I really do not know where to start with this. I guess I’ll start back several years ago, about 9 years to be exact. I was, young and dumb without a care in the world. Unfortunately, I was starting to hang out with bad crowds, and starting to make bad choices. This went on for about a year and a half until I met someone who was taking temporary residence in my city, and who had an 11-year-old daughter. Suddenly I had more than myself to care about, and things started getting better. As our relationship grew, so did we. We became a family.
We decided that it was time to get away from the city we were in because there was too much crime and drugs in the area. We didn’t want her daughter to fall into the wrong crowds, so we put our savings together and moved to a small town out in the country with a population of 480. The country life was nice. We bought a cheap raised house near the Illinois river. It took everything we had, but it was ours.
It was a bold move we made, neither of us had any jobs lined up for us before the move. We lived off what little savings we had left for a few months. While I was searching for work in the nearest town 30 miles away, I was also selling scrap metal from cut-up barges along the river bank. I actually did pretty well with that, and I was also cleaning up the river banks. But in the long run, it ultimately cost me a vehicle, but the income kept us living.
We lived in the house for no more than 9 months. Up north got heavy rainfall, followed by a nasty winter, and the river started to rise. We rode it out as long as we could with the river surrounding all 4 sides of our house. We and our pets eventually had to evacuate with the help of a neighbor with a boat. We had only left with bags of clothes, and a few small items, there was no way of getting anything else out of the home.
We had enough to rent a very small one-bedroom apartment 15 miles away and to afford a few air mattresses. This is how we lived for 2 to 3 months. When the river dropped enough for us to reach our house, we went back to see how bad it was. Everything was ruined, it was all gone, everything that we had worked for. All of our possessions, the home, all of it. It was a very crushing blow to the soul. I reached out to FEMA for help, but there was nothing they could do because it wasn’t considered a disaster area.
So we made a new life in our tiny apartment. We lived there for 3-4 years. It wasn’t great, but we made it happen. The school was 2 blocks down, I was working, and so was my wife. About 2 years in, my wife came down with a disorder of the immune system which caused her to start working less, as well as myself because I was always worried for her and trying to take care of her in any way I could.
Funds started running low again and we didn’t have an option but to leave. We made our way back to the city where we first met because I have family there. My mother was kind enough to let us have two rooms at her house. But tensions got high in this living situation quickly. Two families with different opinions living together can get like that, especially when one person suffers from alcoholism.
Luckily we didn’t have to live butting heads too much though. We had both saved enough with me working, and with her working as much as she could with her ailments. We managed to gather enough for a deposit to move into a two-bedroom apartment and have our own space again.
The apartment we moved into turned out to be a nightmare though. The first year we had to deal with a massive invasion of roaches due to the downstairs neighbor. The landlord refused to do anything about it until she moved out. When the neighbor was evicted, the landlord brought us a few cans of raid to solve the bug problem, but it was so bad I could literally hear the roaches laughing at us.
It took months for the landlord to finally fix the problem correctly. That problem at least. Any time it rains, I have to rearrange every room in the home due to leaks that haven’t been fixed in the four years that we’ve lived here. The electricity constantly flickers. And squirrels have taken residence in the walls, ceilings, and floors. This apartment is a death trap waiting to happen.
The pandemic had taken its toll on us too. My wife lost her job, and I was barely hanging on to mine. The bills were starting to back up, and the stress was rising once again. On top of all this, my sister who is just 3 years older than me, was diagnosed with stage 4 cervical cancer. She took chemo treatments to try and battle it, but it took a turn for the worse, and it became metastatic and spread throughout her entire body.
When I lost my sister, I lost a huge part of myself. I became so depressed that even getting out of bed felt like a chore. I lost my job, and my will to live. I couldn’t find purpose in anything anymore. It took a few months to pull myself out of this dark place. The bill stack just got higher and higher.
Ever since it’s been a constant struggle. The bills are never on time anymore. Everything is always paid for at the last second. My life feels like a chess game now. I have to plan my moves appropriately, one bad move and it could be game over.
Two days ago, my car broke down while I was working. Working to try and pay my electric bill that’s due today. I’m stranded, with no car, no money, and soon no electricity. If I can’t find a way to pay the bill by the end of today, I’ll violate the deferred payment arrangement, my bill will hike in price, and I’ll have a few days, maybe a week before disconnection.
My car is at the dealership, still waiting to be pulled into the shop to be serviced. I have no idea how long this may take, or even what it’s going to cost if it’s not covered by warranty. My wife just started a part-time work-from-home job, but it’ll be 2 weeks before she receives her first paycheck.
My big concern right now is to make sure my electricity gets paid. The bill is $152.03, tomorrow it will be $243.45. I have nowhere else to turn to, please help.
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/StevenWimbish