To think the rich/poor divide is so unfair

Some people are born more privileged than others but you can break the cycle.

do you have children? If so how are you helping them not get into the same position as you?

There are several jobs where you don’t need any initial qualifications and can work your way up.

look at working for a big international organisation they will often pay for people’s qualifications if you are good enough at your job.

at 39 you still have almost 30 years of work
ahead of you. You can absolutely turn things round for yourself

@Mooshamoo

Links below

it is not too late to make dramatic changes

commit to getting into education - links below - this can be being a student or studying while you work

All the stuff about you doubting yourself - you can only fix it by doing it - so focus I getting things moving. You are clearly very bright. Once you are in education you will have access to counselling services, but primarily you just have to do it.

also go to your library and borrow copies of overcoming low self esteem and feel the fear and do it anyway

Go to this site and it tells you about grants and how to keep your benefits - you need to talk to specialists about this, not the job centre, but it looks possible to me

https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/education/third-level-education/fees-and-supports-for-third-level-education/grants-for-mature-students/#:~:text=You%20can%20make%20a%20student,applying%20for%20a%20college%20place.

If you need advice talk to this lot
www.maturestudents.ie/

More references here
https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/education/third-level-education/fees-and-supports-for-third-level-education/grants-for-mature-students/#:~:text=You%20can%20make%20a%20student,applying%20for%20a%20college%20place.

https://www.creditunion.ie/blog/mature-student-grants-and-supports/

You don't know that other people (whatever their background) have "no worries or stress at all".

My parents were born into council estate lives. Not abusive or those sorts of hardships, but poverty.
Rather than socialise, they'd hit the books, rather than waste time they decided to work.

They're both now educated and earn well.

I think 'many' choose a life of poverty because many chose a life of fun, drinking, socialising and prioritised this over education and hard work.

Not all, but most...

OP, I told you this on another one of your threads and you bit my head off, but it bears repeating:

You really, really, really would benefit from therapy to help you with your childhood trauma and your self-esteem. If you want to turn your life around, and you're of course still young enough to do it at 39, therapy would be a great place to start to remove those harmful core beliefs about yourself.

Yep, OP my childhood and life has been similar.

You’ll always get some tosser making you feel worse though by telling you you should have worked harder! You should work harder now!

They have no idea what it’s like and how it shapes you to grow up in crap circumstances. All my resilience was depleted by young adolescence, life from a young age was just about getting though that day. I didn’t have the energy or brain space to think about the future or have goals or hopes.

My parents were fairly well off , but they sucked as parent. While I was never hungry or cold or whatever I had abuse and neglect so I was a total fuck up .

We're nowhere near as well off, DD doesn't have all the opportunities or comforts she should (1 bed flat for example ) but she is loved ,supported,secured and encouraged to do well and be the best person she can be. As a result , she's already achieved 10 times more than I ever did and she's a much better kid than I ever was. That might change in the future, but I hope she always feels loved and safe at least.

Life is unfair.

I will say though that I grew up in poverty. Drug addict father, emotionally unavailable mother who I've not been on speaking terms since 19. She made me leave home at 18.

No support with education and remember being in the last year of high school and everyone talking about college. I genuinely remember thinking 'how come I've not got a college place like everyone else'. It's because we hadn't been to any open evenings and hadn't applied!

I struggled for years through my early twenties in crap jobs and did some temporary work. It was there one of the bosses (accountant) saw something in me and took me under their wing. I then went on to do accountancy qualifications (paid for by work) and I found my way out of my rut.

This was through hard work and dedication and most importantly turning up, not just physically but mentally.

I now do well for myself and have met a wonderful man and we have a great, comfortable life together.

Life is a combination of chance, luck, hard work, stress, doing things you don't like, doing things you do like, privilege, confidence. It's a real rollercoaster. Some people have the tools to ride it, some people don't.

luck of birth is unfair. Some people have opportunities others don’t.

But I think the type of parents we have are the biggest lottery. I grew up like you. Poor, mum had mental health issues. Mum would go to bed when me and dbro did because she could afford to heat the house. We would often sleep all together to keep warm. She went without meals. We often had time where there wasn’t a meal at all.

I was determined my kids wouldn’t grow up the same. That included making the decision to leave the kids Dad when he had a mental breakdown and got us into a load of debt.

I didn’t get the chance to travel abroad and work. That’s a great opportunity and learning experience you had. I couldn’t go to uni. I needed to work.

There’s been luck along the way. I had an incredible boss for 3 years who really mentored me and spurred my career on. But on the other hand, he managed other people and would have mentored and they didn’t take the opportunity. So partially luck. But partially that I took opportunities given. I still have imposter syndrome now.

I have worked hard. That doesn’t mean many people work hard and don’t get where I have, they do. Dp works very hard but earn less than me. That doesn’t mean I don’t also work hard. I went to therapy. I put in the work.

But what spurs me on is what to want to give my kids. Dd is at uni, she has a job. But I also give her money so she can study and not have to work as many hours as she can. She can enjoy uni, but it’s not just handed to her. I made sure she had that opportunity if she wanted it. And will do the same for ds.

Having a crap start is crap. But nothing changes if we don’t start changing it. And yes you have time to still change your life at 39. But you have to do it. No one does it for you.

Agree OP it's utterly unfair and unacceptable that society is structured to perpetuate this.
Why is it that people who are comfortable are not unanimously in agreement about the unfairness of it? How can the wealthy complain about taxes to support those who struggle so much with life's basics? Baffling. I find greed and pulling the ladder up behind yourself disgusting. This government fleecing taxes for their own personal greed is criminal

I haven't read the full thread, but if you are in Ireland, have you looked into courses available through Springboard? They are free for those on jobseekers, or a nominal payment for most others in employment.

Absolutely. I am privately educated and a LOT of my friends came from very unstable backgrounds with lots of trauma. Wealth is not a panacea.

Is there anything that you have enjoyed doing since a young age ?

Don't wish to be harsh OP but the only one that can change things is you . No one else is going to. If you can't change certain things you just have to make the most of what you have . Look after yourself because no one else is going to . I wish you luck and happiness but ultimately you will have to make it . I learned the hard way .

Your last sentence is the key. It wasn’t that I had the confidence to change my life, it was that no one else was going to do it for me so I HAD to.

OP, if you don’t believe you can have a successful life (however you choose to measure success) then no one else will and it simply won’t happen.

This is why I believe in Grammar schools . I grew up on a large council estate and I saw what happened to the kids that went to Grammar schools . Most went on to have professional careers . Education is so important. Without at least Five good GCSE's that include Maths and English you can kiss goodbye a decent job unless you know the right people. Yes there are exceptions to the rule .

I'm not sure it's the poverty per se, but the emotional stuff you've had to deal with that went with it. I was in a very similar poverty boat growing up. There seem to be people out there who grow up in poverty but are able to get past it and when you dig a little deeper, they had emotional support and access to opportunities even though the family were poor. Coming from a family who suffer from poverty of ambition and poverty of imagination as well as poverty of cold hard cash, even though just having no money was a complete nightmare in and of itself., can be very hard to get past. You don't have any firm ground to stand on. Fake it til you make it is all well and good, but that attitude can be easily derailed with a background like the one you're describing.

But, as others have pointed out, you do have agency and can take steps to change things. Jettisoning the past instead of dragging it around with you like Marley's chains might help you move forward, with the help of some counselling. I'm about to start on a similar path myself. Wishing you the best of luck.

I grew up in difficult circumstances, stepfather was an alcoholic and my Mother probably was as well. A very violent household. I left my hometown and got an education. I get what you mean about the psychological blocks my siblings remain in that cycle. I pulled away from my family. I didn’t go full NC or make any sort of declaration I just lived hundreds of miles away. DH reckons that as I had a different Father his genetics gave me the boost, well it’s the eternal nature versus nature debate so who knows. I ended up working in higher education for close to 30 years and have had a very different life to my siblings. I had some therapy in my late twenties and that most definitely helped. I could have gone down the road my sisters did but I had a Saturday job in a public library when I was in sixth form and they showed me a very different world. I also had a very inspirational teacher, he told us every single person had something they could give to the world, they just needed to find out what it is, lovely man. He must be dead by now as I’m close to 60 but I would love to have shaken his hand and thanked him.

Children need role models, mine were just not from within my family.

I agree with a PP who says you're mixing two issues.

I 100% agree that there are a lot of things that are unfair in the world and I feel so sorry for those with talent and drive that are born into difficult circumstances. I also hate that we live in a civilised society where people like nurses and midwives etc are in a position to need to use foodbanks etc.

But...
It just feels like being trapped in a cycle of poverty and suffering that's not fair and there is no way out.

Whilst you need a hefty dose of luck (or at least not continued bad luck) - there are often ways out. I'm currently doing trauma counselling for a bunch of stuff from my childhood. I had a crappy time of it but got lucky and moved to live with my stepfather and grandmother aged 11 and then met DH at the age of 16. If I hadn't met him I honestly wouldn't still be here and he's kept me on the straight and narrow ever since. Now I'm in a highly successful career, two beautiful kids and a wonderful DH in a happy marriage. But I've got a tonne of baggage which I'm working through from childhood. I was still very privileged in some respects, always had a roof over my head and was fed and clothed. But I have experienced loan sharks at the front door, hiding behind the sofa and being told to remain silent so they couldn't see us through the window, child abuse, domestic abuse, seeing a parent self-harming etc.

It's certainly possible that you don't have the correct role models around you right now, or at the very least don't realise you do. By the sounds of what you've written your role models are either 'like you' and also 'stuck where they are' or they're 'not like you' and they're 'successful'. When I look around I don't tend to see women 'like me', ie. that I identify with, in positions of power. But I intend to be that woman and increase the diversity of thought/background through doing it.

In the meantime:

• You can do self-help courses around motivation, public speaking, the art of being persuasive etc. Disadvantaged backgrounds tend to be limited by emotional intelligence, self-awareness and an understanding of how to present yourself in a way that will be well perceived. All of these are skills that can be learnt and that honestly end up making the most difference in terms of making positive changes than most qualifications do. You are an adult and have access to the internet, so you have access to everything you need to change your circumstances.
• You can go for a promotion at work
• You can do additional qualifications (if you need them to access a particular job)
• You can look at the lateral moves that help you to progress towards where you'd be happier
• You can get yourself waitlisted for counselling/CBT which may help start to work through your issues

You’re conflating rich parents with loving and caring parents.

Agree with this

Life is uncertain and it is much more complex than just rich or poor.

Many many examples of kids from "poor" families doing ok, and those from better off families struggling when the bank of mum and dad gets withdrawn and they have no work ethic or values to fall back on.

I think there’s a difference between being raised poor and being raised by irresponsible parents.
Being raised poor 100% must be an awful life but you can still have 2 loving parents and not suffer abuse. Same way you can be raised by 2 wealthy parents but never know unconditional love from them.

Read overcoming low self esteem. It’s essentially do it yourself cbt and it’s on the nhs recommended reading list