Open Thread for Personal Stuff: Very Belated May 2014 Edition

Hi gang. I’m a woman now. At least if you don’t listen to the TERFs.

Congatulations inurashii!! Whatever you do, don’t listen to the TERFs.

I hope no one here listens to the TERFs. I don’t know your story, inurashii, but welcome to the sisterhood. 🙂

I just wanted to check in since I used to comment fairly often and haven’t been here much as of late. I still read pretty much every entry but usually I’m days late so don’t have much to add. Life is pretty good in AKville though, just busy mostly. I keep hoping to comment here more but that keeps not happening. But I’m alive and well, and I hope you all are doing good. 🙂 I miss being more active here but it can’t be helped. 😉

Fuck the haters, inurashii, you are a woman and they can deal with it.

AllyS: I know they exist — Zinnia Jones helped me realize that I was trans, so I got pulled into her TERF wars almost immediately which meant that I was exposed to a lot of nasty TERF rhetoric.

I have only been harassed by them a little — I have few qualms about blocking them — but my skin is kinda thin, so. :/

I def don’t agree with Zinnia about everything wrt trans ideology. It’s silly but her ridiculous joke website http://amitransgender.com/ was actually a huge help to me because it really threw into stark relief the notion that somebody putting this much thought into gender identity might seriously not be cis, and that kicked off a lot of thought

oh actually another thing. I got laid off in December and decided to go freelance. I write interactive fiction and stories and stuff. Here’s my Patreon:
http://www.patreon.com/inurashii

Hey everyone, I know I haven’t been around for a while, but the comment threads always seem to move so fast.

Really the only thing going on with my life is that I’m raising cash to get to referee the gay rugby world cup. So I’m pimping my pledge me page everywhere.
https://www.pledgeme.co.nz/projects/2092

/ shameless plug

Welcome to womanhood, inurashii!

Congrats inurashii 🙂

This thread came at a goodish time because I was just thinking today that once again, since I’ve ragequit most forums, I find myself with a stressed out rant and nowhere to rant it.

My boyfriend and his son now live with me, son 4ish days a week and boyfriend all the time. Except that so far we’ve had him an extra day, at short notice, for the past three weeks, each time with drop-off/pick-up times being rearranged at an hour’s notice so as to be as inconvenient as humanly possible. Logistics of mealtimes and naptime/bedtime apparently don’t factor in to his mum’s considerations, so it has pretty much always involved rushed meals and/or a starving/exhausted three year old. Cool. Then this week – we always get him on Sundays, unless we get him on Saturdays – I’m thinking “can it please just be the 4 days? I would pay good money for my Thursday/Fri/Saturday being Me days this week.” Nah, we have him Sunday afternoon to Friday night this week. Cool. Yep.

Oh, and my boyfriend has nearly run out of money. How? Don’t ask me. Dissecting our budget is one of those things I was hoping to do with the Grown-up Time we are now not due to get this week. Man, I know some people do this 24/7, but I feel like not having kid all the time affects my ability to compartmentalise. When he’s here, my headspace is 100% dedicated to parenting whether he’s out with partner, or asleep, or whatever. On kid days, I can only think about kid things. Then when he goes to his mum’s, I can free up space for self-care and non-parenting responsibilities like the bills and housework outside of general maintenance. So losing those non-kid days plays merry hell with my schedule and ability to get things done.

Anyway, six weeks ago we had enough to last us 4 months, after which point my student loan starts coming in again. I get more this year, and I can also increase my overdraft. Now, we have (on his part) enough to last us a month. Thankfully, I have a little more than I expected after rent and bills come off this month. So, with careful dissecting, tweaking and planning, we can stretch it out. Uncomfortably. There was no NEED for this, though. I’ve been telling him for months to get online banking set up, because this has happened before like three times? But when he was living with his mum, so most-of-the-way running out of money wasn’t catastrophic. I’ve tried to tell him as non-judgementally as possible that when you’re not watching it, it vanishes. Things like buying lunch when we take kid out, rather than bringing sandwiches. Having a coffee as you’re passing through the train station. These things eat money like you wouldn’t believe. But I sort of thought he knew from experience. This is my first time living alone, though I’ve been in the flat for seven or eight months before boyfriend moved in. (This also stresses me out because the delay was never supposed to happen and I find the reasons for it inadequate. I’m trying to put it behind me, but I was SO READY for this to happen eight months ago, then eight months trying to step-mum from afar while running my own house for the same time really dragged me down. Now I do not feel ready. But here it is.)

Anyway, when I first moved out, I overspent hugely in the first couple of months. I caught myself, figured out where it was going – mainly train fare and lunches while at uni, so I switched to the bus and got a monthly ticket, and switched to packed lunches, plus junk food sneaking into my shopping basket so I cut that back too. It wasn’t great that I overspent, but my money was loan payments coming in regularly so I was incapable of spending it all and ruining myself for the months ahead. Boyfriend’s money is/was inheritance, which he got most of in one go, and has now spent most of. There’s no more. Well, his mum wisely held back a grand. But there’s a chance (due to our evil incarnate landlord) that we’ll need to move at the end of summer, so I need to keep that held aside for moving expenses until we know that won’t happen.

I’m just disappointed and frustrated that it’s fallen on me, again, to clean this up and make sure we can survive the summer. And if we keep getting kid extra days that’s going to ramp up the costs, but I fully expect kid’s mum (who works, boyfriend doesn’t (he’s setting up to freelance)) to feign ignorance of that reality. It’s just so much to deal with. I’m so young. I want to be able to not give a shit at least a couple of days a week, and I feel like that option has just been snatched away like “NO, ONLY ADULT LIFE AND HUGE RESPONSIBILITIES FOR YOU, HA!”

Quite aside from the minefield that is parenting and step-parenting a three year old in and of itself. Today, boyfriend and I are sleep deprived because a cop hammered on the door at 1am and gave us the fright of our lives (they were looking for the guy who used to live below us, god knows why) then kid had a nightmare and woke up at 3, then woke up for good at the back of six. Boyfriend has been tired, grumpy, snappish, shouty and unreasonable. I hate that. I’m that too, in my own head, but I just think it is not cool no-how to let it spew out all morning. We’re agreed, in theory, that shouting is counter-productive and upsets kid, the dog, and me (my dad, nothing but awful memories) and that everyone responds better to firm-but-calm. No matter what I’m feeling, I’m always firm but calm and the stiflingness of it sort of drives me mad, but not as mad as partner just letting loose on the dog (mainly) or on kid. The dog is a rescue, and cowers when you shout, even in excitement/not at him. It achieves NOTHING but partner is like “oh he doesn’t respond when I ask him nicely.” He snapped that at me last week when I asked him to quit shouting, and being as I was pretty stung and annoyed by that, I went a bit passive aggressive and kept the dog away from the dinner table for the duration of the meal just by clicking my fingers. It is NOT just me he’ll respond to, that’s just an excuse for losing his temper. Doesn’t fly. Today I’ve been hiding out in my room studying because I have an assignment due on Wednesday and CAN NOT DEAL.

We talked and he said he’s going to try but just having to say these things tires me. Taking on a three year old kid, when I’m 19, in uni full time, when we don’t have much money, when I have mental health problems – I can deal with that, but I need to have confidence in him not to be upsetting my dog, making my home a hostile environment, and adding fuel to the fire when kid is being difficult (which is practically all the time).

Welcome, inurashii! Happiness always 🙂

@inurashii

Hi gang. I’m a woman now. At least if you don’t listen to the TERFs.

Yay!! 😀 And we won’t listen to TERFs.

@K

um, wow. That sounds stressful. Sadly I don’t have any advice 🙁 But internet hugs from me, if you want htem.

Congrats inurashii

Also, what the hell are TERFs? *Lives under a rock*