May is right around the corner... (need some advice, long)

[SandrA9810]

You guys are great for giving advice. And I'm kinda stumped at where to go from here.

A) Work is finally going good, and my manager says I should be seeing more hours, and longer shifts soon.
B) There's a couple possibilities of other work, I'm just waiting on "referals". One thing is working at Discovery Cove photography, and a friend knows some one that does that, so I hope she'll let me use her as a referal (as in this person told me about this job and works here). Another guy that came into work, said he knew of a few managers to get in touch with if I wanted to do Pyro at Disney and that they always need people for it.

May...
The lease is up on this place in May, and I'm starting to go through our things. But Kari doesn't want to make any time for being around here. So I don't know how we're going to start "seperating" everything. And there's a whole room full of stuff that needs to be taken care of. So who really knows what'll happen to all of it.
My aunt is sounding more and more confident in moving to florida, her lease is also up in may. So she would like me to fly out to Dallas next month for a start up on pack (just like a week). And then another week in may for final packing, cleaning, and driving to Florida.

Now here's the hard part. I don't make enough money right now to pay for a room to rent. I'm hoping over the next month, that'll change. And a friend of mine will have a room to rent come April for about 500 with utilities and such. So it's a thought to ask him if I could live there.
My aunt doesn't know if she wants to move to Orlando or Port St Lucie near my sister. There's pros and cons on each side. If she moves here, it's possible she'll buy a townhome or maybe a condo. She's done with apartments, with rental leases, and the ever rising costs. If she does buy a house here, it'll be more like a joint venture. I won't be on the sale, but as long as I live there, I'll need to pay rent (I don't have an issue with that). But I'm really torn, because it can be very frustrating living with my g'mother. And it's not her fault, she's got dementia. And no one knows how long she'll live for, she's already 83 with some health issues.
And it'd be really nice to know I have "home" here. My aunt is 65 (which is hard for me to believe because it doesn't seem like she's that old), so it's a possibility she won't outlive the mortage. And quite the possibility that it'd be inherieted by me or my sis.
If she moves to Port St Lucie. There's a lack of Cracker Barrels down there, and she's happy doing that, and hoping to move up to a new position. (There's like 5 stores here, so it's a greater chance of her snagging up that spot). My mom, sis, and her kids are down there. But I don't know if my sis would try to convince to have my mom live with my aunt. And my aunt can't deal with that. She needs some one that has an income to help support the household.
The family really feels like it's oil and vinegar, might taste good together, but doesn't mix well.

It seems like it would be better for them to move here (and because I don't have 6 children, I can make more time for "babysitting" my g'mother). My aunt really doesn't want her left alone at home alone any longer. For my life, even if I met some one seriously, I would think I'd still "date" for a couple of years before commiting to living with them. So I would still be able to fullfill my "duties". But I don't know if I'm up for these duties mentally.
In PSL, housing is a bit cheaper. But like I said only a couple of CB. There's more family there. But besides my mom living with my aunt (which would not happen), there wouldn't be a constant "babysitter". And my g'mother would tire extremely easily being at my sister's house for an entire day.

My aunt has asked me to start looking into different housing options around here. But I really don't know where to start, or how to look. Is it wrong to walk into a real estate office to ask for listings?? It's possible, she'd rent for a month or two here (furnished place) for finalizing a sale. I don't know if she has enough for a down payment (she could use my g'mother's money, then payments would be made between my aunt and me).

 

[Mathfailure]

I waited to see if anyone else had some thoughts, but here are mine.

This does not seem to be your problem to solve, its your Aunt's and by extension your Grandmother's decision. You can offer to help/move in if they come to Orlando, but you are not the primary concern.

Just help them pack and move, and see what they decide.

I think you need to look into a housing situation the is in your control and not dependent on others .

Kathleen

 

[SandrA9810]

i've been on my own now since i was 19. The house was sold as soon as i graduated high school. And there's never been "home" to go back to. Not necessarily to live at all the time because i want it easier. But some place i can go for a short while to get things straightened out. Right now is definatly one of those times.
I just don't know if i have the ability to do it long term for the help of my g'mother. My aunt is the only one in position of take care of her and it's taking a major toll on her. And i grew up with my grandparents, so i sorta feel that sense of duty to help out. And my aunt is doing everything possibe to keep her from a nursing home. But if she seeks outside help like an aid or something, my grandmother tries to spin it into my aunt wanting to get rid of her. And of course my g'mother thinks she can still do everything that an aid would be there to help with.
I've refused to go out to texas... It's not some place i want to be. And my aunt has said on numerous occasions that she regrets moving to texas in the first place and feels much closer to my sis and i when it comes to family. Which kinda twinges the family heartstrings... You know? I'd feel like i wasn't giving enough back to help out after all this time. I know most adults don't have to deal with aging parents till later in life, but my mom had us very late in life. So my sister is already taking care of my mom now, but that's partly because of my mom's poor choices and something i refuse to deal with.
My aunt on the other hand i feel has given so much to me, that i feel this sense of obligation to help out. And my aunt is definatly one i can trust to keep her word, unlike my mother.

My aunt is still up in the air on which part of florida. My sis and i are both looking into housing options for them. I'll definatly help with their move. And i won't stop pursueing my own place to be at. But i'm wondering how much convincing i should do for here.

 

[DVC~OKW~96]

Honestly Sandra? Focus on yourself.

Work on staying employed. Work on obtaining enough employment so that you can live independantly.

Find a place to live that you can afford. It's not going to be the fanciest place at first, but it will be your's. Period.

Let your family work through their own issues. They are adults and need to take care of themselves. You have enough to do with getting yourself righted.

With regard to the separation of possessions, you can start on it. Kari may be in an emotional place right now that doesn't allow her to deal with it. You start, and be fair, and it will work out as best it can.

 

[mickeysaver]

When it comes to the possessions, in the end, it's just stuff. I have been through two LTR break-ups and I made the decision in split from wife #1 that there was nothing that we acquired together that was worth fighting over. The one thing that I wanted, but she wouldn't give up was a cassette tape of a local singer that I just loved. Luckily, some years later, the singer released the original recording on cd, so I ended up with the music anyway. When it comes down to the end of it all, as long as you have a bed and clothes, that is enough. Really, I know it doesn't sound like much, but it's enough to keep you going.

As far as the question of where to live goes, I agree with the others, focus on what you can control. You can control where you live. You can't control what your Aunt or anyone else is going to do. Focus on securing a residence that you can afford, so that you have a place to start building your life with a new focus and hopefully, some purpose. Focus on keeping your job and continue your attempts to secure better positions with better pay. Don't try to find the next Ms. Right just yet. Really, you need to figure out who you are before you start thinking about what you need in a partner. You are most likely going to kiss a lot of frogs before you find the one, so don't be in a hurry about it.

Good luck to you.

 

[SandrA9810]

I'm definatly not after another person. I really think there won't be a some for a lifetime anymore. So I'm not really concerned about that much.

My aunt already thinks one of us will be the one to take care of her when she gets old. And my g'mother is to the point that every day surprises me. So I'm thinking that this would be a couple year venture.
I guess i'm really worried about renting a room. And well I'm not exactly an easy person to get along with. Of course I don't really know how that will go without Kari around. And if I do this, it's a guarenteed roof. Now if I do snag up one of these jobs before April, it won't be so bad to afford a place of my own. Although I don't have much of my own, so then I have to think about some basic furnishings. I have enough for a bedroom, not an apartment.

 

[DVC~OKW~96]

All I can say is don't go into something expecting someone to "do" something for you. I can't say it any clearer than that.

You have to care for yourself (as you are doing) and now that has to extend to all areas of your life.

There are furnished apartments to rent, or if those are too pricey, an unfurnished (but with major appliances). I remember some of my very first places were pretty spartan.

The point is, put yourself in a position to be fully responsible for what goes on in your life. Relying on someone else gives that person power over you and that is something you need to avoid.

Take care now and keep striving for that needed independence.

 

[SandrA9810]

Wow, cleaning up and clearing out is a lot easier than I thought it would be.

I have a huge pile in the corner of the living room of "my stuff", and about 10 boxes/bins of kari's stuff. I don't know how much of this stuff she's going to keep, but it's things I don't want claims to. And a lot of things that I've collected, especially from Disney for my never got around to project of scrapbooking, I really have no desire to keep now.
And once I clear enough out of the room of forgotten things, I'll move kari's stuff from the bedroom in there, and then I'll be able to put my stuff in the bedroom. And that way I'll have a good idea on how much I can keep and how much I need to get rid of.

But right now, the living room is a mess...

 

[soulmates]

Sandra, I 2nd that of what everyone else is saying. Don't be dependant on other people. In the end, you can only depend on yourself. Get your OWN place and pay your OWN bills. I also agree, before you go switching jobs, STAY where your at. Employers look at JOB HISTORY. All this bouncing around and long periods of not working, doesn't look good for you. Stay put and tough it out for a good year. You'll be SO much happier in the end. As for your family, unfortunatly, when they pass or need to be put into a home, what then with you? You'll be right back to square one. I can't stress enough, you need independance.

 

[NHdisneylover]

Sabdra--I am basically chiming in with much the same things as others have already posted.

You are getting there at work and really starting to take care of yourself (and it sounds like you dug in and got to splitting things up and sorting belongings out which is tough work emotionally and sometimes physically so good for you). At this point in your life I do really, truly believe you are at a precarious place and you NEED to focus on just taking care of you for at least a couple of years. You have struggled too much to get to this point with the job, and it does seem to take a lot out of you so I do not think you can mantain it AND help take care of your grandmother even is you are doing it for purely altruistic reasons (much less for a "guarunteed roof").

As far as not having furniture--you say you have enouh for a bedroom. That is great and mroe than many people have starting out. It is very nice to have sofas and a dining table, etc but it is not a true need. You can sit on boxes, or your bed and use a box as a table until you have more paycheks and more hours on those paychecks. It is what people do when they are sturggling financially and it is okay. You are a tough irl and you can survive that I am sure.

I agree that you NEED to stick with you current job aslo. If you can pick up other work IN ADDITION without hurting yourself at your current job taht would be great, but you truly need to establish that you are a long term hire in order to have any kind of stable future. Stick it out at the fast food place for at least a year (two would be better).

Also. it is very kind of you to want to help your aunt pack up. Howver it is not your respoinsiblity. If it will reflect poorly on you at work to be unavailable for a week now and another week in the spring, I strongly reccomend NOT going and letting your aunt and grandmother handle their own affairs. I realize this may sound callous, but if you suddenly lose your job after your aunt moves and you are living with her, then you are just one more person/thing she has to take care of instead of being a help to her. So, you are doing not only yourself but your aunt and grandmotehr a favour by taking care of yourself first and foremost. ALong those same lines, if your aunt is expecting that you will someday take care of her (and you want to acceot such responsiblity) you will need to have become much better of than you are now to handle it. You need to be working NOW on getting stable so you can be there to help her when she truly needs it.

Best of luck to you. It sounds like a lot of stress to deal with

 

[SandrA9810]

I'm not going to do anything to hurt my current job. My manager is very flexible when it comes to those sorts of things. I think there's about 5 people there that work else where full time, and as long as I turn in my availability before they write the new one, all is well.
There's some people there that truely surprise me that they still work there. Showing up late, ohh I didn't realize I had a shift today, I don't want to stay till closing... Excuses that I thought would never fly any where else. I try to be at work 15min early, and usually wind up a half hour early. One morning I got up early to go to the bank (presidents day)... so I wound up at work an hour early. Then I realized I accidently took my apron out of my bookbag and had to drive all the way home and back (30 miles), and still managed to make it back on time.
When I worked at Disney, I think I called out maybe 5 times in the 2yrs that I was there. Tardies were another thing, but if you missed it by like 30seconds you were late, but I still never recieved a reprimand over it.


Truthfully, getting my own place sounds way easier than living with my aunt. So living with her, really isn't taking the easy road. But I also think it would give me a better opprotunity to save, and in the next 2-3years when things have come to pass, I'll be much better off financially.

Kari came by today... and it's kinda sad what she's doing now. Her parents are paying off the credit cards, they're buying her a house, and sending her back to school. We worked and struggled a lot. And it just kinda seems like she's throwing it all away. Now that I'm out of the picture, she's the golden child again with her parents. And while I don't see an issue with them paying for her schooling... the other stuff seems just a bit much. At the same time, I kinda knew what would happen anyways.

I'm not trying for a free ride with my aunt. But part of me feels I have that moral obligation to help out. And the reason I'm going out to texas is because my aunt can't do quite as much as she used to, so moving things and clearing them out gets really hard on her back. I cleared her closet out that has stuff sitting in there from when they moved in 5yrs ago. I dragged it all out into the living room, that way she could sit in her chair or on the couch and go through it. And well it's still sitting there. The first time I was there, I worked really hard to clean up and clear out the living room. So it's a bit annoying she hasn't done anything with this stuff but let it sit there. She also wants to "keep it in the family".. meaning she doesn't want any outsiders helping or seeing it.

 

[hematite153]

Sandra -- I'm not sure it's worth my weighing in since I'm really just going to say the same things as others already have.

I understand the desire to help your Aunt and the reasons why you want to help with packing/moving/mortgage/caring for your grandmother. But, you don't make enough money to pay for flights to visit your Aunt. If the plan is for her to pay for your flights, then, there are professional packers that can be paid to help her move instead. I also think that you really need to work on living on your own for now. If you don't think you'll make a good roommate, then, look for a tiny bachelor apartment somewhere. Then, the fact that you only have a limited amount of furniture becomes a good thing.

I lived in 100-150 sq ft spaces for 4 years and then a small "full apartment" that was 400 sq ft for 2 years. It seems small when you first walk in, but, you get used to it and it makes it possible to get in a better financial situation.

Despite your manager being flexible about hours, I still don't think it's a good idea to take 2 weeks off this quickly after starting a new job. I'm also concerned that part of why you had left other jobs in the past was your family's medical/care needs. If your Aunt and Grandmother move to Orlando, please remember to put your job (no matter how irrelevant it seems) ahead of taking care of them or driving them places. I know that it sounds callous, but, in the end, you will be able to care for them better if you have a more stable work history and can get a better job.

 

[SandrA9810]

Ohh we lived in a crapmed tiny 200 sqft apartment (maybe smaller for like 2yrs). God I hated that thing. Now anything less than 900 feels small. So I've gotten a little spoiled over the past few years with big 3 bedroom apartments.

I talked to a manager at a local Cracker Barrel Store, to ask if they accepted transfers. And the manager said that one of the other stores is hiring an ETC which is what my aunt wants to do, and is a step up from where she is now. So she's going to talk with her managers about getting in contact with the managers here for an interview.

I spoke with my manager about taking time off. He said it's not a problem at all... as long as it wasn't next week, and wouldn't affect my hours if I took it. Just keep working hard and doing what I'm doing, and I'll be good. So I booked my flight tonight (two weeks out, so plenty of time for writing the schedule). And I take a late flight out, so I can work the lunch shift before and early flight back in, might be able to do lunch, but could definatly do dinner no problem. They were the only direct flights, so no worries of delayed lay overs.

 

[hematite153]

And I take a late flight out, so I can work the lunch shift before and early flight back in, might be able to do lunch, but could definatly do dinner no problem. They were the only direct flights, so no worries of delayed lay overs.

Even with direct flights, delays can happen. I wouldn't risk saying you are available to work on the day you fly back. (Working lunch before you fly out sounds good though.)

 

[SandrA9810]

Alright... I think I've finally realized that living with my aunt probably isn't the best idea so far.

There's so many things wrong in the family, and a lot of it I hate. I also don't have a problem voicing my opinion about it either. And yesterday while i was on the phone with my aunt, she said "All i've heard is negative things all my life, I'm so sick and tired of it. I don't care if you don't like it, I don't want to hear it".

And she's still drawn to the cheaper housing prices in PSL... ohh I can get a 3 bedroom house and a garage for under like 900$ a month to rent. But she tells me she hates renting and the rental price going up and all this other stuff.

After I spoke to the manager at the CB here, I got a hold of her immediatly, it was nearing 5 (thursday afternoon). So I figured little could be done that day, for getting in contact with people here. But she should've been able to get ahold of people at her store since it was only 4pm. No, she waited till yesterday evening to finally talk to her manager about the transfer, and then nothing was done today. They're holding interviews on Wens for the position... how is contacting them on monday gonna help her? sure it'll jump start and kick things into motion a lot sooner than expected. But there's still only like 2 months left. And the home buyer credit ends April 30th...


I wish I had a full time job and decent wage. Looking at homes and prices just makes it seem so reasonable at this time. I mean, huge homes for very very little. I don't think i'll live here in Orlando for ever, but having something that is all mine would feel really good at this point.

Back to the drawing board for me. And me only at this point.

 

[hematite153]

Back to the drawing board for me. And me only at this point.

Sounds like a good plan. Good luck with it.

 

[SandrA9810]

maybe add in a few more and definatly need another ....


ok... now that that's done. I'm here in texas on my first trip of probably a few before May. I just can't believe what I'm getting myself into, even helping her move. I left one pack rat to the idea of moving in with another.

I have finally cleaned out my share of stuff from the room of forgotten things. It's currently all sitting in the living room. And I need to go through it all again, as some stuff needs shredding. But I'll probably keep most of the stuff. I just need to get boxes and put it all in my room. I have till april 14 to take care of it.
Kari came by yesterday to take me to the airport. And she took a look in the room. She spent a good 10 minutes whining to me about "how am I supposed to put a bed in that room??" I still have a few things in there, like board games and books, but they're all put away on the proper shelves with the rest of hers. It's not my stuff, she needs to find time to go through it, and make herself some room to put a bed in there. She's mad that I swapped the dressers. Mine was a small 3 drawer dresser in the closet. And so now there's even "less" room in her bedroom.

Now I'm here in Texas listening to my aunt say "it's still new, it could be used"... if it's sitting in the original box for 10+ years.... I don't care what you "could" use it for, get rid of it. Or "I bought that as a gift for some one 5 years ago". And she just piles stuff up for ages, letting it collect dust and dirt, but won't get rid of any of it. It's like if you add up all this little stuff... it's gonna start costing big bucks to move it to Florida. For the most part, there's each of their bedroom sets, and a couple odd and end pieces of furniture worth keeping, but like 90% of the stuff she has would just be a lot cheaper to buy new when she gets there.
She has some thing against donating to charity. Like if she doesn't know who she's giving it to, it won't go to some one who could use that item.

 

[OrlandoMike]

Honestly, if you have time, open an Ebay account and quick sell all of that stuff!

 

[SandrA9810]

I already have an ebay account, but i've never sold anything on that site before. I also don't have any money in my paypal account to pay for the posting fees, or however that works out.

I tried craigs list the last time I was here, but it's just such random stuff I had no idea where to place it at, and never got any responses. I could definatly use the extra money even if it's only 20 bucks. But I'd also have to make sure I could mail it out by monday/tuesday cause I leave on wednesday.

 

[SandrA9810]

so my aunt and grandmother are here to look at houses. We've only had one full day of looking, and on our second day. Just a few houses to look at. But last night after looking with the realtor we drove around looking for new homes. She found a town home for 15K more than what she has pre-approved for. But she's talking to the lender for an increase.

She's driving me nuts. And she's making sly comments about house rules. Like no guys sleeping over. Umm i'm an adult, i can choose to live my way, not hers. And she won't even let me put up my mickey door. How can any one say no to having mickey?? And of course my mickey kitchen is totally out the window. She wants sea shells... Seriously, she not a freakin tourist or snow bird. She grew up in miami. I have nothing against teal, blue is my favorite, but sea shells of all things?? Gross.

For the most part 3 bedrooms are in her price range, which means even closer living quarters. I don't mean this to sound mean or evil, but the sooner my g'mother passes, then she'll move to the master. And if it's two story like the new town home, i'll have all of upstairs and she'll have downstairs. But i know, that sounds really horrible to think like that, but ma is 84... Her time is winding down.

I'll update later, just had to yell at the world without my aunt hearing.