News on the radio

Every day I have the radio on to create some background noise, to hear the sounds of tractors and trucks driving past less loud. Now it's not because it sounds so loud inside, nor because it disturbs me, but because my guard dogs think they should bark at those sounds every time. And so I DO get upset about that. Yes I have dogs, yes I like them, but bark at every tractor or truck that comes by? No, I don't like that. Anyway, to prevent that I turn on a radio, and it also provides pleasant background music. Besides music, of course, the news gets read out every hour. Although I often don't even consciously hear it, you subconsciously get bits of it. And on such a short piece of news it was that my attention got caught today.

More than six hundred thousand

There are currently more than six hundred thousand households in the Netherlands that are in financial difficulties to such an extent that they can no longer get out of this without very drastic help. More than SIX HUNDRED THOUSAND households. That is a lot! And to make matters worse, 1 in 3 people in the Netherlands currently have problems making ends meet. That is very much! That is so much that you can no longer say that it is up to the people themselves, that people are irresponsible with their money. If so many people in your country, a third of the total population, are having trouble making ends meet financially, something else is going on. Now I am neither a politician nor an economist, so I didn't want to write this blog about that either. But what I did want to write this blog about is that I can say for the first time in 8 years. WE are no longer part of this growing group!

I didn't come this far by doing nothing

And that certainly did not happen by itself. December 2014 I lost my job. And that's where it went wrong. From then on it went from bad to worse to very bad for a number of years. While I was positive in the beginning that I would find a new job, that confidence had disappeared after 2.5 years. While we still had everything in the beginning, we had to give up more and more at that time. And buying something new was certainly not an option. Not being able to use heating in the winter certainly doesn't feel good, but we learned to deal with it. 10 degrees Celsius in your living room is cold. But then you just put on two layers of clothing. No one will see that because you are not getting anywhere. And that getting nowhere, I mean that quite literally! My partner still went to work and the supermarket every day. But I really couldn't get any further than within walking distance and with the dogs with me. I didn't go out. Not to town, not to the store, not to friends… nothing. Walking the dogs, and at home. That had become my life. Every day the same. You can imagine that this isn't a life I've always dreamed of. To put it mildly, this didn't make my partner or me happy.

Steemit HIVE

In September 2017 I discovered that you can earn money for writing blogs without the need for a contract. December 2017 / January 2018 was the start for me on Steemit HIVE, and then slowly, very slowly things started to change.

Not that it immediately got better. On the contrary! The last few years had caused a lot of stress for both my partner and me. And where I started to see a small bright spot through blogging, and slowly built up some confidence again, there was of course no noticeable change for my partner. Our financial situation was of course just as bad. Because although I have cashed out small amounts, I also wanted to build my account. And, for my partner, crypto was mainly “paper money that will be worth nothing tomorrow”.

Because I wanted to build something and I believed in what I was doing, I spent a lot of time on it. We all know discord is a time-consuming activity, and so is blogging! According to my partner, I was spending way too much time on this, and got nothing in return in his eyes. In the end, we ended up in a serious relational crisis… Fortunately we got out of this, and after that things started to get better.

Recognition for my work

My partner realized that crypto will not disappear overnight, he saw that I was indeed building something that he can also benefit from in the long run. No, it doesn't work from one day to the next, but he now understood that I will build something that will make it easier for him too. We are now about 2 years later from that relationship crisis, and in the last two years I have continued to build. Now the point is that I say, I'm going to help with the monthly costs...but still I can keep building! Now I have arrived at the point where I can continue to build, but at the same time I can also enjoy it. Enjoying in the sense that we still won't make any extravagances, but that no longer all the burden will end up on only my partner's shoulders. Enjoying the knowledge that I will continue to build up, and that there will therefore be less and less financial worries.

Eight long, hard years

For eight years, we were part of the ever-growing group of people who were having a harder time financially. For eight years, we have lived in circumstances that should not be called normal. All those years when everyone told me it was my fault. All that time when everyone was still shouting that there is no poverty in the Netherlands. The moment when all my friends abandoned me because I no longer even had the opportunity to maintain that friendship as they were used to from me. All those times I swallowed the pain it caused me, and I kept believing in what I was doing. And now the moment has come when I hear on the radio that more than six hundred thousand households are so deeply in debt that they will never get out without help. That this group continues to grow. And now it's my time to be proud of my partner and of myself. We have lived for eight years in a way that hardly anyone in the Netherlands can imagine, but in all those eight years we have NEVER got into debt. Compliments for my partner's budgeting skills.

I hope they get the help that is needed

Where this larger growing group of people has to hope that the right help will come, we have traveled this long, difficult road mainly without help. Now that it gets finally recognized that there is poverty in the Netherlands, we have now fortunately come to the point where we can say, "Thanks to crypto, We are NOT part of it!"

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