Princess Lamb Chop
07-15-2008, 03:09 AM
Hello.
I have a physical disability as well as psychiatric issues, with the end result that I haven't had a paying job in over 10 years. I hate that about myself.
In my mid-40's, I am just now learning to drive a car. Most people my age have been driving for over half their lives, but I was too stupid and retarded to be able to learn. I can learn now only because my fiancé has been so patiently teaching me, but even he has given up. He can't afford for me to make a mistake, for insurance purposes, and you know, I just can't learn without making at least one.
I consider being a homemaker a legitimate job, and thank God I'm engaged to a man who feels the same way. In my lifetime I've encountered too many men who scoff at what a SAHM does. Mine doesn't. I feel really bad about myself, though, when he has to come home from work and cook a meal or run a load of laundry because I wasn't up to it that day. I feel that I didn't do my job properly, and he had to pick up my slack. My first husband would have made sure to encourage me in those feelings, but this one doesn't do that. He is so understanding, far more than I am of myself.
I do have some saleable job skills. I type 65 words a minute. I am very organized. I know I would make an excellent file clerk, even with a disability. However, not having worked in so long, I am afraid to go job hunting now. I don't know how to explain the huge gap in my work history, or how it is I went to college and have these skills, but my work history doesn't match it.
I've looked for work in the more recent past, and at least in the part of the country where I was raised, if you walk in with a cane even the temp agencies will tell you they don't have anything. They don't openly discriminate--only one person was dumb enough to come right out and say, "I'd need someone who can get around better than you can." But they will say they're "not hiring," and then the following day hire someone who is younger, slimmer, more physically attractive, and not disabled. :(
So I thought I might volunteer at church. But I was told I wasn't really needed. Which comes as no surprise. It's one of those churches where all of the work is done by the same handful of people. It's not as bad as some, where that handful of people are all relatives of the pastor, but it's still a tight-knit clique I just can't break into.
I am not at this moment suicidal, but if I continue feeling worthless and purposeless long enough, I may become so.
I don't know what I'm seeking. Has anybody been where I am now, and been able to pull out of it?
Thank you.
I have a physical disability as well as psychiatric issues, with the end result that I haven't had a paying job in over 10 years. I hate that about myself.
In my mid-40's, I am just now learning to drive a car. Most people my age have been driving for over half their lives, but I was too stupid and retarded to be able to learn. I can learn now only because my fiancé has been so patiently teaching me, but even he has given up. He can't afford for me to make a mistake, for insurance purposes, and you know, I just can't learn without making at least one.
I consider being a homemaker a legitimate job, and thank God I'm engaged to a man who feels the same way. In my lifetime I've encountered too many men who scoff at what a SAHM does. Mine doesn't. I feel really bad about myself, though, when he has to come home from work and cook a meal or run a load of laundry because I wasn't up to it that day. I feel that I didn't do my job properly, and he had to pick up my slack. My first husband would have made sure to encourage me in those feelings, but this one doesn't do that. He is so understanding, far more than I am of myself.
I do have some saleable job skills. I type 65 words a minute. I am very organized. I know I would make an excellent file clerk, even with a disability. However, not having worked in so long, I am afraid to go job hunting now. I don't know how to explain the huge gap in my work history, or how it is I went to college and have these skills, but my work history doesn't match it.
I've looked for work in the more recent past, and at least in the part of the country where I was raised, if you walk in with a cane even the temp agencies will tell you they don't have anything. They don't openly discriminate--only one person was dumb enough to come right out and say, "I'd need someone who can get around better than you can." But they will say they're "not hiring," and then the following day hire someone who is younger, slimmer, more physically attractive, and not disabled. :(
So I thought I might volunteer at church. But I was told I wasn't really needed. Which comes as no surprise. It's one of those churches where all of the work is done by the same handful of people. It's not as bad as some, where that handful of people are all relatives of the pastor, but it's still a tight-knit clique I just can't break into.
I am not at this moment suicidal, but if I continue feeling worthless and purposeless long enough, I may become so.
I don't know what I'm seeking. Has anybody been where I am now, and been able to pull out of it?
Thank you.