Dear HS,

I do have people I do talk to, but it's just not her. I just can't bring myself to trust her.

There's nothing wrong with HER as a person, but I still have very fresh and vivid memories of being reemed a new one for apparently not coming early enough to spend time with the SD when the DH was the one doing the driving and he spent all day long in bed.

I can't handle her overbearingness. Or the cryptic messages about how I should act or take responsibility. Or the vaguness of everything.

I'm a very "black or white" person, there's no grey when it comes to dealing with matters of the family. It's not that I don't appreciate the concern from her, but in my experience in laws tend to mess up marriages.

My own parents being one of the people that know something's wrong but their fantastic advice doesn't help seeing they want me to cut my loses, come home and finish university. Even though they're insanely catholic, they're also incredibly asian and won't hesitate to extract me out of the marriage by justifying that it was the cultural differences that broke apart the marriage.

In reality it's not.

My parents approach at things don't help me at all. I know they're coming from a good place in min. In my parent's mind if my DH fails to care for me, it's their duty to take me home and to look after me.

Here we are... it's the SD's first birthday.

We have no fuel in the car. No cash for rent. I'm looking at fantastic zeros in our bank account. My DH needs to see the orthopedic surgeon next week. Oh yes, and there's about 3 days worth of food left in the fridge. I have a final lined up on friday that I might not be able to write because I can't pay the exam fees.

My birthday's coming up and I could care less.

I'm stuck spending every day at home. Doing nothing. Going nowhere. No job, no hope... just debt.

I just want to die most of the time. The rest of the time it's my DH consoling me over problems that we can't fix. Not to mention the guilt he feels as well.

It's only you guys out here that know what's running through my mind. No one does over here because they'd all think I'm pretty nuts.

TiredPrincess.... I'm trapped.

If only it was that easy.

I'm an illegal immigrant flying under the radar. That means I have no rights because I don't exist.

I can't go back home either, if I leave here I'll be barred from re-entering because I overstayed my visa.

It's all just one big waiting game for me.

Wait for my immigration papers to be processed. But wait, we can't send it in because we can't meet the immigration fees because the CS has tapped us out of cash so hard that we don't even have food.

Last year it was supposed to come out of DH's income tax, but that cash had to go towards essential car repairs.

Then it was going to come out of his drill pay, but that's what's being used to help keep a roof over our heads.

Then there's his regular paycheque, but we only have $100 disposable every month with no savings and that gets spent on food.

His family can't help us... I mean with the older son who separated from his wife, moved back home then got too sick to work, the youngest son going to college and the mom working on her masters.. there's no cash to go around.

My family can't help... it's a HUGE cultural taboo. If they help, they'll be insulted to no ends because they'd have to deal with the truth that their son in law is unable to provide for his family. Therefore they made a terrible decision in sending off their daughter to live with him. They were already humiliated once when I got up and eloped with my DH. They never had any say in the person I married even though traditionally they should have. I'm already thankful enough that my parents were forgiving enough to NOT ex-communicate me (even though my mother still doesn't talk to me), and gave me a modest dowry which paid off a portion of my legal fees.

I'm stuck.

It's the knowledge that if I was to keel over dead. No one would care outside of my own family... everyone would go "oh... it's just another illegal good riddance."

It's burden... it's the hurt... knowing that if I get pregnant, people would look at me and go "oh.. it's an anchor baby... good work."

That makes me feel shitty. I wasn't some rice planting farm girl who smuggled herself on a boat. I had a nice house, went to a good university and as soon as I'm legal to work here I can get a well paying job. It's just getting to that point...

Thanks Snarky,

The words mean a lot.

My family's somewhat written me off.

Kevin's family's not accepting me.

I'm just... alone.

"I want you to get your papers and be happy in life." -> We can't afford it. They hiked up their fees this year again, now it's out of our reach.

As for you inlaws. -> I just don't care anymore.

Stepdown -

Thanks for the offer but no, I will not accept any cash.

The cost right now for us to do our papers is about 1.6k. Which doesn't sound like much but when you're struggling to put food on the table, it's not possible at the moment.

Cleaning houses ->I wish. Too many mexicans to compete with.