What do you do to support yourself?

[theoddz]

I'm a Registered Respiratory Therapist and have been so for over 20 years now. Nearly 15 of those years I have spent working in federal civil service, specifically the DoD (Department of Defense, both military and civilian) and the Dept. of Veterans Affairs. I am also "medically retired" from the U.S. Marine Corps, so I receive a nice pension check and full retirement benefits from the VA and military. I'm lucky enough that my health has held out and I've been able to keep working full time for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, but my status as a Disabled Veteran affords me a lot of protections and security that others don't have. I'm thankful for that, because it's leveled the playing field so that I can continue to work and maintain a productive life. I'd go absolutely insane if I couldn't work at something, even if it were to just be volunteer work. I have this silly little fantasy of working as a part time projectionist at a local movie house, just so I could see all of the new movies for free!!!

I do some other things, too, and they're mostly work-related. I'm both a Shift Leader and Clinical Preceptor for the U.S. Air Force's Phase II Cardiopulmonary training program at Nellis Air Force Base. I'm also a Union Steward for our local AFGE Union (American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO), and I have been trained to specialize in representing the GLBTQ workforce in my local VA system. It's something I'm pretty proud of and very happy to do.

The past couple of years have seen me have to have both knees replaced, so I'm starting to feel the effects of having artificial joints, multiple medical problems and just plain ol' getting older. My hope is to finish the next five years as best as I can, then take a 20 year disability retirement from federal civil service. I've purposely avoided going headlong into debt, but I've also had the income, and the good fortune, to not have had to rely on credit in the past years. My only debt now is my mortgage and monthly living expenses, so when the next 5 years are up and I've got a nice financial cushion in the bank, I should be able to survive very, very nicely for the rest of my life.

Now, I am a *severe* Capricorn......a December Cappy, to be specific. I'm tight, tight TIGHT T-I-G-H-T and very, very good with money. Tabs can tell you how I am!!! It's both my worst fault and my finest blessing, so take that as you will. I was raised by Great Depression era parents, so I come honestly by my penny pinching ways and tight nature. Mother drilled into me, "There's no feeling more secure than that of having money in the bank." She should know. She's the Queen of Tightwads......and proud of it!!!! She taught me well, too. I am different from Mother, though, in that there are things that I do spend money on. Spending money on Myron, my pet frog, is one of my guilty pleasures. Before I buy anything, though, I always check myself with "Do I (or does Myron) really REALLY need this??". Many times, I have put whatever it was back on the shelf, remembering how satisfied I am with my financial affairs and the money in my wallet. I buy what I need, mind you, but I always consider how badly I need something.....and if I REALLY need it, because there's a biggo difference between "need" and "want". One of the few points of misery in my life has been that of "buyer's remorse" whenever I've bought something that I could well afford, but then missed the money I paid out for it more.

Gimme a rock.....I'll scratch a living off of it.

I salute every single one of us who is out there pitching and scraping to make a living in whatever we all have chosen to do....or wound up doing.

~Theo~

[Martina]

i am a teacher who lives in a very expensive area. Last year and the year before, i worked extra jobs -- lots of them. The budget cuts have meant that i only have one small extra job this year. Then HR screwed me over in two different ways. As a result i have to move to less expensive digs in a little over a month. i am looking forward to the move, but it's stress on top of stress. And i am a little worried about my cats adjusting. But there is no choice.

i need to do a lot of the things people here are doing -- like cook ahead for the week and pack lunches more regularly.

i have no talents and can't sell anything. i just work. In the past -- i worked a LOT. i probably am going to teach summer school again, and i will be very lucky to get it if i do. Lots of teachers want it and can't get it. But i wish i had the summer off.

[Oiler41]

I was working a consulting job in the refining industry for a couple of years; I knew it was a matter of time situation going in to it; what I didn't count on was the economy turning South at the end of it, and that my post consulting job situation was going to be much different (albeit much, much better) than what I thought it was going to be. I thought I was going to return to the company I was with when I took the consulting job, but that didn't work out.

I stayed in LA job hunting for a while and living on unemployment. I made good money consulting, but wound up not having much to show for it for several reasons that I'll skip. Anyway, after nine months of looking for work in California, I gave up. I'd met the love of my life in February (although I didn't know it for sure at the time) but in September, I did know. I was still unemployed and in order for us to work things out, we needed to be living closer together so, I left California and moved to Texas. After four months of job hunting here, and after a total of one year and six days of being unemployed and playing in between job hunting, I recently started a new job as an industrial Health, Safety and Environmental Manager for a manufacturing plant in here Texas.

If someone had told me twenty years ago that in 2009, I was going to take a year off of work, and still manage to be okay financially, I would have found that to be quite amusing. I had not been out of a job since 1983 prior to all of this. This economic downturn has been, and remains pretty tough for a lot of people. I was lucky that I had my unemployment and my rental house income to get me through. I'm indeed lucky that it worked out for me. I know many others have not been so fortunate. I've learned a great many lessons through this. I hope things improve soon, especially for you California folks. That place is an economic train wreck!

Glynn

Glynn

[BullDog]

I make most of my money from freelance writing- most of it is website content. I also work part time in the sales department for the Oregon Symphony. Then there is my little internet empire- I make some money from affiliate sales and Adsense. It is growing slowly but surely. I just registered 50 new domain names this week, so I have 50 new websites to build.

[Hack]

I work in public relations and communications. I also do a lot of freelance political communictions works in Michigan mostly.

[WolfyOne]

When R and I both lost our jobs in the podunk town we lived in, we decided to give plasma at the blood bank in a neighboring town. Between the two of us giving, it paid for the cats we were feeding inside and outside at the time. Heck, it even bought flea medicine for all of them. Our country vet taught us how to dose down all our cats from a large dog dose of Frontline. We were able to dose 8 cats from one of those dog doses. If we did the blood bank twice a week, we'd average an extra $200 a month each.