Single Mom on Food Stamps

I'm just going to say it.

I'm on food stamps.

And Medicaid.

Since the day my ex husband put me and my 37 week gestational age baby who had just gotten discharged from his NICU stay 2 weeks prior, I've been using YOUR TAX MONEY to pay for food for myself and my son.

It has also paid for every medical checkup and sick visit Eli has ever had. It's paid part of the medical bills I've incurred as part of my clinical depression and PTSD which resulted from my baby dying, my other baby being sick in the NICU for 45 days, and my husband cheating on me and abandoning me.

It has been a blessing. A true blessing. But lately I've seen these ecards going around Facebook and Pinterest:

I don't have any of these things besides the iPhone - I tan naturally outside, I'm not allowed to have fake nails as a nurse even if I wanted them, I don't have any tattoos. Sometimes I do have a fresh mani-pedi - that I did myself, while my child was asleep, with a selection of nail polish that I've been collecting over years. I'm sorry that it bothers you that I like to have some color on my nails, but let me remind you that a median price for a bottle of nail polish is about $7. If I use that color 10 times over the lifespan of the bottle, that's costing me $0.70 for that mani/pedi you're so offended by.

I do have an iPhone. For the first year after I got divorced (while I was on food stamps!!!) I had a crappy prepaid cell phone. Once I managed to make it into nursing school, though, we had required apps. They gave us an iPod Touch (and by "gave," I mean paid for with our special nursing fees that are added on top of tuition). Many of the required apps for school need an internet connection and I was finding that it was impractical to need to have WiFi every time I needed to look up a drug or study for a test, and I decided to purchase an iPhone. Judge me if you want. I didn't buy it to have the latest and greatest - I bought it because as a single mother, finding study time is hard enough and the iPhone is a great tool to be able to study on the go. Plus also? I didn't/don't pay for my iPhone with YOUR TAX DOLLARS. I pay for it with student loans, which I will have to pay back once I am graduated.


This one is almost funny. I do get to shop as much as I want - at thrift stores. Because you know, it takes awhile to find something presentable to wear when you're sifting through shit other people didn't want. As for living off child support, that's a complete joke. Every dime of my child support goes to childcare while I'm in school, and I have a balance left over after that. It doesn't pay for any of my child's clothes or activities or haircuts or any living expenses. It pays for daycare. That's it. I will admit that my state is generous in its food stamp formula - I get $367/month for me and E. That's $12/day... $6/day each.. $2 per person per meal. So while I do have enough to feed us, it's not as if we're eating steak and lobster every day. Just to clear that up.



I do have a nice pocketbook. I have this awesome one that holds all my cards and my *gasp* iPhone. It was $6 on clearance at Target. Do you know what else I have? I have two Juicy Couture handbags and a Coach Patchwork. I hardly ever carry them anymore, because of judgement like this. Those were bought for me as gifts by my ex husband while we were married and we had the money to do so. They're not in great enough condition to sell for any significant amount of money, and as all I got in the divorce was my personal belongings (no furniture, no dishes, no appliances, no shared property whatsoever) I feel justified in keeping these. They're mine, and I didn't buy them because you were buying me food with YOUR TAX DOLLARS. They were gifts, from a time when I wasn't on any assistance at all. I don't think that makes me a shitbag.

I'll end with this one:

This one shows some common sense. No one knows how I came to be on food stamps, just like no one knows how I got my iPhone. They don't know that over the summer I'm "donating" plasma twice a week to pay the bill. When I first started getting child support, I would hoard all of it in my wallet, terrified of losing it and not sure if/when I would get more. So I'm sure people judged the girl on food stamps with all the cash in her wallet. She must be playing the system, right?

Right.

Snapped

Tonight I snapped. It's not the first time, and unfortunately I'm sure it will not be the last.

The last week of this break from school has been completely overwhelming. My mom and step dad were gone for four days for a funeral and my body of course chose that time to get sick. So was all alone with the baby with the sorest throat I ever remember having - I even went to get checked for strep (it wasn't) it was so bad. I hung on though, knowing that help was coming. My parents would be home soon and they would help. So I bucked up, took a butt load of Dayquil, got the house nice and clean for them when they got home, trying to make everything as stress free as possible.

They did come home. But then they were sick. They spent the better part of two days in bed, leaving me to manage E by myself. It wasn't too bad, because I was feeling a lot better, so again I tried to be as helpful as possible.

Then yesterday, E caught what they had. He had a high fever (104!) and a cough and was just miserable. He clung to me all day long and I enjoyed the snuggle time (although I was worried about him).

But today. Oh, today. I caught it too, although it seems to be mild. I just have major, major sinus pressure and I can't breathe. E still isn't feeling well today, and he was particularly whiny. I held on all day though. There was light at the end of the tunnel. I was sure that if I just waited for my mom to get home, she would help and give me a break.

Ha. They say hope breeds eternal misery, and so it did today. This evening everyone plopped themselves on the couch to hunker down for prime time guilty pleasure TV viewing, and I was the one left chasing E up and down and up and down and up and down the stairs. When my family members had the audacity to ask me what was for dinner and if we had any chocolate in the house... well, that was when it happened.

I snapped.

I stomped around and took E for a bath. He kept standing up in the bathtub and nearly slipping, and finally I yelled at him to SIT DOWN. WE SIT DOWN IN THE TUB!!!!

How awful is that? My kid has the worst sickness of his life so far and I yell at him to sit down in the bathtub. He probably doesn't even understand what I'm saying, only that I'm yelling at him. Me, his mother, his only parent, the only person responsible for him in the whole wide world.

Then my mother, probably fearing I was about to shake him to death or something (which I was not even close to, just to be clear) came up and asked me why I was so angry, and I just spilled my guts. Got my brother in trouble in the process. Told her it wasn't her fault, but that I was sick of the boys (my brother and step dad) doing absolutely nothing to contribute to the family while she and I do everything.

I'm tired. There is so much pressure on me. The divorce (and the dollar amount it is costing me) is weighing on me. I'm applying to nursing school this semester and I have to take the entrance exam which I haven't spent a whole lot of time studying for because - surprise surprise - no one has been available to help me with E. It's so much pressure trying to get my application as strong as possible. On top of all of that, I feel like I am expected to do everything domestically speaking, but I don't even get to do everything my way because I live under someone else's roof. I can't cook the meals I'd normally make because no one likes them. I can't clean the way I normally would because half of the things aren't mine and I don't know what to do with them. I'm in a state of eternal limbo in almost every area of my life, and it's just wearing me down.

I really have no outlet other than this blog and Twitter. Poor Katie has to listen to me rant like a raving lunatic because I don't have any other friends who are as sympathetic and non judgmental as she is.

Luckily, school starts on Monday. That will give me at least a little bit of a break, and E will have fun seeing his friends at the babysitter's. This semester shouldn't be too tough other than trying to get my nursing application together, so that's good. I'm definitely making a counseling appointment at the student wellness center right away, and I'll be exercising as well. Hopefully those endorphins will make it a little easier for me to deal. I hope to start yoga again as well, but we'll see since I have to do that at home.

Anyway. Sigh. Thanks for reading this far if you even did. There is something so cleansing about getting stuff out on the internet ;) xoxo