Small car or any help

Hi

So I am sure that there are people who are in need more than myself, and plus I live in South Africa,

so chances of anything happening at all is pretty much nothing, however, maybe just a place to vent

and tell my story.

After coming from a family where money was always tight, we had a couple of good years at one

point, but it didnt last long. We stayed with my grandparents for many years on and off, and we

lived in 2 bedroom townhouses with my parents sleeping in the lounge, my brother in his own room,

and my sister and I in another - studying for finals in school proved difficult. there were many times

where my brother especially, wouldnt even have a room, he would have a cornered off piece of

whatever house we were in, or i think there was actually the garage at one point - shame :( My mom

drank many days away, and my dad had to support us on the little money he made, he was

retrenched many a time and was unable to find a job. There was one point where he was a waiter a

few years ago, i dont know, somewhere in his 40's , where he would walk to work and back, which

was a good hour in each direction, and in the middle of the night after his shift. The childhood story

can go on, but moving on. My sister and I eventually decided to move into a place, think we were 21

and 23 at the time, no furniture or anything, we had beds, washing machine and fridge. I then met a

guy and ended up spending most of the time at his place, until his mom kicked him out, and he came

to live with me. We decided then that we should move in together and I took out a loan to get us a

couch and a few things - he had bad credit at that point so I thought it was a good idea, just a small

loan to start our lives. I mean yeah, I eventually got credit cards and all that because the money

became a bit tight. He did use my credit card without me knowing and i actually had it blocked once

because I thought there was fraud. Anyway, I fell pregnant and we got medical aid for when the

baby comes, I wasn't on a medical aid and so the hospital expenses were always going to be for my

own account. However, after a few months it came out that he hadn’t been paying the medical aid

so baby wouldn’t be covered. I took another loan to pay for the hospital stays for us both, thankfully,

he was born with no issues and so we were able to leave after a couple of days. Anyway, forward to

less than a year later where my baby had to have an emergency hernia operation, and with still no

medical aid around, I had to beg the hospital staff to do the operation and I would pay them the next

day, funnily enough, this had to take a bit of convincing, even though my baby was very very ill, his

whole groin blue and purple with a huge lump. So then again, forward another year and a bit, I

decided to leave him for the best interest of myself and my baby. Things weren’t going well between

us and I had created an elaborate scheme to see why he was so distant, I created a fake woman and

started messaging him, and he took the bait – he didn’t have anything to say for himself, and yet was

still shocked when I decided to leave. I asked him how we should split the stuff in the house, and he

said he didn’t care, so after a few more little arguments I said ok fine, what do you want, the couch

or the bed, they were roughly the same price, he opted for the bed. I then said the fridge or the

dining room table, he wanted the fridge. I took my washing machine that I bought before we started

dating, the side cabinet as that was a family thing on my side, and my babies room goodies. He went

on to mention to everyone, including my brother who to this day still take his side, saying that I

cleaned him out and left him with nothing…are you kidding??? Anyway, I told him that we need to

split payments for my baby and the loans I have, he refused point blank to pay any of the loans! I

took him to maintenance court where the jurior told me that I cannot be selfish and just take all his

money, everything needs to be split, I said I am not asking for all of his money, just half of all the

expenses, including the loans. She told me that if I want the money for the loans I need to sue him

for it. She then asked him how much he could afford to pay towards the baby, he gave an amount,

and she accepted that…so there was no half split of anything. Anyway…he proceeded to also shout

at me in the middle of the court room saying that I want to take my baby away from him, because I

had mentioned in passing that it would be nice to live in Cape Town. So now, I am a single mom,

having to pay all these things, and I had just bought a new car! My dad and I moved in together

because he was living with his mom after being retrenched yet again, and my parents finally getting

a divorce. You know, things were ok, until my dad decided that he was going to move in with his new

gf, and I wanted to move because someone was trying to break into my house, and luckily my baby

screamed, which frightened them off, and also because I was almost smash and grabbed just down

the road, some guy showed up next to my passenger side window with a gun, so I drove into

oncoming traffic to avoid this problem, my infant was in the back seat, and I had already been smash

and grabbed before, so I didn’t want that to happen again. So yes, we moved on, I got a nice little

place for my baby and I, things were ok, until they weren’t, I wasn’t making enough money at work,

and will all the things I needed to pay, things were getting behind! I decided that I was going to take

an overdraft on my bank account to pay for some of the debt as it seemed like that interest rate was

better than the loan…it was, but it didn’t help the financial situation, it just remained the same and

eventually got worse. I then decided that I was going to go on debt counselling, to have all my debt

put together and pay it off in a few years. This ended up being the worst mistake of my life. The debt

company was not paying people correctly, the different institutions were not calculating the

repayment costs correctly and it was a big mess. Plus, they don’t tell you that if you are on this

process, you can’t rent a house or trade in your car or anything. So then my dad and his gf ended up

breaking up and he came to live with me. Luckily, he still had a job and car at this point, he was at a

low point in his life and wanted to do something great for himself. He really wanted to buy a house,

which he did. However, not long after that, I had to beg him to take me because I wasn’t affording

my payments on things, and just didn’t have enough money in my life. I mean, obviously he nor I

wanted to be living together seeing as I was an adult with a child, but I am his child, and he would

help no matter what. I went out with an old friend one night, we had a bit too much alcohol, things

got to the point…you know…but as soon as it went in, it came out. We both quickly came to our

senses that we had no protection, I couldn’t be a single mom of 2 kids, and he didn’t want to be a

dad yet. But guess what, I fell pregnant, with that quick little bit of no pleasure. He asked me if I am

sure it was his (like I am some person who sleeps around, quite offensive) and then told me that he

thinks I should have an abortion, and while that was super hurtful, it was a feeling I was having too. I

am already struggling man, how am I supposed to do this with 2 kids, I am going to be a single mom

of 2 kids, this is impossible. I considered it for 2 weeks, researching clinics and abortions. And you

know, that was the worst 2 weeks of my life, I decided that I just simply could not do that, it did not

sit well with me at all, and I decided to keep my baby. He was conceived out of nowhere and he has

a special place on this earth given to me by my Lord. Baby daddy was not happy, but came around.

He went with me to docs visits and all that. But this time, I was adamant that I didn’t want to know

the sex, and he was going to have my surname and not the fathers – I needed one of my kids to be

associated with me! Meanwhile, I then told my first baby daddy after 4 years, I would think it is time

that he pays me more maintenance – lest we not forget that during my struggles, he managed to

land on his feet, bought fancy cars, bought a house, started a company which was apparently quite

great…now you might think, oh, I should have stayed with him….NO…perhaps I may also have been

slightly successful if I wasn’t drowning in debt. Anyway, he had a bit of a stink about the increased

maintenance, of which I only asked for 10% (yes, R200). I embraced my new baby and was positive

that I would always do my best for them. My boy was born 7 weeks early, he was in ICU for 2 weeks.

I had an infection that forced him to come out. He also had a bit of the infection, but he wanted to

be in this world so badly, that he put me into labour. This was my 3 rd visit to the hospital in 6 weeks

because I was having contractions, but this one was the last, they were so relaxed with me as they

thought it was the same as before, a bad bladder infection giving me contractions, they were about

to call the doctor for the script when she said, oh wait, let me just do an internal quick, and then all

of a sudden, she was like, ok you are 5cm dilated and you are not going anywhere, and they started

to prep me. My dad and my eldest were at the hospital with me but I couldn’t leave and things

needed to be done. My Ryan needed to go to his father and stay a while, and my new baby needed

all his stuff, which was still in gift bags as I had only just had the baby shower. He didn’t have a cot, I

was still living with my dad, I had no clothes either, it was a panic. And then the nurse came in to say

she is very sorry but I cannot have an epidural or any pain medication, I was like, listen you don’t

understand, I need pain meds, I cannot do this! It was painful, it was awful, but baby was coming and

I was dilating too quickly. My family and friends rummaged to get stuff for my new baby and I, and

the next day, my cousin even bought some prem nappies and clothes because was the tiniest human

around. A few hours into the labour and the pain was real, it was bad, they gave me oxygen for the

pain, it was like in a movie where I knocked it out the way and said I am breathing oxygen this wont

help, it was crazy. The doctor came in to check on me and said he would be back now now as I want

ready yet. The nurses were prepping all the things and were talking to me trying to calm me down,

but eventually I stopped replying, why, I was pushing my baby out, he was coming, I couldn’t stop in,

the nurse said Jamie, are you ok, are you ok, her back was towards me at this time, and I managed to

push out a ‘no’ at which point she turned around and there was chaos, call the doctor now, now,

Jamie stop pushing, she was holding my baby’s head inside me, I couldn’t – the doctor came in and

caught my baby as he came out. They give me a quick look and had to take him away because he

was so prem, he needed to be seen to. I was exhausted, this baby had torn my vag f***ed up – and

the docs were so non-cholent while they stitched the pieces of it together. After the 2 weeks he was

released and I started the single mother life, of now 2 boys. A newborn, who was not easy, he

screamed a lot, for no reason, I saw a number of people to help me, he didn’t have colic or anything,

just turns out he was a crying baby…but it was rough. The father didn’t really come see him that

often, and even when he did, it was for about an hour or so. At 6 months old, my baby was admitted

to hospital with respiratory issues, I told the dad and he was like oh, but why does he need to go to

hospital, it cant be that bad, I was like ok yes, but he is, so you need to come through, he told me he

was busy with work and he would try make it later, he messaged me later around 6 or 7 to say that

he was not going to make it…..clearly work is more important than his kid. My baby was in hospital

for 8 nights, I stayed there all the time, I slept on a single couch next to the cot. Eventually I think it

was the 2 nd or 3 rd night, his father eventually came around with his mom, visited for about and hour

and left. He visited for roughly half an hour a few days while he was there, but nothing helpful at all.

I eventually lost it with him and then the nurses told me that I needed to go home to get some rest,

and just as I was leaving, the father decided to come in. I worked through my maternity leave as I

needed the money. When he was eventually discharged from the hospital, I told his dad that I was

going to give baby his first solid food if he wanted to be around for that, he said no. I did everything

for that baby. The father did nothing and didn’t even want to watch him by himself, because in his

own words, he didn’t know how to be a father. So I eventually decided that I was going to move to

Cape Town, and did I get all the hell – I did. The father of my eldest wanted to take me to court, and

arranged a meeting with his lawyer, which he told me about less than 24 hours before the meeting,

and so I didn’t have any time to prepare or get a lawyer, anyway, I went and stood up for myself, and

I think his lawyer told him that he will lose if he had to take me to court, and so he let me go. I did

get a lawyer after that, paid a lot of money to arrange visitation and things, I also tried to arrange a

case to take him to court to get the money back that he owes me, close to R100k at that point. I

even got a subpoena to meet with a court agent for families, but it was to meet in Pretoria, and

when she phoned me I told them I was in Cape Town, I never heard back from them or anything else

from the lawyers, and I suppose that is the best thing when I don’t have money to fight anything. I

paid the lawyer and that was it. My youngest’s dad phoned me and had a fight with me because how

dare I move, I am trying to keep him from his son, and everything I do is to get a reaction out of him

because I am so deeply in love with him…. Ok whatever.

I wish I could say that is where it’s all ended! I moved to Cape Town, trying to start fresh, my sister

said I could live with her and hubby for a while until I get settled, which was quite helpful. Of course I

have been struggling with money so I didn’t have any, or a good credit record to actually get a place

upfront. I stayed there until basically the uncomfortable mess that living there became drove me

out. My 2 boys and I were staying in the one room, sleeping on a blow up mattress every night,

paying them rent and other expenses. It was clear that the fact that my eldest son had a stutter was

a problem for my sisters hubby because he was teaching his child the wrong way to talk, he basically

treated him like that annoying mole on your face that you can’t remove and just have to deal with, it

really hurt his self-esteem. I mean came to a point where his parent were coming to visit for the

weekend, and they only stayed in a 2 bedroom place, and basically told me that I need to leave the

house so they had a place to sleep….I had no place to go! I had to take them to a bed and breakfast

for a while. I don’t know what happened, but after 1 night I was told I could come back. So I

eventually saved enough money to move out, I needed to save 3 months rent as that is what they

require as a deposit, and basically my brother-in-law had to sign the rental agreement for me,

because I cannot rent a house due to my bad credit. So I moved out, into an empty house because I

didn’t have enough money yet to bring my stuff down from Pretoria after the move. Luckily, my

friend had loaned me her old crib for my baby to sleep in, so I had that, and again the blow up

mattress which my eldest and I would sleep on, I would sit on the floor and watch series on my

laptop when the kids went to bed. Well anyway, I mean, work started to pick up and I was able to

get my stuff down and be stable for a while, not enough money to pay my debt and live at the same

time, but enough that I was able to breath for a bit in my life – money wise. During all this, my

youngest’s baby daddy decided that he was going to move to Cape Town as well….JOY! I mean he

did pretty much the same down here that he did up there, unreliable, more fights, I told him that he

needs to help me more and he said we all have problems and I must just deal with it. I started my

first work weekend, which was supposed to be his weekend, and then he just last minute says, sorry,

I cant take him this weekend, so now I am stuck with both kids while I work. The eldest not so bad,

but my youngest, a 1 year old, acting up, while I am trying to deal with emergencies and what not, it

did not go well. I asked him to come take him, he said he couldn’t, I asked his parents to take him

but they were busy. I mean it was quite hectic, and needless to say after all this, my eldest was also

starting to have troubles. He obviously wasn’t getting enough attention from me, and honestly, he

wasn’t, they were getting what I could push out, and when my baby went to his dad, I had no mood

to do anything, and therefore, my eldest didn’t do much either on the weekend. His school work

became really bad, he was seeing an occupational therapist , and then he started acting out, not only

in the normal child way, but extra, and he started crying a lot at nothing and everything. He started

hurting himself on purpose and I actually caught him with a cigarette, I was at a loss at what to do! I

had to make the very hard decision, after months of thinking, to send him to go live with his dad,

which is what he wanted – it was extremely hard for me, it was like I had physically lost a child, I

couldn’t go in his room, it was awful! A round about the same time that he left, a boy that I fell in

love with decided that he no longer loved me, out of the blue – so it was the end of the year, and my

eldest was graduating and moving away, so I went in to a bit of a spiral. I prayed for days on end to

give me the strength to get up and move on with life, get over the stupid guy and my son moving

and actually keep going for my youngest. I got there, it was a daily struggle, but I decided I need to

get going, have a life, and live a good life so I can visit my boy, make money, pay my debts and still

be ok. It was going ok – I had won a trip to Mauritius a while back and was going to take the guy, but

ended up taking my sister, and we had a good time. I bought tickets for my gran and son to come

and stay for 3 weeks over Christmas, as it would be the first Christmas that both my children would

actually spend together (the 3 rd one since my babies birth) and my Oupa had passed away earlier in

the year and my gran had taken care of him for years and I wanted to give her a break. I started to

also feel that I wanted to eventually start my own travel company and create my own tours through

America, my favourite place in the world, I wanted this and knew I would be really good at it. So

again I prayed on it for a while and eventually decided to take the leap, to resign, I had a very little

bit of money, and I would get pension money after I resigned, as well as my commission from work

and the commission from a sale I had made that a co-worker agreed to pay me half of, besides, the

business was going to do really well, so these payments would be just an added extra! I started off

on a really great high note, I was excited to get going, this was Dec 18, my boy was coming soon for

Christmas, which I was really excited about. Things were going to be great, I worked hard on the

travel company, advertising on social media (as other means are just really too expensive) working

day in and day out, and about 2 weeks in, I had no interest AT ALL in the company, no request for a

quote or anything. I felt it so strange, because even though I was not a well known company,

everyone is always looking for travel deals and specials, and matching agents up against each other,

so I was convinced I would at least get something! But no, so anyway, it was time for my boy to

come visit and I was not going to worry about it anymore for the month. Earlier on in the year I had

arranged for my youngest’s baby daddy that he needed to arrange to take Blake over the December

holidays, we arrange half half, when the schools close – I find it easier this way because most bosses

are really hectic about December leave (and mine certainly were) – and I must just add, that the

baby daddy in the previous years had never made an arrangement, he just took care of it, in the

sense of, he enlisted another family member to watch Blake while he worked. Anyway, so Blake was

meant to go to his dad a few days after my eldest arrived, for the week and I would get him back

before Christmas, but I found out that in fact, he was not going to his dad, but in fact to his

grandparents for the week, which I didn’t quite find acceptable. I know people may think that this

would be something not to get annoyed by, but he has been less than a suitable father for years and

it is not his parents job to look after his son! He never takes leave in December or any other day

when the schools are closed, it is always me that has to arrange with work, and yes, they do get

annoyed. But Blake got sick and was not able to go to his grandparents for that week, but his dad

didn’t make any other arrangements to see him extra over the holidays. But had enough leave for

his birthday week and a 2 week holiday back home – ok let me not go off track because I can talk

forever about these baby daddies! When my eldest went back home after the holidays, I got back in

to work, but still nothing and then I started worrying about money. 3 months in I had nothing and

had to make a plan. I arranged to sell my car and hire another car until I could get enough money to

buy a new car – keeping in mind that it would have to be cash as I would not have been able to get it

on credit, but I needed to make a plan as I had no money, no money to pay rent or buy food or pay

school fees, or petrol, or anything! I still owed money on the car, so more than half had to go to the

bank, and the money I got left, just helped him. I paid money over to a car rental agency that turned

out to be a scam, they took my money and I never got a car, so now I am carless, with no way to get

a loan or anything to do anything. Luckily my sister loaned me her car for a bit until I could make a

plan, and the only plan I could make was to ask my mom for a loan, and she was able to get me a

small loan to get a car that is quite old and goes at least, power steering doesn’t work, neither do

the air bags, and half of that loan I also had to use for the next months rent and bills as my business

still was/is not making money! People always say it takes a while to get a business up and running,

which I get, but absolutely nothing in 5 months is insane (ok I lie, I have done 3 quotes, 3 QUOTES

ONLY). But anyway, I quickly realised that this was never going to work and I had to get a new job,

which I thought would be fairly easy giving my years of experience. And this was what I was going to

do if the business didn’t work, just get back in to a job. I have been searching for 2 months now,

have only been to a few interviews but I have not managed to get a job – and I sometimes think that

my previous job is giving me a bad reference because why wouldn’t I be able to get a job, especially

in the travel industry. I did a short MBA course to widen my knowledge and skills and hopefully get

in to a new line of business, something high up in sales, or project management, managerial,

something like that, but I am not getting anything there either, nevermind the travel stuff which I

have years of experience in. And now, here I sit, struggling to find a job, not making money and I

don’t know how I am supposed to pay my bills at the end of the month – my only option is to sell my

body or my car again, because what else am I supposed to do. I tried to get involved in sensual massages and those types of work, online messaging services etc, but, I was also not good enough for that as no one wanted me! I had to sell the car again, and now I am stuck without a car. I eventually got a job, not great money but at least something, and my son and I have been getting lifts with my friend, however, she is going on maternity leave in a few months and honestly, I can see it is a bit of a mission for her, so my need for a car is quite urgent,something small and reliable would be great, but there is absolutely no way I can get a car, and I have no money to rent one at the moment. I have learnt that doing anything for myself is

stupid, I am not meant to be in a happy relationship or be successful, I am meant to just be, struggle

until I die – make sure the kids are ok and that’s it – my story is just that, and I am ok if that is what it

is, I cannot fight it anymore. I know I have just blabbed on to you, and given you a great sumerization

of things, and it has taken me a few weeks to write this because it's not important really to anyone

but myself and honestly, I have never told anyone half this stuff because it is sad that I am a failure

as a mom and as a human it seems! I really just need to get back on my feet and so any help so that I can get a car would be great....even if it is someone else's car that I can pay towards monthly. I appreciate any assistance.