wearethe99percent:

I am 26 years old. I have a 2 year old daughter and 4 step children. My fiancee works 14 hours a day, 6 days a week and we still can’t pay our bills. My mom buys most of my daughter’s clothes and toys. I had to move 2 hours away from my family for him to keep this job. Because of the cost of day care, I can’t afford to work. Even though I really need it to pay off bills and get a car, I won’t be getting a tax refund this year because of me having to quit my job to move. My Fiancee can’t claim our daughter because his taxes our being garnished for a child he wasn’t listed as the father of until she was 11 months old. So he received 11 months of arrears. We made payments on time, but when he lost his job he only made 2 weeks of partial payments. Because of this, they garnished his taxes. We have tried to work with them to fix it, but they won’t help us at all. I have no credit and because of this I had to pay a $700 deposit for my electricity. This is not okay! I have health problems I can’t afford to go to the doctor for. I don’t drive at night because I can’t see and can’t afford to get new glasses. Thank God I finally qualified for food stamps so I don’t have to worry about how I am going to feed my family for 3 weeks out of the month (if I eat lunch and dinner only the $ lasts for 3 weeks). I stress out every single day about bills and finances. And no matter what we do we never get ahead. I’d appreciate it if people stopped calling me lazy, stop saying I don’t try, and stop telling me I don’t want to help myself. Because it’s BS. I worked until a week I have worked every day of my adult life, and up till a week before I had my daughter. I then went back to work 6 weeks later. I have done everything you claim I should do to get ahead, and so has me Fiancee, and instead it’s getting worse. I want the American Dream, I want to succeed, and I want to give my daughter the best life possible. All I want is an even playing field and a fair shot.

I am the 99%

OccupyWallSt.org

My heart goes out to you & your family. I was a single mom (still am) & it was hell back then but things are much harder now. If there was any way I could help I would - in a second. I’ll keep you in my prayers!