Poverty

Poverty is interesting.  As someone who used to be less poor (2010 was the fourth year in a row where my total income was less than $10,000) I find that the longer I spend trying to live on nothing the more of a strain it is on my resources.  There’s the part where I take extra good care of my clothes (almost nothing goes in the dryer) because I cannot afford to replace them.  Then there’s the part where, when I do go out, I choose my food and beverages according to price.  And there’s the part where I’m constantly anxious about my laptop breaking or my car breaking or something else expensive and necessary.

I seldom let anyone know exactly how tight things are.  I will pick up the tab sometimes when I go out with friends because it makes me feel awful when they are always paying for things.  I do not want to be the “broke friend” who uses people.  And if there is something that I feel I absolutely must have, I’ll do a side job or tap into my “emergency money” (which is just about gone) to pay for it.  This is why I was so devastated when my car was broken into.  I am out of side jobs and I am out of emergency money.

Today, though, things hit a new low.  Back when I still had health insurance at my old job, I had a couple of long-term medical problems handled.  Even though the insurance paid a good deal of the cost, a significant portion, say 18% of my annual income ended up charged to me.  I set up payment plans with the collections department, and was assured that it would not reflect negatively on my credit report.  Liars.  I should have known.

I don’t carry a balance on my credit card.  I pay it off every month.  If I don’t think I’ll be able to pay it off, I don’t use it.  I’ve done this for two years now.  So you’d think that my credit would be ok.  Sure I’m poor, but I pay my damn bills.  No.  That is not enough.  The credit card company has reduced my credit limit to almost nothing – without telling me why or giving me any sort of opportunity to argue their decision.  Not only did they not tell me that this is what they were going to do, but the last piece of mail I got from them was a new credit offer – for being a “good customer”.

So imagine my surprise when I went to pay my student fees today – which I have to pay up-front because my student loan has been delayed… again.  Happens every semester – and had my credit card declined for insufficient funds.  Sure, there’s 0 balance, but my student fees exceed my credit limit.  If I use everything in my checking account, close out my savings, and max out the card, I’ll make my fees, but I won’t be making my rent.  So I have to choose.  Student fees?  Rent?  Ask for help from family or friends?  The last makes my throat close.  I will get my loan money and I will be able to pay everything back, but the act of asking makes me ill.  But I can’t not pay rent, and I can’t not pay my fees – I’ll get dropped from the classes I had such a hard time getting, and my student loans will no longer qualify for deferrals.

It’s a rock and a hard place – and my resources are so thin that if I make it, it will be by the very skin of my teeth.  And I wonder why I’m depressed and anxious and so stressed out that I have hives on my hips and don’t sleep at night.

I was thinking this morning about getting my teeth checked up.  The last time I did this – put off dental care until I had insurance to afford it, it cost me $3,000 in extra dental work.  Very bad dental work, mind you.  In fact, at one point I had a broken molar on one side, a broken crown on the other, and a broke filling next to that.  One root canal, two fillings and two crowns were necessary to fix all the damage.  I was making payments to the dentist for a year.  There will be no dental check-ups.  No more toys, no more picking up the tab, which means no more going out.  No more gear, no more extra expenses.  And most of all, no days off.  Not that I was taking a lot of days off before.  But now… Ugh.

I’ll figure this out.  I always figure it out.  But as time goes on, I can’t help but wonder if I’m headed for another total collapse.  It seems that the time in-between hitting bottom is getting shorter and shorter, and the high points are lower and lower.  What happens when bottom is the high point?  Convergence.  I can see it coming.