So I actually got a check for my first Advance Child Tax Credit payment even though the IRS has literally had my bank information on file since the first stimulus check. I checked, and all of that information is still in the portal on the website. But somehow, some way, I miraculously got a paper check in the mail. I had to make time to go down to my grocer, where my bank works, to deposit this check into one of my accounts. It should be deposited at around midnight if you want to get the most technical, and then I can begin doing what I told myself (and everyone else) that I was going to do with it… buy personal comfort items and toys for them.

I got Monster one of the toys that he has been wanting for going on a year now because he saw a YouTube commercial about said toy… the Peppa Pig Sing-a-Long Kitchen Playset. No one in the United States sells, or sold, it, so I had to buy it from a seller on eBay since I had enough money to cover it waiting for the child tax credit check to officially be deposited. He won’t know about it until it actually arrives because of the struggle that he has with conceptualizing time, waiting for things, and understanding the mail service in general. That, and it’s literally coming from another country, so if it gets here in a week I am going to be surprised.

Now to figure out exactly what to buy them with these payments, and help their dreams come true.

As per Informed Delivery, I was made aware that I would be receiving something in the mail from the IRS.

I thought that it would be the check or the debit card that the IRS portal had promised me, because all of that was supposed to start happening and going out on the fifteenth… but nope. This is probably going to be something like what I experienced with the first stimulus check where it took them months to even get it to me, and then they shorted me dependent pay (+2) for months, finally fixing that. I’ve had to threaten to get a hold of my state’s Legal Aid program again, having actually done so when HHSC and the OAG wanted to actively enforce Bub’s child support case in spite of the fact that it is unsafe to do for multiple reasons. The moment that they found out that I had contacted Legal Aid and that Legal Aid was working that up as a possible case, they put his child support case back into non-enforcement, where it has wordlessly stayed ever since. It was only when I threatened Legal Aid’s intervention that they actually did this, too. Blatant.

With any luck, it may be deposited into the bank account that the IRS has on file for me in the next… few days? But if not, I will definitely be contacting someone about the IRS. They have all of my financial information on file. None of this should be taking as long as it is, or it has in general. For fuck’s sake…

Apparently complaining to the right people about this got me desirable results. I like the sound of this.

So far, my bank (since I can’t use the IRS website to verify my identity, not having a credit card and having an ID card so “blurry” that ID.me claims not to be able to read it) claims that they don’t see anything for the Advance Child Tax Credit being deposited into my account. I was eligible for all three stimulus checks, which I got, and I am the only person who can claim either one of my children as dependents — Monster’s father is now permanently denied access to him, and Bub’s father does not have enough overnights to be able to claim him, nor does he have any taxable income. (I’m told he won’t apply for SSI, making matters worse.)

I was going to buy Monster odds and ends with it, and I was going to buy Bub some more video games, but obviously that is pissing itself away since we might not even get the Advance Child Tax Credit to begin with.

I don’t know, though, I can be a bit of a pessimist when I put my whole back into it.

My neck, my back, my Netflix, and my snacks. Because that’s how it goes a lot of the time now.