The thing that often is overlooked with the “hitting rock bottom” theory is once you’ve hit rock bottom, while it’s true things don’t get worse, but it tends to ignore the fact that you’re still in a hole.
And that climb back out can be just as trying.
When suffering from the level of depression Lissener has described it really is quite impossible to do anything much. It is truly crippling.
Many places. In suburban Sydney (Australia) you would be paying $400 to $600 per week to rent a 2 bedroom apartment in a decent area.
It certainly can suck. But at least you’re movin’ on up.
lissener is in a bad place, but as he himself points out, it could be worse. He’s not in a burn ward or paralyzed or in prison. He’s got a job. He’s got prospects. Just keep swimming, as they said in the fish movie.
Simplify, simplify. This sort of “Disaster” provides an opportunity to, at least for a brief period, simplify one’s goals. It can work out.
This is terrible advice and a terrible waste of public resources. Its even worse becaue you know it is what he wants to hear. The poor cleaning people have to deal with mounds of filth. You expect them to separate fake fur from Hermes silk? A super-special Stetson hat from that party favor you kept at New Year’s four years ago? Your precious coral from the undoubted rocks and other debris in the house. That is absurd.
They did a tremendous service in doing what seems like a ton of work for what is a fairly small amount of money. They liberated you from the crap that has dominated your life. Now move on. Don’t you dare sue anyone. I feel for the peripheral people in this saga. The landlady is watching you destroy what is one of her most important assets while you refuse to leave and can’t pay her. The cleaning company is getting an earful from a mentally disturbed guy who is trying to describe the criteria they should have used to distinguish coral from rock. None of this is reasonable. You were fortunate to lose all of your stuff. Get help. Move on.
Zoe, please consider your advice more carefullly.
ps. sorry for the weird use of pronouns. I am actually addressing both lissener and Zoe.
If she’s doing this, you need to talk to a lawyer, sooner rather than later. ISTR you’re in Seattle, so you’re close to the UW law school. They may have clinics that offer free or low-cost legal counsel. Alternatively, you can try the Tenants Union, and here is a nifty guide to Seattle housing regulations.
Now, it’s true that you didn’t live up to your responsibilities. But she still has to follow the legal procedure in place to evict you. And she needs to learn that she can’t just snap her fingers and force you to move out.
It’s like jettisoning extra stuff when you can no longer carry it. So much less to worry about keeping up with.
I have been debating if I should post anything in this thread, as I dont want to be seen as attacking someone when he is down, but does anyone else think that stiffing a landlady on $1000 worth of rent (even one with a German accent) then crying “victim” over the situation shows more than a touch of narcissism?
That said, I wish you success in the future, and hope that in a little while this whole ordeal is just a distant memory.
Good Luck, Matthew
The landlady was going to have to pay someone, too, and he needed it cleared out in order to leave.
So, no. I don’t agree with you.
I am not suggesting that this is Lissener’s opinion, as I believe that he is going to try and do the right thing and attempt to make arrangements with his landlady to pay her the rent he legally and rightfully owes her.
There are too many others out there however, who have an air of entitlement and no sense of personal responsibility, and have no qualms about skipping out on a mortgage, a lease, a tip on a restaurant check, or the nights bar tab and then rationalize the behavior by saying “xxx (bank, landlord, cafe owner) has so much more than me, why should I have to pay them?”
If you find this attitude acceptable it’s your call, but I dont have to condone it.
Really. You aren’t suggesting it, but you seem to be spreading it the hell over the thread, don’t you? You’re either accusing me or the OP of something, gosh, but you’d never suggest anything untoward.
If Lissener wants to comment (with all he has on his plate currently, I imagine that the Dope is way down on his priority list about now) on if he feels any moral obligation to pay the rent he owes, I guess then we will have more insight into his attitude on my observations…
Jsgoddess, if you want to help Lissener intead of argueing with me, (as I am done here) you certainly could send him some cash, as another generous poster has offered; I am convinced that Lissener will sincerely appreiciate it. (Lissener has posted his contact info upthread.)
You’re just full of insinuations, aren’t you? Stay classy, dude.
There’s an awful lot of, “if this, then that” kind of reasoning in this thread, where the “if this” is presumed to be true, so therefore the “then that” is immutable fact.
If you have to fill in the details of an abstract situation you aren’t familiar with in order to draw conclusions from it, you don’t really have any right to castigate anyone based on those several-cascading-layers-of-assumptions-removed conclusions.
If you must criticize me for what I’ve told you has been happening, have at it. If you have to extrapolate wildly from that in order to have something to stick me with, well, then your stick is of your own making, not mine.
This thread contains a LOT of conclusion *houses *being built entirely out of assumption cards, to make one other ridiculous metaphor.
Missed window to add:
It [the above thread] also concludes some shining examples of failure to RTFT. For the very last time: the cleaners claimed to have expertise in this exact type of situation. They agreed before hand, in a pretty detailed discussion with me, to sort the gabage from the non garbage. Not only did they NOT do that (they threw away ALL of my clothes: 100%: I have only the clothes on my back and couple coats that were hanging in my clostet; as well as ALL, 100%, of my shoes: I have only the ones that were on my feet at the time), they removed perfectly good items, well removed from the mess, from top shelved in closets and such places. Some in boxes, some new with tags. They emptied closed drawers. They “sorted” through my collection of ceramics and took only the most valuable pieces. They took all my charging cords, which were draped over a closet doorknob. Etc. AFTER THEY EXPLICITLY CHARACTERIZED THEMSELVES AS EXPERTS IN HOARDER CLEANUP, AND AFTER EXPLICITLY AGREEING TO SORT.
Finally, while I am not currently in a position to help financially, if I was in the Seattle area, I would gladly lend a hand helping move your remaining stuff.
Good Luck Lissener—Matthew in Salt Lake.
Lissener,
After recently, and not so recently, going through the same kinds of feelings that you describe, know this. It won’t last forever.
I know every excruciating second of it feels like a million years of pain and agony.
But it really helped me just repeating to myself that it WILL change. It might take a bit, but I won’t feel this bad always, it WILL CHANGE.
Your things are gone, and I think the whole “pretending there was a fire” is a good idea. Things are precious, but they are just that, things. You can one day replace them with something equally as precious.
(That said, I would think about prosecuting your cleaning team, and perhaps doing a little dumpster diving if you know where they put stuff) Also, you might want to make the police aware that you think they might have stolen things, and make a list of those precious SO NOT GARBAGE SO WHY DID YOU TOSS IT stuff. Because they just might have taken it instead.
BUT, the most important thing is you.
It WILL get better. If you don’t have some, get a doctors treatment for depression. I wasn’t above goin to the free clinic, you might try it too if you don’t have insurance.
Lastly, I hope your website takes off! And makes you lots and lots of moolah. Could you perhaps PM me the address? My boyfriend might find something he likes there and you could get another subscriber!
Lotsa Love and Hope and Feel Betterness,
~Aqua
Funny, every time I pay someone $1,000 to do something with my house (cleaning, landscaping, building), I insist on getting a signed contract. You got all of this information in writing, yes?
Also, by your own admission, your clothing (sans the few “survival outfits”) was dirty and located underneath three year’s worth of garbage. Of course they threw it out.
I also have to echo some of what MPB in Salt Lake wrote: Have a little more sympathy for your land lady. If what you describe is true, you were destroying her property. Destroying her property and not paying her the rent you owe.
Again, BOTH of your castigations are build on false assumptions and misreadings.
Lissener, I don’t have any experience with depression, and I think that probably applies to most of the people who are telling you how you screwed up in the handling of pretty much everything. To all of you who are giving advice about how he could done things better, I think he gets it. Really. He did the best he could with the resources he had (mental and monetary). Did he make mistakes? Sure. He knows that. Can we give the guy a break, though? He came here for support (and I know he’s getting a lot of that, too) and he’s in a really difficult position right now. Some compassion might be in order. You don’t know until you’ve been there, and “should-haves” aren’t helping anything.
Anyway, my advice would be to file a complaint about the cleaners, then let it go. See this as a rebirth, read some eastern philosophy, work on non-attachment. Fighting the people who, it sounds like, robbed you will only bring more anger and negativity into your life, and you really don’t need that right now. Just try to live as simply as possible until you have a better grasp on life again.
Again, I haven’t been there, but you’re very much a valued and respected poster on these boards, and I sincerely wish you the best.
Thanks, pretty much where I’m at. I went to file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau, only to discover that this cleaning company has an F rating with them.
Of all the lessons I’ve learned from this–and there have been many–the primary one, I think, is Check with the BBB. I’ve never done that before, but I will from now on.