Hello,
I’d like to start by saying this type of platform is something that I didn’t even realize existed and if there are people here that actually help in the ways that I have recently come to discover, then god bless them (you) and I pray there is a chance that my story compels someone to help turn my life back to the light, as Im shrouded in a rain cloud right now and im having a very difficult time finding my way out.
I have always been the hardest working guy on the job, no matter what the job is, and I still try to set the bar at work to this day. I also try to set an example outside of work. Although lately, the last several months, I’ve been in a funk and not myself at all. I know the people close to me have noticed because the regular people that I keep close to me aren’t so close anymore. I’ve begun to recluse. Shut off from the world. Essentially, I suppose I had given up or given in to the hardships that aligned with my life. That was in the beginning of the fall. I have a goal now, not feeling so lost and out of place anymore, as much as I’m feeling anxious to start out rebuilding my life. I need help to bring my vision to fruition. I know I will succeed again and get my daughter back in my life for good if I can just get a boost to get me back up on my feet again, first.
I’m Chris, I’m 38 years old, a journeyman pipefitter of 15 years, by trade, accruing most of my hours all over the country and recently been working in the plumbing field as an apprentice as I moved back home and stayed planted after my daughter was born. This was to give her a life with family just around the corner and a stable upbringing where I enjoyed my childhood, the great PNW. I work every day most weeks, with the exception of Sundays off. Now, you may be asking why I am working as an apprentice when I am a skilled journeyman in another trade? Well, about 2 years ago I was working with a young man that I called my protege, a man I considered a close friend, building heat exchangers in his garage for a successful, local cannabis company. We had a contract for several units to be welded/fabricated from the ground up. We worked up the design and fabrication for maximum efficiency. The work was good work. Meticulous but not overbearing. Kept me comfortable and able to provide for the two of us, my daughter and myself. It was great, working for ourselves essentially. I would bring my daughter to our shop and show her what daddy did for work, which she loved to do so much. She would get so excited when I told her she gets to come to help me at work. I miss that a lot. Teaching her and just being a father. She was living with me for most of the week. I shared custody with my ex as we just couldn’t seem to make things work when she hit her early 20’s (party age), was able to have some time away from our child as she grew older and was able to be watched by daycare or other family, and my ex fell into the party scene that she wasn’t able to experience the 3 years prior as a new mother. She is 10 yrs younger than me. Nonetheless, I had my baby girl most of the time and loved it. Baby mom worked at a local bar 4 or 5 nights a week and partied after work on top of that. Not my ideal motherly figure at the time, but she has grown out of that since. So at the time my daughter needed me there as much as possible. It was a near perfect situation given the circumstances.
Fast forward a few months. I end up dropping a couple gears in my transmission (04 Silverado). So I take it over to a friend’s house where he agreed to let me store it while I got the money together to fix it. Well that was about a 3 week turn around and when I went back for the truck, with parts, my truck was gone. There was a divorce going on I didn’t know about between my friend and his wife, and while he went off to counseling out of state, his wife decided to just give my truck away as she was selling the house and clearing the property. This was a rude awakening. So now my truck is gone, I’m not able to have my daughter as much because of my lack of transportation, and now her mother has found some new guy that wants to be her hero and deliver her back to where I actually found her, where we met, a little town in South East Texas. So I’m informed by her that she’s leaving in 2 weeks with my daughter and there is nothing I can do to stop her. I didn’t go to the courts because the walls were caving in on me and I didn’t feel I would have a case because I wasn’t with vehicle and I had also just got told I needed to find another place to stay because my cousin and roommate, who lived at his mom’s (my aunt’s) had set the house on fire accidentally and it was going to be condemned because of smoke damage and a move back in would be pending until further notice. Great.
Now I have no ride, I’m homeless and losing my family half a country away. Well there’s more. The good friend I mentioned earlier, that I was working with, ended up having a secret drug problem, that in turn, ruined his marriage and he and his wife were moving to Arizona to try and salvage what was left. There goes my job. And to make matters more convoluted, all my tools, 2 tool boxes full, plus welding machine, argon bottle, bottle cart, many custom tools specific to my trade, tools that I had been handed down by fellow tradesman, family (my dad is a pipefitter also) and tools that I have bought over the years. All locked in the garage belonging to my friend, who took a trip to Arizona with his wife to look at houses, for a month. So, he eventually came back and that’s when I attempted to get my tools back from him. He said they were in storage buried by all his house things that were packed in the unit after my tools and I needed to wait until they took their stuff to Arizona, at which point the unit would be empty of his things and my tools able to be retrieved. Well he lied and actually screwed me around giving me incorrect unit information and gate key code info as well. Then he wouldn’t answer my calls so I couldn’t get to my tools and therefore couldn’t work in my field without them. I had to hunt the location and the unit, which I found. Then buy a unit to get my own gate key code, to gain access to the facility’s. After all that, I found out that he stopped paying the rent on the unit before getting his things out and also was selling my tools behind my back to feed his drug habit, which explains why he gave me the run around because once I opened my tool box I would notice that the most valuable tools were gone. So now my remaining tools that he hadn’t sold off are all about to be auctioned off to the highest bidder, because his default on payments had reached the point of no return, and I didn’t have time to come up with the money to save them from being auctioned. My livelihood and life’s work to that point was gone, I lost everything.
So I’m without a job, my truck, that was paid off I might add, my tools, my home, and my family, all within the span of 2 months. I fell into a dark depression when I faced the reality that I was helpless and losing my daughter. That’s what really killed me the most. We were best friends. And I loved more than anything being her Dad. And I miss her so much. I currently haven’t seen her for 2 years now. Haven’t been able to fully recover from everything, I’m living in a tent on my bosses property. I was living in my car before that with my girlfriend at the time, whom I fully supported financially as her family was nothing like a family to her and I could not let her go through that feeling like she had nobody. Yes I know I couldn’t even take care of myself let alone another person but I have always been the type to give the shirt off my back even if I didn’t have another. I was always able to figure it out. The occupancy in the car wasn’t too bad as it was an suv and I set up a bed in the back as the seats folded down. Now this may be hard to believe but I ended up getting car jacked in a grocery store parking lot a couple months ago. She was with me when that happened, and I think it was all to much for her because now we aren’t together anymore. She claims that she left me for someone else because I couldn’t provide for her the way that she needed to be provided for.
Now, I am traversing new territory, as I’m the one seeking, and in desperate need of help. Usually I am the one offering it up. My grandmother always taught me to give without expecting anything in return and you will live a gratified life. I always tried to follow her lead when it came to life and how to live it. She was a pillar in our family, wise and full of love for everyone, always. She just passed away 2 weeks ago. I try to think about what she would advise me to do regarding the state my life is in at the moment, and i think she would tell me to ask for help. Reach out to humanity and have faith that it is still good and there is hope and love left in this world. I believe she is right, and I do have faith I will find it. I just want to wipe the slate clean and go to my daughter. She needs her dad. I am in a much better head space now and feel like I need to go to her, whatever it takes. Given my skills in the trades and contacts, I could easily get a job on the road, pipefitting, again. Like I used to do before Jade was born. Jade is my daughter’s name. So in order to do so I would need another truck, a tool box, all new tools of my trade, new wardrobe, and money to get me a out on the road and on my way to Texas to reunite with my baby and start a new chapter in my life and a new chapter for my family as well. Jade is my only child. My legacy, and we have a lot more to do before that book is written. So all together I would estimate I need around $15,000 – $20,000. I would like to purchase a travel trailer also to stay in as I work my way down south to Texas, and also stay in once I arrived in Texas. I assume I will need a little time to find a job down there once I arrive. With the continued streak of hardships I have endured, it has been very difficult to be myself. I am usually a very positively driven mind, optimistic in nature. Lately, I seem to be just the opposite and I need a blessing to help me shed the negativity and a wave to ride to my goal of reuniting with my baby. Any help would be amazing and more than I could ask of anyone that were to send it. And I thank you taking the time to read what I’ve written. It is a lot to put on paper, and really it’s just the cliff notes to the full story of the past couple years, but it is the truth in the rawest form. From my heart, traversed through my thumbs, into my phone and here to you now, sincerely. Obviously there are many parts to my story that could be expanded on, but I felt it would only take up more of your time, which I consider to be very valuable in its own right. Thank you for you’re consideration. I will leave my information below in order for you to donate at your will. Thank you once again.
Chris
@paypal.me/Lancaster690