The Mental Debt Struggle...

Keedie

I did scream in horror @Makingabobor2 when I saw everything. It's stupid I know, to think like this, but I feel like that pigeon violated my sanctuary. I spend so much time recuperating in my room, and it's my safe space and that dirty pigeon has annoyed me 😂. But to be fair, I was dragging my heels about giving my room a deep clean as it takes so much out of me, but I've got to out of necessity now, so that's a bonus.

My son said that my room stinks but I've got deformed senses so I can't smell anything, it's rare that I can smell things to be honest. He has no nasal bone and that seems to have given him super smelling powers, so he's hyper sensitive to smell and my sense of smell is almost non-existent, so I guess it smells averagely bad? If  you cancel out our differences in perception.

18/20 exams is a whopper of exams @Crazycatlady2! I hope your daughter is getting through them okay? When my son started homeschooling and realised he could drop Spanish he was delighted. I don't know how they do so many GCSEs now, it's beyond me, but I take my hat off to them though. Construction sounds really interesting.

I'm definitely counting in fractions and percentages to get us through @LittleMissDetermined! When he realised that after this week he would nearly 1/3 of the way through he seemed to relax a little. He's got 3 exams next week and then he's on half term. He got into another college, as they offered him a place following his interview this evening, so he's got 5 offers now. He thought I was crazy and being 'extra' when I applied to 9 colleges on his behalf, but now I can see that his confidence is growing as he gets more offers. Especially as he's able to rank them in preference order, and it seems to have given him a better focus. We've got 7 weeks until our holiday, so I need to start getting toiletries and stuff together. 

Whilst I was out of the house waiting around for him to sit his exams, I went to a leisure centre that has a hydrotherapy pool to enquire about using it. They said that it's free to join on a pay as you go basis, and although it's in another borough they take residents from anywhere. It's £5.15 a session, and I'm hoping to build up to going once a week. Hopefully the exercise in the hydrotherapy pool will help with all of my joint pains, as it's so hot. I've been tweaking my budget to give myself £20 a week spending money, so that would mean that I can go to the hydro pool and still be able to put some aside as I am saving up to go to the hairdressers. My hair is not the one at the moment. It looks bad and unkempt. It's been in big plaits for about 2 weeks now, but I'm going to try and wash it tomorrow. My little afro plaits are getting a little messy to say the least 😂.

beanielou

Hydotherepy sounds good 

WelshmansDaughter

Yuck to the pigeon, just yuck. 
Hydrotherapy pool sounds good, quite reasonable price.

Keedie

Yeah I'm not impressed with that pigeon either @WelshmansDaughter! I've been washing all of the bedding and using the dettol laundry cleaner as well. Dunno if that does much in reality, but it makes me feel better lol.

I'm looking forward to the hydrotherapy and I'm aiming to sign up and go next Friday. As I don't usually work Fridays, I'm hoping to try and build this into my routine, so that when I do go back to work, it's something that I can continue to do for myself.

I've finally worked out an ideal solution with the driving and running a car! I'm going to sign it over to my brother in September when my insurance runs out, as he doesn't have a car at the moment and is sharing my sister's with her. He's very neat and a much better driver than I am, and so he will maintain the car and give my son driving lessons as I want him to get a manual licence (my son got his provisional driving licence the other day and he was beaming 😁).  When my son eventually passes his test, my brother will sign it over to him and he have a car to use. And then he can chauffeur me around 🤗.

I've been holding onto the car so that I could teach my son to drive and it made sense when I was also driving. But I'm hating driving more and more and so I'm just done with it all. I'll still keep renewing my licence with the DVLA so that I have the ability to drive, but I'll be free from having to worry about running a car, and my son will have to save towards his insurance and additional driving lessons etc.

I feel so free! My friend told me that zip car club allows you to pay £6 a month and it includes insurance and up to 60 miles. But I'm not planning on driving anytime soon. All this driving around for my son's exams over the coming weeks will just be the nail in the coffin.

Today's exam seemed to have gone well. He came home on a high and determined to do well. He text my mum and thanked her for all of her help with his history revision. And he told me thank you for this opportunity for him to do his GCSEs. I was really touched. He asked me how much it costs for him to sit his exams and I told him £180 a subject with discount, so £90 a paper and his eyes bugged out of his head lol. He said he'll get my money's worth and I told him that's not important, the main thing is that he has this opportunity to do what he can, that's the best repayment. So he gave me a determined nod and jumped on the PS4 for his break time and then he's going to do some maths past papers  which I'll mark as he goes along and give him feedback. What a great difference from this time last year. Things are finally coming together...

Crazycatlady2

DD said history went well today….maths tomorrow then that’s it till next week lol hope it keeps going well for your son 

AntoMac

All this talk of exams reminds me that I still have the occasional dream of turning up for an exam having not gone to any of the lessons.
The pigeon visit sounds most unpleasant @Keedie
I was always told that sort of things is supposed to be good luck, but I’m not so sure that’s the case! 
I remember once taking a direct hit in Birmingham City Centre after work. I had to queue up to buy a new shirt with my existing one covered in the contents of my attacker. Not the most enjoyable experience but I can laugh about it now.
The exam stress period will be over before we know it. Sounds like so far so good 😊 

Humdinger1

@Keedie you and your son are fab!! I've heard the lucky story too...I prepare to be inspired every time I come on your diary.  Love Humdinger xx 

Keedie

It's been a hot minute since I've updated or been on the forum, as life just got in the way and my mood was so low and I didn't wanna depress anyone else. 

We've moved on nicely from PigeonGate, but boy was it annoying. I'll tell myself it's lucky @AntoMac, as that'll make me feel better about it 🤦🏾‍♀️. But I guess the nice thing is that my room has been deep cleaned and it's not like it wasn't necessary, I just procrastinated on it all. I even put some flowers on my headboard that my friend gave me to cheer me up, which was really nice. I've been doing some mini decluttering each day, not a lot, but enough to make small changes with things. Overall, the little tidy ups are slowly starting to make a difference. It's like PADding, but instead of making a payment a day, I'm DADding and decluttering a day 😂. I crack myself up sometimes with the little nonsense sayings that I come up with. 

That's very kind of you to say that @Humdinger1, and I really appreciate that! It still kinda baffles me that people like to listen to my random monologues, but glad that my journey is helping people and is a source of inspiration. This forum and the people on here inspire me so much. And whilst I've been lying in my bed in between frantic driving sessions to and from exam centres and college, I've just watched lots of YouTube videos about budgeting and home organisation hacks. I'm aiming to have my living room cleared of all the paper piles that I keep putting off, by the time I am ready to go back to work. As I figured, a tidy home is a tidy mind and all that, and if my home life and mental state is on an even keel before I go back into that toxic workplace, I'll be in a stronger position to survive it whilst executing The Exit Strategy (more on that later).

How's your daughter's exams been going @Crazycatlady2? I hope she's not been too burnt out and is having a good lie in today. I don't think my son will surface until the afternoon, as he has been a bit of a walking zombie in the last few days. But I'm very proud of how much he has been working hard with his studies, and he keeps telling me thank you for all that I've done for him, so that's always a nice boost to the self esteem isn't it?

He told me last night that he's very proud of me for standing up for myself more, telling people 'no' and making more time for myself. It's funny how you don't realise how much they observe you and what they pick up on, but he said that he can see that I'm starting to build myself up more and it's really nice to see. I do still feel incredibly depressed, burnt out and stressed, but there is a slither of hope that things are going to be okay.

I've been doing quite well with my penny challenge, all of the denominations from £3.01 to £3.65 and the bonus of £2.05 has been completed. The total will be £670 with the bonus, but some has already been banked and gone towards our spending money for Turkey. I was intending to have it all done by the end of October to open in line with the sealed pot challenge, but I think I'll just keep going to the end of the year, so that I can actually have a better chance of completing it. I'm going to start banking it regularly though, so that I can earn my little bit of interest. Yay.

I'm starting to save for Christmas as a sinking fund and I will use the money from my savings challenges and rollover money at the end of the year. I've got £50 in there so far and I'll bank some coins over the weekend using my Metro savings account as they have that nice coin machine that I sadly get way too excited about using 😂. I'll see what I manage to save by the end of the year (in my Freely Debt Saving Pot) and then I will split my accumulated funds 3 ways:

• 20% Freedom - fun money to have guilt free spending in 2024 and to treat me and my son now and then
• 40% Savings - to top up my buffer account and get started on the One Month Ahead fund as the emergency fund should reach its initial £1,000 target by 31 December 2023.
• 40% Debt - I've decided to stop letting my finances and debt consume so much of my energy, so I'll make a lump sum payment to my debt but after I've taken care of the above two as that'll help me to enjoy life more

I've decided to sell my car and will use whatever I get from the sale to repay my mum. My son doesn't want a manual licence as he said it's pointless and too much effort, and I can't afford to gift my brother the car. When I thought my son would be driving it next year, my brother taking it over for that period of time made sense. But now I'm just going to sell it, and I've been getting around more just on public transport as I hate driving. And I feel free now that I have given myself permission to just let it go. Erm, I just need to tell my brother the change in plan... 😬.

Not having a car will make such a big difference financially, as it's just not worth paying for something I barely use. Once the exam period is over, I'll be back to using it once or twice a week until my insurance runs out. I'm not sure what to do about my rollator though, as that currently stays in the boot as I live on the 3rd floor with no lift. So my son might have to engage his muscles and carry it up and down the stairs for me if I'm feeling really weak need to use it. But I'm looking forward to the freedom of that next chapter, and not having the obligation of running a car, but knowing that I can hire one if I need to, but ultimately, it's not my responsibility. Besides, I might as well get use out of my freedom pass. It's crazy to have a car that I use only because it's available and not because I really want to, when I live in London with great transport links. I've even done a post-car budget, cos I'm just that sad, but it's exciting 😂.

beanielou

Good decision on the car I think 

dawnybabes

It’s pointless keeping it and paying for it if you’re not going to need it.