cptsd

EDIT 2: An incredibly generous individual just shocked us by catapulting us to our goal.

We.. may actually be getting into our own place for the first time in two years.

A permanent residence.

It feels like Christmas morning.

EDIT: We got approved for the apartment, but we now need to scramble to raise enough cash to qualify for a huge move-in discount.

I realize this is an absurdly large sum to ask for, and I'm sincerely hoping we *won't* need that much in the end but I'm a realist (okay, I'm a pessimist) and want to try and be prepared.

Ultimately it should help everyone because it would further reduce our living expenses (and by extension less begposting) but I fully acknowledge it's a.. preposterous sum. I'm sorry. I've divided into three steps in order to make it seem slightly less daunting.

We've decided on which apartment to apply for, but we've got to act fast. The staggering total amount I've listed in the CW is worst-case scenario. Supposedly we'll get about $750 knocked off of that total if we qualify which will help significantly but because their website says "up to $750" I'm trying not to consider that in my calculations.

I should have started this last night as soon as we got home but I just didn't have the spoons. Which unfortunately sets us back that much further on time.

Anyway.. here's the itinerary as of now:

Phase 1: Application fees and "Admin Fee" (because it costs soooo much money to type numbers into a computer and hit "print"). Total: $350

Phase 2: If we somehow qualify, we'll need to pay the deposit. It could range from $500 to a full month's rent depending on credit, so once they run ours it'll be a month's rent plus our right arms for the deposit. Total: $1400

Phase 3: Pet deposit is an unpleasant $525, and the first month's pet rent is $45 plus $60 for the "media" package. Total: $630

Grand total: $2,380.

Any help you can give is is appreciated. I'm respectfully requesting that my followers blitzkrieg every social media platform to which they have access to help spread the word and the burden.

They say it takes a village, and for a project this size we're going to need every villager's help with this.

LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Thank you everyone so very much for your help, kindness, encouragement, and generosity.

#Poverty #Housing #MentalIllness #BPD #CPTSD #LGBTQ #Solidarity

@mutualaid

If you're willing AND able, please boost and if possible donate. If you can't donate, *do NOT feel guilty* for being in the same boat as us. Your feelings about it are valid but rest assured you needn't feel bad.

Venmo: https://venmo.com/thegizmotwins
Cashapp: https://cash.app/$thegizmotwins
PP: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/gizmo1982
GFM: https://gofund.me/12171be3

tldr; we need help getting a couch and a mattress with a box spring.

WARNING: Incredibly long-winded diatribe ahead. Do not drive or operate heavy machinery while reading this.

--------------------------------------------

I try to be respectful and use CWs when fundraising to avoid unnecessary cluttering of the timeline unless incredibly urgent. I never, *ever* want to make people feel pressured or scammed, and if I have inadvertently done so, I sincerely apologize.

Having said that, I realize it's very arrogant of me to request this after all the help we've been given on our journey already. There are countless other people in far more dire circumstances. There are even people on the Fediverse who are flat-out homeless, so how can I justify such a frivolous plea for help?

My counter-argument to that is: regrettably, I don't have one. I have no idea how we've been so lucky when there are so many others also in need.

Ever since an encounter I had recently, I've tried to think of how I would feel about other people raising the kinds of funds that have been donated to us. Would I feel jealous, or that it was just "getting old", despite them going to great lengths to not seem pushy or yelling and to just be as unobtrusive as possible?

Obviously I'm biased, but my answer to that question has always been "Absolutely not". I would feel excited and happy that they were being helped. I have helped a couple of people fundraise and I was just as thrilled seeing us hit goal for a total stranger halfway across the country, as I am when *we* hit goal.

Where am I going with this, you ask? Well, perhaps I'm still a little rattled from the aforementioned encounter. I try to look at our situation as if through the lens of others but somehow I can't always muster as much sympathy or excitement for *us* as I would for literally anybody else.

I don't honestly have a valid justification for making this request and I'm struggling like hell to get past that because personally, I wouldn't fault anyone else for a humble CW'd request as this yet it feels vain to write this.

Alright, none of that had any point. Yay cannabis!

So my exceptionally long-winded immediate digression aside, I'm hoping people might consider the following scenario as a "housewarming" gift:

We're coming up on Black Friday. (Yes, I know this is supporting bloodthirsty capitalism. I am a hypocrite, okay? They've got some good deals and I don't know what else to do.)

We haven't owned a bed since we had to abandon it due to poor planning and a very urgent need to get the hell out of a toxic situation. Since we'd been living in motels for just a couple days past a full calendar year, I was making due with what we had in the motel rooms but now that we're in an apartment finally, we've been sleeping on 4" foam padding on the floor. Let me tell you how great that is for my allergies with a prolifically shedding border collie, and how relaxing it is after a full shift of pushing carts. (That's a negative on both counts.)

One of our local furniture stores has a bed I would love on a Black Friday deal, and they do delivery. It's the cheapest I've been able to find with the features I need.

Why not a used mattress, you may ask? What's my justification? Why do I seem to be asking so many rhetorical questions so as to rival Rumsfeld?

The answer to the first two questions in the previous paragraph is multi-pronged: my incessant, never-ending allergies, and a brand-new mattress allows me to put a mattress protector over it and then an hypoallergenic, waterproof liner over that. My allergies are fucking ridiculous.

Secondly, for some inexplicable reason, I seem to do better with back problems if I sleep on a *firm* mattress rather than a fluffy pillowtop. Weirdly, it seems rather difficult to locate a used, firm mattress in good condition in our area.

Thirdly, it gets our bed installed in our apartment. We let the professionals lug those suckers up a narrow flight of stairs to our bedroom.

Alright, if anyone has managed to make it this far, there's another part to this:

We haven't had a full-size couch in six years. God I miss having a couch. I've always used second-hand sofas because pets. Plus brand-new couches cost a fortune. The problem is transportation; usually when a couch we like comes up on the free classifieds section, we have no way to get it home.

I found a local couch - god I hope it hasn't been sold and the seller was just too lazy to take the ad down - that, as far as I can tell from studying a handful of pics of it seems to be in great condition. And the seller is willing to deliver it, although I doubt they would be interested in scaling the above-mentioned stairs.

These two items would make our apartment truly feel like home. And I'm pretty sure I can have them both transported here if not set up inside as well, for $600. Sadly, despite the large price tag I'm afraid this is probably one of our cheapest opportunities.

I promise you we are trying so damned hard to become self-sufficient, despite this request and a gnawing fear that I won't quite be able to make December's rent, which I really *really* don't want to happen during our first month here in the complex.

In closing, let me just say once again that we are insanely grateful for all the help everyone has given us these past few years, and I mean that from the bottom of my cold, cynical heart. We would've lost all our possessions and risked entering a vicious cycle of bad situations. I will never understand why we were chosen to be so fortunate, but thank Cthulu you've kept us alive nonetheless.

If you're willing AND able, please boost and if possible donate. If you can't donate, *do NOT feel guilty* for being in the same boat as us. Your feelings about it are valid but rest assured you needn't feel bad.

Venmo: https://venmo.com/thegizmotwins
Cashapp: https://cash.app/$thegizmotwins
PP: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/gizmo1982
GFM: https://gofund.me/12171be3

#MutualAid #MentalIllness #BPD #CPTSD #MutualAidSavesLives @mutualaid

Hi Everyone!

I've been meaning to do this since I migrated from the bad site in November 2022. I may be guilty of procrastination from time to time. Anyway.. I started on mastodon.social, migrated to mastodon.lol (RIP), briefly ran my own mastodon instance and then migrated to the mighty beige.

I'm a middle-aged, white, #bisexual, #polyamorous, cisgender male and deal with #BPD, #anxiety, and #depression. I live on the outskirts of what I lovingly call the "Mormon Vatican". I self-medicate with #cannabis to maintain emotional regulation. I live with my partner who struggles with #CPTSD, crippling anxiety, depression and BPD tendencies; and also with our obese, codependent #BorderCollie. I almost compulsively use profanity. My content is probably not suited for younger viewers.

My partner is currently unable to work due to the aforementioned conditions. We're currently between residences and have been staying in an extended-stay style hotel while my partner recovers from a recent toxic living situation.

Meanwhile, I put every ounce of my #spoons into poverty-wage #retail. I simply don't have the stamina to work a second job.

Our goal is to be moved into permanent housing in the next 60 days, in large part because this motel costs more than my entire monthly wage income (including a recent rate hike of over $350/mo), and any expenses beyond that have unfortunately been the burden of the #MutualAid community.

Essentially, we've been "making a living from panhandling" because written content and curation by amateurs like myself generally isn't a lucrative endeavor, and I'm always too damned tired to pursue podcasting or vlogging.

If you're someone morally opposed to seeing a #MutualAidRequest in your timeline (or wax pedantic about the etymology and perversion of the term being used in this manner instead of "begging"), you'll probably want to disengage at least for the immediate future. On the other hand, you've likely already muted the terms and therefore won't even be able to see this post, so..

Somehow there are still people who have put up with our begging and "grifting". I would guess their motivation is sort of like a Simpsons quote that seemed particularly appropriate for our situation:

=~=~=
"But why did you do it?"
"I felt there was something special in you. It's like rooting for the Cubs. You keep thinking they'll make it, and then you realize they never, ever will."
=~=~=

If you couldn't already gather, I'm a hardcore, bleeding-heart #progressive. I'm also a deeply-flawed, hypocritical poser about all those things a la Brian Griffin on "Family Guy". I try to divert my views and rants about this to my secondary account @LibertyForward1.

I boost *a lot*. That post average on my profile? It's not an exaggeration; it's updated automatically at midnight local time. Expect an avalanche of #cat pics, #dog pics, other interesting animal pics, and metric (not imperial) shittons of #shitposts. I love weird, vulgar, and silly. I'll almost always boost a #DadJoke if it's sufficiently cringe.

Also.. Brevity isn't my strongest suite.