The Mental Debt Struggle...

Keedie

Most definitely. And to think I didn't even want to get out of bed.

Humdinger1

@Keedie can I say how utterly impressive you are?! Your empathy is off the scale and you are making a fantastic job of negotiating the  hurdles.  Your son's changed attitude is a massive tribute to you as well.  You could teach many of the stuck up entitled types a tremendous amount...don't get me started! Love Humdinger xx 

Keedie

Morning all, I'm a bit sore today as my knees and hips are stiff and swollen, so I've got to walk slowly today to do my errands and use my walking stick. I'm off to take the car to Halfords for its free repairs check and fingers crossed it's not too expensive to fix. My son's dad fancies himself as a car enthusiast and he had a listen to it and reckons "something's loose like a bolt or something hasn't been tightened properly". So hopefully he's right!

My son has his second psychotherapy appointment today which he seems to be looking forward to, as we had to postpone it due to Tuesday's hot weather. He voluntarily did some ironing yesterday (it was still a little crinkled but I gave him 10/10 for effort as I didn't even ask him to), and when he was done he really warmed my heart as he said, "Mummy you know what? I feel like my old self is coming back." He looked genuinely happy, and I was really proud of the progress that he's made. Your kind words @Humdinger1 has really touched me, so thank you! I'm trying my best to help him navigate life, and I'm cautiously optimistic that he'll get there. Eventually. As for empathy, I think it's a fundamental ingredient of what makes us human, and it's necessary for life. It's just a shame that the people who have the power to be the most influential with empathy, set the tone for something else...

I decided to give up on the 1p challenge for this year and restart in January 2023 when I've got less going on. So I moved the £80.01 to my emergency fund and added an extra £10 so it's finally hit its target of £500 and currently sits at £503.60 with a target of 100.72% saved. My Monzo round ups will continue to go into that account to build it up by a few pennies here and there. But now I am focussed on my Globetrotter pot with Chase that is earning 1.5% interest and where my cashback goes into. So I've set a standing order for £50 a month to start coming out at the beginning of August 2022, and that will pay for our spending money for Turkey in July 2023. After that holiday, it will be where I keep our holiday fund to pay for other trips moving forward.

I've also paid the £32.87 direct debit to Sky Mobile and that's now 10.24% repaid. Since April 2022 I've cleared 16.16% of my debt with £2,850.75 repaid and I'm so proud of myself. I know once the school fees are paid, the amount of debt will increase, which I've finally made peace with, but the amount I've repaid to date, that won't change and so I'm counting that as a small win 😁. xx

Keedie

It's not very good news with the car 😩.

Halfords said that they thought it was the air compressor for the air conditioning unit and could be the clutch component within the compressor that has broken off/is loose. They referred me to another garage that can do that type of work and so I called up and drove over as the guy wanted to hear the sound it was making. 

Turns out that it's cheaper to replace the whole compressor rather than buy a replacement component due to the cost of the part and the labour costs. But he said it could also be the alternator or the cambelt, or in a worse case scenario the water pump, but unless they did a proper diagnostic he couldn't tell me. He said that I could order a compressor, but by looking under the bonnet he can't say what it is, as they'd have to do a full diagnostic and if I order something based upon a hunch and it doesn't fix the problem I could just be wasting money.

So that's £36 inc VAT for the diagnostic and that's booked in for Monday morning. He said once they know what it is, they can get quotes for the relevant part and then let me know how much it will be and if I choose to go ahead, then they take the diagnostic off the bill and it becomes free. If I choose not to do the repairs, then I just pay the diagnostic charge.

I cannot spend more than £350 fixing the car, and I'd ideally like to fix it to hold its value as much as possible for when I sell it. But I'm not prepared to sink hundreds of pounds into it just to keep it on the road for 2 months. I've had a look online at a few valuations for it, and based on its age (2008) and mileage, it seems to be valued at £1,700 approx. But I guess it will be significantly lower with mechanical issues if I can't afford to fix it.

So I think my fantasy of getting a lump sum by selling the car and paying down some debts and buffering my savings is never going to turn into a reality 😢.

AntoMac

Sorry to hear that Keedie. Cars are a blasted money pit for sure. 

Maybe getting rid will turn out to be the best option. 

On the positive side you have managed to pay nearly three thousand pounds off of your total debt in just 3 months so should rightly be proud. When you add in the progress you are making with your son there is plenty to be positive about.
You do everything with good intentions and I like your attitude to life and the importance you attach to treating people nicely. I’m a firm believer that good things happen to good people. 

Keedie

Yes cars really are money pits. A part of me is scared for the coming winter and its impact on my joints and getting around on public transport due to my physical disabilities. But the thought of pushing my body to drive and spending money I don't have on a car that is breaking down, just doesn't sit right with me. So I'm okay to cut my losses and get rid of it.

I'm very proud of what I have achieved with my finances and it's not been easy, but I feel more in control of things now that I'm not burying my head in the sand. Hopefully without the expense of a car, I'll be free to actually use some of my PIP money towards getting mobility and living aids that can help me. I've needed a lightweight rollator, new crutches and a new walking stick for a very long time. 

You're very kind @AntoMac with your perception of me and my achievements, and attitude to life and that means a lot to me. I always see the best in people, sometimes to a fault, but I treat people with grace and kindness as that's how I would like to be treated. 

Things with the offspring are a bit tense at the moment as I made him come early this evening before his curfew and I told him he can't go out tomorrow as he's been out 4 days this week for hours at a time. He's not a happy boy. Cue teenage huffing and puffing and door slamming.

Today he was in another part of London (which I knew about), but was with friends that can stay out a lot later and I didn't want him to cut across London on his own late as he's only 15 and he'd originally gone to Westfields shopping centre to go clothes shopping and so I didn't want him walking alone with shopping bags late into the evening. Turns out he didn't buy anything and he claimed he went to a restaurant but he was in a football cage with his friends. My brain honestly can't keep up. 

He'd also made plans for tomorrow without even checking with me, and I can see small signs of him getting too caught up in his friends again, so there needs to be a balance. I don't want him in the house as a depressed prisoner with me worrying about his mental health as that was just horrible for both of us. But at the same time he can't be out all the time and running off wherever he wants to. I know it's the summer holidays, and I wouldn't mind him keeping busy and active, but he gets too obsessed with being around his friends to the point where he just goes along with whatever people are doing so that he can keep hanging out with them and that's not exactly led him to positive actions/thoughts in the past.

He keeps complaining that he wasn't allowed out and to see his friends for 2 months, but his actions led to him having to step back and cut people off. I genuinely don't have a problem with the people that he is hanging out with as they were the friends from his old school that he most seemed to be his natural self with, and they made the effort to play with him on the PS4 when he was grounded and keep checking in on him.

I can see an improvement in his mental health since he's socialising more. But a part of me is very worried that he'll overdo it this summer and then it'll hit him even more when he restarts online school in September and he doesn't have that level of access and contact with people and he gets as depressed as he was a few weeks ago or worse...

I'm hoping that I can get him into a routine of catching up with his school work and then going out and seeing friends or doing activities. So that by the time lessons starts, he realises that he can have both and he's not so behind and overwhelmed with everything. 

Or maybe I'm just asking too much of him and I need to just let him get it out of his system so that he has a good summer... I really don't know what I'm doing with this parenting thing most of the time. Arrgh!

AntoMac

You must often  feel like you’re wading through treacle Keedie. Things must be really tough a lot of the time.
Can I offer any sage advice? Not especially. All I do know is my 19 y/o is a lot less hard work than she was at 15 - can still be hard work though! She didn’t do great academically but she now has a job she loves and works really hard at. Her autism wasn’t diagnosed for years. She was just treated as a naughty kid. Now I’ve read up on symptoms it’s pretty clear to me as a non expert she had it from an early age, but that’s all done now. 

Can your son’s dad not chip in with a bit of advice/guidance/rules? Surely he two wants what is best for your boy?
What about Motability when it comes to your car? I’m sure that’s something you’ve already looked into. Like I say , I have no great sage advice to offer. 

You are doing your absolute best and what more than that can anyone do?

There are lots of positive achievements for you to keep in mind. Keep going. 

Keedie

I really do feel like I'm trying to swim upstream or I'm drowning in quick sand most days @AntoMac. It's exhausting. And it's really difficult, but I just have to keep going.

I'm hoping that in time things will get easier on the teenage front, as I often feel like I'm doing a silent scream at the top of my lungs and no one can hear or rescue me. It's good that your daughter loves her job, there's not a great deal of people in the world that can say that, so good on her. My eldest sister is autistic and with her it's very obvious, especially as she has very limited speech and cognitive understanding of the world around her and she'll never be able to work or live independently. It's a shame that your daughter's autism wasn't diagnosed for years. We all know my nephew is on the spectrum, but the tests they did said he's borderline for some things but he continues to really struggle, especially socially. 

I don't think my son will do well academically even though he wants to. I've resigned myself to the fact that we'll do whatever we can, but I'm not expecting miracles. We had a long talk yesterday and I got some advice from my brother who has a son the same age, and he told me to let my son go out, as "boys need to get out and about" and his cousins can all go out, and if I hold onto him too tightly, then he'll just end up really resenting me and that will lead to more problems. He advised that I enforce a strict curfew and let him know the consequences if he's late. So he went out and his younger cousin wanted to hang out with him, so he came back to meet him and they went off together to play football with my son's friends. So they had a good time and they were slightly late as they were strolling so I told him he's not allowed out until Tuesday at the earliest. He wasn't very happy, but accepted that he mismanaged his time. I actually drove past them on my way to pick my son up from his cousins and they were strolling and engrossed in their conversation, and although I was annoyed to see the pace that they were walking at, when I physically went past them, I saw how happy my son was and I have not seen that in so long, it warmed my heart. I still had to enforce the going out ban though, as I need to set the boundaries.

My son and I had a talk about all of the work that he needs to catch up on, and I realised that I need to properly use him socialising to my advantage. So I told him that we need to go through everything and he needs to work on his timetable with me and unless he's done his work to a high standard, he can't go out. He readily agreed, so we'll just see how that really all pans out.

My son's dad is in his own world and we're not on the same page as we see the world completely differently. I try to engage with him, but I get criticised so much for my efforts and my parenting (when he's not actually really doing anything himself), that  it just puts me off. I have to protect my mental health and too much contact with him sets me back. Also he's been largely absent so my son doesn't respect his opinion anyway. So I will communicate with his dad, and end up giving him summaries of what is happening, but the reality is that he never picks up the phone to just ask how his son is, and he tends to make contact when he wants something or when he wants to give me his "opinion" on where I'm failing. He even told me the other day that I can't have bipolar as I'm "articulate and sane". Like I said, we see the world differently... 🤦🏾‍♀️. 

I looked at Motability but you need to have the enhanced mobility for PIP and I have the standard. My assessment and current award was done before my fibromyalgia diagnosis, and the arthritis in my hands, so I really do need to update them as I've got worse. But I've been solely focussed on trying to get my son sorted, that I've not given myself enough time to think of what I need, but I've started to write a list of life admin that I need to get sorted for myself. So reviewing the PIP is definitely one of them. My current award was for 5 years and ends in 2026, but I can't wait that long for a review. But I'll need to gather all of my medical information, and my flat is a bit of a mess, so I don't really know where all my papers are... 😬.

beanielou

Just remember when you ask for a PIP review they look at the whole award & there is always a liklihood however small that the award can be reduced.

Keedie

Oh well that's not good, but thanks for the heads up @beanielou. They assessed me via the documents I sent in as they weren't doing face to face assessments last year. As I now have a carer and I'm in the limited work capability criteria for Universal Credit. But everything fluctuates with my health, so if I end up with a face to face appointment on a 'good day', then I could be screwed 😢. The first time I got PIP it was in person and the guy said that as I had strength in my grip I had no mobility issues despite being there with crutches 🙄. So I might just leave it as it is for now.

I've been looking into different transport schemes, and I've discovered that there's a scheme called London Taxicard where your local authority subsidises your taxi fare and you have to pay a minimum contribution. I've qualified for that scheme based on my level of PIP, so I'll contact the council this week to do my application and to ask a bit more about it. There's also an organisation I found called Transport for All, which helps disabled and older people with transport matters. So if I can't get much sense out of my local authority, I will speak to them.

I've also been looking into Access to Work and their transport subsidies as I can see that I should hopefully qualify for that as that will help me get to and from work. At present I'm allowed to drive and park on campus under special dispensation because of my disabilities. But I won't have a car soon and getting two buses there and back in the winter isn't appealing and the tube journey is really bitty with taking 3 tube lines and lots of walking so I'm in agony and shattered before I've even sat at my desk. I had Access to Work when I first started my job and they did their assessment and I got a custom made chair and other workplace recommendations. As I've unfortunately deteriorated since 2018 I'll need to ask them for some advice in general.

I definitely need to give up driving, but I need to make sure that I know how I'll be able to mobilse when I'm struggling. I've got bad brain fog in the last few days so it makes it hard to remember things and I think I need to get my eyes tested again as I keep getting headaches. But the good news in all of this, is that my disabled person's railcard has been processed and should arrive in the post soon. 

Also, I'm going to Kent to stay at my friend's house and she's working in London and so she is able to pick me up on Wednesday after work and we'll travel back to London on Friday so I don't have to take the train to see her. We're going to meet with a friend for lunch on Thursday so I'm looking forward to that 😋.