Reflecting back

Well I got a surprise today. I lost track of what the date was being busy and all so today it just hit me to check the date and I realized I got paid today because the third falls on a Monday. My bank releases my pay on the second, a day earlier than my actual payday because it’s a Veteran’s bank. And if the second falls on the weekend I get it the Friday before. I paid all my bills and still had almost $300 left so that’s nice. It feels good not to struggle so much anymore. I remember when I first moved back to town a year after my divorce I struggled so bad. I didn’t even have a stove for a good year or so. I had to adjust on microwavable food and use a George Foreman grill. On top of that I couldn’t make ends meet and was always short on my electric and/ or gas bills. Once I took out a payday loan to catch up but then something went through my bank account and caused me NSF and I couldn’t pay the loan back so they hit me on my next payday draining my bank account leaving me nothing for rent. My new landlord at the time wasn’t very nice and even though I never missed any rent before he got really mean af threatened eviction. I was beside myself not knowing what to do. I was going to my church for the food pantry help so I could feed my son. I didn’t eat hardly at all because it was more important to me to make sure his needs were met. It was a very hard time in my life. Luckily a few months later my brothers landlord had a place for me and I moved there. It was under alot of construction so rent was alot lower than where I moved from but it was also not a nice place. I was sad alot of the time. Then about 6 mos later that landlord told me he had a different house open up that he thought would suit me better and I checked it out. It was beautiful so I moved there the next weekend. That was when I started getting caught up on my bills and all was great until my landlord became the judge in our town and had to sell the property because he couldn’t keep up with it because of all his new duties. The new landlord then took over and was AWFUL! Things started going downhill again until my son helped me by coming up with the down payment for where I am now. Ever since we moved here things started falling into place and bill’s got paid off and I have been happy. This was the best move I’ve ever made!

I think I got through all the rough times from my miserable marriage to my times being so poor and not eating for weeks because of my faith. I may not go to church anymore like I use to or be a Cancer of my church groups like I use to but I still believe in God and pray everyday. I believe God has gotten me through all of it. Without him, without my faith I don’t know where I’d be.

I never thought I’d be this comfortable, this happy living on my own on my Social Security. I was so use to living in a big beautiful home, having money whenever I wanted or needed something, going on vacations and cruises often and driving new cars. I hadn’t always lived that way, in fact far from it until I had met my then husband and moved in with him a year later. So divorcing him was a hard decision. Even though he was mentally and sometimes physically abusive I was still afraid to start over on my own again especially being that I no longer worked like I did before I married him. But I prayed about it and decided I didn’t want my son living with this unstable man anymore and I’d do whatever I had to in order to take care of him. 

I look back on all of this and feel bad for the circumstances my son had to live through. I feel like I failed him alot but he still looks up to me and tells me what a great mom I’ve been. He told me yesterday that he loved me so much and that he appreciates all I’ve done for him. He told me what a great mom I’ve been always being there for him no matter what. It made me feel good! It made me feel like maybe I hadn’t failed him so much. His dad use to be there for him when he was little but one he divorced he went back to his irresponsible ways and brought drugs into my son’s life. I know he wasn’t the only one who brought drugs around, my mom’s neighbor also introduced drugs to him without me knowing. But just the fact that his dad had done so upsets me because my son thinks it’s ok now to experiment. I think if his dad hadn’t divorced then my son wouldn’t be living the kind of life he dies now. Things would be different! All I can do now is just pray for him and always try to lead him in the right direction… as much as I still can now that he’s almost 18 and practically on his own. 

Enough of my reflecting… today is just another day. Not doing anything much. I’ll probably see my son later. He said that he has the next couple days or so off work so he may be home to stay. I don’t know yet. I need to get him to mow the lawn before it rains the next few days. Other than that I’m just making dinner later. I’m making chicken thighs in the crock pot with rice. Nothing special. I need to go grocery shopping. I’m pretty low on groceries. I’ll probably go on Monday… with or without my son. 

That’s all today…