Abigail Loves Poverty

[Wolfie]

Don't feel bad. I also have a little apple allergy. It's not bad, but I can't eat much. Try a banana allergy too. I cannot eat bananas. I can't stomach them and they mess with my throat. :( Apparently I am also allergic to string beans and cantaloupe. I've had some reaction to the string beans, but not the cantaloupe. I was told certain pollen allergies can cause allergies to some fruits and vegetables. I feel for you Wolfie and Spider Burps. Allergies and intolerances suck.

:( yeah, bananas would really suck.

I wouldn't mind a green bean allergy- it would keep my mom from sneaking them into foods and telling me that I couldn't taste them. Luckily she stopped doing that when I became an adult.

[IceQueen]

I totally get that she feels artistic expression makes her a better parent, but holy shit woman buy your baby some shoes and socks! I've tried to follow a budget since I started working and we are very comfortable because we follow the budget! Hell my dad makes a very good salary and my parents follow the strictest most frugal budget of most people I know. And throw in a special needs kid? Please tell me she is not going to do foster care to get the stipend money? I believe special needs kids keep their check after they are adopted.

[Boltingmadonna]

So, I have been inspired by Abigail's story of how it is perfectly fine that she acquired over 100,000 dollars in debt and then quit her job, plus she has only rudimentary parenting skills yet has five children and is doing her best to acquire one with a fatal illness and/or special needs to complete the collection. It's all good because God told her to.

Suppose I flip the story . . . . "Hypothetical Beta Me has 100,000 dollars in debt, and quit my job to be handfasted to a Wiccan coven leader. I may never be able to pay off my bills, but it's okay because my Goddess has gifted us with a yurt in which to raise my spawn who shall be dedicated to Kerridwen and to bringing the Goddess back and defeating patriarchal religion. I don't use birth control because the Goddess told me not to. I don't have time to work because I'm busy getting pregnant, spending time in ritual, and giving free Tarot readings. I don't bother with a savings account because the Goddess told me I could get everything I need by magic. I continue to run up hospital bills I can't pay, because She told me I should have as many children as possible. I was slapping my kids around a lot, till the Goddess told me in a dream to buy a handmade drum and join a drum circle. As long as I get to trance-drum with my fellow Shamans every full moon, I can handle an indefinite number of children."

"When the 'stupid, poor, and feral' folks from the trailer park where I keep my yurt give me the stink-eye as I dance along with my bare feet, elf-locked hair and hand-sewn Renaissance garb, I just feel sorry for them because they are not Chosen of the Goddess like me."

Please do not think I'm mocking Wiccans! I have some tendencies in that direction myself. However--I'm pretty sure that if someone told Abigail this story, she would blog about how she met this craaazy Pagan who was a danger to society. Yet somehow, if she does the same thing herself, it's all good because SHE is the servant of the one and only, REAL imaginary superbeing in the sky. Her magiktimes with God are respectable. Other people's are a delusion.

[GeoBQn]

Abigal responds to the question of whether or not she is poor. Also, she and her husband are looking into adopting a special needs child.

abigails-alcove.blogspot.ca/2012/12/am-i-poor.html

She's deleted this entry (though she kept up a short post entitled "Poverty Rocks!").

[lilwriter85]

I missed the entry that got deleted. The idea of Abigail and her husband adopting a special needs child scares for a few reasons including finances. I wonder if she is trying to compete with Brianna the Catholic blogger in Colorado who has adopted two special needs children. Brianna and her husband seem to have everything together unlike Abigial and her hubby do.

[GeoBQn]

She's deleted this entry (though she kept up a short post entitled "Poverty Rocks!").

She has now put this entry back up, along with a new post:

abigails-alcove.blogspot.ca/2012/12/happy-are-you-poor.html

[Shasta ODonegal]

::smh:: She does not get it.

[Spider Burps]

It is, but I have that problem and it never escalated like the apple allergy did, so I still eat pineapple and ignore the swelling. It happens to my siblings too.

The same thing happens to me and my brother. It's been like that for years for me and never got worse. :D I've found that drinking water or eating crackers/bread/cookies while eating the pineapple helps a lot with the burning.

[JesusFightClub]

She has now put this entry back up, along with a new post:

abigails-alcove.blogspot.ca/2012/12/happy-are-you-poor.html

Eh, she can fuck right off.

On my left foot I have what's described as "catastrophic injury" by my surgeon and "severe nerve damage" by my physio. It's a twisting injury and caused loads of little bone breaks. I had emergency surgery on it and have a long metal plate with multiple pins holding it together. I can't feel it properly and this time of year I really have issues with it - it hurts like a bastard or it's *not there* at all and I have to walk (with a NHS stick) staring at my feet like a total weirdo because otherwise I don't know what it's up to (it often doesn't tell me).

It's doing the "not there" thing tonight. For all intents and purposes I have one foot. I am going round the corner to the shop shortly and I will have to stare rigidly at it and it will drag behind me. So that will look classy.

The reason I tell this is to say I could claim some benefits. I don't (I don't need to right now) but I would never judge anyone who does. You DO NOT KNOW why they have that need and it's not up to you. She seems to have some poverty-shaming issues going on. Get a grip and move past that, Abigail. Your post was patronising in the extreme.

[mrs]

I have not read all 5 pages of this thread.

But why would you choose a church without a cry room if you are so worried about your kids making noise during daily mass.

IDK where this blogger lives but where I live there are 5 Catholic churches within 10 miles. And they all have some kind of cry room. I know older churches do not traditionally have cry rooms.

[samithemage]

I have not read all 5 pages of this thread.

But why would you choose a church without a cry room if you are so worried about your kids making noise during daily mass.

IDK where this blogger lives but where I live there are 5 Catholic churches within 10 miles. And they all have some kind of cry room. I know older churches do not traditionally have cry rooms.

I know at the Catholic church I grew up in, since there were so few people (mostly elderly) that actually went to daily mass, the daily masses were held in a little side chapel which wasn't connected by sound system to the cry room. She may not have access to a cry room for the daily masses that she's attending.

[bea]

Oh, the Happy Are You Poor post. I HAVE NO WORDS. :shock:

It's a list of her stupid financial decisions, including her and her husband quitting their jobs to run a business that ate up all their money, taking cash advances on her credit card, defaulting on the credit card, having to put the kids on the state's insurance program (because at the time she was pro-universal health care, which I guess means that it's okay for HER KIDS to get state insurance but now that they don't need it, fuck everyone else's kids), going on food stamps, being so poor they could barely afford toilet paper...

BUT BY GOD SHE WASN'T GOING TO USE THAT LAW DEGREE TO EARN MONEY OR GET A JOB, NOSIREE! I'm a little lost as to whether her husband worked or not, but for a while there he didn't because she was too "fragile" to be home alone with two kids under two.

Abigail sure brings the crazy, that's for sure. Because all of these stupid-ass financial decisions? They had GREAT results! Because she learned that people on food stamps aren't bad, dirty, or terrible parents and that we shouldn't judge them!

This woman has some serious mental issues.

[bea]

Also, they're filling out paperwork to adopt a child despite the fact they can barely afford the kids they have now AND intend on having kids until Abby's uterus drops out or she loses her damn mind or something. What adoption agency would place a special needs child - a kid that could incur significant medical expense and possibly need therapies and adaptive devices - with a family that can barely pay it's existing bills? She's DELUSIONAL.

[lilwriter85]

I'm not trying to be classist, but I hope the one income and the fact that they have five kids will prevent them from adopting.

[mockingbird]

My advice to Abigail would be to revisit the beatitudes. Specifically, "blessed are the poor IN SPIRIT." In Catholic school we were taught that Jesus meant humility here. Not acting like you are the most rich and powerful or having a martyr complex. Just thought this verse might be appropriate for her current thoughts.

[Arete]

My advice to Abigail would be to revisit the beatitudes. Specifically, "blessed are the poor IN SPIRIT." In Catholic school we were taught that Jesus meant humility here. Not acting like you are the most rich and powerful or having a martyr complex. Just thought this verse might be appropriate for her current thoughts.

QFT

[desertvixen]

Oh, the Happy Are You Poor post. I HAVE NO WORDS.

Oh, I have words. They all have 4 letters.

It's a list of her stupid financial decisions, including her and her husband quitting their jobs to run a business that ate up all their money, taking cash advances on her credit card, defaulting on the credit card, having to put the kids on the state's insurance program (because at the time she was pro-universal health care, which I guess means that it's okay for HER KIDS to get state insurance but now that they don't need it, fuck everyone else's kids), going on food stamps, being so poor they could barely afford toilet paper...

This. We've all made a bad financial decision, some of us more than one, but she KEEPS making them.

BUT BY GOD SHE WASN'T GOING TO USE THAT LAW DEGREE TO EARN MONEY OR GET A JOB, NOSIREE! I'm a little lost as to whether her husband worked or not, but for a while there he didn't because she was too "fragile" to be home alone with two kids under two.

I know. If the choice was seeing my kids needing things or being at work, even a job I didn't like, I'd fucking be at work. My family is working-class/middle-class, my mother has worked most of my life, and has even worked an extra job (newspaper route) to pay for things that maybe weren't needed, but that she wanted to give us.

I would comment more, but I really am not in a good mood, and Abby is a bit too much.

[Jinger Jar]

My advice to Abigail would be to revisit the beatitudes. Specifically, "blessed are the poor IN SPIRIT." In Catholic school we were taught that Jesus meant humility here. Not acting like you are the most rich and powerful or having a martyr complex. Just thought this verse might be appropriate for her current thoughts.

And when the Church does speak of lay people embracing poverty, it's framed as an anti-materialism thing. No where does it teach that Catholics should deny their children basic necessities like food and clothing.

Even members of Catholic religion orders who take a vow of poverty are not deprived of adequate food, clothing, and shelter. They may fast or do without as a penance or as a kind of spiritual exercise, but they don't involve anyone else in their decision, it's done under spiritual direction, and it never involved kids.

[lilwriter85]

I think Abigail could at least do part time legal work to help her family out. There are fundie women who will do stuff part time.

[gilora]

I think Abigail could at least do part time legal work to help her family out. There are fundie women who will do stuff part time.

Abigail is far too special in god's eyes to debase herself by doing part-time legal work. Mommy Mary wants Abigail's children to live with food insecurity while the family struggles to repay $100,000 in student loans.

As an attorney myself, I find Abigail's spelling and grammar atrocious and embarrassing to the profession.

[singsingsing]

As an attorney myself, I find Abigail's spelling and grammar atrocious and embarrassing to the profession.

Oh, but don't you know? Abigail's handle on spelling and grammar is only so atrocious because she's GIFTED. All of her children are gifted, too. The reason she knows this is because her son won't behave, and none of them can read properly.

[bea]

Oh, but don't you know? Abigail's handle on spelling and grammar is only so atrocious because she's GIFTED. All of her children are gifted, too. The reason she knows this is because her son won't behave, and none of them can read properly.

Whaaaaat? I didn't know about that one. Gifted people can't behave themselves or read properly? That comes as a rather big surprise to me, a gifted child who grew up into someone who still does part time editing and proofreading work because of an innate "feel" for spelling and grammar.

And a voracious reader married to a voracious reader (who was also a gifted student, starting college with a full year's worth of college credits based on AP classes) and the mother of one kindergartener who started reading at 4 and a preschooler who's starting to read. Hmmm.

[singsingsing]

I think Abigail read that sometimes gifted children (or adults) can be delayed in certain areas, have behavioural problems, and suffer from certain mental health issues. Since Abigail has bad anxiety and can't spell, and since her son is disruptive and her children are obviously delayed at least in terms of reading, she decided they all must be gifted. It's sort of like saying, "I've heard a lot of talented artists are depressed. I'm depressed, so I must be a talented artist!" when you can't even draw a stick figure.

[mirele]

I have not read all 5 pages of this thread.

But why would you choose a church without a cry room if you are so worried about your kids making noise during daily mass.

IDK where this blogger lives but where I live there are 5 Catholic churches within 10 miles. And they all have some kind of cry room. I know older churches do not traditionally have cry rooms.

Hell, even the Pissing Preacher's new location has a cry room! This woman is nuts.

[Witsec7]

Hell, even the Pissing Preacher's new location has a cry room! This woman is nuts.

If I recall, ZZ was against cry rooms before she was for cry rooms.