Sorry, this is more of a vent than asking for advice. Just feel like I need to come here and “get it off my chest”. I’m just having a bit of a down moment in my life. I’m in my late 30’s and literally have nothing. I know social media can be very very fake and people’s lives are not really that glamorous sometimes but I see my Facebook friends doing amazing things all the time and it gets me so jealous. Buying houses, travelling all over, so many extra curricular activities for their kids etc. or great jobs, going out with heaps of friends all the time. I have none of that. Zero. No friends, no money, no nothing. How do people afford all this yet I can hardly afford the weekly groceries? Sorry, vent over. Thankyou
Everyone is doing wonderful things and I have nothing!
Everyone is doing wonderful things and I have nothing!
Posted in:
Life Lessons, Self Care, Sisterhood Stories, Money
10 Replies
I’ve got wonderful things happening, bought myself a house, new car recently, great paying job and the odd overseas trip with family.
What people don’t see, the struggle doing my graduate studies whilst being a single parent working full time, bringing work home to perform well and get promotions, saving every cent to get that deposit for a house and making sacrifices to keep up mortgage repayments (dye my own hair, hardly buy new clothes, no luxuries for myself), being paid shit wages and treated like shit for the first seven years of my career, but never giving up.
A lot of people are working their arses off to get what they have, ask yourself what are you doing to get ahead? Because I’m working full time, studying, taking shit from a lot of arrogant arseholes, parenting all by myself, so I know that I’m giving life my all. You can’t sit back and expect things to come to you, no one is going to save you, you have to save yourself.
Delete Facebook! Best thing I ever did.
I agree.
You know you see the highlights, not the everyday. And really, you don't know how far in debt they are to live how they live.
I know a young lady I used to work with would talk about what they have, what they're doing, where they're going as a family and although she earned less than I do her husband earned more. She was also very honest about the debt they were in, juggling payments, paying minimum payments, borrowing from family etc. It's not until you see that kind of honesty that you realise what a trap "things" are.
There will be a list there of what you do have. Write those out to remind yourself. You have your kids, your health, shelter, food. You're doing ok and it's important to keep that in mind.
But it's ok to feel deflated sometimes. Use that as motivation!
Want better and plan the goals to make that happen.
Maybe we can suggest some things to help make you feel like you have something to share?
Local park run is great for photo ops of smiling faces, and the chance to make new friends.
Book club at the library, kiddies sitting listening to the library assistant read to them.
Check your local council FB or website. There's heaps of community events on these days like music in the park. And they often have info on activities like local bush walks or sights to see - go be tourists in your own back yard.
It’s really easy to compare the incomparable.
If I started comparing my life to my sisters I’d be a miserable mess. For example her and her husband have very high paying jobs, worked there butts off in there late teens and early 20s and now have all that you described.
Me, I live in a housing commission, with a severely disabled adult son.
Our lives went down very different paths and that’s ok. I’ll never have the life she has, but I’m actually pretty happy with my life. I’ve made some careful, smart decisions and made the best of my circumstances. I’ve become very content with my simple life.
As supports have improved for us, I’ve gotten to do some pretty exciting things the last 2 years, now that I’m in my late 40s I’ve been able to perform multiple times a year on stage. But 8 years back I literally had nothing but caring for my son.
I have a friend who owns a million dollar property, owns horses, drives an $80k car, she goes on all the holidays and has all the stuff.
I used to feel jealous but I just got to a point where I realised that this jealousy was only detracting from my own happiness, I was hurting my own feelings essentially.
I am genuinely happy for my friend these days. She's worked hard.
I don't wallow in self pity anymore either. Yeah, I don't have a nice car and nice house. I don't have 10 girlfriends to go out to brunch with even if I could afford it.
But I do have a roof over my head, I have lovely neighbours, I have a beautiful close knit family, I have 3 great kids, a cat who loves me so much she follows me to the toilet, I have my creature comforts, I have my health, I have my freedom. Generally speaking, I'm pretty fulfilled overall.
Take a social media break. It's not good for your mental health if you're feeling like this.
I'll give you my persepctive and its in no way saying you're not a hard worker. It just our circumstances.
Some people afford these things through really really hard work and often at a cost during a period of their lives of no social life, missed time with family and a LOT of stress! What you see on social media is sometimes the highlight real of the awards. Not the hard work that led to it.
My partner and I were minimum wage earners for the first 12 years of our relationship. We had our three kids during that time so it was TOUGH! We found joy in smaller things. Very rare family days out to playgrounds (when we could, working long hours over most weekends often made that impossible).
In fact if I think back, it really sucked. The stress and long lonely nights with the kids while my partner busted his butt at work, was a hard time for me, him and our kids.
Not being able to afford day care meant trying to juggle my work days with his days off so we rarely saw each other. We had a maxed out credit card just trying afford life. Going out of tea or lunch was out of the question. Scraping through to the next pay day every week, having bugger all clothes for myself so wearing the same things every second day.
But all the hard work and stress and loneliness paid off because my husband is now in a CEO position and earns a 6 figure salary and I work part time in a job I absolutely love. We can spend every weekend together as a family.
We can live an elaborate life (if we wanted to but funnily enough we still find joy in the smaller things) but we do go on a big holiday once a year We can buy a nice SUV. We are building a big house.
But it didn't come without a cost.
I don't post these things on social media but if I did, I wouldn't want people to assume it was just handed to us on a silver platter.
Lol I was feeling pretty good about life until I met a new couple recently. Fuck me lol talk about living the life 😳 makes you wonder how much is put on though and how much is debt. I know to look at people would think I have a comfortable and good life, truth is- you don’t see the everyday bullshit, FB is all a well placed lie and I’m happy to share with my friends and family all the out takes 😂 things are not always as they seem ❤️
Lol I was feeling pretty good about life until I met a new couple recently. Fuck me lol talk about living the life 😳 makes you wonder how much is put on though and how much is debt. I know to look at people would think I have a comfortable and good life, truth is- you don’t see the everyday bullshit, FB is all a well placed lie and I’m happy to share with my friends and family all the out takes 😂 things are not always as they seem ❤️