Hi,
To whomever may be reading this, I hope your day is going good:)
I am a Canadian female, soon to be 20 years old this month of March. A little about me: I was raised by a strong single mother. I love and have always been musically involved ,with school and church choirs, instrument lessons, etc., I am a pisces, I currently work two full time jobs, one support work for individuals with intellectual disabilities, and at a alarm call centre
My parents split when I was 3, and I usually would see my dad a few times a month. My mother has always been a hardworking woman, she has been my mother and father for most of my life. My father struggled financially and my mother did not demand child support, and when she would it would be enough to cover one week out of 4 weeks in a month. My mother has always worked 2-3 jobs to be able to provide for me and my siblings(I have 6 siblings between both my parents, and 2 younger half sisters on my father’s side). I would say my second parent Is my sister, she always looked out for me when my mom was at work, and took care of me like a mother, so I very much love her and appreciate her for everything she to has done for me.
I went on all school field trips, I took piano lessons, I joined literally all the school sport teams (except basketball), went to my sisters whenever, had family cookouts, got my drivers license, got my first car, had my first accident, got my first job (@ Mcdonalds), went through depressive phases, and changes, graduated high school, etc., and I can’t think of one time my mother hasn’t been present for everything, and if there was a time where she wasn’t, she would be the one funding and supporting everything I do. My mother has helped me grow (mentally, physically, financially, spiritually), she has taught me faith and love, forgiveness, independency, and so.much.more. My mom is not the perfect human being but to me she is the perfect mother.
Unfortunately we don’t always meet people with good intentions in this life and with that my mom met her now ex-husband (not my father), they had a good relationship from the start, he seemed to be a nice guy, had his own construction company and would make good money to support us and handle anything else he had to handle, my mom agreed to cosign his sister company to his company, and even paid the office space mortgage for him to be a supportive, participating wife. And guess what, even I can’t believe it, but this guy was totally broke, all the money we thought he was bringing home was just a ton of business loans he took out, and high credit loans, and he had to file bankruptcy because he couldn’t even pay it back because his business was not doing as well as my mom thought, and with my mom being as understanding as she is, she sat down and listened to what he had to say but it was nothing but great deception. My mother decided she will stick by her husband and be there for him for his next plan to restore his finances. This time, he asked my mom to take out loans for him, get credit cards from places like Home Depot, Canadian Tire, etc., and she did. Long story short, the money he promised to pay for the loans and credit, was never paid, my mom could not afford to pay for her mortgage and since it’s an investment home, she couldn’t afford the renovation costs on top of that, take care of me (and my step sister living with us then), pay for her car, and basically pay off her expenses, and then also pay for his expenses as well, therefor we know how crazy interests on loans get and the bills piled, then eventually she had to file for bankruptcy, it became overwhelming for her, and looked back and seen what loving this man did for her, and decided to divorce him beginning of covid. I went to go live with my sister because my mom was a health care nurse and wanted to make sure I would not get sick from covid or anything else at the hospital. I came back to live with my mom September 2020, and I got my first job at McDonalds, I also was able to take my drivers test so I got my license. My mom for the first time told me what was going on behind the scenes. I have always known my mom to be positive and happy, but for her to express what she was going through just meant to me it was serious, she was hurt, and I could tell. The bills that she had to pay were at least 5x what it should have been for just me and her. I was in junior year of high school and I was working so I kept myself busy between those two things. My mom was working 3 jobs at the time, and somewhere along the way she had to drop one because she started experiencing health issues that would not allow her to work as much and had to step down to 2 jobs which she currently works til now. I managed to save 15k working at McDonalds my first year while I was helping my mom, and as I saw mom start to overwork herself, the stress was visible, I decided to get a second job to support my mom more. Once I got my high school diploma, I was able to drop one job, there was more employment opportunities once I obtained my diploma and was over 18, and so i remained at McDonalds until June 2023, but the second job helped with increasing my income. Just before I graduated in June of 2022, my brother who was living with my dad had his first seizure, and was later diagnosed with epilepsy while in a coma for one week. I am extremely grateful that he was able to be there for my graduation, despite all worrying and the tears. My mother became restless knowing that yes he is an adult so no one was watching him or checking up on him as much, so she had him move in with us, after all, we did have a spare bedroom, and it brought us comfort knowing he was there. My brother was involved in a collision summer of 2022 and was found at fault arguing his mental capacity was not enough for him to operate a vehicle, and with that his insurance sent him a letter saying he had to pay for the damage to the other vehicle, and they refused to cover the repair costs for his vehicle as well, so out of nowhere, he just got into over $30,000 in debt, on top of having to still pay for his non drivable vehicle since he was financing. My brother has had a difficult time getting jobs just because he is a slow learner, and not everyone is willing to put their trust in confidence in him, but they don’t know him like I do, and I know that anyone who has him on their team , is winning, period. It may take him a bit longer to learn some things but same with me, same with someone else. I was really strong in math in school, but put some bio in front of me and I no longer know what your talking about, science has always taken me longer to learn but math I comprehend like English lol. As of right now my brother works part time for the city at community centres and after school programs helping other kids and conducting the programs they have for them, and I am helping him look for full time employment because only god knows when he will finish paying his debt on top of other his other things expenses when he only makes just under 500$ biweekly.
As I am working two jobs I am paying for everything I need to pay, while trying to help my mom, my brother, and the rest of my siblings with what I can, and unfortunately, I can not attend post secondary school at the moment because I cant afford it, and with working two jobs, I won’t be able to keep up with my education that I would make my priority. Our house had to be put on pause with the renovations, and recently the bank sent my mom a letter effective immediately stating she needed to upgrade the electrical wiring in our house because it is an older home, so if the house catches on fire, insurance does not cover us at all. That is the simplest and shortest version of my story with a timeline.
Well, to conclude this, I am not sure what to do with my life, and money is not everything, but it has impacted my life so. My mother and my brother have this huge wrongful debt to pay and mine very minor, and I don’t know when my mom’s body will reject physically, or when my brothers health will restore, but these two people I love with my whole heart. Everything is getting sooo expensive here to the point that I cant even support my family the way I want to because I also have things to pay but yet still the least amount to pay between us three. This life feels like a loop, that will. never end, I feel like I won’t be able to go to school while I’m young so I can build my life, I see my brother who’s only 3 years older than me going through depression because he feels like he won’t be able to make it in this society, my mom is growing older and her energy has decreased dramatically because of the financial stress and exhaustion. I can’t see myself being able to save enough money and pay for things, and still support my family. So, I have sought this website while currently working on finding side hustles that can help with streams of income to take us out of the situation we are in so we can find build a future as well, and to all the readers of my story, I would like to say thank you for reading and those who understand where I am coming from.
I do not want to come off as desperate because I understand that everyone has their own going and I am definitely not the only one.
My PayPal is @mmwaahh