Hello, I am Anjie, a single mom in Chicago, most of you know me & have for many years. It wasn’t always this way though. My life took a hard hit about six years ago between leaving an abusive marriage and a traumatic death in the family. I set out on my own, giving up everything, to raise my 4 children in a safe environment. That was when my life started over and it was a massive challenge.

When we first ended-up on our own, I worked 12 hour days & we struggled to buy food. I was able to work my way up until I was in a position where I was making decent money, but my company started cutting hiring and our work hours over a year ago. They finally let us go the day before Thanksgiving. I lost our only income during the hardest part of the year.

I have been desperately applying for public assistance, but nothing has come through yet & bills will not wait. 

I am back with my previous employer, which I love, but the pay is less & there are few hours at this time of year. It will take time to get income flowing back in. I just need to pay this last two month’s bills so we can get on our feet again & buy a bit of food.

So GFM says I should add a breakdown of our needs. Here is what we need to cover to get on our feet:

Rent: $1200 left out of $2100

Electric & Gas: $900 total (it’s behind now - two separate bills)

Everything else, I believe I can get on top of soon enough on my own. It’s just these two that are always difficult, but more so now. These are the bills that could make our lives horrifically difficult again if we can’t get them caught up quickly & I have no place else to turn.

I feel ashamed asking for help, especially after how hard I worked & everything i sacrificed to give my kids a decent life, but I don’t see how we will make it through this transition otherwise. It was quite unexpected.

I have an anxiety disorder & it’s become absolutely crushing the longer this has gone on, being behind on bills. We just need a little help so we can move forward again.

If you made it this far, thank you for caring enough to read our abridged story. I know I haven’t been on here in years, but there is a good reason for that. That is how much we are in need of help - I broke down & posted this on a platform that has become generally too toxic for me to interact with. 

I also added a profile picture so everyone can see what I look like. I didn’t even know I could do that.