On pregnancy, at 5 am

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday August 21, 2012 · 4:18 AM PDT

2012/08/21 · 04:18

My nose has been bleeding since 2 am. I've been trying to sleep sitting upright on the couch. My back hurts, but I can't lean back because I choke on the blood, and I can't lean forward because of my pregnant belly. I can't breathe through my nose, as it is stuffed with cotton. I drool when I breathe through my mouth. And the baby is pummeling me from the inside.

I am suffering.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Friday June 15, 2012 · 7:32 AM PDT

2012/06/15 · 07:32

There was a house for sale in my new town, a foreclosed property listed at $43,000. The price got my attention. It got a lot of people's attention, judging by the parade of potential buyers at the house. The real estate agents were handing the key off to one another as they came and went. Locking up wasn't an option.

The house had only one bathroom, was in the floodplain, and had a swimming pool in poor shape that would probably need to be removed. There were obvious signs that both a child and a dog had been there.

But it was liveable, and a price like that covers a multitude of sins. We had nearly enough equity in our house in Oklahoma to buy this one outright. We could keep the back door locked until we saved up enough to deal with the pool.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Thursday June 14, 2012 · 12:41 PM PDT

2012/06/14 · 12:41

While packing for the move, I found an unused gift card to a local restaurant. We got some take-out tikka masala on the way to the airport, had a picnic in the cell phone lot, and said goodbye for a while.

I did manage to pack up four suitcases and forget only the house plant. I'm rather proud of that. My bag was easy; the maternity clothes came out of storage and straight into the suitcase. My belly popped right around then, so at least one transition went smoothly.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Tuesday May 22, 2012 · 7:26 AM PDT

2012/05/22 · 07:26

My husband is sticking around to tie up loose ends, and my daughter and I are moving on Sunday. We're flying, so we get to take four suitcases and a car seat. That means no matter how many times the child asks, we can't bring her trampoline.

But we can pack her little pillow and her giraffe blankie and her yellow blankie and her purple blankie and her quilt and her monkey blankie and her big blankie. Yes, she sleeps with all that. Add in my pregnancy pillow, and that's a whole suitcase of bedding. None of it is necessary; my mom has spare pillows and blankets. But it feels important.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday May 20, 2012 · 11:40 PM PDT

2012/05/20 · 23:40

Last time we moved, we got free moving boxes off craigslist. But people aren't giving away valuables like cardboard anymore.

On the upside, there's also a brisk market for used furniture. I've been selling off odds and ends. Gone: a coffee table, dresser, cabinet, bed frame, fire pit. Less to move, less to store until we have our own place again. The cash doesn't hurt either. More than ever, my house feels like a pile of stuff with a cover on it.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Wednesday May 16, 2012 · 11:45 AM PDT

2012/05/16 · 11:45

Technically we're not unemployed anymore. We got an offer and we accepted it. It wasn't from the company my husband interviewed with, or anywhere else he'd applied for a job. It was from my mom.

I'm going to do office work at her business, and my husband will launch a shiny new sales career.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Saturday May 12, 2012 · 10:14 AM PDT

2012/05/12 · 10:14

I brought in about $250 in odd jobs last week. Not that anyone’s counting. All that nearly went to a plumber, but the problem resolved itself unexpectedly.

My husband got a sore throat, interviewed for a job with a husky I’m-about-to-lose-my-voice voice, then spent two days in bed unable to talk. The interview went well.

We’ve applied for unemployment benefits (denied pending investigation) and Medicaid (approved pending investigation). I learned that today’s red tape comes in the form of computer errors. The unemployment website encountered an error in line 527, and afterwards refused to start or reopen an application for my husband’s social security number. We tried again the next day, and that time it worked. On my third phone call to the health care authority, I learned that in order to upload supporting documents, I had to turn on a certain setting in certain versions of a certain browser. In the meantime I’d tried submitting my documents in person, but I was unable to visit any of the partner agencies on this list:

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Sunday May 06, 2012 · 10:12 AM PDT

2012/05/06 · 10:12

While we hang in the limbo of the newly unemployed, I'd like to discuss something: Just what does it mean to be middle class?

I'd say my family was middle-class because our income was around the US median household income. We were in the middle, better off than half the country, looking up at the other half.

But I don't know how accurate this label is. I have a certain image of the middle class, and it doesn't include buying groceries with coupons, or sharing a car in a car-dependent city, or having grandparents pay for our child's preschool.

It definitely doesn't include cleaning up poop for a living.

MiddleClassMom

Community (This content is not subject to review by Daily Kos staff prior to publication.)

Saturday May 05, 2012 · 8:16 AM PDT

2012/05/05 · 08:16

I created this username half a year ago. Inspired by Lightbulb's series Confessions of a Retail Worker and rowanleigh's Cashier's Rants, I planned to write about my own experiences one rung up the economic ladder.

My family made around $45,000 per year and was a study in contrasts. We had plenty to eat, but wore our clothes threadbare. We had health insurance, and still we could barely pay for our child's uncomplicated birth. We didn't have to put our infant in day care, but we hardly saw each other around our staggered work schedules. If one of us died, our child would be protected by life insurance. As long as we both lived, there was no security.

And sure enough, we are now unemployed.

Newer
Older

RSS

On pregnancy, at 5 am

Career-change saga: A Tale of Two Foreclosures

Career-change saga: Transitions

Career-change saga: Four suitcases and a car seat

Career-change saga: You can't take it with you

Unemployment saga: An offer we can't refuse

Unemployment saga: Week 1: A comedy of errors

Some children are more equal than others: Just what does it mean to be middle class?

Newly unemployed. Scared.