Sadly, I think this would be in a really good place right now if I hadn't been stupid enough to get into an EA. She's smarting from that and it's infinitely complicated by the fact that our kids will be starting kindergarten at the same school in less than a month. My best option is to get him enrolled in the private school he did 4K at last year. We didn't save any money this summer by pulling him from daycare, which we would have done if we'd decided on this school earlier.
That leaves me to asking my parents for money. I just got a huge chunk from them for her bday present. She's not a huge fan of being so reliant on my family, so it's a tight rope walk right now.
I do know that if I want a prayer of saving my M, I can't have my kid at school w/ the OW's kid. If my W sees her at a school event, it'll be a fight, every time. Well, not a fight because I won't even try to defend that idiocy on my part, but it'll be a bad day.
I've come to realize, I may need to take a second job this year, I need to shift the finances of my family. Not sure what that'll be.
A lot of families have at least one parent with an extra job. We do what we have to do. But to be clear, are you saying the school your son would be at, costs $4k or what? Why can't he go to public school there? I read an article recently that said "barring the unusual" (meaning the schools at the END of the spectrum, like the bottom 10-20%) statistic, most kids can do fine in a "good high school" no matter where they attended elementary school. That's b/c except for the bottom fifth, almost every elementary school will teach your child how to read and write and do some basic arithmetic AND most parents can help compensate for any problems b/c most of us can handle that level math and reading, etc. (I know once 8th grade hits, no one can ask ME for math help).
And why "must" you or your w run into OW? What if anything does her child know? And have you told OW that it's over, in a way your wife knows about?
Have you reassured your w of your fidelity in a way that she believes (even though I'm sure it still hurts her), have you at least gotten your w to see that it's NOT a likely repeat?
As for second jobs, would you tutoring be helpful? They charge $25-50 per hour around here, and you can mostly pick your own hours. Same for SAT prep tutoring work, which Kaplan, Princeton Review and others teach. (Our d17 is taking an SAT prep class now and we paid $1100!! She better do well on it!)
Just some ideas.
ALSO I'm glad the gift idea went over well. I think a 2nd job makes more sense than borrowing more from your parents unless you believe a raise is coming your way soon. Otherwise you are not changing the financial planning, just borrowing more.
I mean, is there something you can sell or something you can DO, or that you are expecting, so that you can most likely get out of debt and get onto the "saving something for FUN" plan?
The "funnest" savings we ever did was with a trip to Europe in mind. Every time we tossed in a $20 bill or more, we'd feel like we were slowly but truly doing it. It did NOT "hurt" at all, you know?
The saving and the planning were FUN, I swear.
M: 57 H: 60 M: 35 yrs S30,D28,D19 H off to Alaska 2006 Recon 7/07- 8/08 *2016* X = "ALASKA 2.0" GROUND HOG DAY I File D 10/16 OW DIV 2/26/2018 X marries OW 5/2016
