Worrying constantly

[workiskillingme]

Anyone worry every waking minute of the day? My mind is constantly turning over wondering how we are going to keep going. A holiday is utterly out of the question but just simple things like a new sofa (the bloody cat has destroyed ours) and being able to fix the crumbling front door and give the house a lick of paint is really worrying me

The sofa, although tatty if the cat has clawed it, is presumably still functional. Put a throw on it.
Paint isn’t essential.
Prioritise the front door for security and draught proofing.

25 years ago when DH & I moved in together, we lived with cardboard on the floor because we couldn’t afford carpet, and went to bed wearing our dressing gowns and woolly hats because we didn’t have central heating! We also had missing kitchen cupboard doors on the kitchen in our second house & our last sofa was off Facebook market place.

Its horrible to be worrying so much, but maybe listing your priority spends will help you see that there are things you don’t need to spend money on, so don’t waste time and energy worrying. Things will get better, it is just going take a little while.

OP both of my cats destroyed my sofa too but I can still sit on it, just looks a bit tatty.
It's one thing I'm not worrying about atm. 😉

When do you think it will get better please? I am desperate for optimism here but the experts I hear (on my admittedly algorithm filtered sites) seem to say it's worse now than in living memory. Not because of conditions right now, but because of lack of bounce-back-ability. The never ending prospect of this is the worrying part for me.

There’s no point in worrying it’s not going to change anything
All you can do is either increase income or decrease outgoings. You could pick up a free sofa on Facebook or freecycle. Holidays could be shorter cheaper breaks when there’s an offer on
Paint is only expensive if you want fancy colours. There are repaint projects that sell unwanted paint cheap. New white or magnolia is £30 for 10 litres

I would if you can put a little money into a savings account to buy these things when times are better , just knowing you have the money there and you are choosing to wait and buy them when you feel secure.

Look for free sofas on marketplace- they come up frequently.

Similarly if you put a post up asking for any leftover paint for a project you'd have all sorts of offers from 'we have 2 tins of this nice olive green paint you can have as my partner decided it didn't go with the furniture after the first coat and we couldn't return it' to 'just clearing out my Nans garage and have 5 unused white paint tubs you're welcome to' etc etc

There are ways to do things frugally and its helping others out often too, or you can pass on the gestures of others when times are better.

The Sun £9.50 holidays can be great for a getaway for a few days if you do your research and find a nice quiet spot.

I got a fitted sofa cover on Shein for £15 that has really transformed my tatty stained old sofa. Not really the point of your post I know but a sofa cover might be a cheap solution for that problem.

@shivawn could you link the cover please - that sounds like what I'm looking for

I got a brown one to try and camouflage my dogs hairs a bit but I know that won't be to everyone's tastes. There's loads of different colours and patterns there if you do a search. Be sure to click on the coupons button at checkout, they have a good coupon at the moment - 30% off if you spend over £30 and it's free shipping.

This is the one I got - m.shein.co.uk/1pc-Solid-Stretchy-Sofa-Slipcover-p-10985497-cat-3495.html?scici=Search~~EditSearch~~1~~Sofa%20cover~~~~0&src_module=search&src_identifier=st%3D2%60sc%3DSofa%20cover%60sr%3D0%60ps%3D0&src_tab_page_id=page_pre_search1676207328578&main_attr=27_334&mallCode=1

that's great thanks so much @shivawn

Not trying to be a pain the arse just trying to look at things differently (having lived in relative poverty for years myself) although it’s shit and depressing, you might not be as badly off as you think.

I think most people are concerned about warmth, food and heat. Not sofas being tatty or painting doors or a holiday. These things would be nice but aren’t essential for life.

So perhaps you could reassure yourself that things aren’t as bad as you fear and that your time will come.

Perhaps s new job or promotion could happen in the future. There could be things in the tenner a day thread (is that it’s name) that might help.

You deserve to be happy. We all do. I hope things improve for you.