...And the Poor Get Poorer

The gavel finally dropped today.  Hubby got laid off.  We knew it was coming, even if his bosses wouldn't commit to that.  It's kinda like when you're speeding down the road and suddenly you pass a cop.  Your eyes immediately go to your rear view mirror, waiting to see if they're coming after you.  It's this built up moment of anxiety...until you see the red and blues in your mirror, then you know.

His boss made sure his hands were clean.  There was a position they offered Kris in a town that is about an hour away.  They made it seem like Kris was crazy to not jump on it.  But here's the thing, they weren't going to give him any type of pay raise, and gas prices here are currently almost $4.00/gal!  AANNDD, DH's car is a piece of crap because he already spent all last summer commuting to the other job!  When he tried to explain this to them, they had the NERVE to suggest he GET AN APARTMENT THERE AND SEE HIS WIFE ON THE WEEKENDS!!  Seriously?!?  I'm sorry, that takes some brass balls to make a suggestion like that!  Bottome line: we literally COULD NOT afford for him to take it.  How sad is that, you can't afford to STAY employed?!?

This is just another bead in the necklace of crap we've been handed.  Last fall, I got a job with my fire department as a full time dispatcher.  It was great money and I LOVED doing it!  I was making TRIPLE what I was making just working as an EMT part time.  Well then, the job was "outsourced" for lack of a better word, and 3 of us lost our jobs.  I was granted unemployment, but due to a screw up on the part of Ohio Department Job and Family Services, I had to pay the money back! Yep, you read that right.  I'll give you a moment to digest that one....

It's a great feeling to know that in the State of Ohio, you can be PUNISHED for being LAID OFF.  God bless my mama, she wrote me a check, and told me to "Pay those bastards off and be done with it!"  If Kris and I did not have such wonderful parents, I honestly don't know WHAT we would do!

This is going to sound bad, but I know we don't technically have to struggle for money.  We could ask either of our parents and they'd stroke us check after check without question.  But neither of us were raised that way.  We are a family now, we need to be self-sufficient, and we have always found a way.  It's just really starting to get old.  Kris always says, "If we didn't have bad luck, we'd have no luck at all."  Not only are we the 1 out of 10 that struggle with infertility, we also don't have any insurance or money to change that.  And even if we DID have insurance, most insurance companies choose to punish infertile couples and not cover their medical costs.

I know a lot of people would say it's a blessing that we can't have kids, seeing our financial struggles.  I personally am not one to think of children in terms of money.  I don't care who you are or how much you make...is a person EVER financially ready for kids?!  We still want a baby, and we aren't going to let a shitty economy change our minds.  Here's praying that we catch a break, one way or another.