My girlfriend’s dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer when I was going to break up with her.

I’ll try to keep this short–

I have been dating my girfriend for a little over a year now. We haven’t had any fights, there are no red flags or conflicts in our relationship.

Rather, I’ve come to see her as more of a friend than a romantic partner, and am no longer interested in continuing our relationship. I had been planning to end things with her and meet up with her to have this conversation about a month ago.

The day before we agreed to meet up, her father was diagnosed with terminal cancer.

I couldn’t tell her I was breaking up with her after that. Not on that day.

The past month has been a lot. I’m torn between wanting to be supportive, but also worrying that she will only grow to lean on me further and that when I eventually do break up with her and that it will hurt her even more in the long run. I’ve been trying to find a good time to break the news–and between the holidays and everything else on her shoulders, I realized that there might never be a ‘good’ or a ‘right’ time.

I’ve gotten conflicting advice, including some that think it would be better if I remain supportive for months until she is in a better place emotionally and mentally. Others have argued that it’d be leading her on and only making it that much harder for her in the long run. The other thing is that we don’t know how long her dad has left. It might be years. Weeks. Months.

I don’t know what the right answer is.

Long story short, my family has bad history with money. I’m really insecure about my finances and being able to provide enough for myself to live happily. What do?

Long story long, growing up, my family talked about money a lot. We were hit by an economic crisis just before year 2000, so my family lost a lot of money through bad investments.

After that and other unrelated personal problems (my parents getting divorced, for one), my dad never got a normal job again to this day, and my mom had been struggling, working maybe 60 hours a week to support us. I try not to dwell on it because I gotta work with what I have now, but they never let go of it. My parents and siblings never failed to let me know how bitter they were.

As a kid I lived with my dad in a small home. My dad wouldn’t stop talking about money to me, at ages 7 through 12, so I learned to be more careful in what I ask for.

Soon enough, mom got a place and we could live with her, but she was always working. I grew bitter because of it. I’m not proud of it, I think I was being stupid, but I hated my family for not being rich, that if they hadn’t had me they could be better off.

We struggled financially until I was older and suddenly I had to make a life for myself. I went to university, I was briefly happy, then lost all excitement as I was told by my own professors that not many of us would make it in life.

I have been praised in different job interviews throughout the years, only to be turned down in the end. They always found an excuse to not hire me. It’s safe to say my resume is severely lacking. The times I have managed to have money for myself that I could save up, I end up giving it to those who I think might need it more, mostly within my own family.

Giving it back to my mom to try and help some, sending my dad money for his food and medicine, spending on my friends. I hate myself for it because I need to save money for my future, but my anxiety drives me insane when I have it on me and won’t help someone who might need it.

Other times, I do think about myself and spend it stupidly on things that I want, then blame myself for it. I still struggle thinking up a future for myself because I have to think about money first. My every move has to be thought out around whether I have the money for it or not. It’s just self-inflicted torture over and over.

I understand that sometimes people make choices that drive them to bad conditions, that there’s also undeniable unfairness around money in general but I don’t want to go into that. I think that my family in particular were just more stupid with money than they would like to admit. I’m told I just have to try and do the best for me but I can’t help thinking that I won’t ever be able to have enough to live.

I don’t want to live in a world that focuses on money as a primary survival resource, when it is something so complicated. I wish I could make plans and carry them out without having to think of money. I wish I could just think of helping other people without thinking of how it could benefit my lifestyle. I wish I could think of the things I deserve too, without thinking of how I must be taking away from those close to me who need it more. I wish money wasn’t the way we measure who deserves to have a good life and who doesn’t.

I am 24 now and I feel like a failure because there are $5 in my bank account while I wait for someone to pay $100 they owe me. I don’t have enough to leave the house if I had to right now.

I could ask my mom for it, but it makes me feel worse every time I do. I have grown more anxious about it in the past two years.

I’m still living with my parents and I’m thankful that they want to help me now that they can, but it’s making me feel worse that this comfort zone has made me so afraid of striking out on my own.

I can’t make plans because I’m afraid I won’t have money, my insecurities just shut me down before I let myself imagine what I want to do.

Please, help me understand how to be financially stable. How do I stop hating the thought of money? I want to let go of the unfairness and disparity surrounding this issue because, as true as it might be, I just have to accept that this is the world, this is my present, and I need to focus on what I can do, not how I wish things were. How do I even begin?