The Difference Between Broke and Broken

Ok, so I pride myself on being frugal and money is always tight, but this week I've hit a new low.  I had a negative balance in my checking account, zero in my savings, and bout two more weeks to live on what...air and love till pay day.  I try to tell myself that my new low is for some people, their every day and I wonder how they do it.  I know I can use my credit card till my next pay check even though the very thought of it makes my stomach queasy.  Chalk it up to my unexpected car accident in March, which thankfully only took my car out of commission.  Now I had the expense of getting another used car, and doing all the running around for the last week, taking my husband to work, dropping the kids off at my mom's, taking my step dad to work, running errands.  Let's just say it cost me a pretty penny in gas.

It's sooo freaking easy to feel stressed, scared, and even hopeless at times.  I have been crabby with my family because of the stress and I hate that because they are truly the only thing that get my through these tough times.  As my oh so eloquent husband puts it - "I simply need more to focus on in my life than him so that I don't take all my stress out on him."  It's a bit rough, but that's my husband.  We are exactly ourselves with each other, on good days and bad, like it or not.  There has to be a buffer between life's emergencies, tragedies, stresses, and losses and that buffer is family.  Through their eyes we filter out the bad things and instead see the hope that lies beyond everything else.  I guess we just need to remember to clean the filter every so often otherwise people's feelings get stuck in the grime of life. 

So as I'm clipping coupons, thinking about side jobs, and reluctantly re-evaluating future plans, I think about what it is that keeps being broke from making one feel so.... well broken.  It has got to be family.  There is nothing else that can pull me out of my own head like taking care of my two little ones and of course my husband.  He keeps his worries close to the vest, not on his sleeve like me.  Gotta be especially wary of that.  I just try to give what I can.  Right now that doesn't include much of anything that can be bought.  I have to hope that love and perseverance is enough to make it two more weeks, another year, ten years - one hurdle at a time, one step at a time, one filter change at a time.