From $30k to Broke: Why You Should Always Save for a Rainy Day
Ah, the thrill of a blossoming bank account! Once upon a not-so-distant past, I, 34 year old male, was the poster child for financial savvy, making a sweet $5000 a month from what the cool kids call "side hustling." My side hustle wasn't just a side thing; it was practically a full-time romance with currency. I funneled most of that cash into investments, watching my nest egg plump up to a cozy $30k over several months. It felt like I had cracked some secret code to the universe. But here’s a twist—turns out the universe had other plans.
Enter July 2023, a time that would make a great plot twist in the tragicomedy that is my life. I found myself carted off to the ER while at work, because why not add some drama to my already busy schedule? This ER visit wasn’t just a one-off episode; it turned into a hospital series featuring yours truly. That month, I visited Japanese ERs ten times, because apparently, I was trying to collect them like Pokémon. I visited the ER so frequently that doctor’s and nurses thought I was psychotic. They told me to go to a psychiatric hospital instead, all while they literally chuckled at the suffering boy with a blood pressure of 180/130mmHg and resting heart rate of over 120bpm.
Now, while all this was unfolding, I had been battling some insidious symptoms for two years. Symptoms that screamed, "Check the liver!" But did the local medical team listen? Of course not. Why would they? It’s much more fun to keep things mysterious. Despite my persistent suggestions and the mounting evidence that something was catastrophically wrong, my concerns were dismissed faster than a newbie's idea in a corporate boardroom.
Frustrated with playing charades with my health, I decided to jet back to my homeland, Puerto Rico, where I don’t need no doctor’s permission to order some blood tests (Provided you pay for them). There, the plot thickened. After undergoing tests that I could actually ask for without having to perform a ceremonial dance, I was diagnosed with Wilson’s Disease—an actual, real-life villain lurking in my liver, disrupting my metabolism like a bad roommate who leaves passive-aggressive notes on the fridge. Suck on that, Japanese doctors, ‘cause you won’t be laughing anymore once I take a ride back and become yet another “compensation for negligence and damages” case.
With this revelation, it was now obvious why my ability to work, think, or even walk properly had vanished quicker than the next Tik-Tok trend. By this I mean I had said goodbye side hustles, regular income, and hello to a dwindling bank account from the very first hospital visit. I began to use the money from one of my investments, which I fondly refer to in my blog series "From Thousand to a Million." And guess what? Million did not happen… at least not for now. Instead, it started to evaporate, leaving me with about $2,000 after nine harrowing months of medical bills and living costs that didn't seem to get the memo that I was financially incapacitated.
Here's where it gets really hilarious (if your sense of humor is as dark as mine). I had copper levels in my blood that were so high, the doctors were practically taking bets on whether I'd drop dead or slip into a coma first. I mean, with 680mcg/L of Free Copper—over 60 times the upper recommended limit and over 600 times the average—you'd think I'd at least get a superhero name out of it. Mr. Electric Wire or The Human Cent, perhaps?
But this isn’t just a sob story about how I went from flush to flat broke; it’s a cautionary tale wrapped in a financial advice column wrapped in an existential crisis. If it weren't for my initial hustle and those investments, I’d probably be writing this from beyond the grave. That money saved my life. Literally. So, if there's anything resembling a moral in this mess, it's this: Invest your money as if your life depends on it. Because, spoiler alert, sometimes it really does.
And there you have it, folks. My journey from $30k to practically zilch, with a side of liver drama and a dash of international medical escapade. Who needs fiction when life’s plot twists are this good?
