sorry for all the whining, I just had to get it all off my chest, before I explode.

If you just scrolled past this, fine, I understand.

If you read all this, then I love you, and thank you all for listening to me bitch.

Thanks again.

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kawaiimeraki · 4 years

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A life update / bio for those who dont know me well

Basic bio: 27, female, living in Washington state, California native ; married & 8 months pregnant with my first child.

I’ve been very secretive about my life since I left to Washington state in general. It really hasn’t been the easiest of journeys for me; but it’s been a learning experience for sure . I’m not sure if I should just spill my heart into this post completely or just take things day by day. September 24,2018 I got married to Isaac who I met online through the app ok Cupid . I met him just a couple weeks after I had been broken up with by a guy I dated on and off for two years. Isaac came into my life when I least expected him, but I really needed him more than I realized . We were only dating for 4 months until we decided to tie the knot and it was the best decision I’ve made in my life in a long time.2016/2017 I was actually feeling pretty suicidal. Which probably caused me to not be the best version of myself in my previous relationship. The timing of everything was just off , I was forcing it , and he tried to show me signs he didn’t want what I wanted in many ways but I just wasn’t getting it. Thankfully , with Isaac I don’t have to worry about my position in my mans life, I’m sure of myself , and I’m more mentally and financially stable than I’ve been in my entire adult life.

Since I’ve gotten to Washington , I haven’t worked as much as I previously had in California. I have been in the food service industry for 10years , and caregiving for 7 years , I also nannied for a family for 4 years . I’ve always had full time work or even stacked more than just that to my plate . However , I was never good with my finances ; I love to shop, I love to go out to eat, and splurge on myself . I’m currently actually working on fixing my credit as well , due to the fact I moved out when I was 19 and I made some mistakes financially along with getting a dui back in 2016 (which is super expensive) I’m not sure that I ever actually went public with my dui. Because I didn’t really want anyone feeling bad for me , I just wanted to figure that out on my own and I pretty much took care of it. I got my license back 4 months after the dui but it took me about a year and a half to pay off my fines and such. It was a learning experience for me. Not something i reccomend (11k) is what it cost me in total.

I still need a lot of help from my family , my mom does help me with some of my debt since I had an unexpected pregnancy , I’m thankful for that, I never really asked for help before but sometimes people need help and right now I do need that help. I hope to be able to get her back in the near future .

Some more about me, I really depend on my husband Isaac for everything. He takes care of our finances , and he’s also in school right now for web development . He was in the marines for 5 years , he’s very driven, motivated and positive . Something I like about him is he’s good at saving money, he doesn’t drink or smoke by choice , he’s a leader , and he doesn’t care what people think. He does everything with a purpose and logic behind it (something difficult for me to do) he’s also been a good influence on me to not lead so much with my emotions , and to not waste time and my life on things that I cannot change, focus on the present day and live in the moment but also focusing on creating a good future by living with purpose and not just going about life without knowing what the point of it all is.

I found out I was pregnant in May of 2019, just 3 months after we arrived here in Washington from California. It was overwhelming for me. I was thinking of what I would do at first , Isaac didn’t think there was any option but to move forward with our baby, I just never imagined myself being a mother. I always kind of thought of myself as a fuck up, not someone that would be a good example, and I always thought negatively about my future , and even sometimes thought maybe I wouldn’t have a future (imagined darkness). Isaac was actually super happy to find out we were having a child, I wasn’t familiar with how he felt because my parents were never together , so I didn’t know that there even could be the feeling of a full family . Now; we’re 8 months into it , and I’m due January 10th. We’re having a boy and his name will be Miles Dominic Nelson. I also plan to change my last name before the baby is here preferably . I’ve been meaning to go down to social security but I never did. I know it would mean a lot to isaac if I got that done, so I intend to do so as soon as possible.

Another thing is that our families recently found out we were married , I didn’t initially tell them and he didn’t tell his family. Because we didn’t feel it was anyone’s business (until we moved closer to his family then it became their business). My mom just found out this weekend actually . I felt a little bit bad about it , but it was just something I felt was really personal for me.

In addition to this, there’s been some hiccups for me since I’ve arrived in Washington with my work and my social life. Things have kind of been flipped upside down in that area. I actually was able to compete a manager in training program with a company called qdoba. The food industry to say the least is immensely different from anything I’ve ever seen practiced in California. I don’t want to delve too deep into it in this post, but I worked there for 3 months & I found out I was pregnant , I was going to take a leave of absence; but my first trimester was really difficult for me, so I left at the end of May and I don’t plan to work until I go back to California .

As far as friends go, I really haven’t made a lot. They weren’t kidding when they said “Seattle freeze” most of the people who live in Washington are natives of Washington from what I’ve experienced. Where as, in California people come and go from different states and country & they are a lot more open, friendly and welcoming . We actually don’t live in the heart of Seattle , we live 50 miles away from it . We live in a city that is considered to be northern and going toward Vancouver, British Columbia. It is more rural, this also makes it more difficult to make friends. I suppose if I wanted to make friends I would have to go to church or go out a lot more but I really don’t feel like putting myself out there because I already have my heart set on moving back anyway. We do have two couples we are friends with one is joe and MJ & the other is Chelsea and jack . We typically get to see these couples once every couple of months because they are busy. Jack and Chelsea live on an island named guemes and joe and MJ live in Everett which is about 20 miles south of our location . They are very nice people, they are natives of the area. They were actually Isaacs childhood friends and that is how I was introduced to them. I’m thankful for these two couples.

Other than them, I haven’t made any friends organically on my own and that kinda kills me inside. I’m really hoping to leave here by May/June when the baby is a few months, that’s the plan we have because by then my husband will be done with school. I don’t intend to stay here any longer than I have to. I have a few really chill friends who I cherish back in California , and I didn’t realize how much they and my family meant to me until I became isolated here in Washington .

I’ve tried to put myself out there multiple times. I’ve downloaded apps like peanut (tinder for moms) it’s basically to meet friends in your area who are moms, thaw (meet friends) and what to expect ; but I haven’t made any meaningful connections. I get upset about it sometimes, I’ve tried to have many conversations and even meet up with people and it’s never quite worked out. I’ve also invited two people who I thought were friends from online and have chatted with a ton to my shower , but they didn’t show, so I’m no longer going to waste my time trying to contact these people like I need to prove myself to someone. I even went to two different events for one of the girls , so I expected some reciprocation but she didn’t show, so I was a little salty about that.

Anyway; the plan for Isaac , baby miles and myself is to move back by summer . He will be done with his school by April , we will focus on minimizing things , streamlining living minimally and I will focus on being the best mom I can be to my baby and getting in the groove of things and we will be back in California in no time . I plan to try to breast feed for the first 6 months, if I can that’d be great if I can’t then I will just get formula. There’s some stuff I have to take care of like getting WIC and changing my name too.

I’m going to use this as my personal blog , so if any of you want to keep up with me or what I’m doing on a daily basis come here and you’ll know. Thanks for reading guys. Lots has changed in the past couple years. Life’s so different now.

Love,

Kawaii

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vices-aand-virtues · 5 years

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Today I finished The Year of Less by Cait Flanders and it really resonated with me. One of my goals for 2019 already was to downsize, partially because I was feeling overwhelmed by how much stuff I own; partially because I was running out of space; and partially because I was anticipating moving this summer, and I wanted to haul as little as possible. I purged my closet, my bookshelf, and my DVD collection. Granted, I still have what many would consider A BUNCH of items in these categories, but as Marie Kondo would say, they really do “spark joy.”

I want to clean out other areas of my home, but due to having roommates, this is a challenge since with some things I’m not sure whose is whose. But this summer, they will be moving out, and my boyfriend and I will be living alone together for the first time in 4 years—for the first time since we graduated from college (me with my MA and him with his BS). I’m looking forward to cleaning out the kitchen and our closets.

Another reason I want to binge clean is because we will have two spare rooms in our house, but I don’t want them to become what they have been in the past: junk rooms. Typically these rooms serve a primary purpose (usually our music room), but they also serve as a dumping ground for anything we don’t know what to do with or things we don’t want in public view (ie junk). I want these rooms to be no more than they are: a guest room and a music room/office. We are only two people; we don’t need three rooms full of just stuff.

But until we can get started purging and cleaning our house, there are some steps I can already start taking to work towards my year of less. I’ve been saving money for a few months now because I thought I might owe money on my taxes. Luckily it turns out I didn’t thanks to some very helpful deductions, so I have a very small “influx” of money.

Which leads me to my next reason for doing this.

I’m in debt. By a lot. Getting a bachelor’s and master’s degree did not come cheap. My parents only paid for 2 years of my undergrad degree, and I was on my own for the next 7 years of school (yeah you read that right—my undergrad took 5 years and grad school took 4). As a result, my student loan debt is astronomical. Not only that, but because of my light class load my last year in school, I didn’t qualify for financial aid, and had to use 3 different credit cards to pay the rest of my tuition. So all that gets piled on top of my K2 mountain of debt.

With what I make now at my job, I can make it by. I’ll be able to afford rent, bills, and debt repayments. But that’s about it. And that’s not the kind of life I want to live. I’m not even talking about traveling the world or taking vacations. I just want to hang out with friends or go visit my family. I want to buy gas for something besides work. I want to treat my friends when they need a pick me up or need to celebrate. I want to be able to get my haircut when I need it.

So I decided I could up my weekly savings and see where that would lead me 4 months from now. By doing that alone, I could pay off half of my credit card debt by this fall, and finish the rest of it by next summer. That frees up nearly $500 for me to put towards extra student loan payments. Just by saving more money each week.

After calculating that, I looked at where I’m spending money during work hours. I am a contract music therapist, so I drive all over my area to my clients homes for sessions. Sometimes I knock the sessions out one after the other, but sometimes I have some time to kill inbetween. Since I started my job in June of 2018, I chose to go to a coffee shop (Starbucks or a local brew) to get a drink and work on paperwork or read a book. I looked at my expenses for just the last 2 months, and I had spent $150 on coffee alone. Thats $75 a month I’m spending to have a coffee for an hour or so once or twice a week. Then I added up any time I ate a meal between sessions. Almost $75 more. $150 a month on food and drinks. That’s almost $40 a week. I easily can cut those things out of my routine. Instead of going to a coffee shop, I can find somewhere else to kill time between sessions. If the weather is nice, I can go to a park and walk for a bit. If there’s a bench or a table, I can do my work there. If the weather is bad, I’ll give myself some grace and allow for a coffee. If I lived closer to work, I would definitely just spend my time there.

My next step was to look at any expenses that were truly unnecessary. I use Spotify regularly for work, so that’s not something I could give up. But I do have some months subscriptions to some other services that I really don’t need. By cutting those out, I save almost $50 more.

That means I potentially have nearly $200 extra to put to better use, and I didn’t even look at how much I spend on eating out for dinner or on just shopping. One step at a time y’all!

So if I save $200 a month for 4 months, I’ll have an additional $800 to put toward something. This combined with my regular savings will put me in a good position to reduce my credit card debt more quickly, which in turn will help me pay off my student loans faster.

Once I pay off the credit cards, I’ll have almost $500 a month to put elsewhere. That plus my $200 savings from spending during work hours is nearly $700 extra I can put toward my student loans each month. That’s half of what I will already be paying. And if I keep putting money into my regular savings...that’s even more. I could potentially reduce my payment time by YEARS and finally really start saving money for better things.

Financial freedom is something I never thought I could attain. But Cait’s book made me feel that it WAS possible, I just had to make it a priority. It was odd to realize that with as much anxiety as I had about repaying all my debt, I haven’t really been taking a lot of steps toward lessening my anxiety. But my making it a priority, not in terms of worrying but in terms of taking action, I have already lessened by burden significantly.

Usually when I do challenges like this, I lose motivation. But this is something I feel good about deep in my bones. And not only that, it’s easily doable. I’m not upping my savings significantly. I’m not even banning shopping like Cait did or cutting back on my eating habits (although I imagine this will start to happen organically once I’m really saving and realize how frivolous it is). I’m only cutting out unnecessary spending during work hours. That’s it.

Anyway I don’t think anyone will have read this all the way through, but if anyone has, thank you! I’m gonna try to post sometimes and talk about how it’s going :)

#year of less #my year of less #savings #personal

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lala-baby · 4 years

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just to keep track of this

verbal

insulting things she knew I liked or was insecure about as a “joke”, especially my body

constantly insulting my intelligence and saying that she’s never met anyone as stupid as me, including saying that nobody else did things I did (e.g choking on spit occasionally)

speaking to me in a demeaning way (“go be a good little bitch and do X” “you can give me £xx for that since you’re using it” “know your place, bitch”)

Angrily criticizing me for things that weren’t my fault (and in a lot of cases were actually her fault)

telling me she doesn’t want control of me despite her actions completely contradicting that

calling me a nympho if i showed any kind of sexual interest, and occasionally telling other people that i was to try to embarrass me (like veda/stacey)

yelling at me for petty things like if I got water on the worktop after washing up

calling me a man or saying I was manly to me/others, or referring to me as a troll or a hog

saying i was too sensitive if i said i didnt like her shouting at me/calling me names etc and she was just being “brutally honest” because i wouldnt listen to her otherwise

calling me a narcissist

calling me arrogant if i didnt listen/disagreed with her

saying i had selective hearing when i genuinely didnt hear her say something (she may not even have said it and just been fucking with me)

bringing up ancient grievances at every opportunity (e.g when i gently tried to suggest that she might be a hypochondriac because its not normal to constantly want to go to the hospital)

making threats about hitting me if i did something she didnt like

shouting at me for crying if she’d upset me

deliberately saying nonsensical shit to win arguments since it cant be argued with (word salad)

having to win at absolutely everything and generally being adversarial

telling me that i can do things/that she wont stop me but then getting jealous and angry making it too difficult to continue

calling me arrogant and saying i was deliberately ignoring her if i didnt hear her because i was concentrating on something on my phone, usually followed by threatening to smash it

Telling me I was a cunt

Being deliberately transphobic to try and upset me

Saying my haircut made me look like I had downes syndrome

physical

hitting me for fun and then telling me it didn’t hurt and I was a pussy, even if bruises formed afterwards and were pointed out to her (she just continued to deny doing it or laughed at me)

holding me down and forcing medication into my mouth, giving me a panic attack so severe she thought i was having an anaphalactic reaction and called 999

Forcing me to drink herbal cough medicine that tasted vile because she said it was the only one that worked for me, even when I didn't really have a cough

using her security training to restrain me for no good reason other than to demonstrate her strength, while telling me I was weak

not allowing me to, or making it too difficult for me to make my own food choices leading to me putting on a huge amount of weight

controlling my medication/using it as an excuse to gaslight me (“these meds are making you act like a cunt, im taking you to get them changed” if I said no or disagreed with her, dictating when i took them/what dose i took, telling me certain medications wouldnt work for me because they didnt work for her and that the prescriber didnt know what they were talking about)

picking her stank-ass belly button and holding me down and forcing her fingers up my nose (what the fuck)

biting me hard enough to leave marks

controlling when i was allowed to sleep and getting angry and calling me lazy if i was tired, but also often waking me up throughout the night insisting that i was snoring and had to turn over /go sleep on the couch

forcing me to sleep under a duvet even though i sleep badly with them and making a big fuss if i refused

“jokingly” burning me with a lighter (though not inflicting actual burns)

Sitting on me to the point of restricting my airways

Pulling my hair

sexual

holding me down and sucking/biting my neck painfully hard even when I was yelling at her to get off of me and had warned her beforehand not to do that because i hated it and it hurt me (and insisting that it wasn’t hurting me, then mocking me/being angry afterwards)

deliberately giving me love bites against my will in places i couldn’t hide them, especially if i was due to see my family to try to embarrass me

telling me that it was my own fault for not being relaxed enough if I wanted to stop penetration because it was hurting and continuing despite my discomfort; getting angry/frustrated if I continued to say no/still didnt enjoy it to the point where i had to wait until I couldn't take it any more to get her to stop

saying that the reason I couldn’t orgasm from sex with her was because I masturbated too much and “banning” me from it for months at a time, then accusing me of not following orders and lying to her if i still couldnt orgasm

putting me on a “sex ban” if I didn’t do what she wanted in day to day life

saying inappropriate things to others, including my parents, alluding to our sex life

having inappropriate conversations about my body with the elderly man we were caring for in front of me, despite knowing that he had sexually assaulted me in the past

angrily insisting that she knew what she was doing and I didn’t have to tell her if I tried to communicate about how things felt

insisting that she had brought me to orgasm when she hadn’t, and that she knew because she could “taste the difference” and I must just not have felt it because my body didn’t work right, to the point that I believed her and thought there was just something wrong with me

insisting that “all /none of the other girls I’ve been with were like that” to try and guilt me about things I had no control over (genital appearance etc)

financial

making me spend the weekends (friday to monday) with her but complaining that I used all her electric/water/etc. when challenged about how much it was actually costing she said i didn’t know anything about how much things cost because “mummy and daddy had always paid everything for me”, and wouldn’t stop being nasty/aggressive until I gave in

making me buy her food shopping with my savings /using my savings as a free resource to be dipped in to at any time when she had spent her own money

making me buy her things or contribute towards buying things for her flat (hundreds regularly) through guilt /empty promises of repayment/getting me stuff when i moved out

telling me that I only give a shit about money and that I’m obsessed with it if I tried to say no to any financial demands

pressuring me to pay for holidays for us on the understanding that she would provide the spending money, but using her benefits payment instead of saving up for it so I ended up having to give her more money after the holiday so she could still eat/pay bills

not bothering to pay her bills/debts, knowing that it would worry me and that i would end up paying them off for her

buying me presents I didn’t want or need as a way to control me (either through guilt or just buying me things like tracksuits that she knew i didnt want to wear but would feel obligated to because she wanted to control how i dressed), but then getting the money off of me for them to pay for her bills etc as she had run out

becoming angry if I tried to donate anything she had bought for me, including things like children’s toys that she insisted I needed for my “autism”

pressuring me to buy ostentatious gifts (e.g nintendo switch, televisions) for her niece and nephew, usually in the range of hundred of pounds, and then taking credit for it as if she had spent her own money (her justification for this was that she had already spent all of her own money on presents /food /etc for me)

refusing to save/claiming she couldnt save and was “happy as long as she had a fiver in her pocket” because money didnt matter to her, to the point that she had no savings and my family and i had to help her buy furniture etc for her flat

psychological/emotional

being nasty about aspects of my appearance until I gave in and changed it (e.g piercings, hair)

pretending that she had no control over her temper, to the point that she claimed to have “blackouts” of rage where she would come round having seriously injured someone but have no memory of it

telling me it was creepy that I kept my pets ashes and threatening to get rid of them/saying i wasnt bringing them with me when i moved in with her

accusing me off loving my pets more than I loved her, despite causing me to be unable to bond with them properly due to the constant stress I was under

telling other people embarrassing /personal things about me that she found funny, usually in front of me, to try and embarrass me

smugly telling me “I know you better than you know yourself” at every opportunity and generally eroding my sense of self

belittling my likes /interests and replacing them with what she wanted me to like /be interested in - everything from clothes to food to shower gel to music to who I was friends with

trying to convince me to use sperm donated from a fucking facebook page like some kind of insane person

planning to use me to have a child and then send me off to work so she could stay at home on her arse for the rest of her life but framing it as “you can go have a career and ill take care of the baby :)”

accusing me of cheating on her constantly with anyone she perceived as a threat to my obedience (e.g regan, sophie), despite her being the one constantly texting her exes (which i never had a problem with because i trusted her for some goddamn reason)

not allowing me to make friends with anyone she didn’t like and lying to me about them/their motivations to turn me off of them (she claimed to be a good judge of character) - again, regan and sophie

lying constantly in general but making it so that disagreeing with her or calling bullshit would make my life hell and it would get brought up weeks or months down the line

constantly telling me my breath stank (nobody else has ever said that and my dentist literally said my teeth are perfect last time i went), claiming it was because i only drank water and that wouldnt hydrate me (????) and constantly forcing me to drink tea or lucozade (neither of which i would drink given the choice) in large quantities

constantly talking about her work history and forensic history with a sense of pride(assault with intent, gbh, abh, criminal damage, etc etc) and about how badly she’d hurt people in the past, I think to leave me in no doubt as to her capabilities

warping my perception of reality by aggressively denying that things had/hadn’t happened, to the point that I didn’t know what was real and became dependent on her to tell me

using love as a means of control (“you’re meant to love me, I’m your girlfriend” if I tried to assert boundaries/did anything she perceived as insubordinate etc)

bagging up any belongings (except the stuff she wanted to keep for herself) I had at her flat and saying we were over and to come get my shit if I wasn’t obeying her enough

getting suspicious/irritated if I tried to take a bath or use the toilet with the door closed

constantly accusing me of hiding things from her

forcing me to strip naked to allow her to check my body for evidence of self harm

making me use her dirty bath water if I needed one, to “save water” (despite already taking money from me for the water bill)

trying to make me suspicious of the mental health professionals in charge of my care and make them seem untrustworthy or that their opinion was worthless (e.g saying they were wrong about my Dx, therapy won’t work for me, “you don’t have to do every little thing your care coordinator tell you to do it’s just SUGGESTIONS, they’re just trying to control you” etc)

insisting on coming to all my appointments with me so i didnt get to speak to anyone on my own

trying to control my family relationships, e.g making me phone my parents but ensuring that she was there to witness whatever was said, to the point that my family were afraid to voice their concerns about the relationship in case i cut contact with them

constantly posting cringey “romantic” bullshit on Facebook, including buying flowers etc for the sole purpose of showing off what a great girlfriend she was, and becoming angry if I didn’t respond in exactly the right way (not enough kisses etc) for “making her look a cunt ”

getting her niece and nephew to call me auntie lauren and constantly referring to me as her wife from only a few months into the relationship so that i would feel more committed than i was and less able to leave

blaming me and getting angry if the flowers she bought me died too early

getting angry if I didn’t sleep with the multitude of teddies she’d brought me/have them on display at all times and angrily demanding to know why she had wasted her money

constantly telling me that I was doing the things she had to me to do like an idiot, e. g hanging up washing, and taking it down and redoing it in a way that was not discernibly different

always threatening to break up with me if I didn’t toe the line, saying there was no point in us being together and that she didnt need me and wouldnt miss me, and that shed finally have less stress and a tidy flat

saying i was hard work and belittling my intelligence if i asked her how she wanted me to do one of the really specific chores she would make me do

badly neglecting her fish by not performing water changes or removing dead fish to the point that they would literally all die before going out and getting a load more, but not letting me care for them instead despite me pleading her and buying things to make it easier for her to do (e.g an expensive water testing kit that would have lasted her years); getting angry at me if i went behind her back to try to care for them by waking up early to do a water change etc and accusing me of being a smartarse for thinking i knew more about fish than she did when i literally studied animal management at college and actually did know more than her

using me like a slave to clean up her flat/do her washing up/take her mountains of rubbish out by angrily telling me that I had made the mess the previous weekend so she had left it waiting for me (this eventually lead to her having nearly 30 bags of months old rain soaked waste on her balcony one winter that she made me take down myself because “the rubbish is YOUR job and it’s your rubbish too, Ive only ever asked you to do one thing for me and you’re so lazy you won’t even do that blah blah blah”)

telling me to do important things “later” in a way that was framed as her being nice but was actually just more convenient for her /she knew would result in the thing not getting done because she didnt want me doing it

repeatedly breaking my toilet in Nelson House by insisting on flushing her tampons down sand saying that thats what you’re supposed to do, to the point that the toilet was eventually removed, then telling everyone I broke it by having a big shit. as sharing toilets was a mental health difficulty for me I had to suffer for months before being able to move rooms because of this

washing one of my outfits in with her own washing, acting all nice and then later saying that because she had done that for me I had to do a mountain of housework for her

making me go to a&e with her constantly (multiple times a week sometimes) and getting very angry at me if I tried to point out that she didn’t need to go; expecting me to go along with whatever lies she told people about what happened (e.g saying her blood pressure was extremely high and dangerous when it had come back completely normal)

forcing me to spend the weekends at her flat whether I wanted to or not, to the extent that my housing benefit and tenancy at nelson house was put at risk

alternately praising and demeaning my support worker depending on what she had advised me about our relationship (she was leas friend/flying monkey and would switch between saying lea was abusing me and that she was good for me)

making false accusations to the police and sanctuary about me “watching videos of babies being raped” on the darkweb in an attempt to get me to kill myself because i was starting to break away from her control

breaking up with me because i sent someone she didnt like a text after being banned from talking to her all weekend

banning me from talking to people and constantly checking to see if i was or not

taking an “overdose” (it was 25mg of diazepam lol) to try and get me to go crawling back to her

saying that I snored and forcing me to use all kinds of expensive and extremely uncomfortable anti snoring medication /devices, and then usually waking me up in the middle of the night and kicking me out anyway (but getting offended if i suggested sleeping separately from the start)

acting indifferent to my presence and alternating between saying she loved me and that she didn’t need me and wouldn’t miss me if i was gone

forcing me to disclose traumatic things even if I said i wasn’t comfortable speaking to her about it (guilt trips), and then using those things against me/miraculously having the same thing happen to her but ten times worse

gossiping about me with one of my support workers and using that support workers opinion to give legitimacy to her attempts to control my decisions

making me sleep next to the open bedroom door (in her usual spot) when i was unwell despite knowing it terrified me

blaming my behavior on diagnosis she had given me herself (“it’s your autism/bipolar” etc) and insisting i didnt have bpd because “thats just what they diagnose you with when they dont know what to do with you”

making me give her massages/wash her hair and body/squeeze her back spots/shave her legs /cut her toenails for her more or less every night and getting aggressive/sulking if i didnt want to

blaming physical ailments (that she demonstrably didn’t have and who’s severity /presentation changed on a very convenient basis) as an excuse to make me do things for her

putting me under huge amounts of pressure to perform “correctly” for her at all times or be harshly berated, ultimately driving me to attempt suicide several times because there was no escape from her nastiness

telling me that her family didn’t like me /disapproved of our relationship if she couldn’t get her own way and saying they wanted her to leave me because I was x y or z

Repeatedly telling a story about her dad (who has a violent history and had been in prison for attempted murder) threatening to burn down an ex girlfriends workplace and finding it hilarious that her ex was too scared to go to work for weeks

dismissing my concerns about anything as not a big deal or getting angry about me bringing them up, even serious things (e.g a sexual assault)

deliberately provoking me when I had told her to stop because my mental health was bad and i didnt feel able to control my reactions, because she enjoyed the drama /going to the hospital /getting attention from playing the long suffering loyal girlfriend role

only ever treating me with kindness if I had made a suicide attempt/done something dangerous to myself, and then using that against me later (”you put me through hell and im still always there for you so why cant you x y or z”)

blaming her being “in crisis” on me/my poor mental health (and not even being in crisis to begin with)

never saying sorry for hurting me, ever, even when proven “wrong” about something in front of impartial third party who insisted she should apologize for it

getting angry at me for googling any of the ridiculous things she said if I wasn’t sure it was accurate

making me go to a&e/doctors /mental health team when I didn’t want or need to be there because she enjoyed the attention she received as my partner

being angry at me for bring “constantly” on my phone and accusing me of texting other people instead of paying attention to her/whatever was on tv

getting angry if I didn’t want to watch whatever she was watching on tv (she would still be watching it but would get angry if I didn’t pay enough attention)

constantly trying to one-up me with her mental health/dismiss my concerns about how i was feeling and calling me self-centered because she had everything so much worse but was still “getting on with it”

demanding that i always answer the phone to her, and calling multiple times a day to keep tabs on me, usually keeping me talking for 2-3 hours daily whenever i wasnt staying at hers. it got to the point that it was pointless for me to try to do anything because i would start and then she would interrupt. if i didnt answer she would continually call the office claiming to be worried about me

trying to stop me from drinking, going to the extent of telling my parents she thought i had a drinking problem (i objectively didnt) because she didnt want me to spend time with a housemate she was jealous of because we actually had fun

expecting me to drop everything even when I was unwell to help care for an elderly man (who at one point sexually assaulted me), including regularly cleaning up urine/feces from the walls/floor because she didnt want to do that part, despite me saying that we werent trained and didnt have the correct ppe, and if we kept going above and beyond for him social services werent going to put a proper care plan in place for him. includes countless hours at hospital etc

buying me a shirt with a a swear word printed prominently on it and getting angry when I said it would be inappropriate to wear to a care home in case they kicked me out, and forcing me to do it anyway because she wanted brian (old man) to see it

lying about the value of gifts she’d brought me as a means of control/guilt (e.g earrings that she’d told me were £60, getting angry when i accidentally damaged one but when i went to get one fixed the guy said they weren’t worth more than £10 and would cost more to repair than replace)

insisting she couldn’t wait to rehome our cats (and taking the money for them despite the fact that i paid for them and their stuff) and giving them to a stranger despite knowing it would be a matter of weeks before i would be in a position to take them myself, because she couldn’t be bothered to look after them

deciding that we were getting guinea pigs (i wanted something else) and saying that caring for them would be split equally with one belonging to her and one to me, and that she would take them with her when she moved out, but only ever cleaning them once and then leaving me to care for them exclusively

complaining and calling me needy whenever i tried to show any kind of affection

accusing me of not trusting her when i did implicitly like an idiot

blaming all the problems in the relationship on me and whenever i brought up something that was upsetting me telling me that i did it to her too but worse

taking credit for me “getting gobby”/becoming less introverted and saying she was a good influence on me, despite having nothing to do with it (and that not being true, I was just settling in to the house)

having to sit in darkness because she wouldn’t let me open the blinds because she said having them open would damage her tv

if i was ever angry/irritated saying i was “hangry” and taking the piss, encouraging me to comfort eat and then acting smug when it calmed me down

saying that she hopes my friend dies and that she deserves to die when she was in a coma

trying to turn a mutual friend against me after she broke up with me, to the point that the friend refused to repeat what she'd said but told me she was dangerous and to stay away from her

expecting me to drop everything and make her cups of tea whenever she wanted, and making me remake them if they weren’t perfect /getting angry if I said i was busy

particularly saying i had to remake tea because it tasted like soap because i hadnt washed her cup up properly (she would use the same mugs continually until they were absolutely filthy and then leave me to wash them when i was there), often after I definitely had washed them properly but she just wanted to keep me in my place

playing on my fears (of guilt, abandonment etc)

convincing me to change my mind about what i wanted through compliments etc (e.g saying i looked much better wearing whatever she wanted me to wear)

expecting me to know what she wanted at all times without being asked and generally to be able to read her mind, and getting angry and claiming that i should know what she wanted because i was her girlfriend and that she always knew what i wanted and did everything for me blah blah blah

getting angry when i suggested couples therapy and saying it would be pointless because i would just blame everything on her

accusing me of “thundering around” and having heavy footsteps when i was just walking normally so I got so paranoid i had to tiptoe everywhere

refusing to clean up to the point that she got cockroaches, then refusing to acknowledge that it was because she kept leaving dirty dishes etc out and blaming it on her neighbours or on me, and then refusing to do anything about it so i had to pay for the poison and put it out repeatedly etc and make sure I cleaned up after her every time I came over so they wouldn't keep coming back

getting extremely frustrated when trying to accomplish simple tasks (usually diy related) but getting really angry and me when i offered help and accusing me of thinking she was an idiot (she was being an idiot a lot of the time, not reading instructions/using powertools in dangerous ways etc). it was scary and she would sometimes break things that i had bought out of frustration if she couldnt get them to work right (the cat cage & ball track toy for example)

refusing to prepare at all for when she moved out of nelson house so i had to do it, and then refusing to unpack her stuff at the other end in the hope that i would do that too

refusing to let me report an incidence of child abuse that happened in a neighbouring flat to hers because she was friends with the father and said the child deserved it

refusing to let me take the bus at times (she did pay for taxis for me but given the amount of money she took from me i might as well have been paying for them) even when i wanted to and acting like by not giving me a choice she was doing me a favour. in retrospect i think she wanted to know that i was going straight home

always asking me where i was, who i was with and sometimes accusing me of lying about it, either way trying to make my life hell

trying to encourage me to stay on my own and ignore my housemates but phrasing it in a cutesy way (just make a cup of tea and shut your door and have a nice night to yourself without any drama) so it sounded less like she was trying to be controlling

ringing me every night to confirm that i was in bed when i said i would be and making me video call her if she didnt believe me

telling me gossip about mutual friends that wasnt even true because she loved the drama (e.g saying venetias children had died because they had been born deformed)

constantly slagging off her exes and telling fantastical stories about how they broke up/stalked her/abandoned her/abused her and about the triumphant ways she got back at them

generally always telling incredibly unbelievable stories that made her look either “good” (e.g “taking down a squaddie in front of his mates”, sleeping with a nurse while both on duty) or made her out to be the illest (claiming to have had a psychotic break, coughing up a kidney stone)

virtue signalling with brian while also being controlling towards him/explaining things to him in a way that he would do what she wanted/saying “oh he won’t mind, he’d tell us to do it if he were here” when she used his card to buy us lunch etc (yeah he probably would have but that isnt the point)

getting angry if i ever discussed our relationship with anyone else, saying it was none of their business/i was trying to make her look like a cunt; telling me not to tell anyone after she did horrible things

promising things about the future and then never delivering any of it

saying that she wouldnt be the one carrying our children, trying to tell me that getting sperm from facebook was safe and generally treating me like a walking uterus

ending lies/false promises with “you know i will/do/am” to try and enforce to me that she was telling the truth

telling me to cancel holidays id paid for/not come over/generally throwing her toys out of the pram when she couldnt get her own way

forcing me to watch murder documentaries, usually about women being murdered by their partners, and getting way too in to it in a way that was a bit creepy

telling me my menstrual cup was disgusting and trying to force me to use tampons instead

making a big fuss about how she used to ~be an alcoholic~ and that she cant drink because it makes her a nasty person, and then buying a load of beer and vodka when the relationship wasnt going well and saying shed fallen off of the wagon because of me

constantly telling me i had BO to the point i was really paranoid (nobody else has ever said anything about it)

bullying me into letting her smoke in my room

throwing her rubbish on to my floor constantly because she was too lazy to pick it up, so i had to

constantly talking about how against domestic violence she was, saying she'd never hit a woman and how she had been a victim of it to make me think what she was doing wasnt abuse

doing small things for me that I found difficult because of my mental health (e. g phone calls) and then holding it over my head

telling me that i was incapable of love, and that the only person i loved was myself because of how selfish i am

deliberately killing two bees that I was enjoying watching by stomping them into the pavement then laughing at me when I was upset about it

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kiritheyoungblue · 7 years

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Nothing like staying up past 3 am dealing with day-long mental breakdown over finances.

The entire thing was triggered by me going to campus and forgetting to prep lunch. Which meant that by lunchtime, I was hungry, and then didn’t want to spend money getting lunch... but I wouldn’t get home until like 6 pm, and I had rehearsal to deal with in the meantime.

Cue me looking at my finances, realizing that because my job isn’t super stable, I might not make enough to pay rent once I move, knowing that I can’t add more hours because that’s the maximum I can handle without going insane, then looking up other ways to make income somehow with what resources I have available, also cue severe bitterness at my family, finally give in and get a cheap lunch... (all before rehearsal!)

This whole situation has made me extremely angry and bitter. Long story short, my parents basically made some very, very bad financial decisions, which they refused to tell any of us about until my sister managed to tease it out of my dad, and the consequences of this are screwing up my life.

It’s entirely out of my control, my parents put me in this situation, and the only thing I can do is find a cheaper place to live (in a city where average rent for a studio is around $1300) and basically live in poverty.

I’m trying to figure out how to live on $50 a month for food (boyfriend says aim for $100). I’m already planning to sell a bunch of my stuff. I’ve already considered giving up my dog to friends for the next two years as a last resort (got some very vehement ‘NO’s from my parents when I told them this). I’m probably dropping my FFXIV sub. I’m not happy about any of this.

I know I’ll need roommates; unfortunately, I have a mild PTSD thing from growing up that makes me get insanely anxious around roommates if I didn’t previously know them, and I’m always scared of someone bursting in through the door in a furious rage. (I know it’s illogical, but it’s one of those PTSD things that I don’t think is ever going to go away at this point). This is honestly the whole reason why I try to live alone, which I know is a luxury. But I’m not going to have a choice, even though my mental health is going to be severely affected.

And that’s where I’m getting worried too - I am horrible at separating my emotional state from work or music. Hell, I’m probably not sleeping at this point. I know my mental health will suffer, knowing that I can’t afford attendance at any music festivals or major competitions, knowing that my family doesn’t support my leap towards music, knowing that there are so many opportunities and activities that I really enjoy that I have to drop because I won’t have time (because I’m working) or because I can’t afford them... music is going to suffer. This is going to be a very rough year.

I can’t ask my parents for help because I don’t trust them anymore. I certainly can’t ask my sister (the one who makes six figures) because her answer will be “You’re an adult, deal with it”. Yes, I’m an adult. It means I’m in a different stage of life than all the undergrads I’m surrounded by. I can’t spend all day and night on campus because all my tools are at home, my PC is at home, and my dog, whom I take care of, is at home. It also means that I’m getting jack shit in financial support for school from my family; I’m going off my own savings and any scholarships/loans I have.

And I am pissed. My parents basically used me for a financial deal (that didn’t work out), in exchange for paying for my housing while I was in school (which they’re dropping). They also felt a need to ensure that I wasn’t in a cozy 100 sqft place; I had to be in a proper apartment, so they moved me. Now they’re in debt due to the myriad of bad financial decisions the last couple years, my sister is partially blaming me, and I’m sorry, I just wanted to restart my damn career into something I cared deeply about, and was paying my own way and was independent for 7 months before they butted in?

I want them to know that I’m upset, bitter, and angry. My sister’s basically getting no contact from me other than occasional blunt, bitter answers. They don’t care about my pursuit of a musical career? They don’t have to know. They don’t have to know that I’m entering the concerto competition, they don’t have to know that I got accepted into the composition program. I’ll just focus on surviving. Because that’s really all I can do at this point. That and letting them know that I am very angry at them.

Really, the only thing I don’t regret about accepting my parents’ offer two years ago is that I was able to rescue my dog from them. I won’t go into details, but my mom was putting her own paranoia above my dog’s well being; by the time I took him from them, he was covered in rashes, scabs, and blood, and my mom was justifying it all under the guise of ‘not getting bugs’. He’s fine now. I refuse to give him back. I’m honestly scared to think about what his condition might be now if I hadn’t taken him.

At least I have friends who’ve taken care of him before and really love him, in the case that I can’t afford to keep him.

I’m angry at my family. I’m in a stressful situation, I have to move (again - 6th time in 3 years), finances are shitty, and all those opportunities I was really excited about when I was at the harp colony? Axed, because I won’t be able to afford them any more. And no, the family doesn’t care about those.

If anything though, at least I’ll be free from their financial drama, even if I’m literally living the starving artist lifestyle. I think that’s about the only upside to this whole situation.

#personal #been a while since the last rant post

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baby-onthe-brain · 5 years

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Affording Baby

Originally Posted 12 March 2018

I’m not going to lie… This is the part that scares me the most. I’ve never been affluent, and there’s only one period in my life where I’ve been well off — a three-year stretch when I was a child myself. The topic of finances isn’t a comfortable one for me, and I’m routinely embittered about all the folks who seemingly have more than I do.

Not necessarily material things, but also the experiences that financial freedom often grants. Things like routine travel expeditions, or not having to worry about going over your grocery budget and the successive awkwardness of having to ask the cashier to take some items off the bill. I’m trying to get better about it, especially since Rhys brought up a little while ago just how often I voice my opinions on it, but it’s still there in the back of my mind. I’m working on it.

I will not the first (nor will I be the last) to say that having kids is expensive. Really, really expensive. Children are a 20-year investment or longer, and you’d best be ready for the long haul (especially if the economy keeps going the way it is). Which is why when you’re actually planning for a baby, it’s a good idea to make sure you can actually afford one. Or two.

Or three. You know how it goes.

Now, I’m sure that you’re aware of the procession of mommy blogs out there that tell you “how to financially plan for a baby in 5 easy steps.” While these blogs are often repetitive and from an upper-middle-class perspective, they do have some useful advice. Some of the stuff I have to laugh at, like cutting down on routine unnecessary purchases (like mall trips or lattes) and setting that aside into a baby fund instead. Other stuff, though… That stuff is good.

One of the things that I’ve really taken to heart from my research is to accumulate essential baby things slowly over an extended amount of time. It would scar up anybody’s finances if you suddenly had to jam outfitting an entire nursery plus stock up food, and clothing, and diapers, and every other necessity under the sun into less than a year’s worth of paycheques. Getting the job done slowly ensures that you can do a little at a time, without the side effect of wincing whenever you see your bank statement. Well… As much, anyway.

I’ve been accumulating in earnest for a while now, and have been happy to discover that most of it can be gotten second-hand. This cuts down on costs incredibly, and I can help to reuse items that still have a good lifespan to them. Most of these financially-savvy mamas also recommend asking your friends and family for hand-me-downs, which I fully intend to do once I actually have a due date. Keep in mind that a baby shower, if you’re going to have one, will also help you accumulate smaller stuff. A friend of mine said that she didn’t have to worry about getting baby clothes because she’d gotten a whole stock of them as gifts. Score!

There is, of course, the necessity of actually looking at your finances. As I mentioned earlier, this is one of the scary parts for me. Rhys and I don’t exactly live in the lap of luxury; while we are comfortable, it’s an uneasy comfort that comes from a lot of organisation and budgeting. This is something we’ve earnestly taken to in recent months, revising our budget and figuring out down to the (useless) penny where our money is going and when. This new budget is still in its early stages, but it’s so far been helping immensely in making sure we can stay afloat and still get where we need to go.

One of the things that baby prep resources across the board (mommy blogs, books, web-based resources, etc.) have asserted is that you must reduce debt as much as possible. This to me is a no-brainer, but one that becomes rather difficult when you’re saddled with student loans you can’t pay out. My advice is to pay the smallest debt off first and work your way up. If you have a credit card, or somebody loaned you money, get those paid off first. Then, when you’ve gotten them out of the way, move the money you’ve been using to pay those off to the next smallest payment.

Of course, this entirely depends on how much you make, how much debt you have, and a whole slew of other things. I’m not a financial advisor by any means, so if you’re really in trouble financially, seek out help! There are hundreds of debt consolidation and consultation businesses available to you. For example, both Rhys and I are in the process of repayment assistance for our student loans, which means we don’t have to think about them right now. We wouldn’t be able to do anything about it anyway, but it’s nice to know that we’re not being thrown under the bus because we couldn't pay for our educations out of pocket.

One of the things that the baby prep book I’m reading (Rachel Pepper’s Ultimate Guide to Pregnancy for Lesbians) brought up is all the legal stuff you don’t really think about. Admittedly, I completely forgot to factor in stuff like wills, life insurance, and RESPs. Well… No, okay that’s a lie. I’ve had it in my head for years that the moment I conceive, I am going to open an RESP account for my baby. I don’t want them to have to suffer through student loans if I can help it. But, in the grand scheme of things when you’re already worrying about the money you’ll be spending on your little one in the coming months… Well. It’s a kick in the butt.

Thinking about things like your baby’s education when they’re not even born yet, or whether they’ll be able to get by if anything ever happens to you unexpectedly can be a bit of a stretch… But a necessary one. The book I mentioned before stresses how wills especially are important for LGBTQA+ couples, or other couples who underwent ART. The will is a legally binding document that makes your wishes known, and will hold up better in court, should the need arise, than a co-parenting agreement or a known-donor agreement. This is fundamental if you want your partner to have custody of your little one in the event of your passing, especially if they’re not on the birth certificate. Rhys and I have thought about what would happen, should our little one be left stranded without both of us. Not concretely, mind you, but we’ve at least broached the subject.

Wow, this post has turned way more into one of those mommy blog posts than I was expecting it to. Apologies, if that’s not what you were looking for!

Back to the topic, in general, though… I’m not going to say that if you follow the steps I listed above, or any steps found online or in books, that you’ll be completely financially prepared. If there’s anything working in childcare has taught me, it’s that kids throw curveballs just by existing. There will be moments where you’re wholly unprepared for a situation, and just need to roll with it. Doing what you can now will help take the strain off for sure, but don’t freak out if you haven’t paid off all your debt, or if you haven’t saved as much as you wanted. Life happens. Shit happens. It’ll be okay. Do what you can.

I think that one of the reasons why I even started writing this blog post, is because I’ve been coming up against a lot of doubt from myself and others recently. Working out the budget I mentioned earlier scared me shitless about how we were supposed to afford a baby with all the other stuff on top of it. In addition to that, when I asked a “friend” whether I should set up a crowdfunding button to go on this blog to help with the added cost of ART, she came back with a rather judgemental: “If you can’t come up with an extra $2000 for that,” (HA! If only it cost just $2000….) “then should you really be having kids?”

Ouch. Right to the heart of my anxieties. Thanks, I needed that. Please take your entitled, unknowledgeable ass right out of my house. Don’t let the door hit you on your way out. It’s not like I haven’t thought about this for DAYS on end and stretched and thought and researched…. No, I’m not like that at all.

I should have known better, to be honest. This particular “friend” has no interest in having children herself or being around them for extended periods of time. She has frequently been seen rolling her eyes at all my preparatory excitement, and giving me long looks that essentially said: “oh my god this again?” Her comment really tore into me, though, like a good cat-scratch, and I find myself still thinking about it. I know exactly where I stand socioeconomically, and I know at least generally how difficult it’s going to be, raising a child. There are tons of considerations I’ve already discovered, and tons more that I haven’t even thought of. But if I’m going to let my financial situation forestall my desire to be a mother, do I really deserve to be one? Situations can change.

One of my favourite romance movies of all time, P.S. I Love You has this really exceptional scene in it that I’ve kept with me since seeing it the first time. Granted, the whole movie is about losing a loved one (spoilers?), but it doesn’t start like that. I’ve been thinking about it more and more, and it’s acted like a sort of balm against some of the bile coming from doubters, including my own anxiety.

It’s the opening scene, and Holly (Hilary Swank) is mad at her husband Gerry (Gerard Butler) because of something he’d said during dinner with Holly’s mother (Kathy Bates). Finally, it comes out that Holly is mad at Gerry because he said she didn’t want children right then (along with a slew of other semi-related issues). The scene shows that Holly is a planner, and a worrier, and frequently gets inside her own head and lets her anxieties get the better of her, and I feel that, girl. The whole opening scene is so relatable and almost perfectly voices my anxieties about preparing for a baby. What sticks with me most is what Gerry says though:

“People have babies with no money all the time…. We’re not a mistake just because we don’t have any money.”

You’ve just got to work through it. You’ve got to rely upon one another and support one another, and do what you can. Things will turn out one way or the other (even if you’re not a cute, carefree Irish guy). It may take longer than you want it to, like it will with us, but… You’ll get there. We will too.

Do you have any hacks or saving tips? Have you had similarly unsupportive friends? Let me know in the comments! I’d love to hear from you.

#preconception chronicles #baby prep #finances #financial matters #money matters #little bit of a rant #PS I Love You #hillary swank #gerard butler #pop-culture reference #kathy bates

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preciousmetals0 · 4 years

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Oilers Upset; Nothin’ Streamin’ but Debt

Oilers Upset; Nothin’ Streamin’ but Debt:

Much Ado About Nothing?

For the past several days, Wall Street fretted over plunging oil prices. Well, Wall Street was concerned for a while … the financial media just decided it was finally time to take notice.

In classic financial media form, however, it appears that the hype surrounding negative oil prices actually prompted a near-term bottom. Oil surged more than 30% today, as the practically undeliverable May futures contract cycled out and the June contract rolled in.

A couple of factors drove oil higher today.

First, tensions are once again ratcheting up in the Middle East. After Iranian ships buzzed U.S. Navy ships in the Persian Gulf, President Trump tweeted: “I have instructed the United States Navy to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea.”

Nothing boosts oil prices like rising Middle Eastern tensions.

Second, the U.S. Senate just passed a new $484 billion pandemic relief bill. And to think that I wasn’t stimulated enough this morning!

The new bill allocates about $320 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program — you know, the one that was supposed to help small businesses but ended up going to publicly traded companies like Shake Shack Inc. (NYSE: SHAK) and Ruth’s Hospitality Group Inc. (Nasdaq: RUTH)?

Wall Street’s thinking here is that more stimulus equals a stronger economic recovery, which means more demand for oil — assuming I’ve got my math right here.

So, not to worry. Everything is all hunky-dory now…

The Takeaway:

With crude oil rallying again, it begs the question: Was the oil panic a false alarm?

False alarms are really funny, aren’t they? What if your home, what if your family … what if your dope was on fire?

(Impossible, sir. It’s in Johnson’s underwear.)

Let me answer this as simple as possible: This was no false alarm for oil.

Demand is in the toilet. It won’t come back for months — even if the U.S. economy suddenly reopened tomorrow.

What’s more, investors apparently believe that there will magically be somewhere to put the stuff once June rolls around.

In other words, we’ll likely see another crunch in oil prices when the June futures contract nears expiration.

I’m not predicting negative oil prices again — fool me once, yada yada yada — but there will be another reckoning.

But, Mr. Great Stuff, you said yesterday that there would be “amazing investment opportunities” in oil!

I did, and there will be. But only if you’re patient.

The best thing you can do right now is stay the course and be discerning in your investment strategies.

How you choose to weather the pandemic storm will make all the difference. I mean, you can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice … but you have better things to do with your free will.

When it comes to commodities, Banyan Hill’s own Matt Badiali has the answer. Not only is he a geology genius in his own right, but he led subscribers at his previous research firm through the financial collapse of 2008 … and showed them some exceptional gains.

Matt just released a brand-new interview where he reveals his entire process for finding winning stocks. Like I told you yesterday, these outrageous oil market days are separating the wheat from the chaff in the commodity world. So, Matt’s timing couldn’t be more perfect.

Click here now to see how Matt’s research can help you choose a path that’s clear.

Going: Getting Kinda Heavy

Like the crack of the whip, Snap Inc. (NYSE: SNAP) attacks … front to back.

After reporting Street-beating earnings and revenue, Snap has the power today. The company reported a narrower-than-expected first-quarter loss on revenue that surged 44% to $462.5 million.

But daily user engagement was the real story for Snap. Daily active users rose 20% to 229 million, beating Wall Street’s target. Snap also projected an 18% rise in daily active users in the second quarter. Snapchat usage soared by 30% in the final week of March, the company said, with its Snap Camera app seeing a 30-fold increase in daily downloads.

However, there was a caveat to this otherwise rosy report. According to CEO Evan Spiegel: “While many advertising budgets declined due to COVID-19, we experienced high revenue growth rates in the first two months of the quarter which offset our lower growth in March.”

Did you catch that? “Offset our lower growth in March.”

That’s right. Even Snap is quietly warning that the pandemic could result in lower revenue going forward. While user growth was impressive, investors will want to think hard before chasing SNAP’s 25% rally today.

Going: Hey All You Cool Cats

Netflix Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) just blew Wall Street’s subscriber growth numbers out of the water.

Now, a beat was expected, and analysts steadily lifted their subscriber count estimates over the past month, but the results were somewhat astounding. For the quarter, Netflix added 15.77 million paid subscribers. That’s more than double the company’s own projections for 7 million new subs.

The company downplayed the explosive growth, noting that “progress against the virus will allow governments to lift the home confinement soon.” Because of this, Netflix projects only 7.5 million new subs in the second quarter.

However, Netflix’s financial figures soured the subscriber growth reports. Specifically, earnings missed the consensus estimate by $0.08 per share, and revenue of $5.77 billion was in line with Wall Street’s targets.

What’s more, the company announced it would issue $1 billion in new debt to help fund new content. With Netflix’s credit currently rated about three steps deep into “junk territory” by Moody’s, the new debt drove investor sentiment even lower on NFLX.

The combination of weaker-than-expected subscriber guidance, missed earnings targets and new debt pushed NFLX down about 2% today.

Gone: Max Overdrive

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) is an old-school media company desperately trying to reinvent itself.

For proof, look no further than this morning’s quarterly earnings report. Revenue missed analysts’ targets, and pay-TV subscribers continued to flee. In fact, AT&T shed 897,000 pay-TV subs and 138,000 streaming video subs.

How do you lose streaming subs in a quarantine?

The report’s only bright spots were better-than-expected earnings and growth of 163,000 postpaid wireless phone customers. However, earnings only beat on an adjusted basis, excluding COVID-19’s impact on operations.

That impact? A 12% decline in WarnerMedia revenue, largely due to an advertising drop for CNN and TBS. The NCAA tournament’s cancellation also hit AT&T’s ad revenue hard.

But it’s not all bad…

AT&T finally leveraged all that WarnerMedia content goodness. The company’s new streaming service, HBO Max, will launch on May 27. HBO Max boasts more than 10,000 hours of premium content from both the HBO and Warner Bros. catalogs.

If AT&T handles this launch right, it could help turn things around for the debt-laden pay-TV dinosaur.

Snapchat, Netflix, rogue telecoms trying to get hip … it’s an entertainment exposé today at Great Stuff. But now, we’re passing the remote to you, to mix metaphors.

It’s time for you to spill your guts and speak the truth (and nothing but the truth) in today’s Poll of the Week!

How are you staying entertained during quarantine? Take the poll below and let us know!

(Psst … if you have a hankering to spin the yarn, always feel free to write us an email. You can reach us any time of day or night — you know … because that’s how online communication works. It’s 100% free and always will be, because nothing’s freer than speaking your mind. Once again, that’s [email protected].)

That’s a wrap for today, but remember: You have just one more day for your email to appear in this week’s edition of Reader Feedback! (You know … because that’s how our weekly Reader Feedback features work.)

In the meantime, please do take care of yourself out there, dear reader! We here at Great Stuff sincerely hope you’re hanging in there. You can always catch us on social media: Facebook and Twitter.

Until next time, be Great!

Joseph Hargett

Editor, Great Stuff

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goldira01 · 4 years

Link

Much Ado About Nothing?

For the past several days, Wall Street fretted over plunging oil prices. Well, Wall Street was concerned for a while … the financial media just decided it was finally time to take notice.

A couple of factors drove oil higher today.

Nothing boosts oil prices like rising Middle Eastern tensions.

Second, the U.S. Senate just passed a new $484 billion pandemic relief bill. And to think that I wasn’t stimulated enough this morning!

Wall Street’s thinking here is that more stimulus equals a stronger economic recovery, which means more demand for oil — assuming I’ve got my math right here.

So, not to worry. Everything is all hunky-dory now…

The Takeaway:

With crude oil rallying again, it begs the question: Was the oil panic a false alarm?

False alarms are really funny, aren’t they? What if your home, what if your family … what if your dope was on fire?

(Impossible, sir. It’s in Johnson’s underwear.)

Let me answer this as simple as possible: This was no false alarm for oil.

Demand is in the toilet. It won’t come back for months — even if the U.S. economy suddenly reopened tomorrow.

What’s more, investors apparently believe that there will magically be somewhere to put the stuff once June rolls around.

In other words, we’ll likely see another crunch in oil prices when the June futures contract nears expiration.

I’m not predicting negative oil prices again — fool me once, yada yada yada — but there will be another reckoning.

But, Mr. Great Stuff, you said yesterday that there would be “amazing investment opportunities” in oil!

I did, and there will be. But only if you’re patient.

The best thing you can do right now is stay the course and be discerning in your investment strategies.

How you choose to weather the pandemic storm will make all the difference. I mean, you can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice … but you have better things to do with your free will.

Click here now to see how Matt’s research can help you choose a path that’s clear.

Going: Getting Kinda Heavy

Like the crack of the whip, Snap Inc. (NYSE: SNAP) attacks … front to back.

After reporting Street-beating earnings and revenue, Snap has the power today. The company reported a narrower-than-expected first-quarter loss on revenue that surged 44% to $462.5 million.

Did you catch that? “Offset our lower growth in March.”

Going: Hey All You Cool Cats

Netflix Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX) just blew Wall Street’s subscriber growth numbers out of the water.

The combination of weaker-than-expected subscriber guidance, missed earnings targets and new debt pushed NFLX down about 2% today.

Gone: Max Overdrive

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) is an old-school media company desperately trying to reinvent itself.

How do you lose streaming subs in a quarantine?

That impact? A 12% decline in WarnerMedia revenue, largely due to an advertising drop for CNN and TBS. The NCAA tournament’s cancellation also hit AT&T’s ad revenue hard.

But it’s not all bad…

If AT&T handles this launch right, it could help turn things around for the debt-laden pay-TV dinosaur.

Snapchat, Netflix, rogue telecoms trying to get hip … it’s an entertainment exposé today at Great Stuff. But now, we’re passing the remote to you, to mix metaphors.

It’s time for you to spill your guts and speak the truth (and nothing but the truth) in today’s Poll of the Week!

How are you staying entertained during quarantine? Take the poll below and let us know!

Until next time, be Great!

Joseph Hargett

Editor, Great Stuff

#Timor Invest

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meraenthusiast · 4 years

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The Truth About Debt – The Borrower Is Slave To The Lender

There are many people currently hurting financially during the COVID-19 crisis and most of it can be attributed to debt. The information that my friend, Dr. Brent Lacey shares below is invaluable at times like these during a financial crisis.

I recently had the privilege and honor to sit down and speak with Dr. Brent Lacey who is a gastroenterologist, financial coach, and personal finance blogger over at The Scope of Practice.

Dr. Brent has coached hundreds of families to succeed in eliminating debt, and has spoken to doctor groups all around the country (including the White Coat Investor Conference) on topics related to business and personal finance.

He like me, is debt averse and subscribes to the Dave Ramsey philosophy (from Proverbs 22:7) that The Borrower Is Slave To The Lender.

Here’s the highlights of our conversation:

Dr Brent: So, I got started probably five or six years ago teaching Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University at my church. I initially got asked to just help teach the class and then started teaching it on my own. I eventually expanded and started doing some financial coaching.

That’s what got me to go get certified as a finance coach through the Ramsey team. After coaching several couples and figured that I ought to have someplace where I can write all the stuff down that I can refer people back to and say, “You know what? I wrote an article about this. Why don’t you go read this article? This has got all the information you need.” And that’s kind of how my website, The Scope of Practice was born.

As you’re aware, dentists and physicians come out of school really excellent at our craft but with utterly no idea how to run a successful business.

And part of the mission of The Scope of Practice is to give people the tools and the knowledge that they need in order to do so.

Dr Jeff: What are some of the things that you teach people moving forward after a crisis now that we know that a financial crisis can hit at any time like the COVID-19 crisis?

Particularly those docs and other high-income earners that have gotten used to a certain level of income and living comfortably.

3 Things To Plan For After a Financial Crisis

Dr Brent: Most of us that have lived through the other financial crisis in the past knew that something like this would happen again.

We need to plan for the future, for sure. And I would say three things are really important for physician/dentists.

#1 Living BELOW our means

(editor’s note: This was the #2 our of the 7 lessons we learned from The Richest Man in Babylon)

One of the things I find when I’m coaching folks is that it’s very natural when you get out of training to let your new income cause a jump in your lifestyle that you’re not really ready for.

Because as a doctor, you’ve been in college and medical school/dental school for 10-15 years while holding your breath living as a resident.

Then it happens, we graduate and go from broke to a nice six-figure income overnight.

Now that money is rolling in, we start to enroll kids in private school, buy a Tesla, doctor house, boat and jet skis even though we have a half of million in student loan debt to deal with.

Remember that the borrower is slave to the lender. Except, we don’t think about that too much as we didn’t worry much about it when we were broke so why should we worry about it now?

Buying all of those things above is fine if you’ve got a financial plan that you’re working through. And I think that’s one of the traps that doctors fall into.

This idea that we have student loans or other consumer debt, “Oh, we’ll pay them later. It’s part of life. Everyone’s got it. But we just have to deal with it.”

And it only takes one giant financial crisis, like the COVID-19 crisis, to really unveil the fact that they know they’re living on the edge. And as soon as someone pulls the rug from under you, that’s it.

#2 Emergency reserves

The second thing I would say is not having enough of a cash reserve or an emergency fund. The only thing you can guarantee about emergencies is that they’re going to happen. You just don’t know when.

Examples are:

Need a new set of tires

HVAC system goes out

Water leak that causes flooding

Or you have a big financial crisis that takes out the entire global economy. Who saw that coming, right?

And so having cash reserves of three to six months of expenses allows you to weather these foreseeable storms.

#3 Alternate income streams

The last thing I would say is make sure that you have other income streams instead of only one, the active/earned income.

This could range from passive income coming in from real estate investments or alternate side hustles you can do until things get back to normal.

Dave Ramsey Baby Steps

Dr Jeff: I know, you’re a Dave Ramsey certified coach and subscribe to the phrase that the borrower is slave to the lender. And you also teach the Dave Ramsey 7 Baby Steps.

Could you briefly go over those steps to refresh our memory?

Dr Brent: Sure. So the seven baby steps that they teach with the Dave Ramsey system is this:

1. Save $1000 in an emergency fund

The Total Money Makeover book by Ramsey suggests that before you start paying down debt, save up $1,000 in an emergency fund is a must.

I realize that $1000 isn’t much to cover emergencies long-term, but it gets the ball rolling towards financial freedom.

2. Pay off all consumer debt with the Debt Snowball method

Here’s an overview of the Debt Snowball:

List your debts from smallest to largest

Make the minimum payment on all debts except the smallest one

Throw all extra money toward the smallest debt until it’s paid off

Once that one is done, start with the next on the list

Use the money you were already paying on this debt plus the amount you were throwing at the first one and add the two together

3. Save 3-6 months of expenses in an emergency fund

After you’ve become consumer debt-free, it’s now time to finish funding your account you started in Step 1 earmarked for emergencies.

Dave suggests that you need at least 3 – 6 months of expenses saved but it all depends on your risk tolerance. (Editor’s note: I plan on saving up two years’ worth of expenses now that I feel that a large financial crisis can affect us at any stage of our life.)

4. Invest 15% into retirement accounts

Dave suggests investing 15% of your household income into Roth IRAs and pre-tax retirement plans. Some think 15% is not enough but you have to realize who his target audience is, blue collar workers.

As doctors, try aiming for investing at least 20% or more of your income.

5. Save for children’s college

Dave suggests two ways to save for kid’s college:

Education Savings Account (ESA)

529 Plan

6. Pay off your mortgage early

Baby Step 6 is all about making extra payments towards your home mortgage to pay it off as quickly as possible.

Dave feels that the only type of debt that he is “for,” is a home mortgage, but if you can save up and pay cash, that would be better.

As an interesting side note, I found a doctor that had posted a question in the White Coat Investor Forum about paying cash for a house he was getting ready to purchase.

What caught my eye was the title of the Forum topic: The borrower is slave to the lender

Here’s his post:

Dave Ramsey is correct. I am buying a home (3rd time ) and my spouse and i are good savers. I have enough to pay cash for the house, but this money is in vanguard stock index funds and we would pay 20% long-term capital gains tax (LTCG) on any gains and tack a huge tax hit if we pay cash, so we applied for a mortgage.

Both with near perfect credit, zero debt and a large net worth. Mortgage brokers and their team seem to have zero functioning neurons. 🙂

Tons of crap to sign.

Tons of data requested.

Tons of asinine questions

Some are: “where did this deposit into vanguard for 80k come from?” When i answer: that deposit was from my savings account. they say: “we need a paper trail, can you send documents.“

I said: listen, here is my vanguard statement, we have zero debt and enough to pay cash for this house, the only reason we are getting a mortgage is because we want to save in long term capital gain taxes; you guys have zero risk. We have no debts, no smoke and mirrors here. You have a house as collateral, we are putting 50% down payment and we have enough to buy the house.

I fill out the stuff, answer the questions then some time passes and more BS questions.

Then as closing day approaches (we have been waiting for a few months to allow sellers kids to finish school) the mortgage people are in a panic. They had months to request info and now they are running around like chickens freaking out about stuff……….”We need this now if you want to close on time!” “send this newly requested info by this afternoon”

Tempted to tell them to $&@$&” off and just pay cash. I know that is financially dumb, ( I posted my situation here a few months ago and i discussed with a cpa and a cfa and everyone unanimously agrees mortgage is better financially) but goodness gracious I HATE BEING A SLAVE!

Now you can see why The Borrower Is Slave To The Lender.

7. Build massive amounts of wealth and give back

Baby Step 7 is to accumulate wealth and give back.

Proverbs 3:27 – “Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in your power to do it.”

Do You Think Dave Ramsey Is Wrong?

Dr Jeff: My wife and I completed the steps in order, but we did something a little bit differently because we felt we had a decent enough income.

For us, while aggressively paying down debt, we didn’t want to miss out on all of those years of not investing and taking advantage of compound interest.

So we did both, paid down debts but continue to invest in our practice retirement account.

Now I know that goes against his thinking, but I think if you’re disciplined enough and you have a high enough income, you should do both.

Is Dave Ramsey wrong?

Dr Brent: I think you hit a really key point with that analysis. It’s if you’re disciplined enough, and that’s really the kicker because the mistake I see a lot of people make is thinking about the problem is a math problem and not a behavior problem.

It all boils down to you knowing yourself better than anyone else. I think it’s very reasonable if you stay disciplined enough and you know yourself well enough, you can make that happen.

Dr Jeff: I’d like for you to comment on a couple of posts from dentists made on DentalTown.com that were in the middle of going through the COVID crisis.

Comment #1:

“Our state shut us down for emergencies only. So pretty much saying, we quit making any money. After we get through this, we need to learn to live simply. Cash for cars, live in a simple house, pay off debt quickly, etc. All we can do at this point is to learn from this.”

Comment #2:

Another dentist commented on the above dentist with, “I’m with you 100%. I told my wife this is a wake up call for me. Once this is done ‘No more payments other than mortgage.’ That’s it. No more financing cars, credit cards, etc. If I can’t pay cash, I’m not doing it.”

I guess they get that The Borrower Is Slave To The Lender.

It seems like people are realizing, after going through a huge financial crisis, what’s REALLY important. My family and I are doing things together much more and getting off of our devices in order to connect with each other.

Dr Brent: Well, it’s true that as we have become more global and more connected that we’re actually less connected to people around us.

Especially, I think in the generation below us. So the millennials are more connected than ever.

What we have seen that I think is distressing is a rapid rise in:

consumerism

depression

suicide

And I think all those things are linked as we become gradually more connected online while becoming more disconnected from reality. Unfortunately this becomes our new norm.

One of the things that I counsel my clients about is that consumerism has gotten dramatically difficult.

The Jones’s have gone digital.

It’s become easier more than ever to try to keep up with them!

Think about all the stuff that we can see on others’ highlight reels on Facebook. The sad part is, like the news, we can’t tell if it’s real or not.

Look at Pinterest. No one’s going to pin what they really look like when they wake up with “bed hair”.

Instead, what are they posting? “Oh, check out my vacation I just went on”, “Look at our trip”, or “Look at this new car.” And then all of a sudden you think, “Man, why not me? Why isn’t it my turn?”

I hear that all the time while coaching. And I think getting them back to a place where they’re connected to the people they really hang out with is incredibly healthy for them.

The Scope Of Practice

If you want to connect with Dr. Brent, check out his site The Scope of Practice or you can email him at: [email protected].

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