Please don't shit on me if you have nothing nice to say. I recently started a job on 3/10, but will not get paid until 4/07 because of payroll fucking up. My supervisor cannot manually go in and approve my hours and I was told today by human resources that my first paycheck will be pushed back until the 7th. It's been a fucking struggle. I'm working from 9 to 4, so not quite full time, but it's during the hours when the food banks are open.
I've applied for SNAP for myself and my child, but my interview date for that isn't until the 27th. I', also worried that because I'm making $20 an hour I won't get approved for any help. My daughter gets free breakfast and lunch at her school (she's in kindergarten) but I'm also paying for after school care so that eats up pretty much whatever I get in child support (which is only $80 a week so it isn't much.) On the weekends when my daughter's father has her, it's not so bad, I can go without, skip meals, eat plain peanut butter, etc. But when it's just me and her, I just struggle. She's a picky eater, wants happy meals and junk food because thats what her dad gives her. It was a fight just to get her to eat a damn peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
I was venting to a friend of mine about how hard it is and how I'm just not in a good place right now because I'm running on empty. My rent is going up, I can barely afford groceries, my water bill shot up an extra fifteen dollars this month and I don't know why or how. My landlord won't fix the issue with the bugs we have, or the fact that sometimes we don't have hot water because the hot water heater is old and sucky. I'm so lucky for this new job but going almost a month without pay is really, really fucking hard.
My friend just sent me twenty bucks. All she could afford to do but it meant that tomorrow, when I have my daughter, I can go to aldi and make that stretch a little. It won't fill my fridge or pantry (which are both pretty bare and that sucks) but it means that my daughter will be taken care of and we will be able to eat for the weekend. This is so dumb and I even told her I cried and felt dumb for crying but I don't think she knew how much it meant to me that she cared enough to want to help. I also feel guilty for taking the money. She said to just pay her back whenever but I don't think she realized how much of a bind I've been in and how much I appreciated it.