u/HauntinglyEthereal

i'm (29f) and my dad is (56m). he doesn't work. he hasn't for several years. he was in a bad accident in 2019 that left him temporarily disabled. tbi, broken back and necks, the works. it's a miracle he's alive. doctors cleared him for work and he immediately got into another accident and can't work. he has chronic pain and issues that i'm pushing him to follow through on medically, but he's stubborn as hell and only goes to the hospital when he really needs to. i've been trying to push for him to get disability but he doesn't want to go through all the appointments and see all the specialists. (he rather lay in pain for a week then go to the ER for a temporarily solution than make an appointment and go to a regular doctor)

i'm the only one working. he has 0 savings. i'm barely scraping by. i'm paycheck to paycheck and working my ass off only to still be a week late on rent.

my dad started to ask for me to pay for him to go to taco tuesdays with friends. i said yes because he needs the socialization, and i don't want him locked inside 24/7. it's only $10 so it isn't a big deal.

the issue is, i found out after about two months that it isn't taco tuesdays with friends. it's taco tuesday with a date. it went from me paying for my dad's to actually me paying for him and his date every single week. i know my dad's going to date. i don't care. if he's happy, fine. but he has a horrible track record with relationships and each time he'd leave himself in financial ruin because of his dumb decisions.

i also just don't think it's fair for me to pay for him and his dates when i'm barely scraping by. i literally do nothing for myself. every penny goes to bills, pet food, and now his dates. i told him i was done. he needs to get on disability and then he can pay for his own dates. i offered to help him with appointments, and get him in contact with a patient advocate. he doesn't want to.

he's had to skip out on 2 dates now because i won't pay for him and his date. it was mainly due to financial issues. i have bills to pay, i can't afford to pay for some random woman's dinner (she works full time and makes literally makes double what i do). now his gf is mad and is giving him the silent treatment because my dad had to cancel since he no longer has my money. he's upset and constantly throwing teenager-esque fits now. i'm just exhausted. i have an emotionally challenging job (DV victim counselor) and now i have this crap going on at home.

AITA?

(edit to add: sorry for reposting this. posted on a throw away, didn't hear from mods for two hours so i said screw it and posted on main. deleted the throw away account post afterwards)

we're coming up on the year anniversary of me becoming a domestic violence advocate/counselor for an amazing non-profit organization in my city. i specifically work at the shelter itself, meeting, interacting, and supporting clients face-to-face in everyday life situations. i love my job. i've been offered other positions in their main outreach office and i have turned it down because i enjoy working in the shelter with clients directly every day.

when i took this job i knew it would not be sunshine and rainbows. i knew it was not a fantasy land where i could pretend to be a savior, knew it would not be a sanitized, happy environment. trauma-informed care comes with the nitty, gritty bits of life. trauma is never happy. there are people who will be disassociated from their pain, people who are in a severe depression, or people who are downright angry. some won't be thankful. some will be downright hostile, and that's okay. the healing process isn't linear or picture perfect. if it was, there would be no need for social or mental health services.

i won't go into much details on the off chance i somehow dox myself. i'll keep this simple. i was the only staff on duty yesterday evening. there was a client that we had to call CPS on several weeks prior. it does not happen often. we are not mandated reporters, but my boss is. she is a child psychologist of near 50 years. it is not something we do lightly. near 8 at night, a police officer arrived.

i let him him, something i hope was in line with our policy (we do not answer the door for immigration police, but a deputy is something else and i knew we had the open CPS case on a client) and he asked to speak with said client. i said okay. i was shaking from the sudden spike of adrenaline and went to the client's room to get her. i kept my voice low so other clients wouldn't hear and i let her know the police were here to speak with her. i asked if she wanted me to stay in the room while she speaks with the police officer so she feels supported or safe. she said yes.

our boss had not told the staff what the CPS case was for. only upper management knew. i learned yesterday though why it happened as i sat in with the client and the police officer. i stayed silent as they spoke about it. it was a follow up on the report. i won't go into details, you don't need to hear it. it was just surrounding a very tragic and heartbreaking situation where a child re-enacted the abuse they faced on their much younger sibling, and said sibling (too young to be in school) now voicing thoughts of self harm.

i held it together as long as i could. the chat was only for a few minutes. the police officer spoke with each kid individually, then left. he was nice, sensitive about it. but it was the first time i heard of something like this happening in our shelter, and i was shellshocked. he was only here for fifteen minutes. after he left, i checked with the client. i asked if she was okay, if she needed to talk, or if she needed anything. she said she was fine.

i called my boss afterwards and told her what happened. she asked if i were okay, as she knows it can be traumatic. i told her i was fine, and i just hope that i followed our shelter policy correctly. we normally never let anyone in, but i also did not want to impede on the investigation and make it worse.

after we got off the phone i couldn't work the rest of the night. i cried on and off for four hours. i promised i would not tell any of my co-workers what i knew. when my co-worker came in for shift change and asked how the evening had went, i lied. said it was quiet. then i went home.

i only slept for four hours, and i'm still trying to process it all. the client's children are not bad kids. i've known them for near two months now and interact and play games with them regularly. i think about what the oldest had went through to cause them to do this. the extent of the abuse they faced. i think about the youngest, and how this will impact his life. will he forget? he's so young. will he keep remembering? will one day he realize how messed up it was, and forever cut off his sibling for what they did? will said sibling adapt well to our mental health services and put a stop to re-enacting the abuse?

i love my job. truly. but yesterday was so hard.

I’ve done two years as CSP, and I wanted to remain as such… but the use of AI becoming more common is making me worry that the position will eventually be phased out. My TL has been really pushing for me to become a TP, so I agreed to take the course.

I’m struggling financially right now though. I work one other job and am looking for a third right now. I love my H&R Block office and my co workers but I feel like I might have to reconsider my prior agreement to take the course.

I know H&R Block pays for the course. Am I paid to take it, though? Even if it’s just the low remote training rate? Or is taking the course unpaid?

Also for those who have made the change from CSP to TP, how do you like it? Any tips or advice?

I applied and was approved for $192/week. I work part time, just the weekends for 8 hours each day for $17.50. That puts me at about $280 per week. Does that mean I’ll get nothing back for unemployment?

i'm trying so hard to take care and help my family.

my sister's been no contact with me because her addiction and mental illness. i heard she was hanging out with a literal human trafficker. i reached out once to help her and she tells me to fuck off and die.

and now my dad? i take care of him. im the only one working. i work two jobs. i'm working 50-65 hour weeks depending on what's going on. i'm working my ass off to scrape by and i still barely afford rent. we got in an argument today, and he's been drinking more and more. lying about it. he drank at least one, maybe two packs of those mini fireballs. we get into an argument about it. he tells me i'm a useless daughter. i'm a dumbass. i'm a dumb cunt. i walk away. come back later, mad. he asks what the hell my issue is.

i tell him what he called me. that calling me useless is crossing a line when i am the sole breadwinner and the sole reason we are not starving and on the streets. he then tries to gaslight me. he didn't say that! he tells everyone how much he loves me, and how highly he thinks of me! he would never say such a thing!

i told him i'm not letting him gaslight me, i'm not crazy, he said what he said and i heard it. if he regrets it fine, but he needs to then admit his drinking is an issue and he has to fucking stop. he told me he never said that stuff. i asked why i'd make it up. his response? 'it's in my head, the issue is these things in your head'. ngl i audibly laughed out loud at that and walked away. he called me a dumb cunt.

during the argument he also literally said we should all kill ourselves- my sister, him, and i. that we're all pieces of shit and should die then.

like fuck man. i am just trying to hold shit together. i work so hard, at multiple jobs, and i'm trying to keep us housed and safe. i've tried so hard to help him get sober but he always lies and goes back to drinking. it's at the point where i feel like i'll have to go no contact with him too. i'm just afraid though. i went no contact with my sister when she was abusing me and it made her spiral into homelessness and worse drug addiction. it'll be the same for my dad.

the sad part about all this? i'm a fucking domestic violence victims advocate/counselor. and yet here i am too. lol.