Living On A Budget - what are the most important things and what can be discarded?

Are you having a hard time making ends meet? Do you always feel like you are catching up? Do you feel like you see the end of the tunnel and then it collapses over your head?

If so, you are not alone. I am there too. Lots of people are as well. Poverty is not exclusive either. It does not discriminate due to race, creed, color, religion or gender. And yes, if you are not able to pay all your bills and live comfortably the classification is poverty. However, there are still things you can do.

I will use myself as an example for now . I was laid off on Jan 6th, 2012. I did not want it to happen, but I saw the signs.

• My boss(the owner) hired a new graphic designer to "help out with the work load".
• During the first week of her training the company decided to drop their biggest contract client due to "disclosure infringement".
• After two months of extensive training we did not have enough work for two graphic designers. Our new designer was left usually assisting in some of the other departments to get orders out for Christmas and New Year deadlines.
• I got sick the week prior to New Years day. The new designer was able to handle the (slow season) workload on her own so my manager sent me home because she did not want me to "get anyone else sick".
• She(the manager) made me stay home two days.
• I had a personal issue I needed to take off a couple of hours for on the morning of Jan 6th (exactly one week after my off time for being sick).
• I actually got a text from my boss(the owner) telling me to take the rest of the day off that Friday before it was even 11am. (Our work day was 9am to 530pm)
• Then about 2pm I got a text message from my boss to call him on his cell phone. (Guess he did not want anyone else to know he was laying me off).
• He told me I was becoming "too unreliable" and wanted me to take a voluntary lay off. He said he would gladly call me back when it got busy, but he felt I needed to stay home and deal with "all of my personal problems".

Wow, no matter how many overtime hours you do to help them out, business is business, might as well keep the new person who has asked for three 1/2 days off in two months than the one who missed one day in the following year until they got sick and were made to stay home. But, I digress, I will save the drama for my blog or Facebook.

Ok, so you see that other people are having issues too.

First you have to decide what you need to have/can't do without and what you want but can do without.

Have to have:

• shelter (roof over your head not a tent) at all costs.
• food (staples) the four main food groups, which does not include,..sigh ... Little Debbie/Frito Lay or Coke/Pepsi)
• cooking source (electric or gas) even a microwave oven and electric skillet help. Camp fires and fireplaces are unreliable at best in the grand scheme of constant daily food preparation.
• personal hygiene (source of water for cleaning, not necessarily hot).
• climate control (heat in the winter, fan in the summer. I do not classify a/c as a must have, but you can if you require it for your health).
• transportation to work (if you are employed) and to interviewing if not.
• emergency contact or non contract phone (most states have a link to get a free phone for emergencies) some are offered on the internet for about $20/month (requires qualification)
• pet food & vaccines (or seek adoption options)

Like to have but definitely not necessary:

• Cable, internet ...darn...
• subscriptions (movie, magazine, newspaper)...gasp ...
• snacks, drinks other than water...yuck ...
• transportation other than to work or interview...stretch them legs folks...
• entertainment (that costs money)....Scrabble & Monopoly are still free thank goodness...
• home phone or cell phone plan with lots of minutes, long distance calling, internet, texting, picture mail etc....no way!...
• pet grooming, treats, toys, hobby supplies...Fido must do his part as well...

Sit down and decide these things as soon as possible. Contact any credit cards and tell them flat out that you will have to pay them as soon as you can. Do not make any verbal commitments & ask them to type that in while you are on the phone and send back all bills you can't pay with a personal note stating why. You will still get the calls, but the documentation will start from the day you tell them. It always helps in the long run. If you have a home phone they will usually suspend all but emergency calls for a specific period of time at your request.

Example: We had a choice of what to pay and what not to pay a few years ago when my father-in-law passed away. He had been living with us, was still an active adult, and contributed to the food and some of the bills. We were living in a larger home in order to accommodate our family (two adults & three teen children) as well as my mother and my husband's father our dogs and my mother's cat. That's seven adult and almost adult bodies plus several pets in one home! Well it was a large home and we had to consolidate by the end of the summer also (too expensive).

While things had been tight, they got down right claustrophobic. We could not pay one of the utilities for sure. We had been struggling since the late fall so we let the gas go because it was summer and we could deal with no stove for a while along with cold water. We lived with cold water and cooking with the microwave plus an electric skillet for two months. That's 60 days of cold showers! We were both working and my mother was contributing $75 a month plus paying for basic cable since she felt that was vital for her (we all benefited from that decision).

No matter how discouraging it was, we all survived. Some times our sons begged the use of a friend's shower or stayed overnight on a weekend night intentionally to utilize their facilities. My husband was lucky, he had the use of a shower at work and took full advantage of it. My mother, myself and our daughter (home from college for the summer) had the worst of it. Even our daughter occasionally accepted a friend's invitation to use their shower. I try to not talk about the negative things so no one I knew really realized what was going on till it was in the past.

But the whole point is to show you what you can do if you have to. We got rid of everything but basic cable T.V. because my mother offered to pay for that so she would be able to watch T.V. We got rid of all phones except my husband's cell phone (plan with one extra free line). He was a truck driver at the time and his job paid part of his phone bill. We used the other line as a home phone so no one could take it out of the house. If we wanted to get on the internet we had to go to the library.

I have always tried to be generous with my children's friends, but since our house was normally a popular gathering place, I sat all the friends down and discussed the problem of not being able to offer them food as a necessity rather than a snub. If they wanted to eat I asked them to bring it with them. They were all very accepting of the situation and even brought extra sometimes by bringing a 2 liter bottle instead of a single serve for themselves. If they forgot and ate some of our supplies I did not have to ask they reimbursed me.

Do what you can for your self, wash those clothes in the sink if you have to. There are still programs like SNAP (food assistance), free lunch in school, medicaid for your children in case they get sick & WIC for small children and pregnant or nursing mothers. Every place I have ever lived has had food banks usually run by church or civic organizations.

We played a lot of board games and read a lot of books. The kids played basketball after school and walked around a lot, rode bikes and skateboarded. (sounds like when I was a kid)

Above all else, know that no matter how bad it is you have not hit the absolute bottom yet so keep on swimming towards the bubbles!