I really feel like I've fucked my life up

[Sandyshore]

Brief history, married young, 3DC, same stupid story of SAHM so ex could build his business, intending on going back to work when DC were at school. Until the day when DH walked out after an affair and I realised how fucking stupid and naive I'd been. I was so poor, literally breadline poor, debts in my name, 3 kids to look after, no work history or further education. Just a bloody big mess really.

So I made some changes, went to college and did my access course, paid my debts off little by little and applied for uni. Still as poor as ever but felt like I was getting somewhere on my own, the first time in my life I didn't rely on a man to support me.

Just before college I met now current DP. We'd been together for a year and a half when I started uni and on the day I went to enrol ....positive pregnancy test. It was like my worst nightmare. I'd just got out of all the baby stuff, youngest was at school, I was finally starting uni and I was pregnant again. DP had no children and I loved him. I didn't want to have an abortion as I knew in future he would want a child of his own, it was do or die for Th relationship really so I went ahead with the pregnancy.

I managed 8 months of my first year before I had to drop out as DD was born.

So here I am today, 4DC, still no job or education. Relying on a man who could walk out at any moment to support me.

When DP moved in I obviously came off all benefits so he supports the household. I get basic maintenance from ex and a small amount of CB as DP is a high earner. Which is fine as long as we are together.

And I feel like shit. Like I've done nothing with my life but look after kids so men can go out and get themselves a career.

DP is generous but I still feel like I'm going cap in hand to him everytime I need some money. He pays the bills at the beginning of the month and then any money I need I have to ask for. He won't add me on his account as I have bad credit from before and he doesn't want to be financially tied to me on paper. He wouldn't and hadn't ever said no to giving me money. Card details are stored on the laptop so I can food shop. He'll ask me each day if I need his bank card that day and leave it with me.

But it's shit you know? At 35 to have to say oh can you leave the car because I'd like a new top or some diesel etc.

And I have this nagging feeling like I've royally fucked up my life, saddled myself with another baby (who is lovely etc etc), still not achieved anything and am dependent on a man for everything.

And he still has his life, he goes out regularly to the gym and sports and night out and I feel like crap asking him to watch all 4 DC so I can go out because he gets stressed with them messing around and I feel guilty about it and 4DC is hard work I made my bed etc etc.

I've been applying for jobs recently and haven't got one interview yet. Real entry level stuff but nothing. And I've wasted my potential, I got all distinctions at college and all my essays at Uni were over 70%. But I'm still sat here wiping bums and picking up toys which I've been doing for 12 years and bollocks to anyone who says there is real long term value in that because there isn't. If there was then men would bloody do it.

I've been an utter fool letting myself get back in this situation and I can't see a way out. I can't go back to uni as I won't get funding. I can't get a job because I have fuck all experience.

Feel like my life is one big mess.

You could also look at the University of London's International Programmes. I don't know if you can get any funding for them, but you pay only a fee per year (about £400) and then you pay per module that you take (about £200) so for a whole degree, they come out cheap compared to other options.

Haven't read all the replies, sorry, but have read your posts.

I'm 41, over the last 2 years my whole life changed.
I was in the RAF, doing really well as an aircraft engineer - joined in 1995.
I was married with 2 boys.

2 years ago I was diagnosed with Crohns and needed emergency bowel surgery; soon after I was officially diagnosed as being bi-polar; these 2 conditions led to me being medically discharged from the RAF after 20 years service.
Just before my discharge date last year, I discovered my husbands long term affair.
We split up - but we lived in a forces married quarter so I also lost my right to carry on living in my home.

So, in the space of 2 years I've lost my well paid career, my marriage, my home & my health.

This was the catalyst for me to sit down and completely replan my life, start over from scratch as 41 isn't really very old at all these days.

In September I start at uni, I'm doing a combined degree in Psychology & Sociology - I couldn't give a toss if they're 'soft' degrees or anything like that, I chose them purely because I want to learn about those things - purely interest.
I've literally no idea what I'll use them for, but they're bits of paper that may be of use in my future.

Whilst you are a student, you'll get a reduction in council tax & will be able to get a loan to cover fees, also possibly help with childcare costs etc.

If you really want to study, then do it.

Lots of luck & love to you, you're not too old & you've not wasted your life

And the tax payer gets to fund this little ego-boosting jaunt for you because it's highly unlikely you'll be paying much of it back.

Hahaha!!!

What a crock of shit.

We'll be working until 67 at least - many of us older students have paid a shit load of tax over the 20+ years we've already worked for.

That post was the biggest load of bollocks I've read in a while.

I've enough time left to have another 20 yr career and some more to spare.

Doing a degree out of interest is one thing, but if you want a career out of it, then you need to think wisely.

I know someone who did a degree in women's studies. Might well be interesting but it's not going to be valued by many employers and she soon found that out.

Hope you're feeling a bit more positive today OP.
Lots of useful advice posted on here, I will be looking into some of these myself!
We can do it ;) x

I'm feeling so much more positive! Everything just looked so bleak last night, that awful witching hour where you go over every mistake you've made in your life. I appreciate all the replies especially the poster who mentioned that they had done the whole career but no family thing. I know I'm very lucky to have 4 healthy DC and to have found a partner to take on 3DC that aren't his.

I was just settling down to do some research and the school phoned to say DD was ill and could I collect her. Baby steps baby steps!

You are still young. I'm sure your dcs won't think you're wasting your time being their mum! I know how you feel as I want to change career but it's so expensive to retrain and the money goes on dcs. Your dd will be at school in four years time? You'll still be in your 30s. Not long to wait.
Being a mum is a really important job.

I'm not blaming you personally for taking advantage of the system as it stands but the system is very very flawed indeed and I wish to God it would change

You want it to change? Currently students have to get 10s of thousands of pounds into debt in order to get an education.

What are you talking about? Have a word with yourself. You got the good life in terms of state handouts ffs! (That's not to you OP).

OP you can make changes. Your dp sounds horrible quite frankly. He has you well and truely under the thumb! Can you get back to basics and think about a) what you want and b) how to get there?
Then think about jobs to apply for etc

I totally get your desire to be independent - you are not even married which although I despise, in your situation would give you more protection.

In your position, I think I would set up a home business. Hey, maybe even a cleaning firm (I don't mean that to be rude but more of a play on what your DCs said)

There is one massive protection there in that if your DP fucks off (hope he doesn't but hope won't stop it) then you will be entitled to Working Tax Credit immediately and you will most certainly survive on that.

Get at least ONE day of full childcare and do the rest in the evenings and weekends.

I think you need to start with a list of what you are good at and enjoy - do you know what you are good at and you enjoy?

You can always get into a new career, but you can't always have DCs when that window has passed you by. You're more than 10 years younger than me and I'm working full time, but studying towards a new career.

There is a lot you can do via distance learning as well you know. Some of those courses require a few days a year physical attendance, but in the meanwhile you could do short cheaper online courses for knowledge and to add to your CV.

I do have some qualifications, GCSEs A-C, NVQ level 2 in business admin and my access course which I finished with 40 credits at distinction.

I'm loathe to get married again. DP knows this but would marry me if I changed my mind. If would offer more financial protection but I think what I'm after is to support myself? I've never really had my own money and it leaves you feeling a bit weak and needy to rely on someone else for everything.

I was so grateful when DP came along not just for the financial aspect but for the support of another adult. I'd literally been dirt poor for a few years and feel horrified at ending back up there.

I've thought about cleaning but the industry is saturated here. I occasionally sell stuff on eBay but that's pennies. I do volunteer for the PTA and as a school governor. I had considered volunteering as a magistrate but haven't got any further with that, but it's something that interests me.

Don't underestimate the value of volunteering - school governance in particular is now being acknowledged by employers as leadership level experience.

"We had our chance to access university with a full grant first time around and we chose not to take it. That's our problem, not anyone else's."

Speak for yourself. Many of the mature students I come across are women who did not have the chance or the choice to access university the first time around: because they had been educated at schools which did not prepare them adequately to get A-levels, because they grew up in homes with no tradition of education and had teachers who assumed that they were thick because of where they came from, because they had undiagnosed SN, because they were carers of parents or siblings, because their parents refused to sign the grants form, because they were brought up by abusive parents and shaped by that experience went straight into marriages with abusive husbands. They are often incredibly strong women who add a lot to any courses they enter, and whom it is a privilege to teach.

corythatwas so lovely to read that.

Am also doing a cheerleading dance for cory

That was a great post!

Late 30s and beyond is a great time to make a complete change in direction - you've a whole other 20 yr career in you yet at that age, and the life experience to directly relate learning points to.

So glad to hear that you're feeling more positive. There has been some wonderful advice on here.

Take some time to look through different courses and see what you'd enjoy. Many you can do part-time, even if you didn't want to go through the Open University. Most courses and departments have a team of administrators and advisors who deal with the paperwork and enquiries- if you find something that interests you, you could always email them and ask for advice. Email address is usually on the bottom of the course outline page online. As I mentioned before, there are a lot of graduate schemes that you could then apply for once you have finished your degree and these are usually well advertised once you are in the University environment. As are volunteering opportunities, which as NNchange mentioned, are very valuable.

cory

So very well said, and so very true.

I just wanted to say that my sister spent her young life raising kids, and when they were late teenage she started at uni at age 39. She didn't even have any O levels and no clear idea of what she wanted to do. She was good at drawing and so decided to do an art degree.

Fast forward three years and she's got her degree, and decides to continue and get her master's.

Fast forward another two years, and she is now 44 years old and she gets a job she never contemplated getting when she started out 5 years previously - she starts tutoring in the History of Art at her own university.

By age 50 she is head of department, earning a massive salary. She did that for 15 years.

It's definitely NOT too late for you.

Start by doing a foundation course at OU. That will earn you 60 points towards your degree, then in the 2nd year you can do a part time 30 point course or another full time 60 point course. And you can take all those points with you if you ever manage to go to uni full time. 360 and you get a degree!

I've just signed up for an Open Degree with the OU

Curviest that is a lovely story!

Thanks a lot you bunch of vipers

Well done!
Wishing you all the best xx

Yay! That's excellent news, OP. Well done.

I'm a lecturer, and you would be surprised how often I meet women who feel like you do. The first thing to say is congratulations for overcoming some huge hurdles to get into uni in the first place. The second thing is that you have had significant success at university (consistent 70%+ grades are first class honours level grades, so you have done fantastically well, particularly when you were pregnant). Don't treat this as the end of the line. Go and speak to student support (it will probably be called something cool and trendy like The Hub). They will be able to help find a way to support you to get your degree. Sociology is not a soft degree, and is useful for many careers, including social and family support worker and community development. Look on this time as a hiatus rather than the end of your education - sure, it might take an extra year or two, but in the grand scheme of things, it's nothing.

" if he will support you to get back to uni now (not in X years when it suits his version of family, etc) then it might be easier for you to stick with him a while."
That is a really bad attitude imo. Stick with him till you've got what you want out of the relationship then leave.

I totally get where you're coming from. But I think a lot of us end up in the same boat... I got the qualifications, degree, masters, career etc. Then marriage, kids, part time jobs, being a SAHM happened. Then exH fucked off and I'm in a low wage job in a rented house relying on tax credits, while all my peers from uni etc seem to have beautiful homes, careers and loving husbands.

I'm about to start a pgce... Excited but scared and wondering how I'll handle it as a single parent. Also, if I'm honest, sometimes frustrated at myself that I'm going back to the start, doing a qualification I could have done 10 years ago! But then I look back at my life and my kids and I think I made each decision with the best intentions, and couldn't have done anything differently. Plus, like you I'm mid-30s... Still over 30 years of working life in me yet!

Good luck

Put you big girl pants on take a deep breath and go for it. If you want to do it you will, put all that upset in to it and go for it.