#if something only takes 8 minutes to bake. we dont need to pull out a whole new activity that will def make a mess

[jinxedlucky]

I want to give a shoutout to my boss who, when I said I can follow the timetable she wants us to follow so damn bad or spend 45 minutes peeling apples but not both, told me "well you can do both, it's important that they're having an experience"

[letsdiscoverkitty]

Assessment Update (Trigger warning)

Firstly, I am sorry for only just getting around to writing and posting this, I have had another very busy/long day with (haircut plus bloods/ecg and then staying in town to run some errands etc).

Anyway, as you know, yesterday was my pre-admission assessment at the Priory with my consultant (12th June). I am not going to lie, it was very hard to go onto the ward and to be there in general/have the discussions, however I think it was a good thing overall/went a little better than I initially anticipated (?)

The journey there was anything but smooth. We ended up being nearly an hour late due to sink holes and diversions (thank god for dad and a mini mindfulness/breathing book I had with me!!)

Once I had arrived, I had a 20ish minute meeting with my consultant (who is also one of the consultants on the ward) - the EDP I see was meant to be there but she didn’t come in the end *rolls eyes*

She believes that I need a short admission to help push me in the right direction/get me going, and that overall the best place for me to be is in the community

She said that yes she could keep me in for 9 months, get me up to a healthy weight etc etc, but that she does not think it would be beneficial (which is refreshing to hear something that isn’t just focused on weight/numbers)

She agreed that I need to have autonomy. It needs to come from me, not just have things “done” to me. I have proven that I have been able to make some changes in the community in the past and get to better places, so I need to pull from that.

We are initially looking at a 6-8 week admission

With the main focus being on the second ward that they have where patients are in either “progression” or “transition”

Sadly due to my current physical health, I will have to spend a bit of time on the acute ward (if the admission happens), but she did say that we would try to keep it to as short a time as possible due to the environment on there and needing me to get more practical support which happens on the other ward. Although we have to be careful not to slip into old grooves of trying to do too much too soon/expecting too much of myself and putting on a front.

In terms of when there might be a bed, this is an issue, especially as EDU beds are so short at the moment…

She said that the next bed under her is likely not for another MONTH.

Yes, a month.

She said that she was quite worried about my current “frail” state and that there is really no wiggle room at all and that if I want to have an admission there then I need to be holding my own in the community in terms of my weight and bloods not dropping anymore.  

I didn’t post about this before but on Friday afternoon I had a phone call offering me a bed at a unit in London for Monday….I was given 20 minutes to decide whether to take it or not. As you can tell I turned down it down (after talking to a few people) and my parents agreed with my decision, especially with the meeting at the priory only a few days away.

My consultant obviously brought this up and we talked about it for a little bit but yeah it is what it is *shrugs*

After about 20 minutes she took me onto the acute ward and we met with the charge nurse who was able to talk to me a bit more about the ward, what things would be involved in an admission and what would be expected, as well as answering my many questions that I had noted down.

It made me feel quite sad when my consultant described me as having a “severe and enduring eating disorder (SEED)”. idk. reality checks like this really suck.

The admission on the acute side, like I mentioned, would be kept to a minimum, however it all depends on how I am coping and what the staff think is best for me.

She gave me a handout with the timetable on and we talked a bit about how things work on the ward, social outings, the groups etc. which there are a few of, not a huge amount/not very much OT but there are at least some trips out each week and visitors are allowed.

I also had a chance to talk about a number of my worries, including that I tend to put on a front and act the good girl/perfect patient and shut off from staff and not want to make a fuss. She couldn’t answer any questions about meal plans or increasing or stuff like that as it is apparently all done on an individual basis after an initial assessment with the dietitian on admission.

In general though the food is pretty similar to what it was when I was there 6 years ago; you do your menu/have to make choices every morning for the day ahead - one light meal and one main meal - you can choose to have your main at lunch or dinner, depending on what the choices are for the day (it is the same food for the rest of the hospital). You start eating in the upstairs kitchen on acute but then you move downstairs to the restaurant when you are on the full meal plan and managing well enough.

I’m not going to lie, it was very hard being on the ward. very hard. There were a lot of very unwell patients, a number with NG tubes…and, idk, I suppose it brought it home a little more how real it all is?? although at the same time I still feel incredibly numb/emotionless.

After speaking with the nurse for a while, I went over to the progression/transition ward where I was able to speak to someone who is being discharged soon, which was really helpful.

She was so lovely and showed me around the kitchen, talked about how the ward works, her bedroom, the rules, how her time has been etc.

It is similar to when I was there 6 years ago but with quite a lot more in terms of therapy/OT input as well self catering snacks and having your own cupboards for food, having the opportunity to bake with the OT, be more independent etc. (although kind of annoyed that apparently the internet is still terrible there and the lack of signal too - boo)

I am still waiting for the unit to send over the patient handbook they said that they would get to me, which is a bit annoying but I am still suffering from information overload tbh so it is probably a good thing.

It was A LOT to try to take in over a short space of time.

I am still trying to process the whole experience: being on the ward (which I did find quite triggering even for just that short period of time), the other patients, the programme, the opportunities, as well as the potential reality of me actually being admitted.

My consultant was honest with me and said that although I am ear marked for the bed in a month’s time, she cannot promise anything as you never know what happens.

In all honesty, if I was offered a bed there for next week I think I would take it…

However we are talking a month at the very least…

which is quite a long way away and it is really messing with my head and causing me quite a lot of mixed/messy thoughts

The programme itself looks/sounds A LOT better than what I experienced at the Bethlem last year, especially with the acute, progression and transition elements fully “up and running” (when I was there it was quite new) so in that sense is much better.

They also seem a lot more supportive in general/have made changes from when I was there last for the better (?)

To be totally honest I don’t know where this leaves me now. L (EDP) wasn’t there so I won’t see her/talk to her about where this leaves everything until next Monday.

However from our session this week i do know that this does not mean that I can sit and allow anorexia to dictate everything and keep me stuck. As L keeps reiterating to me, I have to be making changes.

It is not that I don’t want to get better, I have just gotten so bloody stuck and feel so trapped and alone.

That is one thing that would be helpful in terms of a short admission - it would hopefully be a push in the right direction that I could then maybe continue from at home in the community. and not to mention that it would also give my parents a bit of a break from everything.

In terms of therapy I dont think there would be any 1:1 due to the short period of time I would be there. Although she did say that the length of admission is always up for discussion and it would all depend on how my OP workers want to work and how I am managing on the ward/if I can transfer it home on leave.

idrk how to feel right now. Or how I do feel. It is all so overwhelming and a lot to try to take in

I don’t want to have an admission but evidence is piling up that staying in the community really isn’t working and every person in my team (as well as my parents) are convinced I will be going in :(

And I suppose that is all there is to say really. I am left feeling a little clearer in some ways but at the same time not so much? it’s messy

and I am beyond tired after two very long and exhausting/tiring days. I know I can’t sit around and wait to try to process everything that is happening but I feel like I really need to press a pause button for a while in order to catch up with myself (which I know is never going to happen)

as we all know, there will always be another excuse or reason to put things off. Another reason why we are ‘different’ to others or why there are other people who deserve support more.

But it is all noise from anorexia to try to keep us trapped and stuck for even longer.

I am so tired of this existence. the thought of another admission terrifies me but not as much as a life time spent trapped here.

I wish that I had a positive revelation to end this on but alas, I have nothing. All I want is my bed and a good night’s sleep right now and some magic answer to whisk this all away (if only eh?). Thank you for all your messages of support and kindness over the past few days, it has meant more than I can express to know that I have not been alone in this x

[dickgoblinpi]

i just want to vent about work a bit

yesterday i was working with a boy i know v v well. i am his key worker and have been the main (or only) person responsible, other than himself and his mum, for creating his care plan and routine. he has a significant eating aversion and over the past 8 months i have put a lot of work into developing a mealtime routine with him that he enjoys and that helps him eat and drink a good amount and variety while he is at our service. the routine is pretty specific and takes up two packed a4 pages in the care plan. 

we’ve reached a point now where he eats a moderate breakfast and has some juice when he comes in, then has a large late lunch of sandwiches, pasta, soup or something like that, plus maybe some yoghurt, cake, crisps or similar, and some more juice. he can now eat a slice of cake with the other young people when someone has a birthday. if we all do cooking or baking activities he can eat the fruits of our labours. when he first started attending, that first day he drank a capri sun and that was it. so this progress and achievement is a big deal to everyone involved. im v proud of him and myself. there is 1 problem

for some reason people think anything i say is open to interpretation? at all times? most people know that this boy’s eating plan began at home with his wonderful mum, and from there has been the work of him, me, myself and i while he is at our service. like pretty much every time he eats a meal here it is the direct result of the 8 months i alone have spent collaborating with him to make his routine work for him. most people know that. certain people seem to live in opposite land. quite apart from that, his care plan says ‘do X’ and when a care plan says that, unless X is flatly unethical or you have observed X to lead to terrible things, you DO X. im talking specifically about things like ‘molly stands to get personal care support’ and ‘jimmy requires support from 2 staff to go on trips’ and ‘sandy drinks from a straw’ 

you dont just go ‘meh, i feel like getting molly to lay down today’ or ‘i dont see why sandy can’t just drink from a sports bottle’ or ‘im sure jimmy will be just fine going to the cinema one-to-one’ but when it comes to the support notes i have written, PEOPLE KEEP GOING ‘i can feed this young person by myself’ ‘he doesnt really need a straw’ ‘im sure he will learn to like having reggae music on with his meals’ ‘i should put my arm around him and hold his head to keep him still’  

when i arrived at work yesterday, a supervisor who has been somewhere else not here for 6 months, came up to me and immediately started telling me her awesome new ideas for how best to support this boy to eat. her main idea was that, because he has involuntary arm movements as well as an instinctive reflex to bat away the food, instead of holding on to his arms i could tuck them under his arm rests and very gently put my arm on top of his so he cant get them out, because “that’s half the battle”

it’s really complicated to talk about how we support him not to bat away the food, because whenever i say ‘choice’ i go down the rabbit hole of how a choice isn’t necessarily a choice and the entire surrounding environment and their life to this date and everyone’s expectations of them and 100 other factors have so many complex and interwoven impacts on the choices someone is truly able to make :/

with that said, the general idea of lunch support for this boy is that he can and does choose (gah) not to eat or not to take a given bite, but when he is hungry and willing to eat and drink, he needs gentle support to enable him not to make those movements. like i can maybe think of six bites over the entire period i have worked with him where he has kept his arms still to take a bite without support. and i really am talking the lightest of pressures. if he moves his arms, the pressure comes off. it’s a very communicative process and kind of goes like this

1. his table is set up with his preferred music on and staff are sitting with him. he is smiling and bobbing his head to the music with his hands in his lap or drumming on the table. staff gently lay their hand or arm on his forearm or hand. sometimes he holds their hands and twiddles their fingers. one staff member offers a mouthful of food to him and after a moment or two he stills his head, opens his mouth and takes the bite

2. staff present another bite, but he raises his arms and motions to bat it away. staff take their arms and the bite of food away, and he has a bit of a shake or a dance. he might cuddle staff briefly or pull faces at them and laugh with them. he starts drumming on the table again and staff resume the light pressure and offer the bite, which he takes

3. he raises his arms and pulls them into himself, frowns and makes a groaning noise. staff joke with him and he laughs but staff understand through his body language and vocalisations that he does not want the next bite. staff ask if he wants a drink and he smiles and relaxes his posture. staff resume the light pressure and offer him the drink, of which he has several sips. after this he resumes eating

those three stages are kinda what you can typically expect. sometimes he’s eating happy as you like, sometimes he wants a drink and sometimes he needs a moment. if he is feeling unwell in some way or the process isn’t working for him, he will groan, grimace or maintain constant motion and you know he is saying a clear ‘no.’ it happens. it was very very hard at first to feel as if you were overriding his ‘default no’ at every mealtime, but the unfortunate fact is his health would be at risk if his involuntary or reflex actions dictated when he eats. gastrostomy has been considered as an option but it would impact him negatively in certain ways and carry a number of risks, and would be considerably less of a choice than he has currently :/ ahhhh it’s a minefield

the more fortunate fact is that he does genuinely enjoy his food and mealtimes if his routine is followed to the letter and staff listen to him and keep the whole thing light-hearted. recently we’ve reached a point where at lunchtime, he will sit with his mouth open waiting for you to hurry up and load the spoon, goddamnit. laughing and smiling and joking around with staff the entire time, and eating everything in 10 minutes flat and looking around for more like ‘eating challenges who?’ 

sooooo anyway, when this fucking supervisor decides to tell me soemthing that amounts to restraint and completely misses the point of how this boy eats, it pissed me off all day. 

then when lunchtime rolled around the only staff available to join us for lunch support was someone i really get exasperated with. this staff member insisted on taking the more active role (generally one staff member does the majority of the physical act of feeding, but it isnt a hard and fast rule and sometimes this boy prefers that you switch it around a lot) and i took what i thought would be the path of least resistance as we were a bit pinched for time, but ohhhhh my god! you would not think i had written two pages about how to support this boy, or at least you wouldnt think that this staff member read them. has he? idek. 

it was just so slow! so inexplicably slow! he was using a dessert spoon which was too big and wide and scoopy which was resulting in very tiny bites being taken from the tip of the spoon through necessity. he insisted ‘[name] prefers metal spoons’ which is not my experience. size and shape is more important - he prefers a smaller, flatter spoon because of the shape of his mouth and how he opens it. he had a large portion of fresh mac and cheese from our cafe that i thought would get finished in 10-15 minutes considering we had had such an active day and i knew he would be hungry and it’s his fav, but it wound up taking 40 minutes because this staff member was literally delivering 1-2 pieces of macaroni at a time, and he KEPT PAUSING WITH THE SPOON IN MID-AIR JUST TO TELL ME A FUCKING ANECDOTE

sometimes mealtimes are long and it’s fine, that goes for so many of the kids who like to take their time, but this person knows when something is going on longer than it needs to and he loses patience. wouldn’t you? sometimes he likes to take his time but he doesn’t like to wait around for you to wrap up your fucking self-aggrandising little story about someone you used to work with who was just like him and how good you were at it

the macaroni was cold by the end and so was my heart

[themoneybuff-blog]

Questions About Car Seats, Leftovers, Medical Insurance, Budget Brands, and More!

Whats inside? Here are the questions answered in todays reader mailbag, boiled down to summaries of five or fewer words. Click on the number to jump straight down to the question. 1. Early or late retirement contributions? 2. Purchases for infrequent use 3. Used car seats? 4. Excessive leftovers 5. Friends want me to spend 6. Value of one bag living 7. Buying a house on $35K 8. How to avoid drive-thrus 9. Medical insurance difficulties 10. Budget brands? 11. Starting career advice 12. Thoughts on taekwondo One of the most enjoyable parts of writing this mailbag column is the wide variety of comments and questions I get from readers. I usually try to keep the stuff I choose for the mailbag at least somewhat within the realm of personal finance, maybe slipping in one or two questions or comments a week that arent related to the topic, but I get quite a lot of great stuff from readers that covers completely different topics that I just cant reasonably fit into the mailbag. For example, just in the last week or two, Ive received the following notes from readers: A reader wrote in to talk about the joys of playing Magic: the Gathering with her son and how they were building Commander decks together. A reader wrote in to encourage me to pick up some of the writings of the philosopher Byung-Chul Han, particularly his essays Psychopolitics and The Scent of Time (which Im currently reading). A reader has been trying to get me to debate him concerning a number of hot button political issues. A reader has been writing to me consistently for weeks asking for step-by-step help in getting a batch of homemade kombucha to work. A reader invited me to his dynasty fantasy football league. Thats just over the last several days. Honestly, I love this kind of thing, because it represents human connection. Theres a sharing of ideas and interests and a sharing of concern behind all of it that goes way past merely writing about financial issues, and it means a lot to me, even if its not fodder for the mailbag. Speaking of the mailbag, here are this weeks questions. Q1: Early or late retirement contributions? Is it better to contribute to a Roth IRA early in the year or as late as possible? I have money set aside for my 2019 Roth contribution but I dont know if I should do it now or wait. Brian Unless theres some specific reason thats unique to your situation that points to waiting, you should put those savings in there as soon as possible. The longer the money is invested, the more time you have for compound interest to work in your favor. Having said that, investment markets are unpredictable. Theres always a chance that right after you put your money in, the markets dip. Remember that this could happen no matter when you put your money in there. You could put your money in now and immediately see a dip, or you could wait until next February to put it in and immediately see a dip. The difference is that, on average, its much more likely that the investment youre putting your money into will go up in value over that period. If you wait, its very likely that youre going to miss out on growth. Put your retirement money away in retirement accounts as soon as you can. Dont sit around holding them, because youre usually doing nothing more than missing out on growth if you do that. Q2: Purchases for infrequent use Im considering purchasing a pair of bowling shoes. I only bowl once or twice a year, but it seems like its a wise investment since I could get a pair of perfectly good bowling shoes for around $25 instead of paying $3 or so each time to rent them. How do you view rarely used purchases like this that, while adding to the stuff you own, will eventually pay for themselves? Adam My philosophy on purchases like these is similar to yours. I try to look at the total cost of ownership of the item over an extended but still reasonable period of time, like five years, and I figure out which is going to cost less. I also consider how frequently Ill actually use the item, and it basically has to be annually at the very least and preferably much more frequent than that. That type of thinking requires full honesty to be valuable. So, in your situation, is it cheaper to rent shoes for $3 a pop twice a year for five years or buy a pair of shoes for $25 once? Well, the cost for rental over that period is $30, so Id probably swing toward buying a pair, assuming that Im bowling twice a year. If you assume that its actually going to be much less than twice a year, youre going to be better off renting. I usually use a five year measure for calculations like this, because I figure its pretty hard to predict accurately what my life will be like beyond that time threshold and its also probably a reasonable guess as to the wear and tear that an item can take. Usually, with a five year calculation, its obvious whether its a good move or not. Again, in this situation, those bowling shoes arent going to be worn out after ten wears, so its likely you will be able to continue wearing them at that point or theyll have some minor secondhand value. This pushes the pendulum even more toward buying them. Q3: Used car seats? I am expecting in November. My husband and I are starting to pick up baby items from FB Marketplace and Craigslist. Whenever a carseat is listed on Marketplace someone always comments that you shouldnt buy used carseats because theyre not safe. How are used carseats not safe? Amy A carseat is one of the few baby options I wouldnt buy used. The reason is simple: a big part of whats protecting that baby when theyre in the carseat is plastic, and you dont know how that plastic has been treated. Theres some chance that the plastic has become brittle and could easily crack or break in a severe impact, just when you need it the most. This can happen, for example, if a carseat has been left in the sun too much over the course of years. Its not an issue of negligence its an issue of you not knowing the history of that carseat. It may have had years of sunlight exposure, rendering the protection that it offers your child much weaker. Most baby items are fine to buy used clothes and baby monitors and things like that. Those arent things that will cause calamity if they fail and its usually obvious if theyre doing their job or not. A car seat, though, is something you should invest in. 99.9% of the time, it wont matter, but 0.1% of the time, it matters more than anything else and youll never, ever want to skimp on that situation. Q4: Excessive leftovers On any given night we will have 2-7 people at our house for dinner. By default we cook for 7 but that means that many nights we have a ton of leftovers. We eat leftovers for lunch every day but they still get tossed a lot. We cant give them to the food pantry either. Ideas? Andy My first suggestion would be to simply have a leftover buffet night for dinner twice a week or so. On, say, Wednesdays and Saturdays, just pull out all leftovers, put them on the table, and let people assemble their own plates of leftovers and heat them up (or heat up the hot items before putting them on the buffet). That way, the leftovers get consumed directly and you have a free dinner. Another suggestion is to frequently make meals and side dishes that are easy to remix into another meal if you have a low turnout. For example, if you make a bunch of spaghetti, you can save it for two nights and then mix in a few additional spices, put it in a greased 9 by 13 pan, put a couple cups of mozzarella and provolone shredded cheese on top, and bake it for 30-45 minutes, covered for the first half, to make a nice spaghetti bake. We also often have plain vegetables as a side dish and save the leftovers to make quick soups later on, for example. A final suggestion is that on nights where you have a low turnout, simply prep leftover plates for the next night and have the same thing for dinner again, or prepare a different dinner the next night for just the two who ate the night before. I dont think you need to feel obligated to have a fresh meal on the table for whoever happens to show up each night. Q5: Friends want me to spend Im 23 and got a nice job out of college paying $45K per year. Several of my friends from college are in the same area and have jobs as well so its fun to hang out with them, but it feels like they want to blow their income as fast as possible. They go out drinking and to clubs constantly, upgrade their phones all the time, ride around in Ubers when they have cars, and throw money at stupid stuff. I want to get rid of my student loan debt and start saving for a house and Im already contributing to retirement so I can get out of this as young as possible. Its not like Im avoiding fun but theres a ton of stuff to do that doesnt cost $50 or $100 for an evening. When I suggest anything else other than clubs or an expensive restaurant, I get ignored. Do you have any suggestions? Amy Find new friends? I mean, that sounds fairly cold, but it sounds like your values are diverging from the values that your friends hold, or perhaps they were always divergent and the income just exposed it. While I dont mind being acquaintances with people with drastically different lifestyles than my own, I have found its far more pleasant and easier to have close friends who have similar values and lifestyles to my own. That way, Im not pushed to overspend constantly just to spend time with my friends. I have been in situations where it felt like I had to pay some kind of admission fee (in the form of going out when I didnt want to) just to hang out with a friend and if I wasnt willing to do that, that person wouldnt hang out with me. That just isnt worth it. Id suggest digging into activities that you feel internally interested in doing. Find groups in your community that match up well with that by using things like Meetup and there youll find people who are also interested in what you happen to be internally interested in. Get involved in those groups. Youll find its not too hard to build friendships that way. Q6: Value of one bag living I found your post on one bag living to be interesting but not practical. Its not like more than maybe 0.001% of your readers will actually ever do it. What is the practical value of such an article? Ollie The practical value of it is that it really shows you how few items you actually need to have a happy and comfortable life, and when you realize that, you begin to realize how much extra unnecessary stuff you have and how much that stuff is costing you, both in terms of the stuff itself and the space youre paying for to store all of that stuff. Lets say, for example, that you decided to try it for a month. You packed a big duffel bag full of stuff and aimed to live solely out of that bag for that month. During the month, almost everything you use comes out of that bag other than maybe a few kitchen items, you really dont use anything else in your home. At the end of the month, youre left asking yourself what the point of all of that other stuff is. Why have any of it if youre able to have a great life without touching it? Why have shelves full of books and DVDs you never touch? Why have a television if you have a good life not watching it? This is likely to lead you to start downsizing your possessions, recouping some money along the way, and its also likely to lead you to question almost all of your physical purchases. If you keep going in that direction, youll find that you likely have excessive living space and can easily be satisfied with a smaller home or apartment, and if you downsize that, then youre on the way to some serious financial improvement in your life, as youre losing far less money to utilities, insurance, property taxes, and so on. Q7: Buying a house on $35K I am a single woman with a four year old child from a previous marriage; the father is not involved and avoids paying child support. We live in a small apartment in [a large city with a moderate cost of living]. I make $35K per year. My mom lives about five miles away and takes care of my son when Im working and hes not in preschool as she has a pension thats enough for her to live on because my father died in the workplace. I would like to be able to afford a small house for us and get out of this apartment building before hes too old because theres kind of a rough culture of teenage boys here. I would like to be in a house in four years. I have no debts and am saving about $200 a month for emergencies. Carrie First of all, Id contact a lawyer and do what you can to get child support. The cost of supporting your child should not be borne solely by you and hes legally obligated to provide financial help here even if hes uninvolved. Second of all, $200 a month in savings thats also used as an emergency fund isnt adequate to get to where you want to go in four years. I looked into your area and a small starter home is going to run you in the $300K range now and will probably be closer to $350K by the time you want to buy. 20% of $350K is $70K. If youre saving $200 a month, youll get to about $10K in four years if there are no emergencies. To get to $70K in four years, you need to be saving around $1,500 a month and have no emergencies that tap that money. Considering that youre making about $3,000 a month before taxes, thats an extremely difficult proposition. Thus, to make it to your target, youre going to have to do some radical things. The first thing I would do is sit down with your mother and discuss the option of cohabitation for a few years, with you splitting up the housing costs. If she could move into your apartment or you two could move into her dwelling and its a tenable situation for a few years, youll both save a mint. If youre paying $1,000 a month in rent and it suddenly drops to $500 a month, theres $500 a month toward savings, and probably more than that because youll have lower utility bills and you can more easily share food costs. You may find that after you buy that starter home, it may make sense to have your mother continue to live with you to keep costs manageable going forward, at least for a while. If you can swing something like that, use a lot of smart frugal tactics like sticking with store brand items when shopping, get on that child support issue, and keep working at your career to move toward a better salary, you can make this work. Without those kinds of big changes, this probably isnt a realistic goal. Q8: How to avoid drive-thrus How do you stop relying on the convenience of drive-thrus? I understand that its way cheaper to make meals at home but when I can just go to a drive-thru and get a quick meal and have it eaten before I even get home or eat it right when I walk in the door and theres no cleanup because I just toss the wrappers, its hard to convince myself to make a big mess making a meal at home. Leon There are a few good strategies for solving this problem that work well for different people. I suggest trying one for at least 30 days, see if it clicks with you or merely causes frustration, and either stick with it if it works or move on to another if it doesnt. First, try simply packing a meal for yourself at home before you leave in a small cooler. Make something simple that you like a sandwich and some baby carrots and a drink or whatever. Pack the individual items in reusable containers and put them in something insulated with an ice pack to keep it cool. Take that meal with you when you go out and save it at your desk or in a work fridge until youre ready to leave, then eat that on the way home. You can do the meal prep the night before while watching a television show and if you use reusable containers, cleanup is really just a matter of popping stuff in the dishwasher and wiping off the table (which youd need to do anyway). If you want, you can designate Fridays as eat out days and keep it as a treat for yourself for getting through the week. Another thing I strongly suggest is to simply get better at cooking at home. Cooking seems very difficult at first and even easy things like scrambled eggs feel like a giant mess and a big time and energy investment, but once you get more practiced, it stops feeling so challenging. Start by making really simple meals that you like grilled cheese sandwiches or scrambled eggs or spaghetti. Another strategy is to cook things in advance, make individual meals out of them in reusable containers, and keep them in the fridge. For example, you could make a huge batch of spaghetti one night and pack three or four individual meals of spaghetti with a breadstick in resealable containers in the fridge. Then, you can take them to work with you and youll also know that one is just waiting for you when you get home. Yet another strategy is to use a slow cooker. Start a simple dump meal before you leave (a dump meal means you just dump several ingredients in there and turn it on low) and youll have a hot home-cooked meal waiting for you when you get home. Slow cookers are great for stews, chili, soups, and simple casseroles; it can also make a mean pot roast. The goal of all of these things is to either put something in your hands directly so that youre not tempted to stop or have something at home waiting for you so youre not tempted to stop. Q9: Medical insurance difficulties I am covered by [a major medical insurer] through my workplace. A few months ago, I had a procedure done that my doctors office informed me would be fully covered by my insurance. They filed this with the insurance and the insurance company came back saying that the procedure wasnt medically necessary and wouldnt cover it, so my doctor is now billing me for it at the tune of $30K. I dont even know where to start. Should I contact a lawyer? Petra Without seeing the bills and documentation, I cant give you full advice on what to do. However, my first step would be to document every single detail that you can recall about this entire process, including dates and what you were told by both your doctors office and insurance. If you have any supporting documents, such as receipts and printed information about the procedure or about the costs, thats all valuable here. Then, I would go through the process of appealing this claim with your insurer, providing a copy of all of that documentation. An appeal should definitely be your first action. If you find that your appeal is denied, you should then discuss the matter with your doctor and attempt to get their bill reduced. If youre still finding that youre paying an excessive amount, then I would take all of this documentation to a lawyer and get legal help. It very much sounds like you were given inaccurate guidance from a doctors office and a lawyer can usually help here. Q10: Budget brands? Are there any budget brands you trust for making high quality stuff? Meaning brands that are cheap in price but the quality of their stuff is good? Darren The store brands at most department stores and grocery store chains fit that bill. For the vast majority of product types, the store brand is as good as most of the name brand options. They might not beat some of the really high end premium versions of those products, but the store brand is usually as good as 80% of similar items on the shelf. For things like charging cables and basic electronics like computer mice or keyboards, Ive found that Amazons generic brand, Amazon Basics, is really good for the price. For many different kinds of smaller electronic items, like external batteries for charging devices on the go or headphones or things of that nature, I strongly trust Anker. If theres an Anker option for a small electronic device, youre probably getting great bang for the buck with it. Those are the ones that immediately come to mind as brands that I strongly trust that consistently provide good bang for the buck across a wide variety of products. Q11: Starting career advice My oldest son is about to graduate from college with a degree in electrical engineering. I am collecting career advice from some people I respect to pass along to him. What advice would you give to a fresh college graduate in a technical field today? Robert First of all, treat the first decade of your career as an opportunity to build skills and relationships above chasing salary. A killer resume ten years from now will be worth a lot more than earning an extra $5K or $10K right out of the gate. If one job pays a little more but feels like a dead end, while the other job pays a little less but feels like its overflowing with opportunities and ways to build relationships, take the latter job in the first decade of your career. Second, if your workplace offers a 401(k) plan, take advantage of it immediately and contribute as much as you can stand. You will never regret this. Just do this and then start off with smaller take-home checks theyll still be a lot more than what you had in college. Pay yourself first. Third, no matter how tough a situation is, dont burn bridges, even if it would feel good. If youre moving on from a position, do it as gently as possible and be as positive and flexible as you can on your way out. Finally, eat healthy, get some exercise, get plenty of sleep, and dont work too many hours. If you dont do those things, youll be far less productive during your work time, the quality of work you produce will be lower, and youll have a harder time picking up new skills. If your workplace is obsessed with 80 hour workweeks, carve out as much of that 80 hours toward self care and rest that you can reasonably get away with. Q12: Thoughts on taekwondo I was wondering if you could share your thoughts on taekwondo from the perspective of both a parent of a student and as a participant with an eye toward cost. Is it worth it? Do your kids get value out of it? How about yourself? Brenda I attend a local taekwondo school with the rest of my family. It was an activity that my two oldest children wanted to try and the family plan isnt much more expensive than just the two of them participating, so when our family schedule lined up and our youngest was old enough, we all joined. In effect, our third family member was half price and the rest of us are effectively going for free, and the price has actually gone down as some family members have reached black belt rank (and those who havent are at a belt rank approaching black). First of all, if youre new to martial arts of any kind, its something you should shop around for. Any city of any size likely has a few martial arts schools; a larger city likely has some dedicated taekwondo schools with branches in various locations. Different schools offer different prices and different philosophies. Taekwondo is a martial art thats focused on fast, high kicking. That means that it really works hard on agility and balance. Theres also an emphasis on forms, which are sequences of kicks and other movements that are memorized and done from memory, which challenges a persons memory while physically exerting themselves. Our familys interest in martial arts lies much more in the realm of self improvement, character building, self defense, and fitness rather than training to fight. There are definitely martial arts schools that are very focused on simply training to fight, preparing people for things like mixed martial arts. Theres nothing wrong with that, but its not what Sarah or I were looking for in a school. We wanted a school where the merit wasnt in whether you defeat someone in a fight, but whether youre working hard and genuinely improving yourself so that youre better at the techniques, better in all around fitness, and better in character than you were the day before. Again, I have nothing against a school focused on fight-focused training, but its just not what Im looking for or what I would direct my children toward until theyre old enough to make those kinds of choices for themselves. Perhaps someday theyll take what theyve learned and move in that direction, and Im fine with that. When my oldest son and daughter began expressing a genuine interest in taekwondo, we shopped around for local schools that offered dedicated youth programs and were focused on a self-improvement type of martial art philosophy, and we found one that we liked that had classes near us, and over time, we all joined up. I think it has genuinely helped our children improve their ability to focus, their ability to overcome challenges, their character, and most definitely their ability to defend themselves and get out of a threatening situation. As a parent, Im thrilled with the impact taekwondo has had on them. As for myself, I joined because I agree in a deep philosophical way with the goals and direction of the school, as well as the fact that I was looking for a fitness program for myself and an opportunity to mutually encourage my family to be more fit. This hits all of those marks and with family rates, its pretty inexpensive. If you divide our session fees by five, theres absolutely no way any of us could be in a sport or a fitness program at these rates. If someone is interested in taekwondo or martial arts in general, Id start by figuring out why you want to do it. What are you hoping to get out of it, or what do you want your child to get out of it? Self-discipline? Fitness? Self-defense? Character? What are the one or two things you want most for yourself or for your child that you hope martial arts can provide? Start from there and shop around at a lot of schools in your area. Theyll all have different philosophies and centers of focus some of them will line up well with your own goals and philosophies, while others will go in a different direction (not wrong or bad, just different). Find some that match what you want, price compare them, and give one a try for a session and see if its right for you. Got any questions? The best way to ask is to follow me on Facebook and ask questions directly there. Ill attempt to answer them in a future mailbag (which, by way of full disclosure, may also get re-posted on other websites that pick up my blog). However, I do receive many, many questions per week, so I may not necessarily be able to answer yours. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/questions-about-car-seats-leftovers-medical-insurance-budget-brands-and-more/