My name is Ophie Youtubevideos, I make conversational commentary videos about youtube but… doing that has been really hard lately. As you might have noticed from the dramatic slowing of my video-output over the last several months (or possibly from some of the written updates on my patreon.)

Things have been really hard lately! I know they have been for everyone, and if you’re also struggling please do not feel obligated to support this fundraiser, I cannot stress enough that even just engaging with my videos and my ideas does so much to help me come as close to support myself doing this work as I have over the last two years, I just want to outline a few of the things that have made that more difficult than I hope will be my baseline, over the last few months. Starting by level of urgency–

Apparently they didn’t recertify my food stamps?? I’ve been trying to submit verification info for the last month and now I cannot get someone on the phone to explain to me why nothing I submitted was accepted. I am pretty certain my new application will be approved, but yikes! Not a great feeling knowing I don’t have grocery money coming this week like I thought I did!! Would have probably budgeted my food money differently if I knew it was the last month I’d be getting it on time!!

Creating has been super hard lately. In part because season weather changes love to kick my ass, and this was a long, long winter in boston. Snow being one of my worst migraine triggers means that I’ve spent much of the last few months white knuckling. (It didn’t stop snowing until March!! I didn’t get my infusion until April, and even when I did, it did not help the way I had hoped it would. I think late maybe finally a few weeks out, I am experiencing a little bit of relief, but. Well. there are other ass-kicking happening, concurrently.)

Stress makes my migraines worse… and I’ve been stressed over things like my roommates being out work, having a hard time paying me on time for utilities (which is why I had to raise the amount on my last fundraiser, from when we were closer to homelessness), the seasonal weather changes kicking my ass, as always (see above).

I am chronically unable to record even when I do feel well enough – for the last couple of years I’ve always had to just be adjusted to having roommates while filming. (If you’ve heard dishes done or doors slamming in the background, sorry, that’s why). This has been, uh, a little worse than usual, with more roommates at home than usual due to being out of work (and struggling to pay on time for utilities, see above). I pretty frequently have to bail in the middle of recording because there is Yelling or Slamming or Fighting happening in my home, which I not only cannot record during for fear of triggering a hypothetical viewer, but also because of the very real triggering of the not-so-hypothetical me. And the panic attacks have been a little worse lately because, uh.

Whoops, I got off my meds. I’m really good at keeping up with my migraine treatment and medication. I… kinda slipped and fell off of my antidepressants at some point in the last few months, which has been making all of the above a lot harder to manage. I’m working on trying to get this sorted with my doctor, the wellbutrin she put me on is putting up its hardest little fight but I don’t think it’s right yet, and I think it’s gonna take a while for it to feel right, but unfortunately, I do not have the option of just bowing out of continuing to make videos and engage with this work while I wait for those medications to feel right, because I do not have the safety net of any sort of reliable income from outside of youtube.

The fewer videos I have put out, while feel they’re higher in quality than many of my earliest works, have been performing very unpredictably. Sometimes topics I think would do extremely well get very little interest, sometimes something I expect will be buried does unexpectedly well as of lately but also not… particularly well by Commentary Youtube Standards, if I’m being real. I tend to have a “quality over quantity” mindset and I do think that the people in my community who are engaging with my videos on the regular are so brilliant and thoughtful and wonderful that I don’t often sit around pining over some future subscriber-goal, but it is also hard to work on something for a few weeks and watch it struggle to reach 10 thousand views.

I really believe in this work, and I am fighting against the urge to caveat away from that and address the fact that… yes, I know it feels a little bit Big for my Britches to call what I do “this work”. I do know that I’m a youtuber, and I also know that many, many other youtubers also do this despite disability and less than warm and safe fuzzies in their home life (this is a very accessible job! Say what you will about content creation, but I’ve never had a job be more accommodating of my weird sleeping schedule.) But I believe in this work, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to do it, and to focus on this more than on the endless hydraulic press of poverty.

I am very, very close to being at a point where at least on paper on the Patreon I am making more than I need for my four-way split of rent. In theory, supplementing that with my youtube adsense and any potential future sponsor money should have me far beyond the point of needing to lay out an appeal like this soon. As you already know if you’re on the patreon, I’ve been retooling how I approach my bonus content over there lately, trying to come up with more exciting supplementary content. I have very big ambitions for over there that have been undercut by, well, see all of the above, but I am working very hard at figuring out ways to work around all of this.

You might notice in recent and future videos extended voice-over sections, as I’ve found these easier to film in small portions. I’m trying to come up with a solid editing-voice so that I have solid visual language for this so it’s not as clear as I fear it is that that’s more just an accessibility measure for me than it is a stylistic choice. Maybe I shouldn’t tell on myself for that. The thing about having to ask for money on the internet is that you feel such a need to tell on yourself, to read everything you write from the point of view of someone who will be upset that you admitted to needing help. Even earlier when I said I was trying not to address those people, I still did.

And so I will address you when I say that while I think you, dear reader, probably wouldn’t have been upset if I had raised the donation goal on the last fundraiser again and explained all of this in another update, but just in the interest of giving the clearest picture possible, I want to make sure I’m fundraising under an accurate header.

As of right now, we’ve been able to renew our lease! As of right now, I am also very much struggling to cover my portion of rent as well as indefinite loans for other housemates’ portions of the utility bills, which I was able to briefly catch back up on after the last fundraiser increase but is a cycle that starts to snowball very quickly. I am hoping to ask for help before I get into a more serious situation to try to claw out of. Being able to have dedicated Rent Money again the way I did after your incredible generosity with my first fundraiser would make that a much easier thing for me to be flexible with as I wait for my videos to pick up steam again and for my roommates to find work.

I am including a screenshot of my youtube adsense below, if only to explain why the aid requests feel so close together. They are, but also…. I didn’t really have a scale of what kind of check I’d be getting next time I was paid the last time I asked for help, and next month isn’t looking much better considering my output.

Thank you for even reading this. Sorry I keep having to do this. I really hope to be in a position to offer so much more help than I receive soon.

^ adsense income. my check will be a little better this month but not as much better as I had been hoping

(Oh, also: $50 of this would go toward replacing my bedframe. It is so loud and so creaky and I cannot imagine how much better I will sleep if I get myself onto a flat surface. Like, there's potential for some very real Quality Of Life upgrades if I can manage to get off the hamster wheel.)

Thank you. Love you.