u/wanderingharmony

Ik the job market is rough right now, but fuck, I'm convinced nepotism must be the only way in at this point.

It's like anytime I walk into a place where they have entry-level minimum wage workers, they're always understaffed, half the people working there are too old to be doing the job w/o extra help, and yet, they still aren't hiring, and if they are, you never hear back.

I feel like I've applied to literally everything at this point. I'm not even picky in the slightest. I've tweaked my resume to hell and back, I give a call if I'm able to, I would try introducing myself in-person, but the last time I tried that, they seemed annoyed with me and just told me to apply online. I've even had employers schedule interviews with me only to show up early and be told by the employees that they aren't even in the building.

Is it because I'm a student? I only have classes two days of the week this semester. I get why they want open availability, but still, is two mornings of the week really that big of a deal-breaker? Most of these places don't even have the decency to send out a copy and paste rejection email. It's like I'm begging into the void.

I feel like I'm going crazy. I've been looking high and low since the start of this year and it's all starting to feel like one big humiliation ritual. Is there any establishment at all in this city that's actually willing to take a chance on students? Anywhere????

I (20F) haven't seen a dentist in over 10 years. When I was younger, I hardly took care of my teeth. I'm usually okay with hygiene, but brushing and flossing have always been a big struggle for me for some reason. I have awful tooth pain all the time and a large cavity in one of my top molars that I've just had to suck up and deal with for the past 2 years. I strongly suspect I have cavities growing from the inside out too. I take pain killers almost every day. I've gotten better at brushing, but I'm still hardly consistent with it.

Recently, I've been losing chunks of my back teeth. It's happened twice now to one of my top molars and to one of my bottom molars on opposite sides of my mouth. What's crazy is both times it happened when I was eating softer food. I don't eat hard foods anymore and I and try to avoid sticky foods as well, but I still drink soda regularly. I stupidly believed that drinking zero-sugar soda would be a safe option for me, but based on my research, I'm guessing bc the soda is super acidic, it's been making my teeth soft, which combined with potential cavities, has been causing them to start breaking off.

I also have a molar that grew in sideways towards the inside of my mouth bc I only lost half of one of my baby teeth as a kid and the other half never fell out. I've tried pulling the chunk of baby tooth out on my own, but it won't budge. I didn't mind much at first, bc it didn't give me and pain, but lately I keep feeling pain around where the baby tooth is. Almost like the adult tooth behind it is pushing down on it. It's not as excruciatingly painful as the cavities in my mouth, but it's still been bothering me more and more lately.

I wish I could just start over again with a new set of teeth, but I can't. The thought of visiting a professional honestly scares me too. It's pathetic, I know, people seeing the results of my mental health struggles terrifies me. My teeth have to be the absolute most disgusting thing about me. Even as a kid, it was so embarrassing, but now I'm an adult that should've never let it get to this point.

I guess I just want to ask for some advice on what to do in the meantime until I can somehow afford to have this all treated. Taking care of myself has been really hard lately and I wish I could use this problem to motivate me to make it better, but I just feel so discouraged.