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January 2012 Moms
cbkeni
member
Hooray for wretched parents! Long...
cbkeni
member
So my stepmom emailed me to see how I was feeling the other day and it happened to be one of those days where it was the end of the world and everything sucked and I wanted to jump in front of a bus. So instead of just taking the email as a courtesy email and giving the usual "I'm fine thanks!" I accidentally let a little depression slip into it. It was pretty much just about our money situation which is pretty flippin bad at the moment. She obviously said something to my dad because he called me for like 3 days straight (we don't talk on the phone often so I tend to ignore him when he calls). In the 3 days he was calling me my stepmom never responded to my email (remember this for later! It's crucial to the plotline).
Finally I called my dad back and he asked if everything was ok so I sort of just let him know what was going on. Being the super wonderful supportive father he is he did the most obvious thing to do when your pregnant daughter is upset; he said "well that's life, unfortunately you just have to get used to it" then went on to tell me that because I never graduated college (in an angsty teenage fit I dropped out of high school when I found out they had put NO money aside for college for me, now 7 years later I'm putting myself through college but obv haven't graduated yet) I don't deserve maternity leave because I'm not valuable as an employee and if I wanted to get maternity benefits I should have waited until I had my degree to get pregnant. While I know that in the real world unfortunately this is pretty true, I kinda didn't need to hear it from my father. He also threw in that maybe I'll be in a better situation by the next time I get pregnant so just suck it up for now...which honestly to me translated into "this kid was an accident so he doesn't count".He ALSO wondered out loud where my husband was during all the stress and why he wasn't helping me deal with anything...
The next day my stepmom finally responds to my email with "Well does (MH) REALLY need such a fancy phone?"...that was her genius plan to save us from the end of the world apparently. My husband has an iPhone that he uses for work AND we've already had this conversation. Then she goes on about how if we got a home phone plan and 2 cellphones just for emergencies we could save SO much money. When I flipped out on her for basically calling my husband...I don't even know! Something...spoiled or a gold digger or something...she responded with "Oh I didn't mean for it to come out like that, I even held off on sending that email because I was worried it would upset you!" (See, told you to remember that part...she held the email for like 4 days and STILL couldn't think of a way to not piss me off!).
I know this doesn't sound SUPER bad, you kinda had to be there and know the relationship I have with these people (my sister won't even speak to them because they're so hard to deal with). Also for anyone who's keeping track while I was pregnant (and it was after I told her) my sober-for-2-years-mom's boyfriend broke up with her and she tried to get back at him by drinking a 30 rack of Bud and swallowing 3 bottles of sleeping pills and anti-depressants and was in a coma for a week that they thought she wasn't going to come out of. So yea...I have 3 parents and they all suck.
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Re: Hooray for wretched parents! Long...
Wow...I'm sorry you have such wretched people to deal with! I'm sure you were just venting about the situation and not expecting a solution from them, just some sympathy or something.
And don't let your dad fool you with the degree BS! I have a degree and in this economy it has not helped me one damn bit with getting a job or anything else. But it did help me get into debt... lol
I hope you have some other supportive people in your life. ((HUGS))
This! I have JD, but because I work on a contract basis, I don't get maternity leave either.
Maybe she didn't phrase it well, but I do think your step mom is trying to be helpful. You seem defensive about her suggestion to cut back on the smart phone, but she is right, you would save a bundle. If your DH uses it primarily for work, look into writing it off as a business expense on your taxes (I work from home, so 1/4 of our rent gets written off as a business expense). Or having his employer cover it.
When DH and I were saving up for our sabbatical a few years ago we cut out a lot of extraneous expenses. The first to go was the home phone - since we both had cell phones, we realized we didn't need it. We also slashed our cable down to basic, cut way back on the eating out (unless one of us could expense it), and stopped buying new clothes (not possible while pregnant, I know). All the little cuts really added up to big savings for us.
It sucks cause I want to spend the next week and a half explaining all the douchey things she's said or done to DH since we've been together! It's all passive-aggressive too which I hate because I'm super direct. It's more just that we've had that conversation before and I feel like she's just stuck on blaming DH for anything she can (and to be honest DH actually makes pretty good money we're just in a weird screwey spot right now where EVERY SINGLE financial thing is piling up on us right at this time). I should see if he can write it off though...never really thought about that!
Yea pretty much everything else we've already cut out. I've only bought one maternity shirt and 2 pairs of pants (1 for work and one pair of jeans) and the rest of the time I live in my yoga pants and sweatshirts (or other shirts I can get away with at work). DH has only 2 pairs or work pants which is gross cause he works in commercial construction but he refuses to buy more...but my last car payment is this month!!!!!!! So that helps a bunch
ALSO just to get a clue of how my stepmom is she has literally told me that she's better than me, my sister, DH and pretty much every one in my family because she went to college. I'm not even exaggerating. And when she says it she's completely certain that we're all going to agree with her and she's down right shocked when it upsets us because to her it's just a fact (keep in mind my dad, aka her husband, never graduated college).
This for us to, DH phone is a write off. He does do a lot of his programing at home and I also work from home, so internet electricity heating and water between the two of us are significant write offs. We even are able to write of portions of gas, and insurance on our vehicles because we both use them for work. It really is worth looking into all those details. We priced the home phone idea before as well but they are not as cheap as they used to be and it only cost us an extra 20 to have our smart phones with long distance which the house line would not. Which is important since we have to call numbers with different area codes for work and even family.
This financial thing your going through is just a bump in the road, one of many to come. You and H just need to sit down and evaluate your finances, it's a good habit to get into at least once a year, especially for having a healthy happy marriage. They say finance is one of the number one downfalls in relationships.
I also have to agree about the Degree thing right now having that has gotten me know where. No one wants to pay enough to make it worth my while. I'm doing better off working from home in a whole separate field. Many times I feel like it was a waste of time and money to do the standard college route. My DH did a sort of trade school thing and for being in our twenties he is on salary but it breaks down to $35-40/ hour. I work 3-4 hours a day every together day for $30/hr. With my degree people want to offer me a starting out wage of $15/hr. really?? Plus then I'd have to pay child care for 3 soon, gas, and lunch expenses, just not worth it. If our kids have a good idea of what they want to do I am definitely going to urge them to go through the trade school route. Either way they have accounts set up for college as well. I will support them no matter what they decide as long as they are working toward a goal.
I'm sorry, but I have a really hard time getting past that statement. So because they didn't fund your college, you dropped out?
Regardless, maybe your dad shouldn't have berated you or phrased things the way he did, but it sounds to me like he cares. I mean, he tried to contact you after you sounded upset in an email to his wife. If he truly was a wretched person, I doubt he would care enough to check in. Maybe his "rant" was coming from a place of love. He doesn't want you to make the same mistakes or he wants to point out things that he feels you can improve on. Maybe he was aiming for constructive criticism and it didn't work out as planned. Things to consider before calling him a horrible person.
Furthermore, I agree with your stepmom. If you are in dire straights, cutting the phone is probably a smart idea. What about it does your hubby need for work? Email? Internet? There are plenty of cheaper phones and phone planes that can handle those things. Does his employer specifically state that he has to have an iPhone? (If so, I would look into seeing if his employer could pay for it.) You could always switch to another provider and get a smaller plan to cut some costs. Or do as some of the other ladies suggested and write it off as a business expense on your taxes. I don't think she was trying to call you or your husband names or insinuate anything by her statement. I think she was honestly trying to help you because she is concerned.
But really, if they are horrible wretched people, why are you still in contact with them? If they are truly bad, then write them off or don't be upset when they say things that you perceive as negative.
BFP #1 5/07/11, DS 01/19/12
BFP #2 08/09/12, M/C 08/10/12
BFP #3 10/30/12, EDD 07/11/12...please stick!
Oh don't get me wrong, I've regretted dropping out every day of my life since then. I wish to hell that I didn't do it. And it wasn't JUST that they had no intentions of helping my pay for school, there were other factors too just none of them have to do with this specific incident so I didn't want to bring them ALL up. I'm just saying that having the fact that I didn't already graduate college shoved in my face while I'm currently working 2 jobs, paying my way through school and pregnant wasn't really what I wanted to hear right at that moment. It would have been nice to hear something along the lines of "you're doing the best you can and I'm proud of you" as opposed to "well you should have though about that 7 years ago" It was also how he sort of brushed off his first grandchild as a mistake...that's what upset me the most by far. I can take him being a douche to me, but to have that kind of attitude about my baby was just harsh.
As far as the phone thing I told DH to look into seeing if his work would pay for at least some of it, and if not when we get our taxes done I'll see if we can write it off.
They're not the most horribly scum-of-the-earth people in the world, they're just super insensitive and my stepmom has a habit of trying to turn me against DH (this isn't even close to a good example because from an outside perspective it doesn't look like she was saying anything bad). They just caught me on a bad week and I needed to yell about it is all. Nothing's the end of the world, I just would like to have some sort of support coming from my parents.