jobs are back in fashion

mere hours old, and after a 4-day induction, I am never going to forget when she was born!

 

 

I have had The Letter. The DWP have written to tell me that my child will be 5 soon (gee, thanks, without you telling me I might have forgotten!) and that I will be taken off income support at that point and will have to apply for JSA. Great. I am so looking forward to that. Not.

 

And why do I have to apply again? Surely I should just be moved onto it... Although, they have also stated in the letter that I may not be entitled to it, so that's probably why. As far as I know I am, but it's enough to make you nervous... And I really don't want to be on JSA, they make you feel so shit about being unemployed. Like it's some sort of choice you've made.

 

I would love not to have lost my job (that I hated and didn't *actually* plan on going back to) but I did. And then because I happened to lose my job/have a baby at almost the exact same moment as the recession hit in 2008, finding another one was suddenly impossible.

 

My plan had been to have madam and at the end of my maternity leave go back to a part-time job. Now, that would have been impossible where I did work as I couldn't have had hours that would have fitted in with childcare hence why I was always going to leave. But this was different. There were no jobs in the town where I lived. And I don't mean that as some sweeping generalisation. There were none. ALL the biggest employers had either closed or laid off everyone except the bare minimum.

 

There was no seasonal work as no-one was going anywhere as no-one had any money. Scarborough died in 2008. It was awful. Anyone with a job held onto it with both hands, no matter what it was. Not even K could get work. And he'd worked everywhere in that town. He ended up doing the odd night on a door in Driffield, but that was it.

 

So we moved back to Beverley. And I still miss Scarborough all the time. I sometimes wonder about moving madam and I back there, one (well, actually both) of her godmother's live there. I have friends with small kids, it's small enough for me to not feel intimidated like I do in cities, but bigger than here. The reason I don't is the exact reason we left.

 

There is nowhere else locally. Nowhere bigger anyway. The nearest cities are Hull and York, both about an hour away. So living back in my home town where Hull is just a 20min bus ride away is much better for me, jobwise. And Scarborough is still a seasonal town. Jobs are mostly service based and if you're one of the unlucky ones there will be no work in the off-season. Zero hours contracts are the absolute norm.

 

I can't live like that, certainly not now I have madam and that we're on our own. Actually, financially the being on our own bit makes little difference as K quite happily left me to pay the majority of everything even when we were together. He used to give me £75 a week, which he cut down to £40 without any thought of how little money that would leave me with.

 

This is another form of domestic abuse that I *actually* didn't really understand about until after we broke up. That control he had over money was another way of making me the weaker partner. Most of my debt issues started from there. I couldn't keep up with all our bills etc, and after I lost my job it just went into freefall.

 

Sorry, should have put a trigger warning on that last statement. For me if for no-one else. I have had to take a short break to calm myself down. So angry that he controlled me in so many ways and that I didn't even recognise it.

 

Domestic abuse makes you feel stupid.

 

*breathes*

 

Sorry, back to me getting a job... I am staying put in Bev as I am better placed to get a job as there is a big city and several biggish villages/smallish towns around and about for me to plum(b?) for jobs... But I do keep seeing photos of the seaside and wishing I was there...

 

But now I have to get serious about my job searching and start treating it as a job rather than a past-time. I would still prefer to only work part-time so that I could do the school run, but am aware that that is unlikely to happen. I am incredibly glad that mum and dad are local and I can rely on them to do that bit for me if I can't! But I don't want them to have to do it every day. And I'd like not to work weekends if at all possible, which would be something of a novelty as every job I've ever had has involved weekend working.

 

This is why I want to work in schools. I am considering applying for everything from dinner lady (person) up. I would love to not be reliant on the government for all the money I have. I would like for K to bother giving me some child support *laughs so hard there are tears in my eyes*. He won't. But he should. I don't get how any man (or woman) can just walk away from their child without it seeming to bother them in the slightest. How do you not care where they're getting food, warmth, shelter and clothing from?

 

I apparently, am a fool for caring about my offspring. 

 

But I am terrified with how I'm going to get on with all the form filling I'm about to start having to do. Let alone my lack of interview skills. I am so bad at interviews... I hate selling myself. Perhaps I should include a link to my blog in my applications! No, then they might realise I'm crazy...

 

I have managed to get myself a few smart clothes that would be suitable to wear to an interview and I know if I do get a chance to work in a school I have some experience with the age range. I just feel like I'm floating around grabbing at something to anchor me. I am so afraid of returning to that environment, even though it's what I need. 

 

Days are long now that madam is at school properly. Time to colour in the hours we're apart so that we can show each other our days over tea :)