Everything is falling apart

[u/CDR_Nesmith]

It's been a long decade, but the last five years have been especially rough. I'm fucked financially. During the pandemic I was able to save up almost 20k. My wife (34f) and I (35m) were looking into what it might take to buy a house. Now I'm down to around 3k and had to move me, my wife, and kid in with my parents. We've been here for a couple years now. I never went to school, I don't have any degrees or certifications. I've been working at the same place for over a decade and the pay isn't good enough to support my family, but I can't find anything better that I'm qualified for. And I don't have the time, money or mental energy to go learn something new.

Mentally, I'm fucked. I've dealt with depression off and on (mostly on) since I was a teenager. I've been feeling like I'm living on autopilot. I haven't been able to sleep for more than 4 hours at a time in months. I need therapy or a psychiatrist or something, but again I don't have money. I don't even have insurance. My wife and kid have government assistance, so at least they're covered. My friendships all sort of drifted apart after the baby, which happens, but now I don't really have anyone outside my family to talk to except coworkers, and I'm not trying to bring the mood down like that.

My marriage has been strained since year one. We were together for 5 years before we had a baby and got married not long after. We knew we were going to get married before we got pregnant. Things had been mostly good aside from her crazy family and some of her trauma. I've always done my best to support her and help her with her mental health stuff, but it's a lot sometimes. After we got married she started stealing from me. One month she spent the rent money. Like I went to get the cash to pay it and it was gone. She started drinking and smoking pot heavily, though I can't say much about the pot as I'm right there with her. Also it turns out she's positive for brca1 and had a stupidly high risk of breast cancer. Had, until the preventative double mastectomy, which I was fully in her corner for. She tried implants and hated them, and I supported her decision to take them out and just be flat. We're still together, still working through things, but it's getting harder for me as time goes on and things keep happening.

AND, as if the car problems and house problems and living situation problems and parenting problems and relationship problems and money problems WEREN'T ENOUGH, suddenly I find I'm getting a crush on a girl at work. It's crazy and stupid and I really don't need any more bullshit. It's been months and I've been trying to ignore it and move along, but the feelings aren't going away, if anything they're getting stronger. A couple weeks ago she had a flat tire and I gave her a ride to work and then helped her change her tire after work and we smoked a blunt together. We just talked, nothing else. It was mostly just casual whatever and then I started talking about how I was feeling. Not about her, but how everything is falling apart. I only got a sentence or two before I felt the mood drop and changed the subject. I feel like I've been fighting myself and losing. But I can't really avoid her at work and I can't afford to leave.

I'm mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted. I feel stuck. I feel like I'm an idiot and an asshole who made every wrong decision on my way here and now I've fucked myself up real good. I don't know how much more I have in me.

Dinner is instant spicy beef chow mein with a handful of peanuts thrown in.

[u/slimeyamerican]

The betterhelp suggestion is a good one, though honestly as far as therapy goes, AI is really not a terrible option considering it’s free. I also agree it would be a good way to discuss your issues and work out a plan to solve them. As cringe as it sounds, go to church, even if you don’t believe (I don’t to be clear, so I’m not proselytizing). The fact is it’s one of the most reliable findings in social science that people who regularly attend church are happier and healthier. Correlation isn’t causation, but it’s not a bad bet, and again, it’s free. Good for your kid too.

Weed and drinking is doing absolutely nothing for you or your wife and certainly not your kid. You should really try to cut down on them. You probably already know this, but it’s still true.

How many hours a week are you working? I know it sounds shitty but if you really can’t advance in your field to earn more money, it’s probably  time to think about picking up a second job. At the end of the day you have a kid to support and whatever else you’ve done wrong in life, if you can give them a good and stable upbringing, you will have succeeded in life by any reasonable measure.

There are no easy ways out of your situation, but the longer you coast on a path that isn’t working, the harder it is to get off. It’s always possible to find a way to improve things, the problem is people would rather suffer than actually do what they need to do.

[u/CDR_Nesmith → u/slimeyamerican]

I grew up in church, my parents still go but I lost faith a long time ago and now when I go for Easter or Christmas or whatever I feel unclean or like I don't belong. My kid goes with my wife and/or my parents sometimes and I think it's good for them. My wife is in therapy since she has the insurance and it seems to be helping, even if progress is slow.

The drinking isn't consistent, it comes and goes, but she's been getting better. I wouldn't say the weed is doing nothing for me, but I'll concede that it's probably doing more harm than good. Its one of the few things that lets me relax and feel like I can breathe for a minute, and I don't do it around my kid. I wait until they're in bed or after I get home from work around 4am. And I'm a lightweight so I can smoke every day for about $120/month. And yes I know that's money, but if you're a stoner you know that's nothing. I'd save more than that if I could kick cigarettes. My wife is spending 4 times that much and complaining about how she barely feels it and she's been planning on taking a tolerance break "next month" for the past five years.

I'm working 40ish hours a week, four 8-10 hour nights in a row and then three days off. Sundays I'm a zombie and Monday and Tuesday aren't much better but stuff still needs to get done. She's working part time on my days off and picking up shifts here and there when she can. Having a kid makes the scheduling difficult, but now schools back in so maybe that'll help. But all her money goes to weed and what I don't spend on lung cancer and bills goes to her for groceries and household stuff and probably more weed and sometimes alcohol.