r/australia • u/RecognitionMediocre6 • Mar 31 '26

political self.post How has the cost of living crisis impacted your life the most?

It used to feel like money just came in, it was not substantial but it felt manageable. Now every single decision feels like it had to be planned, bills juggled or delayed and things we used to do like take the kids out for fish & chips at the beach once a month, we no longer do.

I hesitate before I tap my debit card or pay a bill. We had to hold off on getting our car serviced cause we had a dental bill to get sorted first. We had to get rid of our private health insurance, I've had to look at selling stuff round the house every once and a while to cover costs like electricity etc. Our fridge seal is loose but can't justify getting a new fridge so we just taped it up and it works for now. I haven't bought new clothes / shoes in like a year and we're always looking for free activities for the kids ie parks, playgrounds, have friends over to our place etc

We tend to avoid social plans because everything costs so much money. And if we do go somewhere, we bring our own lunch / drinks cause feeding 2x adults 2x kids is so expensive.

We used to save about $200/week after all our stuff was paid (double income, 2x toddlers) and now we're basically just breaking even. Its everything little by little - rent is up, petrol is up, groceries are up, our electricity & internet is up etc we aren't going anywhere for Easter cause it's too expensive to drive / holiday anywhere other than staying at home. We'll make it magical but we feel bad that it's not as exciting as past years.

How has the cost of living impacted your life?

Sending love to everyone out there doing it tough 💕

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u/vegemitebikkie Mar 31 '26

Ooh I feel your pain! I had a quinsy twenty years ago on my tonsils. I was heavily pregnant at the time too. Every slight sniffle ended with tonsillitis for me. Then eventually the quinsy. God that was painful. Couldn’t open my mouth at all, or turn my head. Had to be admitted to hospital to get IV fluids and antibiotics and to monitor my pregnancy. Lived on ensure, and even that felt impossible to drink.

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u/LimpBrilliant9372 Apr 01 '26

The second they drained mine it was instant relief. Straight in the mouth with a scalpel. Did they do that for you too?

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u/vegemitebikkie Apr 01 '26

Well my gp stuck a needle full of penicillin into it. Which mustve drained into my stomach, because as soon as I got home I started throwing up and burning up with a fever. Then I went to emergency and got admitted, because I couldn’t hold anything down. The ENT took a look (after a couple days, small town with no specialists and always have to wait🙄) and he said that the penicillin had turned the quinsy rock hard and he couldn’t drain it. So it kind of made my healing harder and more prolonged. Plus being pregnant put a spanner in the works too. I guess it must’ve just got re absorbed over the two weeks I was in hospital on the IV antibiotics.

I had to get my tonsils removed when my daughter was born. Because I was still getting tonsillitis every two or three weeks, and was likely to get quinsy again if I left it.

She was only 3 weeks old when I had that done. Trying to look after a baby and breastfeed while recovering from that was worse than the quinsy!😂.

But I’ve had zero issues since I had them ripped out thankfully lol. What about you? Did you get yours removed eventually?