A stalemate, to quote Google of course, is “a situation in which further action or progress by opposing or competing parties seems impossible.” Synonyms include impasse, standstill, and deadlock.
For the past few months, I feel like I’ve reached a stalemate and don’t know how to get unstuck. At this point, the only opposing party I can think of is life (or North Carolina… or Sedgwick worker’s comp people). It’s been an emotional, mental, and physically trying time, and I still don’t know how I’m going to get out of it. Every ounce of my trust is [and always has been] in God.
I know there’s hope because I finally felt motivated and [mildly] energized to write for the blog again.
So what’s been going on?
Let’s take it back to October 2024. I began having doubts about a friendship that I realized was aiding in the deterioration of my mental health. As I’m sure we know by now, when you’re mentally drained, you tend to be physically drained. Truly, I don’t know how I functioned during fall 2024.
Actually, I do. I adopted a puppy named Clover, whom I may or may not have talked about before. I truly cannot remember, and I do not want to use my small amount of energy to go back and check. Adjusting to life with a puppy was a lot, especially since I started distancing myself from the friend that could’ve helped me and had to figure it all out on my own. Though there were mistakes made, I am very proud of how my puppy is growing; we consistently get complimented when she doesn’t bark while other dogs are going buck wild. Because of her, I persisted through the mentally gruesome fall and winter.
Everything took a 180 on December 13, 2024. I had an accident at school while I was working and severely sprained my ankle (it was basically fractured). Because of the injury, I could not work my second job at TJ Maxx and missed out on A LOT of necessary money. While healing, I was getting half decent care from the doctor I was required to go to via the worker’s comp people, and I played the waiting game of seeing if my worker’s comp was accepted or denied.
After going to urgent care for a month, there was no real healing with my ankle. It was swollen beyond belief and wasn’t moving the way it should’ve. The urgent care doctor put in a referral for me to see an orthopedic. The following day, worker’s comp denied my claim.
I cried ugly tears for hours. My foot was no better. I would not be receiving the care I needed. I would not be financially compensated for three weeks of work I missed.
When I realized the financial setback this created, I panicked. Honestly, that panic has yet to disappear.
I was unable to pay my rent in January, which increased at the start of the year and had a late fee attached. This is where I began to regret moving to North Carolina because North Carolina renter’s rights/law/whatever it’s called is absolute garbage. Basically, you cannot break a lease in North Carolina unless you are a victim of domestic violence or going to the military.
Instead, there’s this policy called Skipping, where you give up the place you’re renting and turn in your keys, but until someone else rents your unit, you are responsible for paying the rent. I was gob smacked when I found out this was the policy AFTER I turned my keys in. The whole point of going through the Skipping process is because I couldn’t afford my rent…
Being someone who works in the education system, I only get paid once a month at the end of every month. No matter what, I was paying the raised rent price with late fees. Fortunately, someone rented my unit at the beginning of March, and I received my final statement (which meant sweet freedom from my apartment complex). I was able to pay it at the end of March, and of course it took most of my paycheck.
Let’s go back for two seconds. I turned my keys in at the end of January and stayed with the sweetest, craziest 70-year-old Cuban coworker for a month. I will forever be grateful for this wonderful woman and her willingness to take me and Clover in. The Cuban’s granddaughter adopted Clover’s sister, so Clover was happy to have another dog to play with for a month; miss girl was super spoiled.
While I was staying with my Cuban coworker in February, I also got started at a different second job as a server at a restaurant (and ghosted the heck out of TJ Maxx because a situation arose that I thought would get me fired from my job in the education system—a story for another day). The job at the restaurant has been good supplemental money for the various things happening this year, like a trip to Charleston in March and a wedding in September and everything else happening in between (random small bills, oil changes, tag renewal, sibling graduation, birthday trip, family visitations, etc.).
Of course, no job is perfect, and there are issues with a coworker who is one of the most obvious hypocrites I’ve ever met… well, obvious to everyone except herself. Mostly all the other servers have an issue with homegirl too, which shows me I’m not making things up. I am nervous that her hunger for power will create bigger problems, but I’m working on controlling my mouth and semi-controlling my facial expressions.
When March arrived, I expected to be able to move into a new apartment and everything would be all good. Bless March Jamilah’s heart, so full of hope.
This is when I found out about the second part of the Skipping policy, which was not outlined in my lease, by the way. Unfortunately, Clover and I had to find somewhere else to go because the wonderful Cuban woman was having contractors come fix her home (which is a whole separate story on its own). I was fully okay with us staying in a shelter, but the wonderful Cuban’s equally wonderful intern would not let that happen.
Initially, it was just me staying with the intern, and Clover spent most of March home hopping because she was not allowed in the apartment complex. I spent a few weeks dealing with some of the crappiest mom guilt ever. However, it did bring me joy that Clover was making new doggy friends at all the homes she was visiting. It’s going to make for a great doggy birthday party in August.
Eventually, I had exhausted all of my resources for Clover, and we slept in my car for half a night before the intern rescued us and said Clover could hide in the second bedroom with my air mattress and me.
That brings us to today. I’m in the process of subleasing a room in a townhouse where the previous tenant paid the rent for April. A couple of nights ago, I found out from the intern that Clover and I need to be out by April 14th, and if things don’t process quickly with the subleasing, it puts me back at square one… or in my car.
Hence, the stalemate.
I feel like that seems like a lot of bad, but there have definitely been some beautiful moments over the past few months, besides figuring out how other people operate outside of work.
The bach trip to Charleston, SC made it out of the group chat, and despite crying because I only had enough money for gas to get there and back (meaning I had no money for food), I had an absolute blast. I feel like our weekend there was so short, so I fully intend on going back one day and doing some exploring. Look out for the documentation of that solo trip.
Also, my student book club has started, and it brings me so much joy to see how much the students love it. This month, we’re reading A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab. Speaking of things that bring me joy, I love my job, and I think this is the longest I’ve gone with loving a job. In fact, I love all three of my jobs; I just need to work on balancing them and making sure I make time for SJ since SJ brings me peace.
Once I’m done with prom, because I’m in charge of the decorations this year, I strongly believe I will be less overwhelmed and have more time for SJ.
I say that, but this final piece of good news will be something else I’ll have to add to my list of things to balance: I got accepted into a local university to go back to school and receive my master’s in library sciences. Yep, I love my job so much that I’m going back to school to get a degree in it.
I know going through hard times makes you stronger, and nothing about life will ever be perfect. With the way things have been going, I really hope I come out of this a bodybuilder.
