I am a single mother of two who is a teacher. I work in an urban school. I split my time and money between my kids at home and my kids at school, mostly on incentive prizes and skill building activities. My school district provides some programs, but for the students who cannot stay after school because they work or babysit, I try to fill the gap. As a teacher, I am subject to the irregularities of contracts. I do not always get a raise at the end of the year. It is hard to fill that gap some years.
My sons and I live in a one bedroom apartment. The boys have the privacy of the room and I use a made over dinning room with a make shift door. It is becoming harder and harder to make ends meet, especially since their father abandoned us and does not pay child support. We have not been able to find his place of residence for three years and he refuses to maintain a regular paying job in order to continue not paying it. We are on the edge of loosing the car I need to get to work. We would like to get a small house or at least a two bed room apartment and would like to clear up my debt to start off in a better position. I am also currently in grad school trying to improve our situation through education and education based pay raises. It is a better guarantee than waiting for the contracts which sometimes take years to approve.
I am interested in grants or loans, preferable grants that can help me make things better for my boys. For instance, I need ~$1,000 to pay for my next grad class asap and I am behind in my bills. I just spent my entire tax refund on a bill incurred by my ex, but that I was listed as a back up payment source. Things are geting so tight here that I have had to take two days off of work in the last month just to be able to pay for gas for the next week (4 days in, 1 day off to stretch out supplies and money). We need help if anyone would be willing to give us temporary help or point us in the direction of aid that is not going to take 60% of what is made to pay for evening babysitting.
