Today is a new day!

beanielou

Great news on holiday :j :j :j

Happy riding for your DD :j

Gingerjar

Dear P&F, I've just read through your diary and just wanted to say that I think you are incredible. Despite all the terrible things that have happened you just keep going, working, struggling and beating debt and looking after your lovely daughter. You sound like a very special person and I feel humbled having read your diary.

All the best
Ginge:D

taxi73

She is indeed an inspiration.Great news on the holiday and the riding lessons for DD ...you are doing fantastically.

POSITIVE_AND_FOCUSED

Oh thank you for your comments! This last week has been a bit of an ordeal where my family is concerned. My dad reached 70 years of age. We had a lovely family get to gether for him. It was a great day, very nice. Just a couple of days prev had a disagreement with mum. Basically, I will never tell her anything about how Im doing! I was taking dd round there for the afternoon while I worked which I appreciate. "You're looking tired! I can sense something is wrong. Can you tell me?". Im ok mum, honest. "Just tell me". Well, Im £58 down on my mortgage but I will speak to them mon so its ok as I will have it on mon, and I am still recovering from my falls. I will need to go back to the docs" "Oh well, I can give you the £58." Thats ok mum, Ill sort it." "No take it." So, I took a chq for the amount for which I was grateful, and then it started. "Well, what do you expect. You should go on Incapacity. Half the village say they think you looked tired. How long can you keep going?What does it tell you when the lady from the Disabled Parents Network says you are the only working disabled parent on her books? Why are things so financially tight? The day has come where you need to change your life. etc etc etc. You should have met somebody else by now!" Was all v upsetting. I know mum and dad care and have my interests at heart and I love them to bits and appreciate them having my dd twice a week and more recently paying for dd to have a horse riding lesson every other week. Thats all great but mum also said they think dd has a dreadful life!, I apparently have a dreadful life etc etc. True it is challenging but I think it always will be by virtue of the fact I am disabled, I am on my own and still dealing emotionally with dh but as a unit, dd and I are just great. We love each other so so much, we do have lots of v precious and happy times. I then made the mistake of texting my sis who again I love dearly. Her response was simply not all of us get our own way in life, I should accept my lot, consider selling the house, giving up work, giving up on my goals and dreams. This is the same sis who I appreciate was coming from a caring perspective but who told me my financial situation was not sustainable two years ago, and here I am still holding my own with the debt going down. Also, telling me I was totally irresponsible to go through with my pregnancy and my dd is now a healthy 8 year old and just v lovely.
So, the answer to what they want me to do is: I love you all, but No, No, no! I will not! You will have to continue to "watch in horror" which is what mum told me she and dad do.
Basically, if I should fall again I am on my own as I have in essense been this last month in terms of getting any extra support while my bruises and scars recover. My parents, sister, friends all who are part of a couple, so there is an energy of two, they have all said they are finding finances tough, so why should it be a surprise I am too when I am on my own? Why am I considered such a failure because of that? Everyone else carries on but I am supposed to not, I can not call on exta support from my family because essentially Im choosing to work. Its my choice and as I am realising I have to understand that unless I am prepared to give it all up and not work anymore the support is simply not there. I could go on Incapacity and not fall over possibly as much but then again I still could and my friends know that I love what I do and I want to keep my home and pay the mortgage off. Since this saga mum has texted me and said she and dad can sit with me and see how they can help. The fact I have to explain to them what it is to fall over 3 times in one month, and keep it all together is just not going to happen. How would they be in the same situation? If they answer that question they will know the answer to theirs. What about a well done for keeping it together, for being upstraight with all my bills, for reducing my debt, for building what is in fact a successful business and doing so in the aftermath of a murder situation and falling? Since the sad death of my dear dear aunty, I am now the only single parent in my entire family and am managing to hold on to my mortgage and everything in essense on my own. Mum pointed out to me that she paid for my car adaption last year which I have thanked her for a million times. There is no acknowledgement whatsoever of the £800/£900 a time I had to find myself for my previous car adaptions over the years. I have always maintained my independence in all areas virtually 100% of the time. Its true I rely on food parcels from the charity involved with dd and I at the mo and again I am most thankful for that.

No, I can not do what they would like me to do. Its not going to happen. I think I can keep going. If I fall then I simply wont tell them, and just keep going. So, I am in a very fighting spirit right now. saw an interview with Arnold Shwarznegger the other day and he was saying how when he first arrived in America he was told he would never make it in the movies and he would not be able to rise high, and look at him now. Ive just got to still believe in myself and what I am wanting to achieve for dd and I and in the main so far succeeding. Will update my signature but since my light bulb moment my overall debt has reduced by nearly £8K and I am in a strong position for that to decrease faster. It took a while to address outgoings etc so I was reducing the debt as opposed to dipping in to it from time to time. On that note, off I go for a snack and do a bit of paperwork before collecting dd from her club after school. Sorry to anyone reading about the long post.

taxi73

that sounds awful what your family said..you are strong willed and know you can do it but mums/dads are always protective and are only trying to protect you.

POSITIVE_AND_FOCUSED

Thanks taxi, I do know they all have my best intentions at heart but then I have re read something I have up on my kitchen cupboard that says what other people think of you is none of your business! So, on that note am going to respectively ignore them, be there for them, love them, and leav it at that.!

Just a further bit of news concerning my debt with Sainsburys. A n acquaintance had great success with her debts by simply writing to the companies off her own back and asking for interest to be reduced or not deducted at all. So, I thought nothing ventured nothing gained and wrote to Sainsburys to start of f with. It transpires for me to be charged no or less interest on my debt with them I would have to be in arrears with them and I am not. So, have decided to leave that approach for now. I would need to get my head round whether I could do that without having sleepless nights. So, for now will see how I go because I believe I can keep going and things will get easier, particularly if the falling isn't an issue.. In the event that things dont go according to plan I will seek help via the Citizens Advice. Off to pick up some lovely orders Im sure!

Verbatim

Looks like you're putting your upset with your family behind you and moving ahead as ever PAF. It's really the same old same old again isn't it?! Whenever they offer help and you accept you seem to have that sort of outpouring from them. I wonder if they feel a bit responsible or guilty. Perhaps they need to accept that you're all grown up now and quite capable of making your own decisions.

But you are fortunate in having family nearby who can babysit and help out in crises. My parents were long dead when I had my dd and I so missed having my Mum to ask and compare notes with. But I did and do have a lovely OH which of course is so important and it must be so difficult and lonely at times for you without yours. Do remember how WELL you're doing though.

POSITIVE_AND_FOCUSED

Thanks Verbatim, I do hear what you say and I am appreciative so v much for what my mum and dad do do which is have dd twice a week after school and I collect her about 7pm ish and of course they are paying for her to have horse riding lessons every 2 weeks.. Other than that evening babysitting is a no no and in fact looking at my life my social life is zilch in terms of ever having an evening out somewhere but then I would say I dont mind that but then tbh I would probably fall asleep half way through the evening anyway. Friends are q prepared for that when ever I go round a friends house with dd for a take away which again is once in the blue moon, I often doze off. You have to laugh! Yes, mum and I have made a sort of peace. She did ask again on Monday why had I got behind with my mortgage over January and Dec and I just find such questions beggar belief. I am surrounded by a small but lovely lovely group of friends who have told me that if their oh died, they would have to rethink their life completely, possibly move, here I am still managing everything since before my oh was murdered and despite the snow and falling, and they want to know why I got behind over Christmas. So, I didn't tell mum, she must surely realise the answer herself, and asked about other relatives, anything to get off the subject because I didn't want to argue. I owe a lot to my parents, how they fought for me to get a place in a Spastics school as they were called when I was a toddler, and enduring the numerous visits to Great Ormand Street, my gran bless her used to buy us tea at the Victoria Station hotel to make the trip a nice one! It amazes me that they would rather I gave up the fight now, it will always be a fight in the sense that this world expects nothing but perfection from us all, its just the way it is, the situation I had with Soc Services last year is testament to that fact. But, it doesn't mean things are impossible. I believe I have a 10 year window until dd is 18 in which to really get all my debt inc mortgage paid off, get some savings in place, and build my Kl team to be able sustain us financially during and beyond 10 years. I believe that is v doable. That is my goal. And to maintain my retail which is ongoingly steady. In fact Im getting so many orders I have a back log at the moment which is v reassuring and just great! When Im 55 instead of owing 150Ktotal inc mortgage as is the case now I will be on the road to having that in savings in addition of course to my home value by then with no mortgage owing. It is a very exciting prospect and one I relish achieving. It would ensure my dd doesn't have to worry about me when she is older and may want to go travelling or to university or move away. and it would ensure I retain my independance and mobility for as long as possible. On that note, just want to mention my bargain of this week. Have been in huge need of a new home phone, was intending to get one from BT website at £29, then got one from Asda for a fiver! Not bad!!

Verbatim

Excellent. Glad to see you as your name says, positive and focused.

beanielou

Keep plodding xx