A source of continuous stress in our house is money. Stephanie gets more stressed about it than I do, but overall it just creates a lot of ugly feelings.
I've been working for myself now for about nine months, and the truth is that we're spending way more than I'm making right now. The biggest problem is that ad revenue is seasonal, and this is not the good season. Related to that is the fact that various taxes are due at the end of the quarter. That's no fun at all.
I decided I'm going to look for a contract job, hopefully something short-term. I wish more than anything that I didn't have to, but oh well, that's what being an adult is. I guess the most annoying thing is that there's a lot of cash later in the year from book royalties and improved ad revenue, but that's not going to help me right now.
BTDT
The problem when going from a two income family to a one income family is the amount of cutbacks that are required. Generally those cutbacks include eating out and non-essentials. This means I have to cook most every meal which is a royal pain in the ass on the days I end up working late or am the most stressed.
No buying new clothes to replace worn out or out of style clothing. No "dates" to movies, and cutting back (r cutting out) on other fun stuff, which in my case are coaster events and trips to CP--even with a season pass, there is still the cost of gas.
When one sees all of the money going towards bills, and credit card balances are getting higher and higher, it's easy to get stressed, and sadly, to feel resentful. I deal with that daily.
On the other hand, Gordon is doing something he absolutely loves now. His stress levels have dropped dramatically, so even though his paycheck is small, the mood change has helped a great deal.
I guess it comes down to who can best handle the stress. In our case, it's me.
Amen to that last comment. My wife and I are starting to spend more than we should, but it's just that we've become too accustomed to living well - two vacations a year, staying at the Westin instead of Ramada, eating out 4-5 times a week, buying what we want when we want it.
I'm just now realizing that it's only going to get worse, unless one of us gets a major promotion (not going to happen), new job (unlikely) or wins the lottery (lol).