The Mental Debt Struggle...

Sarahwithlove

That's great that your old carer can come help you declutter, it will make the move so much more manageable. 

Keedie

We've had such great birthdays, I've really enjoyed myself. I met my sister in East London and she treated me to a Thai lunch for my birthday. And my son brought me a lovely gift, and had it wrapped and personalised from the perfume shop. I've kept the personalised ribbon as a keepsake 🤗.


Despite having a hospital appointment on his birthday, my son enjoyed his day too. But we found out that he has to another surgery to remove the screws in his leg. I saw them on the x-ray in the consultant's office and it made me queasy. They're look like long screws you'd use to do carpentry or something 🤢.

No one turned up for my housing assessment appointment which was rather disappointing. But I contacted the lady and she said they've been very stressed and busy and someone from the office will contact me soon to rearrange the appointment. I'm still a bit confused by the whole process, but I will contact the Occupational Therapists for them to also do an assessment for me to move. I realised that they're two different teams that all work together. And all of the paperwork goes to a Medical Needs Assessor, who determines whether I stay in my current housing category or get moved to a higher band. In 2017, I was told that I have "low medical priority", and considering I've deteriorated since then, I should hope my category has increased to give me higher priority. For all of the bidding I've been recently doing, I'm like 852 out 1,154 or 1,298 out of 1,715. So that has been a sobering reality check. I think my 2 years timeline is really optimistic, even after the assessments and reviews have all been done 😬. I was being stubborn and should have updated my medical stuff and pushed more, years ago 🤦🏾‍♀️. At least being on the list for 7 going on 8 years does give me more points, as the longer you're waiting, the more points you accumulate.

I'm going to have to see if home swapping is an option, in which case, my flat needs repainting. So having a serious declutter is no bad thing. People need to come up the stairs and whilst they're struggling to breathe and recovering (I see the same reaction in everyone 🤣), they can be wowed by the flat itself. I'm gonna have to draw up a list of all that needs to be removed, and what needs to be done so that I can budget properly.

I had a meeting with my manager today and we were talking about the office relocation, and how it will mean that I cannot drive to work and will have to use public transport which is slow, painful and physically draining. I think when it happens, I may well have to reduce my hours again. I sat down today and had a long think about everything, and I think I need to just find another job. I can't wait until there's a smooth transition from HR to Finance. I'm out of my mind with boredom in my job and yet incredibly stressed and irritated by the mistakes my colleagues make. So I have a lot of planning and decisions to make over the coming months...

PennysIntoPounds

Many happy returns to you. What a lovely personalised ribbon!
With your organisational skills I'm sure you'll work out the best approaches for flat and job x

KajiKita

That perfume box is just lovely ❤️ Well done that young man 😊👏

Your comment about the screws in his leg remind of a friend who is a carpenter. Years ago he had a bad bike accident and had to have one of those encasing wired into the leg structures fitted, which needed periodic adjustments during the healing / bone regrowth process. On his second appointment he got a young registrar who didn’t know how to use the adjustable molegrips … so my friend grabbed them and literally did the job himself! 😳😂😂😂 (I’m sure that won’t happen to your son though 😉😊)

The housing thing sounds like you have to be open, honest and fully sharing about the reality of your health and capabilities. I know this is not comfortable for you, but it sounds like an ‘investment’ worth making …. Maybe advocate for yourself as if you were speaking of someone else (like you advocate for your sister I think?)?

The job sounds like it needs changing sooner rather than later. If you can get a new job now, at least you won’t have to face the office change and then have to work there and try to get a new job at the same time as battling that process. 

KK

beanielou

Happiest of birthdays to you 🥳🥂🌻🍰🥰

Cherryfudge

Belated happy birthday! It sounds so nice - and what a lovely gift from your son!

I'm sure your son's further op to remove the screws will be a much smaller thing than the original, and they must be happy with the healing process to contemplate it. I still have a an armful of screws from an op years ago and in my case was told that unless I developed any problems, the best thing was just to leave them in place as it's less intrusive. I wonder why they are taking his out? Perhaps because he's still growing or something? 

It's a good thing you are pushing for your housing assessment, it's going to make a big difference when you don't have the stairs to cope with. Similar goes for the job of course: you don't need to add stress to boredom and the sooner you start looking, the sooner you'll find the right thing. If you are getting fed up with the errors made by less experienced colleagues, could you become a coach? Or is that not your thing?

Sun_Addict

Belated happy birthday 🥳 What a lovely thoughtful gift from your DS. I keep saying it but he really is a great credit to you. 

I have screws in my leg but they won’t be removed unless they cause problems. 

Keedie

Thanks for all the birthday wishes and kind messages. That is very kind of you to say about me and my son @Sun_Addict, that really means a lot to me.

I've been a bit all over the place in the last few days. The excitement of my son's 18th and my own birthday kind of sent me a little on the high side, and I could feel myself becoming agitated and easily irritable and sleeping less. But I didn't really think too much of it. I didn't realise it had ventured into hypomania territory until my son pointed out that I'd spent a lot of money on Amazon in their Prime Day sales. He was a little disturbed when the parcels arrived. And when I saw them, I also knew that I had to hibernate for a few days.

I brought household things that I needed, so that's not the issue, I got good deals on things like Calgon, Fairy non-bio pods, cutlery set as we were down to two forks, two knives and a couple of spoons. I got the airtight containers I needed, a food processor to chop and slice things as my dexterity in my hands is kinda lacking, and I replaced my George Foreman which I've had almost as long as my son has been alive. I also got him a new gaming chair, as he's been sitting on the Ikea office chair I got him when he was 12, and it leans to the side as it's broken and the back support has completely gone, so now, he has one that has a footrest to support his knee and reclines. And I also got a small Yale safe for cash budgeting, and I brought a Fitbit for my birthday present to myself.

I had a somewhat positive spending spree in terms of nothing I brought was just for spending sake. Everything was something I needed. But... had I been firing on all cylinders, I would have only spent what I could afford. So I'm a bit upset with myself, as the money I had set aside to repay the credit card has taken a hit 🤦🏾‍♀️🤦🏾‍♀️🤦🏾‍♀️. There's £400 left, whereas, this time last week I had around £720ish. Luckily I had a semi rational approach, and only got things I needed. But it still stings in terms of accumulating that money. So I'm going to have to be tighter with my budget in the coming months to replace that money. I do really like my airtight containers though 🤣.

As for work, I've trained people on the things that I know @Cherryfudge, but they'd rather keep coming back to me than pull their finger out and just get on with it. Or they want me to fix their problems, and so I get frustrated with them as they distract me from my work and use my knowledge or understanding of how to deal with an HR query to resolve their workload, but their distractions means that I'm then overwhelmed by mine. We have a new member of the team starting tomorrow, and I made it clear to my manager that I am not available to do lots of training. I will do some support work like the rest of the team, but I am not to be leaned on, or expected to do more than my fair share. 

The only problem with job hunting that I am finding @KajiKita, is trying to work out how much of a drop in income I can comfortably live with. I'm currently paid above the salary threshold for my actual job, because they kept exploiting me and I kicked up a fuss, and they gave me threshold pay increases over a few years, as they kept asking me to do more and I kept pushing back. I have been looking though, and I've been tidying up my CV, as it's rather out of date, and to be honest, it's way too long. I'm trying to figure out if I should do the bookkeeping or the accountancy route, and which awarding body/qualification to pursue and how to pay for it all. There are some options to spread the cost over 12 months on 0% interest. I need to stop dithering about, and once I make a decision and cost everything up, then I'll be able to work out what my salary range needs to be. I think realistically, I will end up having to work full time during the probationary period, so I need to be sure that I can handle that. There's some part time jobs, but the commute is either dire or the wages aren't high. I look every few days though. I just need to work out a career path, and that should hopefully help with the finance qualification issue. And I can then plough through the course whilst I'm job hunting, so that I am not trying to navigate an online course and a new job simultaneously. I'll get there, I just have to figure out where 'there' is exactly...

Keedie

THE SUNDAY SUMMARY

(Week 41 ~ 13 October 2024)

Debt Regrets

Goal 1 - 100% repayment to Bank of Mum 3 (school fees) - due 1 April 2024
Progress Checker = £3,800/£3,800 (100% repaid)
🎉 Achievement Date = 24 March 2024 🎉

Goal 2 - Pay £5,000 off my overall debt balance in 2024 - due by 31 December 2024

Progress Checker = £3,898.80/£5,000 (77.98% repaid)
There has not been any debt repayments this week, so the balance and progress remains the same as last week.

Goal 3 - Clear Barclaycard Plan 1 (£6,508.43) - due by 31 January 2025
Progress checker = £3,297.23/£6,508.43 (50.66% repaid)
The fixed direct debit at £150 is all sorted with Barclaycard, and so the first payment at that amount will come out at the end of the month. So far, I have £406.26/£2,611.20 to clear Plan 1 by 31 January 2025. The total sibling debt is now £1,135.32 as I received £21 from my brother and put this towards the debt pot that I am building.

Saving Grace

Goal 1 - Save £500 for my son's 18th birthday - due by 30 September 2024
Progress Checker = £500/£500 (100% saved)
🎉 Achievement Date = 15 September 2024 🎉

Goal 2 - Save £500 emergency fund - due by 31 December 2024
Progress Checker = £213.98/£500 (42.80% saved)
I've made £1.12 in cash back and so that has boosted the emergency fund a smidgen. I aimed to do surveys to help me with my finance goals, but this week was a write off for any of that, so I'll try again this coming week.

Balancing the Budget

This section of my weekly check-in will focus on how I am preparing for the upcoming month, so that I can stay on track and be more successful in meeting my targets.

Income Tracker - £2,500 for November 2024's Budget
Progress Checker = £829/£2,500 (33.16% accumulated)
Having a spreadsheet tracker has really motivated me and it was actually kind of fun to log my child benefit when it came through on Tuesday. The child benefit was £25.60 and so £25 went towards November 2024's budget and the £0.60 went into my buffer pot in Monzo. 

Freely Debt Savings - £300 Goal for November 2024
Progress Checker = £0/£300 (0% saved)
I am going to do some freelance work next week and try and build £300 after taxes by 31 October 2024, so that I will have £300 towards my Freely Debt Savings in November 2024. This will give £30 for fun (10%), £120 to debt (40%) and £150 to savings (50%) that will be split across sinking funds and the house move at £75 for each pot. 

Keedie

I forgot to say the screws in my son's shin are temporary, to help the placement of the knee whilst it heals. From what I can work out, they're there to prevent displacement of the knee and to reduce his range of movement, so that he doesn't bend it too much and undo the effects of the surgery. And at least I have the stuff he needs for the next surgery recovery, like the shower cover for his leg and the cushions to elevate his leg and the ice packs. I am admittedly dreading the second operation though.