Russu by CHM, a budget-friendly faith-based alternative to health insurance. CHMinistries.org. My situation is rather complex. My, I'm a 24-year-old from Oregon, who's doing college, had two years left for a business administration degree.
My girlfriend is five weeks pregnant, I found out about it three days ago. And to be honest, we're both rather scared. I've now standing deaths. I don't know if she has any outstanding deaths, but they have to leave so.
However, she's not in the best financial situation, just overall, with the living, expenses and other things. Well, that's scary, and you have a right to be rightfully spooked by all this. I'm going to go ahead and assume that you are the father. Yes, I'm the father.
Okay. How long have you been together? We've been together around a year. We live, we don't live together, unfortunately, so there's even more scary because we need to find a way to live, find a way to move together if we decide to have the child.
Okay. Let's roll back once one moment before we even think about that part. Was there somebody that you plan to be with, or is this something that's like, oh, dang, now I definitely feel like I am stuck. This is someone that I was considering, Mary, and I both get along amazingly.
We have never had a fight in the entire time we've ever been together. I mean, it's been 12 months, man. It's not like it ever even. Okay.
So it was something that you were thinking about a future with. She is the one that I was thinking about having a future with. Okay. That is good because that way, all of what I would hate is for you to just be thinking, oh, I got this girl pregnant, now I'm stuck, and now I have to move in, now I have to get married and be forced into something that you never saw a future with that person, but it's good that you did see a future with her because now she's having your baby.
Okay. So you've got two years left of college. What about her? She is currently, she's not in college or nor is employed.
And that's, I think the biggest scary thing for me is she's gonna have to find a job. I said, I could grow up really fast now. And I've never worked a full time job. I've just been so focused on school.
I'm like, so you're 24. Did you take some gaffiers? There was one gap year, but there was a lot of jumping around unsure of what career I wanted to go into because of the fact that our world is changing so fast. Okay.
So what's on the other side of this? Let's say you do finish the degree. What kind of job are you looking for? If you miss health plan, open enrollment, don't panic.
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Check out CHMinistries.org. So let's say you do finish the degree. What kind of job are you looking for? That's kind of the more difficult thing.
I personally am really interested in architecture and I was also interested in psychology. However, I've had family members push back against that and say, no, you should be doing this or you should be doing that. Okay. Also, I've been so unsure.
Well, here's the truth. You might need to put a pause on education and just get to work doing anything. Yes. And the truth is you could probably make as much now as you would with a business administration degree on the other side.
The degree could help you long term, but in the short term, now we just got to stack cash and get ready for this new life of being a dad. And you know, does she have insurance? Is she covered through her parents? I believe so, yes.
That would be one piece of homework to figure out is the medical side and then childcare side. She's unemployed. She's going to need to get to work until she can no longer work and babies about to be here to try to at least, you know, mitigate some of the financial damage here. And then is it, is she going to just stay home with the baby?
And then are you going to be near her? How close are you guys right now as far as distance? I'm around three hours. Three hours.
Oh gosh. Okay. So now I understand a little bit more what you were speaking about. Is there since she's kind of unattached in the way of school or work, is she able to come closer to where you are?
Would she be willing to do that? She's been currently working towards that. She has been trying to find a way to move out where she finally lives. Where does she live?
She lives in the financial part. She's living in a home with other roommates is what she's living in. How is she affording it? I think she, I think it's very personal, but I think it's like something regarding a she is a case manager and not going to fight.
Okay. So she's just getting government assistance? Yes. I think so.
She's even quite a bit of assistance. Okay. Okay. How will she?
She's 21. She have family nearby that you guys can move closer to to have some help and would they be willing to help? Have you had that conversation? Her family is not very inner life.
My family unfortunately is six hours south of me. Got it. Okay. So thing number one on the list, I think, is you guys need to get together and you need to create a plan for you guys living near each other, especially if you think the plan might be to get married.
So that's thing one thing too, is verifying the whole insurance business because if she's a stranger from her parents, maybe she's not and if she's getting government assistance, there's a lot there. And then the third thing I would do is once you figure out the living situation, I would start, I would find a local church and I would start premarital counseling just to see if you guys are fit. Like if you could do a marriage together, if you could. Yeah.
I would have a hard time saying get married immediately because I just, I'm not hearing in your voice and even in your vicinity that that was the plan per se. This, I don't know if I'm right or wrong on that, but I don't want to just say to you, go get married. Does that make sense? Yeah.
Given what you told us and then what is your financial picture? Do you have any savings right now? Do you have any debt? I have a large college fund that was set up by my family.
I come up rather from a rather privileged background. I believe my college fund is technically it's owned by me. It's around like 50 to $70,000, maybe up to 90 at the most. Okay.
What about other cash? Other cash? Not a lot, unfortunately. Okay.
Well, you've got a nine month runway here. And so I would heavily consider pausing school, moving closer together and you getting to work full time plus a side job, her taking on a full time job until baby's close to being here. And then we'll figure out the debt later, but right now you're in store code, stocking up cash and figuring out the life plan, then we'll figure out the financial plan. And don't do anything really crazy until the doctor says a lot of times people don't even tell people that they're pregnant until like what around the 12 week mark.
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