Help Adam with Bills and Debt from a Tough Year

Hey there. Feels really weird putting this out there, as I’m usually pretty outwardly positive and try to some extent to keep a lot of my life private. But I had to realize recently something that I thought I always knew, but I guess never really internalized- That it truly is okay to ask for help.

Oh hold on, I haven’t really introduced myself for those who may not know me that well, my bad. Name’s Adam, Adam McVay!

Been told it’s a “really good stage name” before, but no, that’s really just it. Adam McVay.

That’s me alright. In the flesh! Or- written form, anyway. I’m here today because, admittedly- I do need help.

My bank accounts have run dry, many bills are past due, and my debts are overwhelming any attempts at getting back on track financially.

I’m stuck. And desperately need to escape the cycle of debt and month-to-month meager subsistence where I’m barely able to afford my own important obligations, let alone anything for groceries or paying off debt. Or hell, even to properly save for the taxes I’d owe from each and every individual job.

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Quick Summary if you don’t have the time / energy to read what’s now 11.5 pages of How I Got Here, however I’d highly encourage and would greatly appreciate if you would take the time to give it all a read-

But I completely recognize that not everybody has the time for that.

So here’s the TL;DR.

• I’m an online worker, usually doing freelance Video Editing for various clients

• Got a steady gig just over a year ago, “quit” it after a few months due to a hostile work environment and its conditions not being worth the soon-to-be-docked pay:

• Do have an effective plan for self-sustainability, but need help getting relatively stable again to actually have the time and ability to put it into action

• Have a BFA in Motion Pictures, received in 2022:

• Am disabled in a few "invisible" ways that prevent going out and just getting "any old job:"

• Job market is incredibly stale right now, have been looking for a consistently stable video position for effectively a year

• I'm incredibly good at what I do, but just seem to have had a really bad run of luck for a while. My portfolio's included in my writing here, and screw it, I'll link both of my Reels here as well just to prove my efficacy I suppose, why not:

• I have been working on my own professional projects of cultural artistic analysis, and am going to be promoting them very soon to break into the critical sphere.

• Am in a position where I just need some help to get through this and the next couple months as I:

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Seems like a good time to explain my fundraising goal. It’s a combination of various elements:

MONTHLY COSTS:

Rent & Utilities: $3,412.50 ($1,137.50 x3, includes May, June, and July costs)

Car Insurance: $542 ($300 to get current, $121 each for June and July to get back on my feet)

Groceries: $600 ($200 / mo, paying back my share for May, then June & July)

DEBT :

Monthly Consolidation Payment: $1,350 ($450 x3, May, June, July)

Monthly Student Debt Payments: $495 ($165 x3, May, June, July)

Debt in Collections: $663.10

Back Taxes: $2,150 (including taxes reliant on a 2024 IRS determination I’m waiting on)

All of which totals to $9,212.60

Woof. Hence my maybe “optimistic” goal of 40 cents more than that number.

This number wouldn’t get me close to debt-free, as I have the debt being paid off by a plan, totaling about $21k, as well as an entire six-years of college’s subsidized and unsubsidized loans still slowly needing to be paid off, which is just over another $40k. Again- Yeesh.

I’m creating this goal to ask for help in getting current on some various debts that have been haunting me for months, some almost a year, and assist in my monthly costs for the next two months as I find stability through employment or my own endeavors.

That said, any support I receive at all will be immensely helpful right now, as shown in my breakdown there are plenty of pressing needs I regrettably have no immediate income for.

I’ve been working very hard to create a sustainable model for myself, but unfortunately work alone without much cashflow doesn’t pay the bills. At least not all of them.

Been a business owner of a video production company since last fall, which has been a way to effectively consolidate my main source of income, video editing services, into the same umbrella entity that I’ll present works of my own under. Was kind of a last-ditch effort to “professionalize” what I do and market my services and work to a larger swath of people.

Hasn’t really been panning out for the best, if the existence of this page says anything about it.

I’ve been in a bad spot for a while now, and while I’ve always felt immensely guilty even considering the option of asking my circle of internet friends, acquaintances, industry peers, and more or less strangers online for help, I have to swallow my dumb pride and understand what I’ve heard and been told all my life. That being that sometimes you really do have to take a chance, and put yourself out there in asking to rely on the help of others.

I’ve been working online for about ten years now, doing many different things in the production of various video and film projects. As of last fall, I’ve now even contributed to a video game.

My usual work consists of getting an assignment from a client, and then utilizing different software to artfully combine my sourced materials into a cohesive, edited video practically ready for distribution, minus any minor notes.

Sheesh, I really can do corporate-speak sometimes.

But outside of video production, I’m a trained filmmaker as of spring 2022, when I graduated from Wright State University with a BFA in Motion Pictures. Even when in the program, when so much of my time consisted of attending lectures on the nuances of film history, learning how to craft a compelling story from my own experiences and falling back in love with writing, and studying how to manipulate the pacing of a work through its editing- with all of its invisible techniques and strategies which I adored analyzing and adopting- I was primarily supporting myself by video editing through the connections I had made online, from the friends I had made from my years of making YouTube videos of my own.

All the while, even when I became an RA at my college for 3 out of my total 6 years in attendance, I was earning money and paying what I owed per year out of pocket primarily from video editing. At least, as of my second year, when my first I was doing so from multiple on-campus jobs.

I really thought that having attended school for film, and even having edited them before, would make me seen as a more attractive potential asset in the minds of production heads of studios and YouTube channels. But now I realize that I’ve essentially risen to the level a lot of other editors are at- in perpetual debt, looking for work, and realizing that there’s always someone willing to do the work you need for cheaper than you.

Not to wax poetic about the hardships of the freelance video editing space, because I truly wouldn’t rather be doing anything else. Contributing to a work and bringing it to fruition, whether it be a film or a video, is incredibly rewarding.

Here, hilariously enough I do think it’s appropriate- if you’re interested or want for whatever reason to to see a full list of both projects I’ve fully edited myself as well as ones I’ve been a contributor to, you can here at this YouTube playlist of nearly all of them:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNuYWTKa55ieBFW-0NFatA7kV3lFvXhPC

And here’s a more detailed place you can see my work, on a barely functional job-hunting site for people looking for YouTube work, with notations in its “Portfolio” section for explicitly the sections I worked on: https://ytjobs.co/talent/profile/296645

If you take a look, you may see some videos you’ve enjoyed. Or resented!

I know a lot of Dragon Ball fans had a bone to pick with “Let Goku Die,” I kinda had a feeling it was coming when I was oh-so-thoroughly and intentionally cutting those anime clips together (clips from only the finest of Dragon Ball sources of course, none of that green-tinted nonsense), but I hope you can find it in your heart to look past that offense.

Even if you couldn’t see where Geoff was coming from with that one, I hope you can try to see where I am in my life situation.

…Okay sorry, I’m just trying to give background for this fundraiser and I’m creeping into my usual creative writing voice. Trying to do my best to keep an appropriate tone, yet sometimes I can’t help it. I’m me! But hey good news if you dig it, in spite of my recent troubles I’m back to working on my own writings, so that’s a positive in some respect!

Anyway-

Working in this fashion truly feels like the culmination of my life’s work.

…That is, if you would call spending the early double-digits of my life singing along to the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack and performing - what would probably be best described as interpretive dance - to my family members, solitarily studying the intricacies of games like YuGiOh and old NES titles like Castlevania and Mario 2 in my free time, and pouring hours upon hours of planning, designing, and animating plotlines and action sequences in my LEGO Spider-Man series (my first ever YouTube outings) - “work.”

During the best times of my experience in working online in the video editing space, it feels like a dream come true, and like everything I’ve ever reached for and dreamed of has somehow reached an equilibrium and nirvana I could have only imagined in those years.

During the worst, it feels like a hopeless digital hell where I can never work or do enough to feel at peace in the slightest. Where my worst fears are realized, that it’s not a profitable career at all, that no one sees me and my work as a valuable asset, and how if anyone knew of the difficulty I was facing they’d understand just how much of a loser I was for trying to make this work instead of going out and doing literally anything else.

These kinds of ups and downs I feel are enough to make anyone a nervous wreck.

Which is why when the chance for stability arose, I took it without hesitation, at the unfortunate cost of somewhat alienating my most frequent clients as, well, clients, and as friends. But this was short lived.

For the past year in particular I’ve had extreme financial difficulty. Some of it arguably self-inflicted, much of it unfortunate luck-of-the-draw.

Around this time last year I quit what had become a full-time job working for a reaction YouTube channel due to workplace conditions. Long and probably boring story which would only unnecessarily elongate an already lengthy fundraising description with a detailed recounting.

Cliff Notes version- I was unhappy. Long hours. At my PC at least 9-5, but often ended up being closer to most days 10-10. At least 5 days a week, but often 6, or 7. Barely any contact with my employer after my hours increased. No feedback. Except for negative feedback. Considered a contractor, yet no had no formal contract. Was- in my opinion- treated as an employee in almost every way but name. But at least the pay was okay. At first.

They said they had to cut my pay and my work needed done faster. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with that kind of situation, but it’s not exactly one that when presented with it, you’d likely feel like sticking around for.

Especially if you were already working extremely hard and that fact was going seemingly unnoticed. Felt constantly drained, isolated, and taken advantage of.

And honestly more accurately, I didn’t “quit a job,” but “stopped consistently working with a client who (in my humble opinion) treated me like an employee in more ways than I wasn’t.”

Contracting without a contract- won’t make that mistake again!

Was quitting the right move, in retrospect? I’m not sure. Just because I could quit, might not have meant that I should’ve. It was certainly the right move for my conscience on multiple levels, that’s for sure, but it certainly did me no favors in the long run.

The consistent paycheck was a luxury I’m not sure when I’ll have again. But sometimes that’s the price of freedom.

Even though I had quite a few clients I had worked with before- it wasn’t to much surprise that it was found to be rather difficult to reconnect to the consistency that was seen before, after having to devote myself to a completely different job for months without contributing to my regulars.

Regardless, what followed is an odyssey in job hunting like I’ve never experienced before. If you’re familiar with the job market right now you’ll know what I’m alluding to. I got a taste of that for a lot of 2023 as well- it’s insane out there.

Especially for a video editor. More than half of the listings want free labor just to get a foot in the door with a test edit. And if you do something unique and interesting in that test, that’ll just be used to show the guy they actually go with something in particular the hire should mimic to add to their style. True story!

When did a nicely edited reel become not enough to effectively prove I know what I’m doing? Guess I missed that. Along with the “don’t mind the low pay, you can earn more if the video does super well” webinar.

Longer story short, I’ve had three situations in the past six months where I make it through the initial hurdle of being noticed among all the other applicants. For 2/3 of them, we even ended up doing decent work together. All seems well, and I begin to relax my nervous system.

Then one day the silence begins.

You don’t think it’s a ghosting at first, right? Must just be busy!

But then three days pass.

Then a week.

And a month.

Suddenly, the bright future you were promised of working with them long-term doesn’t seem like a sure thing anymore. Even when they were so pumped in the zoom/discord call!

I gotta tell ya, it’s really hard to lift yourself back up after feeling like everything will be okay now because YouTube Channel Man will fix all of your problems by Paying You Fairly and then- poof.

He’s gone!

Like a magic trick!

Or a bad joke!

Except it wasn’t funny.

Maybe I assign too much weight to these things. I’ve been told I may assign too much of my self-worth to my profession, which may be true. But god, there’s nothing in the world I wouldn’t rather be doing than contributing to art in some fashion.

There was a time before I entered the film program, when I had convinced myself that I should go into a “more profitable” or “more stable” field. I was STEM-Brained, which, to be fair, has its positives!

But I was miserable. I didn’t know why. Couldn’t figure it out!

Just couldn’t shake the feeling like something always felt off.

When my distractible brain didn’t somehow afford myself time to create anything, be it a large project I’d plan on releasing or a personal one to train my own skills, I’d feel an emptiness unlike anything I’d ever experienced.

I can’t quite describe it. Or at least, I’m not sure if I adequately can.

It’s like trying to put into words that sinking feeling of dropping out from under yourself one gets right before they fall asleep.

I’ve had periods in my life where I feel like half a person.

Like a chrysalis incapable of progressing through its natural processes.

Some of this I’ve come to more understand from the help of a recent untreated ADHD and anxiety + depression diagnoses.

The experience of finding the right medication and recognizing the unrecognizable- that my brain has been self-sabotaging myself for years, in ways I couldn’t comprehend before even considering the idea that there may be something “wrong” with me.

Or at least, something that not necessarily everyone else experiences.

Some of my writing here is an attempt to convey the impossible- the culmination of my life experiences, and how my life has led here, to this dire place, in an admittedly embarrassing position when by all measurable metrics I easily have the potential to be elsewhere.

But I’m no stranger to simply “finding myself” in circumstances. I think we all are, to some degree, but not understanding the nuances of your own brain and its tendencies can do that to a person.

Now, with all that said, you may very well have been wondering-

Even with the emotional fulfillment this work brings me- why keep it up if it also brings such unstable conditions, and practically predictable stress?

Couldn’t I go and get almost any job somewhere, anywhere?

Sure. I suppose so. But couple unmedicated ADHD alongside semi-medicated anxiety and depression with major asthma, frequent joint pain, and various other serious health problems I haven’t had the time nor out-of-pocket funds to address that I worry about exacerbating - not even to mention the general lack of industry positions that don’t require much travel where I live-

I’ve found myself in a position where not only my bills outweigh what minimum wage or even just-over it would cover, but where the chance of a single decent freelance job a week can help to keep my head just above water.

Do I want more than that? Of course, absolutely! I mean that’d be great. Excellent, even, it’d be welcomed.

But finding new clients is harder than you might think. As detailed before describing my difficulties in client ghosting and the other kind of ghosts the online job market is flooded with- ghost jobs themselves.

If you don’t know the existential horror of what a ghost job listing is, do yourself a favor and watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9rn-ATHoHA

It’s dire. But informative! Such is the nature of the Economic Analysis Video Essay. That whole channel is wonderful, Damon Cassidy does admirable work.

But getting back to my life’s story, I have to touch on an element of my life I think is often forgotten by not only those closest to me, but even myself.

I’m legally blind in my right eye.

Somehow, yes, I am a licensed driver, and even with somehow having managed to not get a ticket or be pulled over once in my four-ish years of driving- I absolutely am of the belief that I shouldn’t be on the road unless under some of the calmest of circumstances.

I’ve trained myself to pay excessive attention to the road and my surroundings at all times, but as a blood pressure monitor showed just after I drove myself to sell plasma once, even relatively calm day driving does a number on my blood pressure.

So much so I couldn’t even give plasma that day, even after waiting like thirty minutes! It sucked, that place was like a forty-five minute drive away, too.

They had the best plasma deals, you see. Donate eight times in a month and you could get a total of $800! …I know it’s for science and saves lives, but it definitely feels… dystopian, technically “selling” my plasma.

Anyway- I can’t consistently, safely, drive myself to a location there and back daily for work.

Feeling safe at the wheel of a car is a luxury I’ve never known, even back to the frequent nightmares I’d have as a kid of being at the wheel of an out-of-control car. Not the most calming memories to recall before, during, or after the already somewhat universally stressful experience of “the only way to really get around” that we’ve created for ourselves.

This is all before even mentioning that my current “ride” is a 30+year-old metal deathtrap that’s been sitting on a flat tire I haven’t been able to afford to fix for the better part of a year. Don’t even want to think about what that’s done to its viability as a “road-safe” vehicle, nor the cash necessary for the labor that’d be required to get it back to such.

Point is-

As weird as it feels to say out loud- I am disabled.

Combine asthma that gets me seriously winded and needing to sit down just from raking leaves for 5 minutes, with half of a regular person’s eyesight, alongside the blood pressure of J. Jonah Jameson when I drive, to intense GERD (it’s kind of like if acid reflux got supercharged by the TMNT ooze) that has the capability of disallowing me to swallow almost any food at a moment’s notice producing excessive saliva which blocks up my throat (usually caused by any kind of anxiety / or even minor unease), as well as another particular major personal health issue (another long story) that could be seriously exacerbated at any time by lifting almost anything, all topped off by a lifetime of uncommunicated depressive episodes with major anxiety exacerbated by social isolation due to somewhat on-the-spectrum behavior from ADHD-

Somehow I wonder how I didn’t recognize my converging conditions sooner, and really comprehend WHY I was so at peace with working from home, creating art as my livelihood.

Even in recognizing all that, I don’t so much as feel stuck in my career as I know that this space and this kind of work is just where I belong.

Certainly helps that I’m really good at what I do. At least I think I am, and arguably more importantly, so do my clients!

The fact that I’ve worked with the same few people for the last seven years is proof enough that I can consistently deliver quality.

I have to, since it’s what I love to do! I’d better be top-notch if I want to continue doing it.

I just need to figure out where and how in particular. And unfortunately, I don’t have the money to assist in making that happen, and don’t have a person I can just up and ask for this kind of help from.

Hence my creating this campaign.

Over the past decade of doing this, I’ve not only been barely able to afford my basic necessities, but also amassed more debt than I’m proud to admit by paying for groceries with credit and, in the past, justifying large purchases of things I truly can’t afford because “it’s necessary” to my work in some capacity.

Luckily in addressing the underlying psychological issues of overspending by medicating my depression and anxiety I’ve been able to understand how and why it occurs.

I don’t want things. I just want stability.

And, I think, I owe my own stability to those who care about me.

I don’t like not talking about “how things are going,” or when I do, having it be a barely-intelligible emotional outpouring of the past few years of instability wrapped up in a naive optimism that “everything will be okay.”

Like I said at the top, I am, and do try to continue to be, a generally positive person all things considered, but recognizing that I’m unsure how to completely fix all of my problems is scary. Unfortunately, like many things in life, it can tend to boil down to- “Not enough money.”

Part of the reason I’m writing so much here is to try my absolute best to really communicate how I’m feeling due to what things have been like for me.

I realized last night that most people would probably just recognize making a GoFundMe at all as a sign enough of financial hardship, but just in case, I did my absolute best to pour my heart out in a way I don’t often do in some probably vain effort to try and get it all out there.

Thought about doing this on camera. Not sure I have that in me honestly, even if it’d surely make for a much more “attractive” fundraiser.

Said that it felt- strangely good, writing all this out, to my boyfriend Quinn last night, and he said “Yeah I mean I think that’s why people have journals.”

…I should probably start journaling. It’s been like, over a decade, I think?

All that said- I don’t expect everyone to understand.

But worrying about that isn’t productive, and letting that stop me from posting this in spaces that’d get more eyes on it is definitionally counterproductive.

I’ve been debating posting this to Facebook, or other social media where a lifetime of friends and family, distant or otherwise, would get a front row seat to my explanation of my misfortune.

I have to admit, I’m hesitant to be transparent about my situation and thoughts and feelings about it for fear of being misinterpreted, or just being told to pull myself up by my shoestrings and go get a low-paying job that would ruin my body like they did.

Put myself at risk because at least it’d be “something,” right?

I’m not sure if everyone will understand. I want them to understand. I hope that they do.

But nothing’s ever guaranteed.

Love you guys. Thanks for being here, reading. I miss you! Hope you’re well, no matter who you are or how long it’s been.

I have too much extended family to count haha. Hard to keep up.

That’s another thing- the inadequacy of my situation for my age. At twenty-eight many of them had stable careers, and hell, probably even families. My folks certainly had me by that age!

Different times. Different worlds it even feels like sometimes.

When a phone call and a firm handshake could get you a job that’d last a lifetime.

Now a resume needs fine-tuned to get past AI filters, and recruiters want to know if you’re devoted to the mission statement of Home Depot to be “qualified” to lift boxes around or fill Excel sheets.

At the end of the day-

For the time being, thankfully, I currently have a roof over my head that’s contingent on me making rent every month. Surely, things could always be worse. But I also want to work to make things better too, as much as I can.

And I recently had to accept that it truly wouldn’t hurt anything but my stubborn, dumb pride to humbly request the help of others, in a time of need.

Okay, maybe I haven’t been exactly “humble” this whole thing, I’m not sure, but I wanted to keep things a little light when warranted. Never exactly been great at writing about myself, let alone writing about negative experiences of myself that technically the whole world could see, and at least that my immediate circles of friends, family, and peers will see! Yeesh.

Anyway, if you actually read this far, you must genuinely like me. Or perhaps you were just entranced by the writing stylings of a trained professional. Who’s to say?

Either way, I’m touched!

…Genuinely, thank you.

As weird as it must have been for my writing style, or- “personality-” to seep into introspective writing that should maybe have been a bit more reverent, I appreciate you sticking with it and reading me ramble about what I’ve been experiencing, thinking about, and feeling lately.

It’s been tough.

My mind’s not been in a great place lately due to the culmination of all this, without even mentioning the effect “everything going on” in the U.S. has been having on my psyche too.

And that said, I’m well aware there are plenty of people out there who have it worse than I do.

I don’t think I’m deserving of your money more than them. In fact, now that I think about it, that’s probably been a contributing factor to why it’s felt weird, or even inappropriate, to ask for help right now.

But honestly, my brain could probably always come up with a rationalization for not doing this.

Doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea. If I even somehow get 1/10th, or hell even 1/20th of my goal, it would seriously help in a meaningful capacity.

I just want things to improve. For me, and for everyone.

But god, I’m just glad I was able to summon my wits and do this. Even if it amounts to nothing.

There’s something therapeutic about even just getting all this out there.

Once again- thank you. Just for listening.

Er- reading.

Thanks.