Confessions of a Teenage Mom

SCREAM

2009-07-07T15:47:00.002-05:00

So yesterday I logged on to our bank account to see that my fiance has made SIX purchases in the last two days, each of them less than $2. He usually makes these while he's at work (a gas station) and that's fine except for the fact that he failed to make sure we actually had MONEY to cover the charges.

Each charge cleared today and overdrew our account, which then causes the bank to charge us $35 for every. single. purchase! OMFG! That's over $200 in charges for small stupid shit he shouldn't have even bought!

Right now he's sleeping so he doesn't know this yet, but I seriously want to beat the crap out of him for this. How the hell are we supposed to be saving money for Olivia (our daughter, due 10/22) or for our wedding when he can't even keep track of the most minute details our financial lives?!

I feel soooo close to taking his card away and just giving him an "allowance", but I know that' s going a little too far. What do you think?

I'm soooo upset, even my boss could tell when I went to pick up my paycheck today. I deposited that in the bank right away, but even with that we're still negative over $100! Thank goodness he gets paid again in a few days!

Life...

2008-10-01T22:01:00.002-05:00

Man! It feels like I've been gone for FOREVER. Since school's started I've barely had any time to catch up on my "social" life. That means pretty much every profile or network I have has been neglected.

My fiance lost his job a few weeks ago. It caught us by surprise and since they put it on his recording as "quitting" and not being fired he can't file for unemployment. We've made it by only from help from my family and the little bit of money I make with my WAH businesses. My fiance has been applying for multiple jobs in the area every day since he lost his job and he only had his first interview two days ago. It's been extremely disheartening.

Besides that I've been running around planning our wedding (8 months and 14 days left). My parents put the deposit down on our reception site so we can't back out even though my fiance is currently unemployed. They are paying for almost everything up front now with plans that we will pay back half of it over time. I spent the past weekend with my mom trying on dresses and we went cake testing. I bought my dress on Sunday! I'm very excited to see that things are coming together. Now I have to work on the final guest list and sending out save-the-date cards.

My sister is STILL living with us and we found out her DH has just been declared "fit for duty" after being in transition to leave the Army for over two months. He has severe stomach ulcers and a back problem that will only worsen over time. He wasn't allowed to do minimum training and still isn't allowed to do much so I'm extremely frustrated with the fact that he wasn't given an Honorable Discharge. He hasn't passed his PT test yet, so if if his medical condition gets worse and he never passes his PT test he will be given a Dishonorable Discharge... meaning that he won't get to keep his medical benefits or get paid after leaving.. and he's only 19! It's just not fair.

All of this and I'm still in class 5 days a week. My Developmental Psychology class is proving to be harder than I had anticipated and I'm actually enjoying my Teaching Math class (shocker!).

Oh, and did I mention we are still trying for #2? Crazy, right? I finally got my DH to get behind the idea, but we anticipate that it will take awhile since I was on BC for so long.

Here are a few pictures of my dress:

I hope everyone is doing well and your lives aren't as crazy as mine is right now!

Confusion? Content? What is THIS?!

2008-09-01T17:48:00.003-05:00

So lately I've been going through the motions. I'm not really here today.. some where in between fully conscious and half asleep. I'm not sure how to explain it.

It's been over two weeks and Rob hasn't found a job yet. Tomorrow I'm going to take him to Family Services so he can apply for unemployment and food stamps. Our rent is going to be late because we need to pay the utilities first. I've been looking through the house for things worth selling and I'm contemplating a trip to the pawn shop tomorrow for some quick cash. Not that we really have much worth pawning.. but a few things. My CD player should get us something at least.

Labor Day sucks. I hate not getting my mail. Getting mail is the highlight of my day sometimes... sad. True.

This might be TMI for some of you but this is my journal: I started my period last week. I'm so thankful! Rob and I were going to try for #2 so I stopped my birth control. Well, I stopped for that and also because many professionals don't recommend being on the same bc for more than 2 years. It took almost 6 months for my period to return and I was starting to get worried, but now I can at least put that out of my mind. :)

My sister has been at my mom's for the past week. She went back with her after our trip to KS for Home Interiors' Fall Rally (which was a blast!). My sister got into a fight with her hubby right after she got here. Apparently one of the tifs they had was about her not spending "quality time" with his parents, both of whom live over 2 hours away from us. So she went back to my mom's so she could spend a few days with her hubby's dad and then with his mom.

It's been nice with her out of the house. Not that we got much alone time here. Rob's friend Nick ended up staying the weekend... AGAIN. It's getting really tired, but Nick's car is getting fixed so it won't be happening anymore. Then today we ended up babysitting for another one of Rob's friends who didn't ask us until last night around 8 p.m. Nice. I feel like boarding my windows and parking our van in the backyard so no one knows we're home.

I started school last week, which wasn't bad. Especially with this three day weekend. I'm not going to like my Teaching Math class very much. My professor reminds me of Rachael Ray on a sugar high. It's beyond annoying. My Pysch professor reminds me of a very happy mouse. She's the kind of wallflower girl from high school who always had her nose in a book. I actually like my Government professor. We spent most of our second day in class discussing the Democratic Convention, which was refreshing. The other two professors are Education professors I've had numerous times over the past two years... nothing new there. I doubt I will be involved in any extracurricular activities this semester besides The Education Association, which is kind of involuntary due to the fact that I'm an Education major. You just kind of get sucked into it whether you want to be or not.

Jesse has been surprisingly talkative lately. He's saying all kinds of new words. Here's a quick list of what he can say so far (he's 24 months):

Mama
Dada
Bye
Kitty
Night-Night
Door
Shoe
Cup
Book
No
Bath
Woof woof (for "puppy"
Movie
Pretty
Yucky or Icky

That's what I can think of off the top of my head and it's pretty good for his age. The list was about half that only a few months ago. I'm really proud of him. Of course, he understands more words than he can say and he gets extremely frustrated when we don't understand what he's trying to tell us. Poor thing.

I guess I better finish with what I was trying to say at the beginning of this. Even though things are financially bad for us, my love life (sexually and emotionally) is very prosperous. I feel kind of unbalanced. It's strange.

My Hair

2008-08-13T09:25:00.002-05:00

So I got bored last night and started chopping away at my hair. What do you think? I didn't like it at first (almost cried!) but it's starting to grow on me.

Stressed

2008-07-25T00:29:00.002-05:00

My sister and I got into a huge fight last night over her WiFi router. She bought the router so she could use her laptop, but failed to mention that she would be wanting to use it at one in the morning. We have a rule in the house that anything that isn't being used gets turned off and that includes the power strip that our computer, modem, and printer are hooked up to. I tried to explain to her that she was living in our house and that we have certain rules that even she has to follow. She informed me that she had something she needed to get done for school, so I told her that she should have done it earlier that day instead of being on the computer talking to her DH or later on when we were home and she choose to paint her nails and watch a movie. She got in my face and started ranting about how she doesn't get to talk to her DH (who is in the Army, but is getting out on a medical discharge), which I know is a bunch of B.S. because they call each other and text each other several times a day. Then she threatened to punch me in the face. I told her she could go ahead because she'd only end up spending the night in jail and then demanded she leave my room. She pretty much ingored me, so I took her by the arms and go her out of the room and locked the door. She started yelling through the door that was going to call the cops on me and I told her she could go and do that because her name isn't on the lease and she doesn't have to be here.

I ended up crawling up on my bed and crying for about 30 minutes because I was in such shock. I was truly scared of her, which is sad considering she's my younger sister and she's about 60 pounds lighter than me. She's only living with us because my mom was tired of her behavior and wanted me to try to help her get her back on track. We had been doing okay lately (she even managed to apply and get accepted to two online colleges), but apparantely she's been stressing me out more than I thought. She doesn't clean up after herself, she only pays $50 a month to stay here, she doesn't buy food or laundry detergent or pay for gas for me to drive her around... and yet she expects me to bend over backwards for her.

Yeah, yeah.. I know.. it's just the router. But the fact is.. she's discrespectful. She doesn't ask.. she just expects to have it.. and I'm sick of it.

Anyways, my fiance was outside with his friend when the incident occured and after I managed to get my sister out of my room (and only suffering a few scratches to my arms).... he didn't even come to check on me. He just sat down and started a video game with his friend. So I got even more upset than I already was and decided after a few more minutes of sobbing that I was going to take a break from EVERYTHING and go stay with my mom. So I grabbed my bags, headed through the living room, told them to have a nice weekend, and started to go out the door.... but my fiance stopped me. We went outside and I almost collapsed outside because I was crying so badly. We talked for over two hours and he told me he didn't come see me because he thought it best for my sister and I to deal with things on our own. The only thing is, I was really scared and I needed him to check on me. I needed him to care about whether I was okay or not.

We figured out that we needed to do some readjusting. My sister has been stressing me out more than I realized and we decided that she needs to either move out on her own or move back in with my mom. I tried talking to my sister and telling her it was fine if she wants to use the internet at night, but it would be nice if she bothered to ask instead of demanding. She also needs to remember whose house she's living in. She didn't say anything back to me.

My fiance and I also decided that we need to spend more quality time with each other, so today we went and played pool with my sister and my fiance's friend. We had a pretty good time! :) I'm hoping that we can continue to do things like that.

My sister tried to bring up the router thing again today, but we didn't talk to much about it. I read a text from her DH that said that she should only do the bare minimum around the house because I'm only giving her the bare minimum. I guess they just don't understand that she's living in my house!!!! How is that the "bare minimum"? Am I supposed to cater to her every need as well? I'm not as upset about it as I was last night, but this situation is obviously not going to work. She really needs to get her own place and try to make it on her own.

Kitchen!

2008-07-19T17:07:00.004-05:00

Okay.. so I'm officially done with my Tuesday Tackle for the kitchen. I'm almost done with the living room and the bedroom has a lot left to do!

Before:

After:

Tuesday Tackle (a little late)

2008-07-16T11:47:00.010-05:00

Learn about Tuesday Tackle on 5 Minutes for Mom, a website that I am completely addicted to!

For Tuesday Tackle I am going to share with you before and after pictures of this chaotic mess I call home.

Here is our bedroom:

Here is our living room:

Our Kitchen:

Our bathroom:

Jesse's Bedroom (the cleanest room in the house!)

I'm going to make a checklist for each room and add it here when I'm done. :)

My Third Post For Today... a confession.

2008-07-07T23:24:00.002-05:00

I am near the edge of breaking down again.. I can just feel it. Maybe it's just the fact that's it's 11:24 p.m. here and I'm exhausted. It could be the fact that I'm going to take a pregnancy test in the morning and I'm not sure what I want the results to be. Or, maybe it's because things have just been going well lately.

Rob got his tax refund so I was able to pay a few bills. I was able to pay the rent + late fees, plus pay my mom back and we'll actually pay the utilities on time this month! My grandparents are sending us $1,000 from my college-fund CD because they are using the rest of the money to pay for tests my grandmother needs. Disappointing because I could actually USE that money for school this semester. *sigh*

Well, I'm off to bed... better get some sleep.

Wedding Updates

2008-07-07T23:12:00.001-05:00

Wednesday night we visited a reception site (Pevely Farms Golf Club), but it's too small to accomodate my guest list (which is at 191and growing!). We decided to go ahead and visit another site on Thursday.

Rob and I slept in Thursday morning and then met my mom at Fox Run Golf Club to check out their reception area. It's called the Carriage House and it's GORGEOUS! It's a big indoor facility (whereas Pevely would have been partially outside) and it's just beautiful. Here are some pictures:

Here is some of the land and a photo of the front of the Carriage House:

And here is the inside!!!

It's just PERFECT! Oh.. and I found a dress that I just LOVE and it's in my price range. :)

I also found our invitations (well, the paper).. so I"m going to buy that ASAP and start sending out invites. :)

Jesse's Modeling Photo

2008-07-07T23:11:00.002-05:00

Here is Jesse's finished modeling head shot. :)
Isn't he just adorable? He's been to one open audition since his shoot and he did a great job!

Modeling...

2008-06-23T20:13:00.000-05:00

Jesse was signed on by the modeling agency and has his photo shoot on Thursday! I'm so excited! :) Please wish us luck with getting jobs!

Modeling!

2008-06-16T15:33:00.002-05:00

Jesse has an interview with a modeling agency (Images Agency in St. Louis) tomorrow night. I'm so excited!

I've always wanted to try to get Jesse into modeling, but Rob has really opposed it. I'm hoping that it will be a fun experience for us, as well as bring in some extra cash.

Wish us luck!

I Flinch

2008-06-15T22:52:00.002-05:00

I flinch when someone waves their hand near my head.
I flinch when someone goes to pat me on the back.
I flinch if someone goes to give me an unexpected hug.
I flinch if someone tries to touch my face unexpectedly.

and why do I flinch?

Because I was abused when I was a child.

My sister flinches too.

But my fiance thinks we should get over it and that we shouldn't flinch when someone does those innocent things.

He believes that because he too was abused.. it's one thing we have in common- our terrible childhoods.

The only thing is.. that flinch.. it's permanent. It's embedded into my nervous system. I can't help it. How do you stop something that's learned?

Breakdown

2008-06-10T12:03:00.004-05:00

I was so close to breaking down this morning.

I've been calling the Family Resource center for a week about help with our electric bill and they never called us back. I called them twice last week and then again yesterday and today our utilities were going to be shut off at 10 a.m.

My sister got the idea to try to contact a cash loan place, but none of them open before 10 a.m. so that didn't work. So I call the Family Resource center once more this morning and FINALLY someone answered the phone. The lady said "oh yeah, I have your file here in front of me and was wondering what was going on...." She then told me to call the City to see if they could delay my shut off and to find out how much the electric was, but when I called the City said they couldn't stop our shut off if we didn't pay before 10. I called the Resource center back and the lady then says she can't do anything unless she has a paper from the City saying how much we owe and she can only pledge an amount for us if it that amount will keep us from having our utilities shut off. She kept saying the same thing over and over like I was stupid and it was pissing me off!

So I get off the phone with her and call the City once again. A different lady picks up this time and I told her that the lady at the resource center basically chewed me out for not knowing what to do or what I needed and then told me that she couldn't stay on the phone with me because there were other people waiting there (HELLO!? I called LAST WEEK and you could have taken care of it then!!!!). The lady at the City said I could come up there ASAP to get a paper for the Resource center so I could get a pledge amount, but I had to come up there right away because it was already 9:30.

I get off the phone and start to cry because the whole situation just stressed me out! Rob was on the computer at the time and consoled me and said he would come with me. So I get my stuff together and we head to City Hall. When we get there the lady I had spoken to was already on the phone dealing with our utilities and she said she would fax over our info to the Resource center so we could get a pledge before 10. Rob and I waited for a few minutes to see if the pledge would come in and sure enough it did... at 9:56! I felt like hugging the two ladies at the City that helped us and just said "Thank you" about 1o times. I was relieved it was taken care of, but I was still really shaken up because of the way the lady at the Resource center treated me. If they had simply called me back last week instead of waiting till today to help us this wouldn't have happened.

So, not such a nice start to my day...

On a good note, I had my day of training for my new job yesterday. Basically, I'm checking stock on products that our company handles and I train the employees on new products. Woohooo! I have to do the last two stores (one in Jefferson City and the other at the Lake of Ozarks) by Sunday and I'm not looking forward to it. Not because I don't like the job (it's super easy) but because I've never met the managers there and I don't know the store. I guess I'm just anxious. I can't wait till it becomes a routine for me.

Another update: My sister moved in with us on Saturday. Her DH is in the Army and since she graduated from high school and my mom is sick of her attitude.. I'm on sister duty. LOL Basically, my goals for while she is here are:

Help her get her license
Make her pay a set amount every month to cover expenses
Help her find a PT job
Possibly get her set up for online courses

She did NOTHING while she stayed with my mom, so I'm going to try to get her back on track. Which will be hard if she continues to sleep till noon every day!!!!!! :P

Anyways, besides this morning little catastrophe we doing pretty well. I made $43 at the yard sale on Saturday and got a severe sun burn.. but that is healing nicely. I think I will leave you with this...

3 Years!

2008-06-02T20:06:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was our 3 year anniversary. We didn't do anything special. Rob worked and was extremely tired when he got home. We grabbed Taco Bell on the way home and he fell asleep on the couch. We did have a VERY good night. ;)

This morning we had breakfast at a local diner. We deposited our state tax refund and then went to shopping to get things we had been needing around the house for some time. Plus, Rob got a new pair of head phones and cord converter as his Father's Day present.

After that we went to a clothing store so I could buy a new outfit for my new job! I got a part-time job as a Retail Sales Associate with Chuck Latham Associates. I will be working with local Petco stores. It's very part-time (about 10 hours a month), but I get paid $10.50/hr and they pay for gas over 30 miles. :) I start next Monday and I'm super nervous! I love my new outfit though.. I got my outfit instead of an anniversary present (flowers).

I've pretty much been online since we got home. I have tons of online parties on Cafemom now and I ordered checks today too.

In the mail today I got a personalized book I won for Jesse from one of the online parties. The lady who makes them is named Carolyn and her website is www.toysandbooks.net She's really nice and she is adding my diaper cakes to her website! :) I'm so excited!

I've gotten 10 orders over the past week just from the online parties! Plus, I have one lady working really hard to join Home Interiors for FREE. I've also gotten other leads, and joined a few other awesome businesses! I will have to post about those later.

Right now.. I need to get off the computer....

RE: Sunday's Confessional

2008-05-25T18:18:00.001-05:00

I still spent too much time online today.

But I got a few things done as well!

I did dishes, folded laundry, cleaned another load of laundry, made Jesse's Thomas the Train fitted crib sheet, and gave Jesse a bath.

I was semi-functional. :)

Etsy Baby Treasury

2008-05-25T16:41:00.001-05:00

I'm putting together a Poster Sketch for a baby-themed treasury.

If you want to be on it, let me know what you have!

Sunday's Confessional

2008-05-25T08:50:00.003-05:00

I spend waaaayy too much time online.

Literally, I spend about 18+ hours online during the summer. It's not healthy.

But then again, I have a lot I'm involved with online:

4 CafeMom pages (one personal, one for etsy, one for Home Interiors, one for my Missouri Moms group)

MommyAuctions (mod and seller)

Etsy store

Numerous WAHM trading/selling groups

Kizoodle

Post Points

Myspace

Mommy2Mommy and The Diva Within (ning social networks)

The Momma Sanctum forum

and that's just the short list.

My fiance wants me to cut back on them so I got rid of a few trading groups... only to join others. I'll admit- it is my addiction.

I make excuses saying that most of those website bring in some sort of income, which most of them do. But I'm still not doing things I could be doing during the day.. like playing with my son, cleaning, etc.

I need to limit my online time like my mom used to do for my sister and me.
Mom always knows best, doesn't she?

Confessions?

2008-05-24T10:50:00.000-05:00

Do I have anything to confess? Sure...
Do I really want to confess everything? No..

So why start this blog?

My name is Jessica and I'm 19. I had my son, Jesse, 6 days before my 18th birthday and only a few months after I graduated high school. I went to Prom and walked across the stage at graduation with my lovely 6 month pregnant belly, and I truly enjoyed it. I am beginning this blog as a way to "control" myself. I have many deep buried issues that I tend to forget about for months. I'll remember one day and allow that memory to mostly destroy me. I then have to rebuild myself.

That process is tiring.

I used to journal, but it takes too long and my typing is much faster than my penmanship.. and it's easier to read.

This blog will be my haven. I may not let you know it all, but most of it. I will begin again tomorrow with a short introduction.

Let the confessions begin...