Help Us Move To Portland!

Hi friends,

As many of you know, we're about to embark on a huge change. Not only are we getting divorced, but Laura and I have decided to move to Portland (into separate homes) because it's so much more affordable than Southern Orange County, California. However, between the divorce, the cost of moving, stockpiling debt from years of passing stuff off onto credit lines, and more, we're incredibly short on money.

Here's what we're looking at:

That being said, I want to be totally transparent. I want you to know what's in play to help combat this.

We're exploring the options of liquidating our 401Ks and I'm probably going to obliterate most--if not all--of my remaining stock plans (even though the stock market sucks right now). Sadly, Laura never got a stock plan and only has a small 401K, so she can't help much in the way of savings. Still, it's not completely hopeless.

But I'm torn. If I completely destroy all of my savings, we'll have nothing for emergencies or my gender surgeries (and I'm going for top, bottom, and FFS). Not to mention that all of my personal savings are going to be cut in half due to the divorce (that's just how divorces for marriages beyond 10 years work), though it's worth noting that the debt will be split in half too. It's complicated and hard.

The goal is set to $10,000 to at least offset the cost of moving, help with the first month's payments, and help bring down debt so it doesn't cripple us from the get-go. Child support and spousal support are expensive on top of a car payment.

I should note that all of this will be split evenly between Laura and me.

I'm asking for help because I'm scared and panicking. I don't know if the right call here is to just burn through what little is left. I don't even know if I should be on here. I've made a lot of mistakes with money in the past and I want to start fresh with the girls up in a new city.

Frankly, I don't know if I, Penny, deserve your help. I've done a few of these over the years, sometimes ones that I didn't need to.

I don't know.

But, on the advice of some of my most trusted friends, I'm reaching out anyway.

I hope it's okay to ask this. And whatever you can spare is so appreciated. Even if you can't spare anything, maybe pass this along? A little signal boosting could help.

Thank you.

- Penny Stansifer AKA Amber Spark