My family has been struggling to stay afloat since I had to leave my job during the lock down here in Ky. I have been struggling with my mental and physical health. I have been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease of the thyroid, Hoshimotos thyroiditis, since 12 years of age. I would love to know what an average woman of 35 feels like. But I know when I started having aches and pains, trouble catching my breath without moving and chest pain with lite activity, hallucinating from lack of sleep and horrible anxiety and panic attacks that I needed to see a doctor or specialist. This started when I was with my ex-husband. I met him when I had an unplanned pregnancy, after my ex-boyfriend raped me, and no one believed me. I was living with him while I attended a tech college to get my LPN degree at 18. I didn’t want any kids. But when I found out and saw my son’s heart beating on my 4 week US, he became my first true love. My best friend and her husband introduced me to my exhusband who was in the army. He was 19 years old and told me he wouldn’t be able to have kids. I believed him at that time and he was nice, charming and he seemed to have his life together. He got out of the army and joined the NG and found out he was going to be deployed. This was 2006. He tore his shoulder in pre deployment and had surgery right away. My son was 6 months when I got pregnant with my oldest daughter and my son regressed into autism at 15 months, when he finally got his 1 yr vaccines. One day he was normal, milestones on time and the next he stopped talking and making eye contact and everything from sights, sounds and foods he enjoyed, made him upset. My ex couldn’t keep a job and I had found emails and pictures and when I went to confront him with them, they disappeared. This happened multiple times throughout our marriage. I had my oldest daughter and got pregnant when she was 3 months old. I didn’t have a drivers license and I asked to get my medication and have my labs for my thyroid, but I was dismissed. I finally got an appointment to get birth control and found I was pregnant but I miscarried at 10 weeks natural as my body hadn’t regulated my thyroid. There was no comfort. 2 weeks after my miscarriage I was pregnant again with my 2nd daughter. I felt awful the whole pregnancy. I didn’t get to my appointments. And even though his mom, sister and brother-in-law lived close by, they ignored me asking for help. My ex got orders for deployment again and he left 1 week after my daughter was born. That was 2019, during an ice storm and he had been activated to help clear trees and get people out of their homes. My mom and dad came to help with the kids and I ended up needing my gallbladder removed when my 2nd daughter was 6 weeks old. Not once did he call and see how I was or ask. I sent care packages that I learned he gave away. He spent all his money and barely left any for food and bills at home. When he returned on RandR he left his laptop with his email and Facebook open. I thought it was mine as we had the same laptop but realized it wasn’t from incriminating messages of cheating. And of course they were gone when I confronted him with them. I got an online associate’s degree. I got pregnant with my last daughter and found out he was to be deployed again. One week after she was born, he deployed. Again I received no help and had no money after he returned from deployment. During this time he made a friend with a woman. This woman had 3 kids with 3 different men. She ate out all the time and didn’t get child support. She was being evicted and my ex told her to stay with us. I told him no. It was 2014 and I had moved by myself with 4 kids into this house with a mortgage. I had started my associates in nursing at the local college. Her and her kids were horrible influencs and she was just a bad mom who played good cop bad cop. Mom and dad. She didn’t help with bills and they ate out every day. I confronted my ex about his relationship with her and he denied everything. His mom lived with us and she and his friend ease dropped on our conversation. My ex, his sister, mom and friend confronted me outside and told me that I was childish and selfish, for not supporting my husband’s friendships. Eventually I told her to her the hell out of my home. I was trying to finish my nursing degree. I started having problems with my mental and physical health. My body ached and my right arm would go through points of tingling, falling asleep and pain to the point where I want to cut it off. My hips and lower back hurt a lot more and my legs crawled. I had a sleep study and labs. My legs moved 59 times per minute in my sleep. My iron stores were very low. I was put on supplements. But my mental and physical health got worse and my Dr. Prescribed me anti depressants though it helped nothing. When I told him about my pain he mocked me, called me a pill seeker even when I just wanted to know what was wrong and would blatantly ignore things I said directly to him. I told my ex and him and his mom told me to grow up and that they deal with pain and it’s all in my head. My ex started seeing a therapist for his fake claims of PTSD stories. When I asked to see a therapist, my ex diagnosed me with trying to upstage him. Then I finally was able to get into his phone and confront him with the evidence I needed to realize enough was enough. My kids and I have suffered at the hands of him and his family. I worked a year as a nurse and had nothing to show for it. I was the only one helping the kids with school and appointments. I asked for a divorce. And then he abandoned his family and went to North Dakota to make a new one. I continued to work. My dad moved in with me to help with the kids. Then I met my current husband. He loves the kids and the kids love him. Right before we got married I found out my oldest daughter was molested by my ex brother-in-law. But nothing could be substantiated. There was only her word against his. I got married and my friend and mentor died at the end of the year. I started trying to get help from my doctor’s for my mental and physical health. My pain kept getting worse. I was having anxiety attacks and was allowed to collect intermittent FMLA and by the end of the year, I was fired and accused for something I didn’t do. I had to fight for my nursing license and I started a new nursing job as an at home nurse. But my mind couldn’t take the pain and lack of sleep. I started hallucinating. My doctor and the ER turned me away, saying I had no pain and I was just seeking for meds and attention. I quit my job when my kids schools shut down for COVID-19 and applied for unemployment. I have up my nursing license because I wouldn’t be able to pay for drug tests and evaluations for 4 years. Then some people lied and CPS made my family take our kids until it was straightened out. My ex took the girls and my dad got my son. Then they said my dad couldn’t have my son because someone said he was not capable of doing so. So they took my son 2.5 hours away to a foster home. My husband lost his tattoo manager position that he had for 5 years. He suffers from chronic pain and it’s something that keeps him living because he can’t do much else. He’s legally deaf and has hearing aids that makes him have anxiety when he wears them. And all this is tearing him apart. He got a factory job. And after 2.5 days they had no work d then. The holidays hit. I had exploratory surgery and found that I had endometriosis all over inside and 7 years of not being treated made it worse. I’m bleeding inside and out every month. I finally got my unemployment. Then we got COVID and the flu. When we got better we tried to open a tattoo shop with a partner and he took all our money, used my husband’s portfolio to pretend he was a tattoo artist. Our building owner kicked him from the building calling him a horrible person and partner. We found out he told his new boss that we were selling and doing drugs. We lost business clients and then we couldn’t keep up with the bills so we lost the shop. And our home has been in COVID-19 forbearance and now I was able to get my ex to modify his VA mortgage loan. And now our bills are past due. We won’t have a home for our kids to come home to. And they want to come home so badly that they cry every night. My mortgage is $855 due by the end of this month. And the next 2 months by the end of the month or we will lose our family home. It’s much cheaper than renting and by this point we won’t get somewhere to live. My dad died in July unexpectedly at 61 years. My mom has the two youngest girls. My husband has no family. We have asked and sold so many things that we have nothing left. And my husband’s tattoo equipment is the only way we can get back on our feet. We have tried to get foodstamps but they gave us $200 and then even though we gave them the paperwork, they keep stopping them and say we didn’t. So we have no food left in the house. We have one car that’s running and it’s not doing well. We need some help just to get back on our feet. Money for gas, getting one of our cars in better shape and bills paid so they aren’t shut off. We could even take part of our house and make it into a tattoo shop but we need the money to fix it up for approval and licensing. We just don’t want money we want a kickstart back into our life. We want our family back.