what sandra thinks

Frustrated.

We are not in the best financial situation right now. John has a decent job that he likes and he’s been there for years. I got laid off many many months ago and I remain unemployed. We have money to pay our bills… for now. But since I’m not earning, we aren’t saving and we’re really just scraping by. John doesn’t make enough to cover all our expenses without me contributing. Eventually, the well will run dry. I never wanted to even dip as far into my savings as I have already.

My being unemployed for this long was never the plan. When I lost my awful job, John and I decided that it would be okay, good even, for me to take the rest of the year off… and start looking seriously for work the next January. Well… I was laid off in 2014. I was supposed to start looking in January 2015. We’re almost at January 2016 and I have no prospects whatsoever.

As awful and depressing and stressful as all of this is, what’s really killing me tonight is mostly something else.

John is not a saver. He’s a spender. He spends money on things I think are frivolous. He’s not spending [wasting] hundreds or anything like that… I know it could be much worse. But we are in a dire situation right now. My savings is going to shit. I have no job leads. The topic of finances makes me so depressed and miserable that it’s even harder for me to conduct a job search at all.

I honestly wonder if we could make enough cutbacks to live on John’s salary alone… if that’s even a possibility. But I don’t have the answer… and I never will because I’ll never have every detail of every dollar he spends on things we don’t need. And he’ll never make those cutbacks anyway. If I try to discuss it with him, he says things like ‘it wasn’t that much‘ or ‘I’ve given up a lot of stuff since we had kids.’ That last one is getting old… my firstborn is almost 11 and he’s been saying that since the boy was an infant.

I know there are some frivolous-ish things that do tend toward necessary-ish. We have two children and I want to give them happy birthdays and Christmases. And that costs money. We don’t go overboard. They don’t need tons of gifts (well, they don’t need any). But I can’t give them nothing. And even just four or five gifts add up really quickly. Zoe’s (fake daughter name) birthday was just last month. Now it’s almost Christmas. Zach’s (fake son name) birthday is in January. This is a financially stressful time of year for us. Even when I had a job it was. But now… ugh.

I struggle and stress so much about money and not spending it while John does whatever he feels like doing. [That’s an exaggeration… but still…] It irritates me. A lot. For fuck’s sake, other than the money I contribute to the mortgage, gas, heat, electricity, etc., I spend less than $40/month. Seriously… gas for the car… and a few coffees from the outside. That’s it.

John hasn’t cut back his spending at all since I’ve been out of work. I get that I am the one who is unemployed. I do. But he’s my husband. We’re supposed to be a team. We’re supposed to think of things, good and bad, as ours… not yours and mine. If I am the only one who has to cut back because I’m the one not working, then he should be the only one who has to pay bills since he’s the one who is working. Hey, that’s his flawed logic… not mine.

John has no idea how many nights I sit on the sofa or lie in bed sobbing about all the job/money shit. I’m not generally a happy-sunshine-flying-out-my-ass kind of person. But the one thing that makes me feel truly 100% hopeless… is this. What am I going to do if I don’t find a job and my savings runs out completely? How are we going to live? I’ll never be able to build up that savings again. How will I take care of my children? How will we keep our home? How will I not end up institutionalized?

I get so scared. Unbearably scared. He doesn’t know. I’ve mentioned it, kind of, a few times. But I think when I do, I don’t describe it as it really is. I minimize it. I doubt he realizes how bad I get. I mean, literally tears pouring out of my eyes for hours as I sit alone, hopeless and desperate and… oh God.

I don’t want to give him more things to worry about. Things like me. I know he worries about money already. But that only frustrates me more. God, how can he worry about money but refuse to curb his spending to better our situation? It kills me. And it makes no sense.

You may wonder how I have these episodes without John knowing… hearing… seeing. We live in this house together… how can he not know?

Oh, he goes to his little basement room to play with his computers or guitars or he reads comic books or something. Or he’s right at the other end of the couch… sleeping.

Yes, it bothers me that I can feel so awful right here in the same house with him… sometimes the same room with him… and he has no idea. And worse still, if he does know, he hasn’t mentioned it. Not surprising because whenever I do break down and try to talk to him, he mostly just sits there in silence. Sometimes he’s not even looking at me. So if it makes him uncomfortable when I bring it up, he sure as fuck isn’t going to bring it up.

God, I know he doesn’t know what to say to me, but Jesus Christ, just give me a fucking hug and lie to me. Tell me it’s going to be okay… that we’re going to make it. I don’t care if that turns out to be untrue. It’s still better for me to be okay now. If it all goes to hell, I can be upset then. 

And those last two sentences are probably the most healthy thoughts I’ve had in weeks. Stop worrying about what might happen. There will be plenty of time to fall apart later if those things really do happen.

I don’t need a fucking head start.

What I need are winning lottery numbers… preferably the day before the drawing.