START A ROTH IRA!!

 So, growing up in extreme poverty, I grew up realizing very young that my parents knew nothing about finances. They went bankrupt 3 times by the time I was 8 years old. I know what starvation feels like. I know what it feels like to live in a garage for part of my childhood. To live in the ghetto. To never have been in a school more than 2 years because we kept not having housing security. So, by the time I was 11, I took finances somewhat into my own hands, little by little. I worked babysitting since I was 8 years old, and I also earned some small coins from doing tasks and chores for people. I got my own bank account, my own savings set up, because I was a strong student, with a bank that paid for every A I earned a small donation into the savings account. My mother influenced some of my saving/spending/investing though, and I learned the hard way her influence was bad, for the most part. She did help me understand budgets, but I made a way better one than she had tried to show me. I didn't want to be stuck my whole life.

Sadly, I remained stuck into my 30s. Because I grew up with total financial ignorance, and had to try to learn what not to do from the people around me. That helped me get to where my stability was better than my parents, and I even helped them be able to put aside enough money to retire, but in reality, I am still living under the poverty level to this day. Learning some of what not to do made me frugal, a bit minimalist, and even someone with a strong work ethic. I became a saver, and was willing to 'do without' to get the bigger things I needed to survive, but over time was able to have more quality of life.

But the ignorance about finances has hurt me deeply in my life. Understanding things not to do kept me from having debt, and gave me a good credit score, without ever getting even a month of interest charged against me in my whole life. But it didn't tell me WHAT TO DO. 

I found out in my 30s that I could have, at any point, even as a teenager, opened a Roth IRA. An investment account where the money you put in is already taxed, so someday when you take it out, it will not be taxed, including any growth it accumulated over the years from investments. All money inside it, no matter how big it grows, is not taxed later on when used in retirement. 

There is a limit to how much you can contribute in a year, and I have never earned enough in my life to have the cap to spare, but I could have opened one and invested and had something toward retirement. Instead, I listened to my mother and put my saved up money when I was a teen into a single mutual fund, which tanked, and by the time I was moving out I had lost HALF of all my savings. She didn't know anything about diversification, or how to actually grow money. I took my money out of the mutual fund and then was scared of the stock market for years, because I didn't understand how or why that had happened, and I was poor, and losing thousands of dollars felt like a massive punch in the stomach for young, struggling me.

No one ever taught me about finances in school. I had one class on finances in college, and it basically was about stuff I was already doing right. Not having debt. Having the ability to save. The self discipline to pay a credit card at the end of each month. The ability to make a flawless budget. To have financial hopes someday, and to know how much I would have to save to have those goals. 

But not about how to grow money. Not about investments and how to get to those goals sooner/or raise the odds of getting to them. No one ever told me I could have a retirement account. Ever.

I worked whatever jobs I could, and none of them were upper class or the kind that would give someone a 401k or anything of that nature. I was excited if I could just get healthcare coverage at a job. No one ever told me that ANYONE can open a Roth IRA. That no matter how dirt poor, even if all I could afford to invest in a year was 50 dollars, that it was still something, and would still grow. That 50 bucks could gain and become 62 bucks in a year, just sitting there, invested into stable index funds and ETFs with a long history of stability. I didn't know until my 30s. And so, my retirement fund is lackluster and rather small. 

But at least I have one. According to a study put out by the IRS, only 30% of Americans have a Roth IRA. So, if you read this, and you don't have one, go open one. Most of the investment companies have promotions for opening an account with them for the first time, so just go on your web browser, type in the name of a company you think you could trust and then the word 'promotions' after their company name. For instance, if you typed in Fidelity Investments, which is who I use, you would type promotion after that and find they have a promo that if you invest 50 bucks, in the next 25 days they will add 100 bucks into the account, that you need to leave in there, but still, it is there to invest and help you grow your retirement money. 

So, go do it. Because even if you are 16 with your first job, you can open a Roth IRA and have non taxed money to use when you are old and need to retire. Even if you are 50 and never knew you could have a retirement account, you could at least leave it in there growing for 15 to 20 years and have something of some kind. 

Even if you can only afford to invest 10 dollars a year. At least it can grow and you would have something, even if just 15k to use as you started into retirement. Anything is better than nothing. 

It is true you can lose money in the stock market, but that is why you just put your Roth IRA investments into nice safe low growth, but steady growth index funds and ETFS. Do NOT just buy a bunch of stocks randomly. Just web search popular index funds and ETFs and research from there. The funds over time will trend up, and not quickly, and not get you rich, but they will grow, and so you will have something when you go to retire. 

A few days after you pick your index funds/ETFs, make sure you go into your account and set your gains to reinvest themselves back into the security they came from, whichever index fund or ETF you earned from. That money is for later anyway. It isn't like you are going to use it now, so it will give your money an extra chance to grow. Maybe you can't afford to put any money in that year, but your gains will still compound your growth even if you can't put a single dollar in yourself that year.

If you can afford to max out your contributions for the year into your Roth IRA, do it. Remember, any growth on that money is NOT TAXED later on in life after you retire. You can with draw from it after age 59. Or, if you are getting your very first home, you are allowed to withdraw up to 10k from it untaxed early. But really, you should just let that all grow in there. Unless you are putting money into the account, just pretend it doesn't exist. Let it get bigger and bigger so when you retire you have something. 

Just make sure you open a Roth IRA now, while you can. Today, if you don't have one. Don't be left empty handed when you retired, praying that social security still exists when you retire. It might not be enough to make you rich, but it can be enough to give you even 100 dollars a month more than you would have had for the rest of your life in your aging years, the years when your body is slower and can't do all the things anymore. Take some of the stress about aging and finances and turn it into something that can help you. Can help anyone, financially. Open a Roth IRA. 

Working Part time and More

So, my girlfriend was laid off. This has impacted our lives significantly. Thankfully I had just started working part time remotely at the tail of December and am bringing in something,  but now I am going to be trying to work more hours. Also, we have enough savings to pay through the end of the Lease for our Apartment even if somehow she couldn't find another job in that time, which I fully believe that she will. She is smart, has a good amount of experience and a great degree. I have faith in her. 

She is getting some unemployment, but it is for a 5th of what she was earning, so that is too bad. We will get through it, though. I am certain. The biggest problems thus far have actually been the blow to her confidence, having to set aside my hobbies, and that we might blow all our savings, which I am super hoping we won't.

Also, I have been trying to explain to her we need to lower our bills, and she seems to not agree with that. But we could save more of our savings by spending less of it each month. She doesn't want to stop living our lives. 

I don't know what to do or say to help her feel more like I do. Like, yesterday she went out with friends for lunch, and then afterwards went to a pie shop and bought more than one slice of pie to bring home for 8 bucks each slice. 

On the one hand, pie is super yummy. But on the other hand, it was such a frivolous purchase. I don't want to make her feel more down, so I didn't say anything and haven't been pushing, but it does concern me.

We will see how it goes.

2 years on Testosterone!

I actually am celebrating 2 years today! Such a big accomplishment in my life and I am just so grateful!

Trans Vlog Ep 139 2 Months Post Op from Top Surgery (9/13/2022)

So I have been posting my trans vlog on Youtube and all, but I moved it from the rainbowmoonshadow channel to the Lyl Enlyl channel. All of my Trans Vlog posts will be uploaded to my Lyl Enlyl channel from now on.

I had surgery!

 I finally had my first surgery, and the next one is probably before the end of the year! I am getting close to full recovery, and have been healing really well. Having less deformity on my body is a massive relief, and being a little closer to feeling like I can get over this hump of much needed change into the rest of my life is good. It is just top surgery for now, but when they tested my chest, it was even more deformed than they had thought, so it was kinda amazing just how deformed a person can be, and I had no idea. I had a chest fused to a chest underneath in strips of lesion like skin, that had skin tags and cysts in the long lesion looking parts. The nerves were all buried under the bottom chest, and the top chest had the fat in it. Also hence why I had no milk ducts, nor sensation in my chest my whole life. 

After surgery, I have so much sensation and feeling in my chest, it is crazy. The stimulation has taken some getting used to, of even doing something simple, like wearing a T- Shirt. haha. But it is always super rewarding and I am thrilled I did it :)

Scare

 My mom almost died. It has really been impactful for me, and frustrating for me. She almost died and I couldn't do anything or help or even get proper info because she was on the other side of the country visiting my baby brother and his family. My dad was in a big dark depression there and not helpful at all, and not even noticing that she was sick or not eating for 10 days straight... She finally had to be rushed to the hospital by my baby brother, and still not my father. 

She had covid-19 and if she had had it even a couple more days she would have died. My father refuses to let either of them be vaccinated due to his conspiracy theories he believes in. Even now, after she has recovered and could get the vaccine, he still is hardline against it. She almost died. 

I don't understand how someone could risk their family like that. I do everything I can to protect my wife's health despite all her health disorders and conditions and to keep her safe as humanly possible, and my father won't even get a poke in the arm, or let his wife, even if it could save her life in the future. I just can't comprehend that. At all. How do you commit to protecting your family and then be so completely flippant with their lives? How do you make a vow to your wife to be there for her in sickness and in health and not when she needs you most?

I told my father off. I yelled at him. I asked him to explain to me and he did explain the depression, which I hadn't known, so at least there is some sort of reason for him to be so oblivious when she was sick, but at the same time, that doesn't change that none of it should have happened in the first place like it did. The vaccine lowers the symptoms of the pandemic when caught for the victim, and lowers the victim's chance of ending up in the ER by 99%. It doesn't mean you will never catch it, but it does mean you are significantly less likely to suffer any long term harm or even have a really bad illness from it as you would have. 

And even now, after she survived, he still insists she not get it, even though the antibodies from catching it dissipate low enough to catch covid-19 again ever 16 weeks after catching it without being vaccinated. Like study after study shows the information and my father would rather clutch to the idea that Bill Gates put a nanobot in it and that he is trying to use the vaccine to sterilize the population of humanity with it, even though studies show that it is the illness that can cause one to become sterile, and not the vaccine. It is all so completely irrational as far as I can tell and it really upsets me, that someone as precious and kind and sweet as my mom almost died because of the pure willful ignorance of the person who is supposed to love and protect her most. I don't get it. I could never treat my wife with such disregard. Ever.

I told her if she divorces him, which she won't cuz she isn't that way, but she should, and if she did that she wouldn't lose her kids. That we would understand and all love her and support her. She matters. She matters more than some political mumbo jumbo that should have zero baring on whether someone cares about saving other peoples' lives. I am having such a hard time coming to terms with the situation and don't know how to reconcile with my father or this at all. It all feels so wrong, and yet, I have no say. 

My parents were both raised in very conservative ways, and are both traditional in how the household roles go. My mom would never do anything without asking my father for permission, even when he is not stepping up into the supposed role he proclaims is his  God given right, as lead of the family. He isn't being a man. He isn't protecting his loved ones. He isn't sheltering them under his caring. He is outright going against the very thing he insists he is supposed to do. But if only I could somehow convince my mom to do something without his say...

But I can't. I have tried. She won't. I just, feel helpless. And dumbfounded. And scared. I just, would never, ever risk my wife's health like that. I can't imagine how you can be a good person and be willing to. I can't imagine what good thing he thinks he is doing for her instead. He just said he is following his belief. How does that help her? How does that protect her? How does that protect anyone? It certainly doesn't make the world a better place. 

My father thinks he is righteous and God fearing and going to Heaven. He thinks people who aren't like him are hell bound. But as far as I can tell, my father is more bound for hell the more he is convinced he is holy.

Happy New Year

 New Year, new goals, new pats on the back for things I did last year. Kudos to me :)

We moved successfully, got a new car, and I even started the processes for name change and top surgery :)

I am hoping this year we can officially get those both finished and start on bottom surgery processes. Plus, it would be cool to be able to work some part time. 

I am hoping to keep up the weight loss trend and to hopefully keep up with regular posts on here and Youtube. 

Big goals to me, and meaningful, even if they might not be to everyone. But I am really proud of myself for keeping up with things as well as I have thus far in my journey. :)