I posted above in the new member forum. I'm 58, married nearly 30 years, 2 daughters whom I love dearly. I presently have a part-time job as a cleaning lady (approx. 12 hours per week). I also fill in on occasion cleaning a dept. store when that former boss needs a replacement. I used to work on that job, but what I disliked about that job (it was the reason I quit) was that it is a 7-day-a-week job. You never get a day off (unless you ask for it and of course they don't encourage that very often). The store is closed only 3 days in the entire year (Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter Sunday). The other job, the one I have now, is cleaning a children's afterschool facility 3 nights a week. I can manage, sort of, doing this job 3 times a week, but doing the 2 together I CANNOT handle. The afterschool facility takes 4 hours to clean, and we can't start until 8 p.m. This means we don't finish until midnight or after and don't get home until nearly 1 a.m. And then, if I have to do the dept. store the next morning, I have to get up at 6 a.m. This means, at best, only 5 hours of sleep. To make matters worse, I haven't been sleeping well.

This all started about a year and a half ago. The lady I work with at the afterschool facility boards with us. She got me the job. At the time I thought it would be all right. Our finances were tight (they are ALWAYS tight), and any money would be welcome. So at first everything worked out. But I rapidly started feeling that something wasn't right. To begin with, at that time we only had one car, which my husband, a church musician, had to take to his church job out of town on weekends. This meant that my boarder/coworker drove us to work every day. No problem usually, but on Sundays she wouldn't take me to my church. She insisted on going to this other church. The folks there are nice, I have nothing against them, but I missed my own church so much. A few months ago, my husband hit a deer while delivering pizza (he also works for Papa John's) and our car was totalled. We were given a big enough check to buy 2 used cars, so now both my husband and I have a car, and I am able to go to my church!

Well, at a later date this lady started taking me with her to clean this afterschool facility. Finally, she talked me into coming on with her to clean it on a regular basis. Again, it would be more money. But this was in June, and that created a problem with the dept. store 7-day job. At this time, the ASF, school being out, holds a summer camp program for the months of June and July. Instead of the kids being there only after school, they are there all day, and the place has to be cleaned 5 nights a week instead of 3. So I'm going to the ASF 5 nights a week (a small mercy was that during this summer stretch we could at least start at 6 p.m. instead of 8) then getting up early the next morning to do the dept store. Before I knew it I was coming unglued and in hysterics every night. I told this lady and my husband I HAD to make a choice. I COULD NOT do both. I decided to quit the dept store and concentrate on the ASF, since it paid slightly more (below minimum wage, BTW) and was only 3 nights a week. Even after I gave my notice, I still couldn't leave for 2 weeks because my boss had to find a replacement for me. She finally did, but I'm still on call, and as it turns out I'm filling in now because the replacements aren't working out and she's trying to find replacements for them. (So she says, anyway.....)

I have been trying to take the needed steps to become a professional genealogist. I have travelled to our state archives to attend seminars and do research and have joined several genealogy groups. I would like to find work as a genealogist, or a writer, or something to do from home--anything to be able to quit the cleaning jobs. The work itself doesn't really bother me that much, I suppose, but this lady (our boarder) is getting on my nerves big time. I'm a quiet, withdrawn person, and she is very outspoken and VERY aggressive. I'm on eggshells around her all the time. You have to watch what you say around her. She gets mad very easily and yells and hollers at you. I'm to the point where I dread even being around her. She always wants to know where I've been, where I'm going, and she's always badmouthing somebody. And she seems determined to turn me into a professional cleaning lady. She'll say I've got a career now. (It's a JOB.) And now that she knows that the dept. store cleaners are being replaced, she mentioned that maybe our old boss will take us back. ( I didn't say a word.) Because I often don't have any money on me (my pay goes directly into our bank account, where it isn't touched because we need practically all of our money just to pay the mortgage), she has often paid for both our meals (she LIVES at Waffle House), and she has also often taken me to movies. We were pretty good friends once, esp. before we started working together, but now I avoid her as much as I can, talk as little as possible, and fervently pray that she will find herself another place and move out soon. (She gets on my husband's nerves, too, and he has had several arguments with her. He told her at least twice to get out but then apologized. By the way, since she is often strapped for cash, she has stayed here for nearly 2 years and has not paid us much rent. Some months none at all, some months $50 or $100.)

About 3 weeks ago, one of our local book stores had a notice on their door that they were having a job fair in 2 days. That night, I happened to mention to her and my daughter that I might look into it, just out of curiosity. Well, she went ballistic. How could I think of quitting? After all she had done for me? She had gotten me 2 jobs!! Our boss had just given me a pay advance! (True. The ASF summer camp program had ended, and we didn't do any cleaning there for 2 weeks because no one was there until school started. The boss advanced me $100 to tide us over because my husband found out and told our boarder, "If we can't pay the mortgage, you better start packing, because we are all going to be out in the street!" ) I backpedaled and told her it was just a passing thought, I probably would not have gone. (Actually, a day job now won't do me any good because I want the days free to do genealogy work, so in that respect the cleaning job is good, as long as it's just the one job. Trouble is, if I do the 2 jobs, I'll have to sleep during the day and won't be able to do ANY work during the day.) To make matters worse, my dear 17-year-old daughter, bless her heart, tried, in a very calm, reasonable voice, to defend me, saying that I just wanted to check this out and I should be able to. Well, our boarder went ballistic over that. She accused my daughter of being disrespectful to her. (She later gave me hell for letting my daughter do that and demanded that I make my daughter apologize. I told her I would mention the matter and said no more. My husband said my daughter didn't have to apologize. I felt bad about it because it's really not right for my daughter to have to defend me. I should have spoken up for myself, but I get tongue-tied with fear nearly every time this woman opens her mouth. My husband, and even my daughter, tell me that she's just that way and I should just ignore her. She's always going on about her hard life (her husband divorced her, she seldom hears from her adult children, her youngest child was taken from her right after birth by DFACS--don't know why) and badmouthing everybody. Not only do I hate being a cleaner, I also feel like a prisoner in my own home! I pray and cry nearly every night, begging God to help me and get this woman out of my life. She once told me that my husband said he had been attracted to other women and that she said, "If he's talked about it, he's done it!" My husband and I have had our problems, but I do not believe he would do such a thing. He works 3 part-time jobs and is also trying to start an online affiliate marketing business.

I want to be a professional genealogist because it is a line of work that is done by many elderly people, and it looks like I will have to be doing some kind of work for the rest of my life, as our savings are nearly gone. I am on Social Security disability (for carpal tunnel syndrome. Can you get additional payments for secondary conditions?), and my husband will turn 65 early next year and become eligible for Medicare, then a year later for his Social Security. Our savings have been depleted over several years in desperate attempts to stave off foreclosure on our house. We owe on several credit cards and cannot pay them, so our credit is shot. Then I had to have major dental work (teeth extractions and dentures). So I am thinking that if I will have to work for the rest of my life, I would much rather be doing work that I love rather than work that I hate, work that is also less physically demanding.
But this woman seems to think that my portion is to be a cleaning lady working with her until I literally drop. At the prospect, I want to die. And she doesn't seem eager to move out, either. In less than a year, my daughter will be (hopefully) heading off to college. Oh, what on earth can I do? I've thought about going back to our counseling center, but my husband doesn't want me to. No psych meds! Doctors are shills for the pharmaceutical companies! He is convinced that the answer to any mental problem is lots of supplements, treatment of thyroid deficiency (mine has been removed and I'm on thyroid replacement therapy; he's convinced that the dosages aren't right and keeps threatening to come along when I have my appointments with my endocrinologist and give her a piece of his mind), and having lots and lots of faith. (He swears by this guy on TV named Doug Kaufman.) I hardly know who to trust anymore. I'm beginning to think that this woman is taking over my life, undermining my marriage, undermining my family, but I know it sounds like I'm paranoid. I've started having panic attacks and nearly fainted once a couple of weeks ago. I suspect I may be headed to another nervous breakdown, and I'm almost tempted to let myself go into one because at least if I'm hospitalized I won't have to do those cleaning jobs and with luck I'll be fired! But then I tell myself, if I'm hospitalized my daughter and husband will be at the mercy of this woman. I cry and pray every night, begging the Lord to help me, to do something, anything. I know I should be grateful to have a job, and they really don't take a whole lot of time, but for some reason I can't fathom I consider my situation to be intolerable. I fear that this woman is trying to control me. When I say anything of that nature to my husband, he belittles my concerns and tells me I'm making too much of it. Am I? Is this my mental illness (whatever it is) speaking? Any comments?

Thanks