Health (Mental Physical)

I Moved Out

Posted on by Double Debt Single Woman

In my last post, I was trying my best to endure my living situation. It was not to be, however. Two weeks after my last post, I moved out.

Yeah, it all happened pretty quickly. I was prepared to try to ride out the winter there even though I was miserable. Two events triggered my decision to leave; one linked to each roommate. That was it. I was done. I packed up my stuff and got the hell out.

Thanks to all of you who commented on my last post. Ms. Afro Penny and Maria asked me to think about whether enduring my living situation was worth it, and to prioritize my mental health. I did reflect on those words.

I’m now lounging in my own small 1-BR apartment. I considered a renting a studio, but after living in a small bedroom for the last 7 years of my life, that option felt suffocating. I LOVE my new place. The apartment isn’t super swanky or anything, but I think it’s cute. More importantly, it’s clean, quiet, bug-free, and safe.

It is not cheap, but moving to any place was going to be more expensive than what I was paying while living with multiple roommates. I moved to a new town where rent is a bit less expensive, and I got 2 months free rent because the rental market is no longer competitive because of COVID.

This will set me back financially. My savings rate will lower by quite a bit due to the higher rent, and I have been spending money like water over the past couple of months to furnish the place. For me, it’s worth it.

My mental health has boosted. I feel so much better. I love having my own space and having total control over it. I have space to improve my mental and physical health.

Time Flies

I’ve not blogged for a long while. Frankly, with COVID and the elections going full swing for the past couple of months, plus my soul-sucking job, I have not felt energized to post. I haven’t checked on my retirement savings, because it hasn’t been a priority for me. I got an email from “debtor” who reminded me to get back on the keyboard. Thanks for the nudge. 😉

Michelle, congrats on reaching your retirement saving goals for the year. Afro Penny, thanks for keeping it real and sharing the ups and downs of working multiple jobs to pay off debt. It’s a smart move to build up an emergency fund before anything else. You’ll be back to chopping at that debt in no time. My Early Retirement Journey, boy do I understand the stress of a soul-sucking job. I hope the communication channels you’ve set up, help you to work through your grief and challenges. Losing a family member is always so hard. I lost a relative to COVID not long ago. It’s a hard road, but one you can walk.

Happy Holidays

Now that the elections are over (except for Senate seats in GA), I can start to free up some mental space. I’m hoping things slow down at work over the holidays. But it will be my luck to get someone over my team who has something to prove and wants to make us work at full speed, while other groups get to kick back a little. Sigh.

I hope you’re all able to make the best of a not ideal holiday season this year.

.

DDSW Archives

Endurance

Posted on by Double Debt Single Woman

I am this frog right now.

The Indoctrinated Roommate

The working-from-home roommate and I are continuing to get on each other’s nerves. On top of everything else, he’s now told me he thinks COVID is a hoax and is not taking it seriously. He spends time getting indoctrinated by weird conspiracy theory and pseudo-scientific videos online. Because he blasts his computer at high volume in the house, I can hear the nonsense he listens to.

Since my last post, he had an out-of-state relative fly in to visit for a couple of days in the house without even telling the other roommate and me, let alone asking if we were ok with it. Not a mask in sight as they spent time in the common areas of the house. (Apparently, his family doesn’t take this seriously either.) I wasn’t comfortable with this and voiced as such.

He got offended and deflected what I had to say as a personal attack on his relative instead of accepting his own insensitivity to the needs of the other people in this house during a pandemic.                    Read More

Rethinking My Living Arrangement

Posted on by Double Debt Single Woman

Image credit: The Atlantic

Roommate #1’s room has remained empty since she left. Last month, Landlord told me that one guy was interested in renting it, but I said no. I didn’t want to share a bathroom with a guy. I’ve done that before (see my old posts about my roommate when I first moved to this area) and I’m not interested in doing that again. However, as the weeks have gone by, Landlord has been getting increasingly desperate to rent out the room. I was getting concerned that he would rent it out to anyone just to get the money.

One afternoon, Landlord, without letting me know ahead of time, invited a woman into the house to look at the room. Afterward, he asked me to come meet her after they spent some time talking. He informed me that she is interested in the room and will start moving in her things tomorrow. Wait, what? This is just dropped on me in front of the woman. I was not consulted for my opinion and felt ambushed. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was by design.      Read More