We got a room! The shelter has room and we can stay here until January! I’m gonna make my daughter proud

I recently got some discounted cans from the store and it has literally been lunch and dinner. I don't have money to spend rn and I dont want to die so i fill myself up with crap food just to stop the grumbling. Yk what it does the job. I work two jobs every day of the week so energy is important to me. Its actually fine

In Florida. My county water department alleges that there is a "leak" somewhere in our property's water line that's caused us to rack up 50,000 gallons a month usage (or about 5 swimming pools worth of water, not something that seems possible for two people), which has led them to permanently shut off our water until such a time as we can fix it. (Nevermind that this leak only mysteriously sprung up after the new meter they installed was improperly calibrated.)

This "usage" has, of course, also racked up a gigantic bill that they've put us on the hook for to the tune of $4000, and which we cannot pay for as both I and my disabled mother are on limited income. She has a disability pension which is barely keeping our other utilities up, and because the job market and all benefits have been gleefully gutted by a fascist administration of used car salesmen and technoslop-peddlers, I cannot find any work. I'm literally living on maybe $50 a week that I've picked up from a tutoring gig, which is not exactly consistent.

In addition to not having that four grand, we also do not have the money to repair this supposed leak. There's a toilet that needs to be replaced, which also requires structural repairs to tile, concrete, and flange, and again, this doesn't even count the fact that this toilet in question might not even be the source of the leak in the first place.

My mother has a digestive condition and needs a working toilet, however. I cannot keep buying water to flush my one working one, I barely have enough to drink (and that's with rationing it). But it seems I can't just get a camp toilet and dispose of human waste in the regular garbage collection, either, as most sources I've found claim that's illegal. Other articles say "just dispose of waste in the toilet with some water" but again. We wouldn't need to resort to this if we had water in the first place, we'd just use. The actual toilet.

Our neighbors do not like us so they're of no help, and my friends are just as poor as I am, so they can't help either.

TL;DR: Water's probably shut off for good, how do I manage toilet issues for a disabled parent in this scenario?

I have exactly one year to graduate from my undergrad and I see no hope of a good job. I studied hard and know stuff (I have certs and projects too) but I ain't getting an internship. I don't have one parent and I anyways can't bear to depend on the other. Basically I am on the streets.
I feel stressed 24x7. I'm 21.

I see it a lot and it causes more problems then it has to most of the time. I live in a bad area and I go to a local fast food joint. Once in a while I'll see someone get upset for messing up their order and start crap with the workers.

They go on a major rant and just turn the whole thing up 100%. In my head its like its just food and if you tell the workers nicely to fix it they'll do so. They get the situation they didn't want by being emotionally out of control.

I studied in a very poor state school, kids were beaten for small mistakes no extra activities, teachers never came on time, over crowding, broken infra

Growing up in a poor family that too in a poor country or poor area you are done for life, I went to a bad state school I am not from US but from Asia, children were not taught properly, teacher did not come on time, we were beaten for minor mistakes no facilities and overcrowding most of my peers are now doing jobs such as cleaning, waiter or unemployed

I was told to put $500 a week in savings…. I am making my way now but that sounds like the dumbest thing to tell someone making $12 an hour supporting a family of 3. Of course I’m paying rent twice a mortgage… but hopefully I’ll save enough money for my kids to buy a house. (Down payment)

My Heat system in my house broke… it’s currently 17 degrees in my house in canada, I have 2 layers of socks on and my credit card is maxed out. My mom has no way to pay for it so the ability to pay for it falls on me. I am in nursing school so i work maximum 10 hours a week. For me this translates to about 300 bi-weekly. Which is typically just used to pay the power and gas bill, groceries, gas, dinner and makeup. I guess it’s part of adulting that you just always have to pay for things so I don’t want to complain. But I want to! My parents should pay for things for me. I’m 20 years old with zero savings. Im going to have to text my friend that i cant go to the movie i already agreed to because the money is gone. This doesn’t have anything to do with the rant but .. I got an awful review at work basically calling me stupid and bad at my job aswell today. Before you write that google review know that you are insulting someone who genuinely has the worst day every single day

You finished HS with good grades? No one cares.

Masters Degree in the humanities? Lol you are stupid.

Did another Masters Degree in IT? Well "learn to code" thats so 2022. No job for you because of AI.

Now matter how much you educate yourself, its always your fault. No matter how much you do, its never enough. No matter what you do, its always wrong.

Meanwhile Boomers got jobs with just HS or even without HS. Despite having a fraction of our education, they became Managers and Bosses.

The system is broken. But its always the average Joe that gets blamed for staying poor.

Especially toxic are the people who deny that they had any luck or favorable circumstances and claim its all down exclusively to how smart and hard working they were.

Finest survivorship bias and victim blaming you can come across.

"You were born to a poor abusive family in the middle of nowhere? Only bad influences and trying to survive all the time and no help at all? Yep. Your fault and not the systems. You are just making up excuses. Because like 1 out of 1000 who had the same situation managed to escape poverty."

"Laid of with 200 or 2000 other people because the company crashed or budget cuts? Yep. Your fault".

"Cant get a job because 50-100 people compete with you for the position every time? Yep. Your fault."

This is mostly said by people who had it easy in life and think they had it hard and who would be homeles or dead if they had a really hard childhood/really unfavorable circumstances.

But Its always the individual, never the system thats to blame.

Does it depend on the situation?

Like if they make extra money under the table and don't report it?

Thefts? Stealing from a big corporation like walmart?

Or how about if a mother leaves her children home all day because she can't afford daycare?

Drug use?

Does anyone else have to use Afterpay, Klarna, Affirm, etc. to purchase groceries for your house? It's rough out here.

Who even told our parents to name us after someone who either died or is just old ... I feel like this tradition should just end .. coz tell me why I like expensive stuffs and lifestyle na Sina hata hiyo pesa .. I'm literally just broke like hell ... But still I feel so rich ..

1. you learn to do things for yourself, I have friends who make less than me (and I don’t make even 6 figures), but grew up spoiled, who have never cut their own grass and can’t make mac and cheese from a box.

2. you don’t have to worry about getting mixed up with hard drugs. This may not be true for attractive females, but for us normies, no one we hung out around could ever afford anything besides alcohol or weed.

3. being good at budgeting

What other ones can you think of.

Okay my husband of 11 yrs and I are fairly comfortable now, not rich, but not penny pinching or counting every dime. He has NEVER been poor. I have been the poorest of poor - I lived on the street for 2 yrs before i slowly clawed my way out that and put forth an insane effort to improve my life financially.

So other the day we were getting ice cream at sonic and i brought up our friends who are trailer trash (self proclaimed), they are poor and blah blah blah. My husband said "I don't get it. Like, why not just go to college if you want to improve your life, make more money." I laughed at him, flummoxed, and said "you just don't understand shit about being poor."

So this lead to a debate, my key points were:

1) Telling someone who doesn't know if they'll have enough to eat the next meal, or having to decide between rent or fix the car to get to work, that the solution is to go into massive debt for college, is insane.

2) Yes, you could get college loans and still work, but for most of us (especially for me back in the day bcuz it was pre-internet colleges) it's work or college or work and kids or college - there are so many situations where it's just not realistic to do that.

3) Simply going to college doesn't make you doesn't guarantee you a well-paying job, i know plenty of 4 yr college educated people that can't make shit with their degree. I said right now, trade school would be a better option - more money and more employment opportunity right out of the gate with a ton of advancement possible.

4) Scholarships - he claims scholarships is the answer to the massive college debt problem. I laughed again - said most scholarships only pay a few hundred to a thousand bucks, which is a drop in the bucket. He said full ride scholarships - i said yeah, you know how many of those they give out? They don't just give those away willy-nilly and they don't give them to a dude who is 30yo and has a GED. So what is that person supposed to do? Work he said - my answer is in #2 to that.

5) He said you could at least take a couple classes. I said not usually no, most colleges require prerequisites for everything - even my little campus said i had to take 4 other classes before i was allowed to take the advanced computer class i wanted to take. He said you can just pass out of those, and i said yes, some of them i could pay the ENTIRE cost of the class to pass out of, but that others were non-passable and they required me to go. So instead of me being able to take 1 $200 advanced computer class that would've helped me get a better job, they wanted me to pay $1200 which was an insurmountable amount (cost the same as my car at the time) for me, and 4 other classes that they had a strict schedule (during the day) for that i couldn't do AND work my job.

I ultimately informed him that he can't even conceive of what it feels like to be THAT poor. I told him once I was skinny af and my mom & aunt asked me what my secret was to stay so fit, i said "being too broke to afford food". I once cried, having to decide to fix my POS clunker car that needed a $200 gas pump (that i replaced myself in the driveway in 8 degree weather) or pay my landlord the $400 for the room i rented in his POS trailer (and actually I had to borrow the $200 from my mom and pay her back later, my landlord let me work on his finances as payment and yes, ironic af, so i didn't get kicked out). If someone had come up to me and told me to just go to college (which i actually tried see #5), I would've laughed in their face at how ridiculous it was. Because, you just don't know unless you know.

Need Iron infusion, pretty bad. Who knew a vitamin was so expensive?! Applied for charity care( its 600 a pop and I need 2) and thats with insurance! Thankfully it was accepted when they realized im poor. Guess I found a silver lining

I’m tired. I dropped the babies off at school and decided to run to Goodwill to see if I could find something to make a costume for them since their is a Halloween bash this weekend with their school. All I could budget was $9.72 ( which is all I have left after bills and keeping a roof over our heads). I get the check out & heard the most anxiety ridden sound. A beep. Tried again & another beep. Looked at my app & a maintenance fee charge came out for one of my son’s seizure medication that we signed up for to get it cheaper .

I REFUSE to become homeless or have to stay in that Women’s shelter again. My sanity can’t handle it so I literally use everything for bills so it doesn’t happen again. My 5 year old has been obsessively talking about trying to win the costume contest because the winner gets their class a pizza party. Now, I have to find another excuse as to why “mommy can’t do this right now” or “we have to wait”.

When will this get easier? I am fighting for my life & hate disappointing them especially when I feel like I have done nothing but disappoint them since leaving our home. I know they blame me for making them loose their rooms, their toys , their old friends, etc. but their dad should have never put his hands on me in the first place…. Being poor hurts when you are just trying so hard to survive.

Just want to vent. In September, everything was going great. I was making $30 an hour, and had just gotten a 2018 Silverado I had for 4 months at the time. On 9/26, I got into a car accident and my truck was totaled. The following Monday, my job fired me for missing one day due to my accident because I had minor injuries.
I was able to use my last paycheck to buy a $1500 beater with a heater, and find a new job, but it takes weeks and weeks to go through interviews, offer letters, drug tests etc then start. I have the hiring process all finished now, I’m just waiting until 11/2 to start my first day. So I have had no income for weeks now, and trying to DoorDash in a 2002 f150 isn’t going well. I don’t want it to break down to make $30 a day.

It’s crazy how fast your circumstances can change when you have no support. If I had family, friends or resources I could be a little better off. But the friends I do have go from making 200k a year to broke overnight as soon as you ask for gas money and offer to pay them back, funny how that works. Everyone loves you when you’re doing well, but as soon as you have a bad month, they are disgusted by you

Trying to make it until I get back to work and get to a check. Of course my trailer park wants to evict me as well. Loving life :)

Edit: Just went out to start my truck to dash today and the pulley is now smoking and it won’t run. Life laying it on thick

Like Damn, at least I'm not homeless living in a van in a sub-zero temp city.

Or this is kinda messed up, but I like watching people walking through "Skid Row" parts of cities like walking past hordes of homeless people high on fentanyl. Because I think damn at least I'm not that fucked up. "Poverty tourism" by these wealthy social media youtubers kinda intrigues me.

I am a woman married to an alcoholic. He is functional, for now. Not abusive, doesn't yell or damage stuff. But he does lie and gaslight. He drinks nightly. Our marriage is 100% over. I will never be able to love him again.

The reason I am posting here- he makes quite a bit more than I do. When I post in the Divorce or AlAnon subs, I get a chorus of "Divorce him! Save yourself!"

But the kicker is... the money.

I will barely make ends meet if I leave. We are cushy right now, I'm not poor while we are married. But with his alcoholism, there is a downward slope. In the last year, he has started drinking at work. He is getting worse.

I feel like getting out and taking care of just myself and my daughter (college age, no child support) is the right move.

But I've been poor before. I know what it's like to put food back at a grocery store because I thought I had $30 to my name, but only had $20. I know what it's like to have one pair of jeans. I know what it's like to have to choose between paying the water bill or the light bill.

I'm better off now than I was, but everything else is more expensive than it was too.

I'm scared of being back to square one.

So... in my shoes, would you do it? Would you get a divorce?

Has anybody noticed fast food has gotten really expensive? It's just my mouth I have to feed but man I'm kinda uncomfortable food wise. I do prefer to eat out on the weekends cause life is too short and miserable to deprive yourself of tasty meals.