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Money: The Root of All Douchiness
12 years ago
General
Have you had your daily dose of brick to the face, today?
I am so sick and tired of hearing people toss away my complaints about how this windfall I recently got is stressing me out, and all of the problems it's causing me, simply because "they wish they had it so good". So good? You fucking kidding me? This is a train wreck for me, the absolute worst scenario I could've been handed, thanks to this money.
Let me explain: for the last 10 years, I've been struggling to scrape by, living off of government programs and the good graces of friends. During that time, I was doing alright, learning to live minimally, putting the essentials above my own desires, etc. I don't really have any bills, per se, and I don't have the kind of financial issues that other people have (no car for gas issues, etc.). I only recently got on Medicaid, and was still trying to get on SSi, when this happened.
This fucked everything up.
It's a one-time, one-lump-sum deal, that's considered enough for an average one-year's salary to the government. That means that, thanks to it being way over the maximum amount I can have for SSI or Medicaid, I'm automatically disqualified from them. However, since it's only one year's worth of income, I can't exactly live off of it indefinitely. I can't invest it in anything, since the government will dock me for that, as well, and I have to spend it "wisely", in their opinion, which means I have to make sure the majority of my spending has to be on "essentials".
For most people, who have bills and mortgages and other shit to pay off, that's a no brainer, but for me, who doesn't have that kind of thing... what can I spend it on? Yugioh cards and dildos? Yeah fucking right, like that's a plan. Sure, sonehow, I spent like $2-$3000 on myself at most, compared to spending like $7-$8000 on essential stuff for the apartment and paying off bills, but that still leaves me with over $27000 or so to spend. And yet, whenever I tell this to someone, they don't seem to fucking get it, only hearing dollar signs and what they could do with it. Even my own fucking boyfriend fell into that trap, when he first heard that I was getting it, and was pressuring me at first to get him what he wanted. True, I can go take a trip to Tahiti or something, but in the end, when the money's all spend up, will I be in any better position than I was before I got this windfall? Not fucking likely; more likely, I'll be in a worse position, since I'll be off of the programs that I needed to survive, before, and will have to struggle to get back on them again, and considering now they'll be looking at how "wisely" I spent this money, that could easily mean an automatic denial from them.
So I'm sorry, but I don't give a fuck if you're envious of my "good fortune", I don't care what you'd do with this money. This is the worst case scenario I could have with this kind of windfall, in my opinion; enough to throw my entire life into chaos, but not nearly enough to actually do anything with it for any significant length of time. They say money can't buy you happiness; at this point, I'd rather give happiness an IOU than struggle to figure out the exchange rate for it.
Let me explain: for the last 10 years, I've been struggling to scrape by, living off of government programs and the good graces of friends. During that time, I was doing alright, learning to live minimally, putting the essentials above my own desires, etc. I don't really have any bills, per se, and I don't have the kind of financial issues that other people have (no car for gas issues, etc.). I only recently got on Medicaid, and was still trying to get on SSi, when this happened.
This fucked everything up.
It's a one-time, one-lump-sum deal, that's considered enough for an average one-year's salary to the government. That means that, thanks to it being way over the maximum amount I can have for SSI or Medicaid, I'm automatically disqualified from them. However, since it's only one year's worth of income, I can't exactly live off of it indefinitely. I can't invest it in anything, since the government will dock me for that, as well, and I have to spend it "wisely", in their opinion, which means I have to make sure the majority of my spending has to be on "essentials".
For most people, who have bills and mortgages and other shit to pay off, that's a no brainer, but for me, who doesn't have that kind of thing... what can I spend it on? Yugioh cards and dildos? Yeah fucking right, like that's a plan. Sure, sonehow, I spent like $2-$3000 on myself at most, compared to spending like $7-$8000 on essential stuff for the apartment and paying off bills, but that still leaves me with over $27000 or so to spend. And yet, whenever I tell this to someone, they don't seem to fucking get it, only hearing dollar signs and what they could do with it. Even my own fucking boyfriend fell into that trap, when he first heard that I was getting it, and was pressuring me at first to get him what he wanted. True, I can go take a trip to Tahiti or something, but in the end, when the money's all spend up, will I be in any better position than I was before I got this windfall? Not fucking likely; more likely, I'll be in a worse position, since I'll be off of the programs that I needed to survive, before, and will have to struggle to get back on them again, and considering now they'll be looking at how "wisely" I spent this money, that could easily mean an automatic denial from them.
So I'm sorry, but I don't give a fuck if you're envious of my "good fortune", I don't care what you'd do with this money. This is the worst case scenario I could have with this kind of windfall, in my opinion; enough to throw my entire life into chaos, but not nearly enough to actually do anything with it for any significant length of time. They say money can't buy you happiness; at this point, I'd rather give happiness an IOU than struggle to figure out the exchange rate for it.
That's what pisses me off so much about people who don't get how jacked up this windfall has made my life; I don't technically have the kind of bills they have to pay, but they're under less restrictions on what they can do with it than I do, so while they CAN spend it on a vacation to Aruba or something, I can't afford to without risking not being able to get back on SSI, Medicaid, and whatnot when the money runs out.
This wouldn't be such a big problem, if the government wouldn't quit living in the stone ages and think a person can live off of $3 a day worth of food. My boyfriend has signed a petition to get a project meant to update stuff like Food Stamps and whatnot to match inflation, so people like me, who can't get a job (struggling with a mental disability that I'm desperately trying to prove to the government I need on SSI for), have to live off of these government programs, but can still have unexpected windfalls like this without jeopardizing those programs. I guess I should be lucky that we only got a slight raise in how much we have to pay, each month, for housing from Section 8, rather than being kicked off that, as well, else we would be screwed.