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In an effort to be fair, I'll get billdaman's back here and not so much call :BS: on the Beckalees saga, but give an emphatic "and all of that sounds like stuff you either made happen or let happen due to personal choices" and for all the dramatic stuff like "chronic neurological issues" that reduce your brain to 65% of normal and all that, well, I disbelieve all that stuff simply because I grew up with a mom who had generalized malingering form of hypochondria known as Nonspecific Symptom Disorder, which is essentially inventing some horrible sounding medical reason to excuse why you lay around the house all day. I am jaded, and unless I see all manner of detailed record proving such claims, I 100% disbelieve as a matter of principle. More on that in a minute, for now, let's get specific....
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Let me tell you my story and I defy you to tell me how "working harder" would have made a difference.
Challenge accepted...
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Originally Posted by beckalees
I started my first full time job before I graduated high school. I worked my way up through this job to become a manager by the time I was 20. I was a district training manager by 24 making almost 40k a year in the mid 2000s. I used this job training to become an operations manager making well over that.
"Work harder" and go to school on top of the job. At 24, you'd have had a masters degree in addition to your operations manager gig.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
That leads us to 2008, September in fact which was the month I found out that my boyfriend and I were expecting a baby. We were ecstatic and not at all worried as we both had good, long term jobs. The same week, the great recession started or at least that's when we started hearing about it. We were ok though. I had a lot of experience and my boyfriend had a great degree. Everything was swell and our American Dream was well secured.
Your boyfriend had a great degree? In what? What was his job? And how was your American dream secured?
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Our apartment burned down that December, through no fault of our own. We lost everything and had to use our wedding and emergency fund to get ourselves settled again.
Renter's insurance. You'd think people "secure" in their American Dream would have insurance to protect it. Working harder in this case means the hard work of paying the $20 per month that a really good renters policy would cost. My last renter's policy cost me $14 per month and covered $25k in possessions and $50k liability. Had you done that hard work, renter's would have covered every possession you owned and you likely would have come out ahead.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Then my boyfriend was laid off.
With a great degree? Laid off from what? Doing what job? I'll find the missing hard work in that story, I guarantee.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Luckily unemployment helped until he got hired again, but was laid off again right in time for our daughter to be born. Lucky us, no worry about child care because I could support us both and he could be stay at home dad.
9 months out of work in not hard work. I appreciate stay at home parenting, but two incomes handles recessions better than one. Working harder in this case means both adults with jobs.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Fast forward 9 months. Baby is here, we're settled again and the very day (no I'm not kidding or exaggerating), the very day after our wedding, I'm laid off from my good job.
More to this totally random event than you are telling. For one, there's no way a lay off comes without you seeing it coming, especially at the operations manager level. There simply had to be signals. And I'd need to know what business you were an OM at, because a good position inside one company does not necessarily translate as a good job outside those corporate walls. And again, 9 months later, your boyfriend/hubby should have had a job, because assuming the details of your story are true and that you're age appropriate with each other, we're talking about someone with a "great" degree and very little experience.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Before the recession, I was considered a great hire. Very experienced and hard working. During the recession, I could not get a job because I had no degree.
You were the same hire before and after the recession. The difference is that when the good times are rolling, non-degreed folks can find work more easily than they can during or right after a recession. The degree always makes you more employable, or at least keeps fewer doors locked.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
It was not for want of trying....After a year on unemployment
That's a serious lack of trying. I've lived through I think 4 recessions since I became an adult and have never once been unemployed. I've bartended, landscaped, done tree work and delivered pizzas, sometimes to the tune of 80-90 hours per week, but I always got paid.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
frustrated that I couldn't get hired, I decided to go back to school. I needed something quick, relatively inexpensive and something I could rely on. I chose cosmetology school because I've always been very good at that and could do that anywhere. As a hair stylist, you can be just as successful as you choose to be and I was ambitious and a hard worker. I used a Pell grant and instead of using loans, we survived on an inheritance of my husbands. I worked my ass off for 16 months to graduate with honors. I was the best student the school had ever seen and upon graduation I had multiple job offers. The school wanted me for a teacher, the owner of the school wanted me in his chain of salons and I even met Nick Arrojo, the owner of hair salons in NYC who personally invited me to apply at his salon. That was my plan, to go to NYC, continue working my ass off and become a huge success. I was on my way again and nothing could stop me right?
here's where it breaks down, the undiagnosed, debilitating illness of much mystery that prevents working, but not writing 700 word essays on the Internet.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Here's the catch. 2 months before graduation, I got sick. Really really sick. I was barely able to graduate and had to postpone accepting job offers because I was spending so much time at the doctors office. Fast forward to now, 4 years later. My husband and I both have neurological diseases (presumably from toxic mold exposure from somewhere we lived), I am constantly in pain, suffer from debilitating migraines, have an undiagnosed (as of yet) autoimmune disease and have indeterminate severe cognitive impairment. On my good days my brain functions at 65% capacity and I can get out of bed. On my bad days I'm a complete vegetable. It took 2 years to get on federal disability for myself while my husband worked and tried to hide his own disability. Right after my case went through (I'm not going to waste time detailing what a horrible process getting disability is), my husband was laid off. If he'd been laid off before then we would have been homeless. At this point we'd been very broke but not poor for 4 years. Now we are living in his parents basement, with just 300 square feet for my little family.
OK, when did he get a job? I thought he was laid off guy, stay at home dad? And the assumed cause is toxic mold exposure from somewhere you lived? Two questions there - why would you live somewhere with toxic mold that apparently causes brain damage, and why have you not sued the landlord for all manner of punitive/compensatory damages? Surely you and your husband cannot be the only ones who suffered this, since toxic mold is not biased nor individually specific, so some of your other neighbors must have had similar problems and can easily testify to this? This entire story line makes no sense. Out of nowhere, the debilitating illness trikes, and you presume from toxic mold exposure in one of the places you rented, and nobody until me mentions suing the crap out of the landlord? There's an entire wing of the legal industry dedicated to making people like you and your lawyer very wealthy. Something very fishy going on with this story.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
And guess what? I have a flat screen. Do you know why? Because it's the one thing that survived our fire 7 years ago. Couldn't sell it due to smoke damage but it still works, so I have a flat screen tv. And I watch Netflix on it because it brings me joy, keeps my children busy, and costs 8 dollars a month. I have tattoos. Because I paid for them when I had money (and no they are not why I couldn't get a job) and surprisingly enough tattoos are permanent. They don't come off just because you're poor now. I have a smart phone that I bought with my tax refund, because I need it to remind myself that it's shower day and to feed and change my son's diaper. Or to make/keep doctors appointments. Or to pay the few bills we can afford. My cell phone is my brain and I cannot get by without it. I do not smoke or drink and the 100 dollars a month we get for food stamps goes to help feed my kids. (Yes, I have two now, the second also a surprise and my husband got a vasectomy thank you very much, so we won't produce anymore "drags on society").
This is the totally inconsistent behavior I am used to with nonspecific symptom people. Any sort of effort like daily hygiene, child care, a job, housework, etc...all that is far more difficult, if not impossible, but stuff that is more leisurely and recreational seems to go just fine and dandy. example - you do not have mental capacity for remembering when to shower, but do have the mental capacity for knowing how to program a recurring appointment in your smart phone calendar app to remind you about it. You can barely function, but can post Internet essays on your predicament in such painstaking detail? Did your phone remind you of all these details?
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Originally Posted by beckalees
I pay 130 dollars a month out of my disability check for "free" Medicare plus a prescription plan premium. My medical bills and prescriptions use half my check. We have to have a car because we had to move out of the city (with better public transit) and because of our inability to walk long distances we have to drive our daughter to kindergarten. I can't drive at all and no longer have a driver's license. We live on 13k a year and we are a family of 4.
You said your condition is un-diagnosed, yet you are getting prescriptions and disability checks? Prescriptions for what?
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Originally Posted by beckalees
Tell me how if I worked/tried harder, things would be different? Rip apart my story and tell me how I could have avoided my situation.
1) Get a college degree and married before having children.
2) Don't live in places where toxic mold melts your brain.
3) Hold off having children until financially and logistically prepared for them.
4) Do not have periods of unemployment that number in the months.
5) Do not let medical excuses rule your life.
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Originally Posted by beckalees
So I bet you're thinking one of two things, 1 you're finding some way I messed this up for myself. 2, I'm an exception right? "Of course there must be truly sick people who can't work, who can't help their current circumstances. But they are the exception." My own parents and siblings, who agree with most of the garbage spewed on this thread, think we are the exception and everyone else on welfare is lazy and unmotivated. The truth is the opposite. Welfare queens are the exception. People abusing food stamps are the exception. Most people will work if given the opportunity. But as it is, a lot of America is un or under employed. And this stated "fact" that if you work hard, you will succeed, is the exception. This misconception is keeping this country from changing. I can't believe so many people still believe that poverty is a choice. Hardly anyone in their right mind would choose this.
I don't think you're an exception. Anymore, I think your brand of medical jargon rationalization for what is garden variety malingering is the rule. When my mother spent 50+ years on her permanent coffee/smoke break, it was more of an exception. Not so much now. Now the medical industry will freaking make up a way to give you a "Get Out Of Work Free" card and get on the government gravy train. I do think you're unmotivated, but that again is more rule now than exception. Your little essay, subsequent rebuttals and attention to detail in this thread belies a brain working just fine, when you feel like doing so. Work is dull and boring, so your brain can't possibly do that, but it can painstakingly recount distant past events and organize coherent essay writing. I understand. Matter of fact, I think my mom has actually used your very non specific brain damage excuse at least twice in the past. Car wreck when I was 17, that one gave her brain damage and she didn't work for like a year (and homeopathy, apparently in the form of tea and meditation and a lot of sofa time cured it), and another car wreck when I was like 30? Same thing that time too...apparently, not working, watching a lot of TV and laying around cures brain damage. Sounds like you're on that path to the cure, so good luck. =)
But the past is done and all you can do is go forward. If you're so mentally incapacitated as to need a cell phone for even daily needs of your children, then I submit you are unfit parents for the simple fact that cell phone can die, and then apparently, so will your children. So the first thing I would do is seek alternate guardians for them, given your total dependence on a cell phone battery for their day to day needs and survival. After that, assuming your claimed burning desire to work is legit, I'd use my abundance of free time with Lumosity and other web things (since you clearly can use the internet without difficulty, somehow...) to sharpen what little brain that toxic mold left you with, and then I'd use the same Internet to begin researching the litigation against the landlord who gave you the brain damage via toxic mold. And after that payday, I'd go to the local religious and charity orgs, explain the brain damage thing and then ask for assistance with job placement for the handicapped.
Lots of options. But seriously, your total dependence on a cell phone for your children's welfare is frightening and unnerving. That's a legit safety issue there, and I am quite surprised you are still the legal guardian of your children, given that serious mental handicap.
My husband and I both have neurological diseases (presumably from toxic mold exposure from somewhere we lived), I am constantly in pain, suffer from debilitating migraines, have an undiagnosed (as of yet) autoimmune disease and have indeterminate severe cognitive impairment.
Bull! Absolute bull. How can you say this with a straight face, do you seriously think you are fooling anyone, or even yourself? The doctor who let you believe this farce should have his license revoked. You ma'am are sick, but it is a sickness of mindset. Stop with the excuses, pull up your damn big-girl pants and get your life together, and while you are at it find yourself a real man who can do what it takes to care for his family, the sooner the better.
Thank you for trying to not be insensitive. I do appreciate that. Yes, I am challenging people to troll me. And I'm waiting for them to. The whole point of my very personal post and truthful post is to get people to say how I could have done it better. How any of it was my fault. I want them to back up their belief system that "hard work equals success" by telling me how it applies to my situation. It is very difficult for me to put this stuff out there like this. I did not do it lightly.
As for your calling "bull****". I completely understand how my "decent grammar" and articulation would make my post seem spurious. However, what you can't know is the story behind my post. I spent 4 hours writing that post. If we counted the words in that post, how many words was I able to write per minute? Also, 65% for my brain is remarkably good. Prior to my sickness, my IQ was 145. I was reading Shakespeare in 5th grade for fun. Linguistics, vocabulary, and literature are kind of my thing. For most of my life I tested in the 99th percentile in the country for those categories. If I could have gotten paid for reading and comprehending difficult things, I'd be much more well off. My IQ is still in the 130s however my particular problem is not that I've lost my intelligence, it's that I have a remarkably hard time accessing it. My working and processing memory are completely shot. As one doctor put it, it's like trying to access all of Manhattan by one rickety rope bridge. So my good grammar and articulation unfortunately in no way affect my inability to work. My brain is a Ferrari with a geo metros engine. Imagine how frustrating that must be for me.
"AS far as your larger point, the governments not going to be able to save everyone. There will be people who struggle and suffer regardless what any politician says."
I'm interpreting this as you saying I'm an exception. I'm an exception that the government can't save. I've fallen through the cracks. But my point is I'm not an exception. There are too many people in this country with stories just like mine. There are too many cracks for us to fall through. Most of us are too proud to voice our misfortune and just keep hoping there is a way out.
You do know that when people read a story like yours on the internet we known that anyone can say anything. It doesn't mean your story is not true but it also may very well be a complete fabrication.
I'm not blaming or finding fault but the story is not credible nor does it have any value when discussing public policy. She writes better than most of us but has severe cognitive impairment....
I've got ASD myself. Some things work far better than average. Others don't. If you look at what I'm good at you can far over estimate what I can do.
Easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven.
Give all your money to the poor.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
And somehow the VAST majority of American Christians are consistently judgmental and hateful of the poor... while practically worshiping wealthy Job Creators(TM).
You people have FAR more in common with the Pharisees than with Jesus.
You do know that when people read a story like yours on the internet we known that anyone can say anything. It doesn't mean your story is not true but it also may very well be a complete fabrication.
It is also proof to SSDI that they are not cognitively impaired. It's like people posting on FB pictures of themselves horseback riding, biking, etc. while on "disability". Don't they know this can be used against them to take away their benefits?
I've got ASD myself. Some things work far better than average. Others don't. If you look at what I'm good at you can far over estimate what I can do.
I do not think you understand the condition the lady is describing. I'm intimately familiar with issues regarding cognitive function. Severe Cognitive Impairment is tantamount to end stage Alzheimer's. Do not take my word for it, look it up. You are defending this lady claims while not really understanding what she has told you, then you make these foolish arguments, as if your word is any sort of barometer to her condition. You like or agree with what she says and its largely irrelevant if its accurate or true. Like you said, you are results oriented. You do not seem to care about how the result are achieved nor if they are valid results. A quick Google search will give you more than enough evidence to see how Severe Cognitive Impairment manifest which in turns makes it impossible write with the ability and substance she demonstrated. I'm not going to call the lady a liar, I'm not going to call her dishonest but I will say her story is not credible for all the objective and reasonable issues that I've listed here and previously .
You need to have a a little old fashioned skepticism or what new age people call "critical thinking".
Also another important thing to note is that it is very possible for a "poor" person to have things like a smart phone, a car, and a place to stay. So this creates the illusion in the eyes of outsiders that most Americans are doing ok but it's all a facade.
"They hVe a tv, they can't be poor". Um no
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