Getting a harsh wake-up call

I guess everything started when I completely ghosted the internal recruiter from JPMorgan Chase. It was a hybrid position that would require me to drive about 30 miles each way three days a week.

I told my kids that I wanted to find a fully remote opportunity instead, even if it paid a bit less. I fully planned on redoing my resume. I just completed a first revision and I’ll continue working on it over the next few days.

I also had concerns about working for the world’s largest bank, as it doesn’t mix with my personal ethics.

And then I faced a harsh dose of reality: rent was due on the 1st and I didn’t have enough money to cover it. Everything spiraled from there.

Why I didn’t have the rent money

I count on my two young adult kids to each contribute $500 a month toward the rent. That’s a very reasonable amount for them but it also helps me at the same time.

They couldn’t contribute anything last month because they were in between jobs. My son started one last week. My daughter is still looking, but she has some very good leads.

They’re also both planning to start college soon. It’s a relief that my son is going back after dropping out when his dad died. And it’s a wonderful thing that my daughter finally decided that she has to go to college to get a good job. I told her that’s an excellent idea and she just has to work hard and believe in herself.

I planned to put part of my rent on a credit card that has more than enough available credit to cover several months of rent, but when I called them on Monday, they said the card had been frozen due to suspected fraud and I wouldn’t get the replacement card for 7–10 business days.

That left me having to take the last of my husband’s life insurance money that I had available as cash, which felt like the ultimate failure. I got the rent paid, but I have to earn more money. I simply can’t survive as a single mom on the salary for an entry-level customer service job, no matter how good my employer is. I need a job that allows me to cover the rent on my own without their assistance.

What I realized in the aftermath

I realized a lot of things about myself, as well as about my upbringing and how it still affects me. I also realized how I treated my late husband, which made me feel incredibly guilty and sad for him. He was finally very happy to be my rescuer but I desperately wish I hadn’t been so dependent on him.

I am an adult child of an alcoholic who’s a covert narcissist, with all of the messed-up communication patterns associated with that. So I finally told my mother that I feel like she has sabotaged my entire career path, including telling me to just settle for disability income, even though it’s not remotely enough to live on. (It’s $967 a month; of course, it’s not enough.)

I’m not going to make my kids rescue me; that’s not their job. It’s my job to make their lives easier and that’s what I’m trying to do. I just don’t earn enough money to do it yet.

I clearly can earn enough money if I just reformat my resume to more accurately reflect the wide scope of the work I’ve done over the past 20 years. I’m currently working at a company that gives opportunities to young people without degrees with the potential to grow into more and second chances to employees like me.

Contrary to what my mother has told me my entire adult life, applying for jobs that require only a high school education when I have a degree and 20 years of professional writing experience isn’t the “smart thing to do;” it looks suspicious. Nobody ever calls me back because they assume that anyone with those kinds of qualifications would surely get bored and quit as soon as they found something better. (Little do they know that my self-esteem was so poor that I thought that was all that I deserved.)

I shouldn’t be taking “second-chance” jobs, not when I’m already very qualified to get good jobs on my own in the first place.

It’s time to focus on my healing

I’ve been in therapy for years, so I’ve been working on getting better.

But I need to do more. I need to get involved with Adult Children of Alcoholics groups again, for the second time in my life. I did it once and stopped because the focus on taking a personal inventory that’s part of 12-step programs was too scary.

Plus, I don’t really believe in 12-step programs; I don’t like the idea that a Higher Power can save me when I really need to do it myself. It still works anyway and it helps to have people to regularly talk to about similar issues.

I already rarely drink because I don’t really enjoy it but instead, I took up smoking weed. That allowed me to see myself as other people saw me, which was incredibly humbling and unflattering. Weed is just as damaging to me as alcohol is to others. I know it’s not physically addictive but it is often habit-forming.

I also accepted that I was indeed sexually abused when I was a preschooler. I’ve had multiple graphic flashbacks for years and I prefer women, so it’s a logical deduction. I need to start working on healing from that, too.

It’s time to get focus on healing myself. I’m looking up ACOA meetings, both online and in person. I’m very glad that I haven’t dated anyone in 8 months because I haven’t destroyed anyone’s life. I do need more friends, though.

But I’d like to possibly find a woman to love at some point when I have the capacity to focus on someone other than myself, my kids, and my cats, as well as maintaining my house to a proper standard.

The only way I can do that is to start a healing journey of getting in touch with myself and how I really feel about things. A lot of that needs to be done through private journaling. I also need to maintain a regular sleep schedule and follow a healthy diet, as well as getting some exercise.

I’m feeling very raw and afraid but failure is not an option. I have to get better for the sake of my kids. They have a lot of potential and I can do a lot to help them become prepared for good careers of their own. Helping them succeed gives me a sense of purpose. Pursuing a better job of my own will also model how they can do the same themselves. It’s well past the time for me to change.