Where can I live?

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

Serious discussion time. I don't at all know where to look for information like this, so I'm posting here and on the Flying Spaghetti Monster forum because both forums are full of reasonable people who mostly seem to like me.

 

I have lived in Massachusetts, USA, for my entire life. Not once have I had a permanent residence father than 26 miles from my childhood home. Every time someone asks, I say I don't want to live anywhere but Massachusetts, because it has the best mental health system in the country and is also probably the most liberal. I say I love the USA and Massachusetts is my home because I can't go anywhere else and be safe. But I'm suddenly tiring of the USA.

 

There's a lot of nationalism disguised as a patriotism in this country, and if I say "I don't like this place," I risk being abused by everyone around me. It's "wrong" and "giving up" and "shameful" to say I don't like this country, and therefore I love this country. It's "abandoning the land that raised you" and "the land that fought for your freedom" so instead of feeling neglected, I act loyal. There's nowhere in the world better than here, so not only is it a waste of time but it's ignorant to look elsewhere and it's wrong to try. But that's like Stockholm syndrome, except the abuser is a country instead of one person. Isn't it?

 

I don't want to harp too much on what's wrong with America. There's a lot I adore about it but I'm afraid it's not meeting my needs and I really would love to know if there's somewhere better. And this is an international, largely-intelligent forum, so I'm hoping I can at least get a starting point regarding both location and feasibility.

 

Things I MUST have:

-Strong mental health care and dignity for the mentally ill

-Strong health care in general (especially if it's free)

-Not being forced to live in poverty just because I happened to only be able to prove I was too disabled to work after age 22 (if not this then I may as well stay in Massachusetts)

-Strong laws against anti-LGBTQ/anti-atheist/anti-mental-illness discrimination and abuse

-Sociopolitical climate at least as liberal as Massachusetts

 

Things I would really like but which I may be able to flex on:

-Large English-speaking population (I tried learning Italian and Spanish once but neither of them stuck, could have been the American public school-style education hindering me though)

-Good treatment of animals (absolutely won't live in a whaling country, but things like better farm practices and such are just a plus)

-Good public transportation system (I can live near or in a city if I need to although I'm definitely a suburbs guy at heart)

 

And this would be a bonus:

-Legal allowance for, upon my death, my salvageable organs to be donated to others in need, my skull and jaw to be removed and painted whimsically and sold at charity auction to a museum, and the remainder of my body to be fed through a wood chipper and fed to a sapling (I was recently told the second and third are illegal here)

 

So that's what I'd like in a place to live. The other issue is, would I be able to find a place there, get to that place, and stay there sustainably? That's also important obviously.

 

I hate saying I don't want to live in America. I have an American flag on my hat and on my website. But damn, I'm living on $850/mo in a privately-subsidized house for nine people, and if the country swings right again, even that could all get taken away and I could be homeless and without healthcare. That scares me. I didn't choose to be sick. I had dreams of having a job and owning a home and being respected as a valuable member of society. I didn't want all that taken away from me and if I could have it back I'd take it in a heartbeat, but it's becoming clear that even the Certified Peer Specialist position will be too much for me. I teach two classes per week and I feel drained and frustrated doing it. I can't imagine doing three times that every week without the ability to say I can't handle it and not get fired. Is it my fault? I hear hallucinatory voices telling me to do childish things or say rude things that sometimes talk so loud they drown out my thoughts. I've been manic for almost a solid month. I alternate between being so happy that even really bad ideas feel like good ones and my smile is hurting my face and I want to cry and be sad just to relieve the pressure but I can't, and being so anxious and restless it feels like my heart and stomach are having a fight to the death, and I never know what I'll be from day to day or sometimes even hour to hour.

 

I didn't ask for it. No reasonable person would ask for it. I want to live somewhere where that's understood, and I want to feel safe and secure that my life won't be destroyed at the behest of Donald Trump. Is that so much to ask?

 

Is there anywhere in the world like this? Where can I live?

[Tyranicus]

Sorry, but I really don't think there are any options for you. Most countries have pretty strict immigration rules, and they are unlikely to accept the application of someone who is not able to work. Also, good luck finding any country with a more liberal sociopolitical climate than Massachusetts.

[Randomizer]

While you can find countries with lower cost of living and decent health care, I don't know if you can find one with what you need in mental health care too. There are Central American countries like Belize where English is spoken and are set up for Americans planning to retire there so not working is possible.

 

Try using Google to see if you can get your minimum requirements.

[Level 1 Hermit]

Off the top of my head, a few countries cover some. I'm not sure if they would cover all your points (really, it's almost impossible to find a similar place)

 

France, Denmark, Sweden...?

If I recall correctly, these countries have good healthcare, benefits, English is (sort of?) a second language.

Denmark especially has a great biking community.

 

Pretty liberal overall too

[Lilith]

Given what you've said, your best hope of being able to live outside the US on a permanent basis is if you're already eligible for citizenship through a family member. Do any of your parents or grandparents hold citizenship of a foreign country? If you're eligible for citizenship in a Schengen Area country, most of Europe opens up to you, which expands your options considerably.

 

i mean, it's either that or find someone rich to marry, which sounds like it would solve a lot of your problems even if they were American

[Alorael at Large]

The countries that do well by the mentally ill are usually the ones that have very strong family ties, and it's more those ties than a societal attitude towards mental illness that helps. As an outsider I think you'd be at a disadvantage just about anywhere else.

 

I'd also have concerns about other countries. The US has recurrent threats to its tattered safety net, yes, but Europe has its own flirtations with right-wing xenophobic nationalism, and those sentiments seem to be at high ebb right now.

 

—Alorael, who also has some dubiousness about the global options for safety nets. If you're truly unable to work for your entire lifetime there are places where you will not be homeless and you will not starve, but systems rarely provide for much more than that.

[SoulScroll]

The first countries that popped into my head were the Scandinavian countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland) and good 'ole Canada. I do not know which of the Canadian provinces would be the most liberal, yet as a bonus you wouldn't be too far from Massachusetts, Canadians speak English with a smattering of French, and the healthcare system is good. Canada seems like a good starting point with secondary options in Europe.

 

As an aside, I would feel weary of moving to Central America (Belize). High rates of homicide and property crime.

[Lilith]

The first countries that popped into my head were the Scandinavian countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland) and good 'ole Canada.

 

Since ADOS specifically mentioned it's a dealbreaker for him, it's worth noting that Norway and Canada both allow whaling, although in Canada it's restricted to indigenous communities that have traditionally practiced it and rely on it as a food source (which is also the case in the US). I'm not sure why he chose that in particular as worth making a stand on principle for when he's presumably not going to have any personal connection to whaling in any case, but...

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

I would make exception for ancient indigenous peoples, I suppose. I just don't want an industry made of it. Killing anything with complex language skills irks me, but pale-skinned strangers coming in, killing almost everyone who was there already, ordering everyone else into little reservations, and generally being a giant pain in the butt irks me too. Also, as far as relatives, my great great grandmother was Mi'kmaq, born on a reservation and everything, making my bloodline 1/16th Native Canadian, if that means anything.

 

What IS the situation in Canada? I know the health care system is supposed to be wonderful there compared to the USA and they've recently had a jerk for a PM, but are Canadian jerk politicians as bad as American jerk politicians? What's the rest of the situation like? I do like the proximity to the USA.

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

Anyway, I would like to remind everyone that I've been super-manic for a month and it's beginning to wear on me; it usually doesn't last more than a week or two, so I'm becoming exasperated and my thinking isn't clear. I would love to own a little 350-400sq.ft. (total, all floors) mini-house. That's my pipe dream. But in Massachusetts $800/mo. gets you next to no opportunities for home ownership or even an independently-rented apartment. It's possible I could work a very limited number of hours without becoming overwhelmed, and supplement that, but it wouldn't be much. By my calculations working 15 hours/week at $15/hour (approximate pay for a Certified Peer Specialist, which on further thought is a position that probably doesn't exist outside the USA, one reason I've been afraid to consider moving anywhere) would bring my income to ~$1200/mo or about $14400/yr. Still doesn't get you much, but I wonder if my pipe dream would be possible on that income, including whether it's feasible for such a home to exist in Massachusetts.

 

I really don't know what to do. I've been given until tomorrow to decide what groups I want to lead next semester and I'd like to do three of them, as opposed to two, to see what I can handle. I just... I don't want to live with people like I'm living with for my entire life. They have no concept of sanitation.

[Randomizer]

You might be able to find a home/apartment in your price range in rural areas, but then you would have increased transportation costs to get anywhere that you need. What you need is an online job that would pay as much as your current job, but would allow you to move to a cheaper area.

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

I don't have a job at all, which is part of the problem.

 

My Internet searches indicate that it is possible to buy a house on SSI but it's complicated and I don't think there's a lot of flexibility regarding location.

 

EDIT: Actually, a trailer park could possibly be feasible. There's a lot of trailer parks in suburban areas. But they're... trailer parks. They're not usually pleasant places to live.

[Tyranicus]

Actually, a trailer park could possibly be feasible. There's a lot of trailer parks in suburban areas. But they're... trailer parks. They're not usually pleasant places to live.

Some trailer parks are better than others. There are plenty that fit the "trailer trash" stereotype, but there are also many very nice ones.

[Slawbug]

In New England, rent is surprisingly expensive in rural areas.

 

ADoS, how much is your rent, currently?

[Lilith]

What you need is an online job that would pay as much as your current job, but would allow you to move to a cheaper area.

 

easier said than done; in general purely online work pays poorly and it's a struggle to get more than a few hours of work a week. if you have the qualifications and skills for them there are some full-time jobs (mostly IT-related) that you can mostly do online, but usually you're still expected to be able to show up in person in emergencies

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

In New England, rent is surprisingly expensive in rural areas.

 

ADoS, how much is your rent, currently?

 

~$250/month due to a private charity subsidy. It comes with heating, water, electricity, and people who eat hard boiled eggs with the shells, vomit them into cooking pots, and leave them on the counter.

 

As I said, I'm rather manic and it's making me irrational. I want it to stop very badly, but it won't. My manic episodes are triggered by high-stress situations such as moving into a house with people who don't know what "sanitation" means, and all the problems with the house itself like bathwater raining on my stuff. So it's been almost nonstop for a month. But I have my lucid moments, like, I hope, currently. I talked to my therapist after deciding not to just kill myself, and she reminded me of the actual, single-occupancy apartments for the elderly and disabled. The wait lists on those are somewhat long but not as long as the standard Section 8 housing (if I'm lucky I could be in as soon as 3 years as opposed to 10), and the rent is the same 30% of my income. These are in places like Salem, Beverly, and Hamilton, within walking distance of my favorite train line that takes me to everyone on my treatment team. My therapist will help me fill out forms tomorrow.

 

My therapist agreed that the thing to do is set my room back up nice and clean and organized for the first time in almost two weeks, now that the leaky pipes have supposedly been fixed. My room can be my sanctuary, and I can deal with cleaning the kitchen in order to cook there once a week (I cook in bulk), and the bathroom next to my room is usually clean enough to not make me cry. So for the most part when I'm at home I can sit in here and ignore everyone, aside from the donkey laughing, retching, and banging sounds coming from around the house. I have nice headphones to listen to music and drown it out if I want to as well. Having a disorganized living space is not good for my mental health. A good thing about living in a 10'x15' (at most) room is that it becomes uncomfortably cluttered and messy very quickly, so when I get sick of it it's easy to catch back up, as opposed to living in houses the size my mother prefers, where it's a nightmare.

 

I'm rambling at this point. I've been drinking coffee to keep me awake long enough to clean my room. Currently I have done all my dishes, so that's the sanitation out of the way. But anyway, I'm tired and caffeinated at the same time, so I'll stop typing for now, until someone says something else that warrants a response from me, at least.

[Jerakeen]

You will continue to get the $850/month even if you leave the country?

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

I don't know. I do know that foreign nationals can pay into and receive Social Security provided our country has the appropriate agreement with their country, and I'd still be an actual American citizen, so maybe, although I would not receive the Massachusetts state supplement, of course. Anyway like I said, there are more options available to me here in Massachusetts than I had considered. Please don't judge me or mock me for freaking out. It's very hard living with schizoaffective disorder especially because it causes irrational, nonlinear, clouded thinking on a difficult-to-impossible-to-predict basis. It's basically all the "fun" parts of both bipolar disorder and schizophrenia thrown into one bag.

[Jerakeen]

Nobody is judging you. More than a few of us have had, and are having, our own struggles with mental health.

 

I hope you can get into a better place, physically and otherwise.

[SoulScroll]

The Almighty Doer of Stuff:

 

The more I read your current plight regarding your living arrangements along with being overwhelmed by mental anguish, the more I feel like suggesting taking smaller, more simple steps to improve things. Physically moving to another address is a BIG stressor all its own, and trying to move to an entirely different country only adds to the complications.

 

My instincts suggest that you consider taking it easy and think about what small and simple steps you can take to improve your living situation first before graduating on to more complex undertakings such as moving to an entirely different country. Maybe the patriotic people you have been around recently are not for you? America is a huge and widely diverse country; you might find people more suited to your liking simply in another state. My childhood state of Minnesota is nice with a pretty liberal set of social programs if you can tolerate the brutal winters.

 

Having to deal with mental anguish and strain only adds to your life burdens, so why make it worse on yourself considering something extraordinarily complicted such as moving to an entirely different part of the planet? You may end up facing more serious stressors in your current life once you move out of the country and be worse off than you are right now.

 

I emphasize small and simple changes to your living arrangements first so that everything doesn't become overwhelming. Only go with the more complicated undertakings when you have exhausted simpler options.

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

Thanks.

 

The step I'm taking right now is cleaning and organizing my bedroom. Tomorrow my mother will bring me more of my possessions and when I have them and everything's all nice and neat and my art is on the walls, it will feel more homey. I have a long day ahead of me and I'm still awake at almost 3 AM, but I want to get it all out of the way. Plus I need to have room for the nice glass shelves. They were part of a crappy desk that fell apart but I discovered the shelves could stand on their own so I kept them. I can even get a printer for my computers if I keep an empty shelf for it.

 

Having a harmonious living space may lead to a more harmonious mental state. No sleep will not but it will only be for one day. And I'm almost done.

[Alex]

Given that the nationalism of your compatriots bothers you, do you think living among nationalist foreigners would be more pleasant?

 

In order to get a residence permit in most countries, you need to have a job there, be a university student, or be granted refugee status. As pointed out, you could also marry a citizen of the country you wanted to move to.

[Nephil Thief]

@ADoS

 

My sympathies re the mental health stuff. What you're going through sounds horrendous. *hugs*

 

Wish I had advice on the living situation. My main thought is, try not to make major life decisions while you're on the emotional roller coaster. Not sure to what extent that's possible, but... yeah. Personally, decisions I made during times of anxiety, depression, or emotional desperation have not held me in good stead.

 

As far as nationalism allergies, you have my sympathies on that too. American nationalism these days terrifies me.

 

P.S. Oh hey, I'm also in Massachusetts.

 

P.P.S. Not sure if I should say this, but I feel like I kind of owe you one, for your advice in the thread re: my dad. You're an awesome person.

[The Almighty Doer of Stuff]

Thanks!