I Had to Leave My Groceries at the Store

Monday Money Check-In: Nov. 20, 2017

Published in

Fuck Off Funding

3 min readNov 21, 2017

Friday: I pull out the $100 I’m supposed to use for the week. Then I start to have a bad day. I’d lost my anti-anxiety medication three days before, and it rushes over me, that emotional hallucination, that uncomfortable feeling. It sends me running: to social media for distraction, to sweets for comfort, to spending. If anxiety disorder is having a deficiency of certain drugs in your brain, I found myself doing all the things I could to bump up the dopamine.

After a panicked day (how did I ever live like that, before?) I took myself to the cheap happy hour at Momiji. I sat alone and read a book and drank an old fashioned, and it was fucking lovely. But then it was $40.

The next morning, still jet lagged from Nigeria, I was up at 5. At Cafe Solstice at 6:30 when they turned the lights on. Since I was up early, I deserved a latte, and a scone. Then, since I worked there for six hours, I deserved a lunch.

Then my friend asked if I wanted to go out. Two $12 cocktails, some almonds, then tacos. By Sunday morning, the $100 that was supposed to last me until Friday was gone. So then I go to the debit card…

Almond Milk, Frozen Blueberries, and a Shame Spiral

This morning, again awake ass early, I went to 6:15 yoga then trotted over to the QFC to pick up ingredients for a smoothie. Then the card machine honked at me. I quickly looked at my account. I had $98 in my business account, and -$88 in my personal checking. I’d gotten a $25 NSF fee overnight, because some automatic payment, which should not be surprises, went through. Because I’m me, I can’t find my business debit card right now. If I transferred over the money, I would have had less than the $13 I needed to get my groceries.

“I…” I stammered. “I’m sorry, I can’t buy these.”

“It’s ok,” said the cashier, taking my bag and putting it aside.

I walked out, waiting for the shame spiral. Because here I was as a kid, all eyes behind us on my mom as she tried to pay, as we, as a family, left behind a cart of groceries. As we walked out, all the moms behind us in line followed us with bells, ringing “Shame…shame… shame…”

“What if,” Amanda Clayman asks me, “you didn’t hate yourself when you mess up?”

So I worked on that.

Isn’t it interesting that as soon as I get money, I feel almost as if I have to spend it all. Isn’t it interesting that I spend money like a freight train until it’s gone. Isn’t it interesting that I almost seem more comfortable with zero than with anything. Hmmm.