Hello there fellow Redditors. I am posting here today due to my current position and angle on life. I'm asking for any input, advice, outlooks, or encouragement anybody might have about mine or similar situations.
Backstory: 19/m, 10 month old daughter and wife at home. Wife does not work in order to take care of our child and our small at home business. I work full time ~60-70 hours a week on average. I make just enough in my lovely factory job to sustain our bills and food. With little room for a date once a month or so. We just recently re-leased our apartment because of a lack of funds for a home, as well as took out a loan for a newer used vehicle due to me driving 100 miles a day for work. I owe 6k on my Jeep, am paying $540 a month for full coverage and plpd on the second vehicle. $670 for rent(with 11 months left on our lease) and about $1000 more in other bills. About 7k saved up from taxes and frugal living(after investing 6k in one day to have a vehicle to get to work the next).
My question to you all(if this post even gets noticed) is how do you cope with this? This is my first time ever having a full time job, let alone one with so many hours. And what should be my strategy/plan if things do fall through? How about before things do? I struggle mentally with the fact that I'm only seeing my daughter for an hour or so a day before she goes to bed. And my wife for only 2-3 hours maximum. This alone tears me up inside, but add on over 14k in debt to a vehicle and apartment, and the fact that I never have owed money to anyone. It all adds up to chaos in my head. If I end up losing my non-union, unsafe job and am stuck with only around $600 a month. If I get hurt on-site I am left without work. If I break something expensive I'm left without work. It's been a constant struggle to be perfect just to make ends meet, and have maybe 500 a month savings if I put in 11/12 hour days. Driving an extra 2 hours/day on top of that. I understand that people have it worse than this and still function. And to that I commend them. But being straight out of high school and jumping into a job that is consuming most of my life is detrimental to me.. I loved the family life before this. And that has no amount of stress to factor into this. But at this crossroads of my life I am a slave to a job and debt. And I can't seem to cope with it right.
If any of you happen to have anything to say on this topic I really do appreciate it. It would mean the world to me as I cannot seem to get this feeling inside of me to be bearable.
Thank you so much everyone, -O
March 20, 2017 at 10:01AM
