My mum passed away from covid in April 2020. Not long after, I was fired from my job. They were looking to make people redundant anyway and then used the pandemic as an excuse. It turned into a case of “We may rehire you once we know what the situation is”, but I was left with a small redundancy of about £1300, despite having been there for three years, and they wouldn’t let me have furlough.
Me and my children came to live with my mum when my relationship broke down. My daughter blamed me for my mum passing away, because I broke something which led to us needing to borrow something from a neighbour, which may have brought covid into the house, I don’t know. When my mum passed away, my daughter left not long after, which I understand – we all grieve in different ways. But where it was once me, my mum and my daughter all contributing to the house, everything suddenly fell on me, and I had lost my job, and my mum and my daughter had gone. I reached rock bottom. It was over a year before I felt like I could leave the house. It’s a miracle that I’m talking to you today.
I found myself in £900 of debt with Council Tax. I had been trying to get a DRO to get rid of my debt, but you have to pay £90 to use the service.
I spoke to the people at the Essential Living Fund who told me that I would be ok to qualify for help with them, so I paid the £90 for the DRO, and then applied for the Essential Living Fund and was told that they’re so busy it was going to take ten days to even look at my application. I wish they’d told me that before I paid the £90.
So now I find myself at the foodbank. I’m paying everything off, along with an advance on Universal Credit, which I needed when my fridge/freezer broke down, and put me in debt from the start with them. I’m left with £295 a month once they’ve taken that advance, and that needs to cover all my bills and council tax arrears, before I even think about food.