So yeah, yeah, I lost all my clients and all my gigs and they were good ones. They were ones that were rating me high and sending me compliments and stuff. And then they just faded off, just poof. And like I said, I have one. And for me, it was supplemental because I am on disability. But disability alone is not enough. It’s just not enough. It’s not enough. I mean, get serious. When you add up rent, you got rent, car payment, insurance, and then you got doctor bills, you got copays. And you know, you gotta have food, you gotta have gas. And if you have pets, you take care of pets.
Well, my pets are not an option. These dogs keep me alive. And I’m not joking when I say that. If I didn’t have Emily and Ricky. My mental health would tumble so far that it, it would be very dangerous. It’d be very dangerous. I would end up in a very dark place that I couldn’t get out of with these dogs. So they’re unconditional love and giving me a purpose. I get up every day and take care of them and they take care of me. Keeps me alive on my dogs are not an option. So it really ticks me off when people say, oh, but you could get rid of your dogs. Okay, no, why don’t I get rid of my dogs? That’s like throwing your kids away. Like, no, there’s just this does not happening. And I see these posts, I guess it’s like an Arkansas Rescue page or something on Facebook. And all the time on there I’m seeing, well, I’m moving out of state and I can’t take my dog so I gotta rehoming. He’s 5 years old and he’s really sweet and he’ll post a picture and the poor dog loves them. Could you imagine the trauma that dog feels when the owner just gives them up, just walks away? Actually, I can’t imagine that feeling. Actually, I can. I’m not doing it to my dogs if I have to sleep in my car for the rest of my life, I will do it. But my dogs stand with me. They are part of me. They are dedicated to me and I am dedicated to them. Okay, moving on. Sorry, most of the moment there.
Back to schmere cognition then. I’m talking about the main cause of homelessness in America in the. Excuse me, the main cause of the rise in homelessness in America being mental health issues and substance addictions. Come on, Betty. That’s one of the reasons I wanted to document my experience here. I may have mental health issues, but they’re not the. I don’t think they’re the kind that they were talking about on here. My mental health issues mainly pertain to Asperger’s and I have trust issues with basically everyone, including myself. Like my last relationship was what, nine years ago or something like that. I don’t trust myself to be in, to pick someone to be in another relationship with because I thought I did it right this last time. And boy, oh boy, oh boy, did I ever pick such a terrible psychopath.
Narcissus. The whole thing that goes with the. And I can say psychopath because I experience living with him for about four years. And he had no remorse. He didn’t care who they hurt as long as he got what he wanted. He would use you. He would manipulate you with your emotions, whatever. And he did not have any care or concern for anyone else. Still, as classic psychopath, my father was one of those as well, except my father was very violent. He drank and he was very violent. Well, this guy drank and he did get violent. There were times I ended up with bruises, black eyes, missing teeth and stopped that. Yeah, I thought some of that was my fault anyway.
So I do have trust issues. I do realize now that I have some social interaction issues. But that’s, it all kind of comes back to the trust thing, you know, like I’d rather kind of back off and watch and feel out the the fill out the situation.
And I’m very careful about who I give my information too because I’ve had it used against me so many times in my life that I’m very careful about who I give those jewels to. I’ve shared a lot during these videos because I want help other people who are out there like me, especially women who are over 50 or 60, really having a tough time. I wanna give them hope. I wanna tell them don’t give up because there’s, there really is good stuff right around the corner.
We’re gonna go through hills and valleys and hills and everything in between. Like I said, the boots and the mesas and every aspect of the landscape in between, we’re gonna experience in our lives. But when you get down, they’re not gonna stay down forever. Things are gonna come back. I have to remind myself that all the time.