Thoughts That Keep Me Up at Night

Sometimes I stay up at night thinking about all the things I've got to do the next day or later in the week. Sometimes my thoughts are just a giant pile of horrible that start off like this . . .

My student loan payments started off at $1161.06 a month. On an income based repayment plan loan payments are limed to 15% of my discretionary income. To make a $1161.06 a month payment payment on a income based repayment plan we would have to make $9033.40 a month, or $108,400.80 a year. I am unemployed right now and the job market in my field continues to be in the tank.

So Hubs and I would like to buy a home one day. According to Mint lenders generally won't give a mortgage if the payment will be greater than 28% of your gross monthly income. And they look at your other debt payments and combined with the mortgage payment they don't want those to be greater than 36%. Most lenders prefer you to have a 20% downpayment. In order to buy a house we'll have to save up an extra $10,000 to $40,000. And we'll have to have a combined income of $94,000 to $84,000 by the time we have all that saved up. And that just seems so impossible. I still can't find a job and if I don't find a job soon start my own practice and will likely have no income for year.

I want to have children, hopefully four about two years apart. If we wait another year it will be too late to have as many children as I want to have since I've always been told your ability to have healthy children decreases dramatically after 35. I want a job and want to buy a bigger place before we start having children. Neither of those things look like they'll happen.

And yesterday Hubs came home and said he'd like to quit his job. I don't want him to suffer at a job that isn't what he wanted so I'm supporting him. It wouldn't be as bad as I initially imagined. We'd still be able to pay rent for our apartment buy food if we both worked minimum wage jobs. But we wouldn't be able to afford anything else, like car insurance. Also, health insurance and all my allergy shots!

I also think about the job interviews I've gone to in the past year and I just want to know why no one has picked me yet. What am I doing wrong? What have I done wrong? I can't figure it out.

After thinking about all this I can't help but think about all the things I should have done differently in my life. . .

I went to school and I went to school for a long time. I had incredibly mediocre grades the whole while. If I had better grades I would have a job an a house now. I was so irresponsible with money. I shouldn't have taken out so much in student loans or I should have worked on paying them back while still in school. I shouldn't have even gone to law school--I could have gone to medical school for free but I choose law school because it was faster and easier and I hate touching people. I should have checked out the Bureau of Labor Statistics while in college and chosen a major based in part on which professions were expected to experience growth instead of majoring in History. I should have gone to a bigger school so that my major was more career oriented.

It all just makes me feel so frustrated and stupid. I can see all the mistakes I make and I get so angry at myself for being stupid I also get frustrated when I waste my time thinking about how I could have done things differently because I'm just wasting the time I have now. Sometimes I am sad about being off track and sometimes I get angry at my little pity party because I know so many others have it worse and they're making the most of their lives and getting plenty of sleep each night.

Some nights I'm still thinking hours after Hubs has fallen asleep and I just can't stop. So I'll read under the covers until I fall asleep just to keep myself from thinking about how it feels like my life is totally out of control and off track.