July 2022 Updates: Work Stress Part 2
July was an anxiety-filled month. Work has been crazy and my manager broke the news that she spoke with higher ups and I will not be getting a salary increase. Their rationale is they have hired a dedicated person to help alleviate the work I was helping with for a different department.
Another person from my department is also finally coming back after having taken a month leave. I was assured that once that’s in motion, she’d take back the role she was doing which I had taken over while she was away.
I am ok with that as long as what they say is true. I don’t want the extra stress of having to be client-facing and working extra hours even if it means extra pay.
My manager is great and has really taken the brunt of the client-facing stuff (and she’s great at it) but next week she’ll be gone and the two people are still not fully trained yet so I’m anticipating a lot of work catching up the newbies while juggling the current workload.
On a more positive note, what I hope will become a tradition is continuing. My pharmacy school friend and I who now live on opposite coasts will go on another vacation this year as we did last year!
Our destination? Europe! The best part is I booked my flight last weekend and it is completely covered with points from Chase. I even have some points left that I can probably use to pay for part of the hotel stay as well. Yay to credit card points!
The $95 annual fee from My Chase Sapphire Preferred was well worth the $900+ value I was able to redeem the points for.
July Budget
I did a small revamp to my budget. While I hope my miscellaneous spending will stabilize and go down next month, I think I have a working fixed spending budget now.
Fixed Spending
A change from last month is that I decided to break down “Streaming Services” from “Bills + Utilities”. Streaming services will stay as a fixed spending. “Utilities” is now part of variable spending.
All my loan payments (mortgage and student loan) are now part of my fixed spending.
I apparently missed one of my HOA bills in June so I had to make it up this month but things should normalize in August.
Variable Spending
Utilities – for some crazy reason, all my neighbors and I have yet to receive our water bill. So this amount is all Gas & Electric charges.
Gas – Barely left home since I’ve been so stressed with work that I spent all my nights and weekends just destressing at home. Only filled up once this month.
Entertainment/dining out – Dined out a few times. I will likely have to raise my dining out budget from $150 to $200 next month thanks to inflation.
Groceries – As I took care of most home improvement/furnishing purchases, I noticed that my mom has been really taking care of getting groceries this month for me which I’m thankful for.
Shopping – Made a photobook and bought some personal care items from Sephora that I was able to use my Discover credit card points to buy a discounted gift card for! Again, yay credit card points!
Miscellaneous
Car Renewal & Service – Last month, I had to pay my car insurance. This month, my car was due for service, renewal, and a smog check. Owning a car is not cheap! I’m glad that the car is completely paid off so at least I don’t have to worry about monthly payments.
I am super nervous that my car is now a decade old though. I love it and am planning to keep it as long as I can. I do get FOMO when I get into new cars with all the fancy setups and backup cameras, but not enough to justify getting rid of my perfectly working car.
Home Furnishing & Home Improvement – I’ll be completely honest. I definitely underestimated the amount I’d be spending on home furnishing/improvement considering I brought most of my furniture from the old home to the new one.
I’m definitely interested in having a breakdown at the end of the year to see what the “hidden” costs of buying a home is.
Mail – mailed my passport renewal. I was devastated to see that in the last 10 years I only traveled to one new country. Hoping to change that in this next decade of my life!
Blog Renewal – a small price to pay for helping keep me accountable.
Investments
I’ve gotten rid of my Savings category as I now have enough of an emergency fund. Instead, I started investing my extra cash again. My goal is $500-$1000/month to my brokerage account. The market is still in a downturn, but I’m hoping that I can take advantage of this time to invest in anticipation of a recovery.
Student Debt
Student debt paid this month: $880.77
Student debt remaining: $30,836.01
Here are all my previous student debt statements.
Goals for Next Month
None? I’m honestly just hoping to survive this month with work and hoping things get better starting next week.
Planning my vacation has been a much needed escape.
7 thoughts on “July 2022 Updates: Work Stress Part 2”
Sorry if I missed this, but are you no longer a pharmacist?
Hi Shawn!
As I’m re-reading my post, it definitely made sense why you’d ask this! I’m still a pharmacist but I’m no longer in the retail setting. At this point, I’m just a work from home office worker. 😅
While I still utilize my clinical knowledge in some instances, my line of work is getting farther away from clinical . But it’s definitely a field I had my eyes on so I’m happy in my current position 😊
Hi Avery!
Would you mind sharing more about your current job position and what it entails? I am interested in learning about a pharmacy job that is remote like you mention.
I am currently a P2 student and have doubts about my future because I am interning at a retail right now & I am not enjoying it as much as I thought I would. I read your post about regretting pharmacy school & I realized we share some common views. So I would like to explore different avenues in pharmacy that still allows me to use my degree since I feel as if I am in too deep to leave now.
Thank you!
Hi Ming,
Trust me when I say, I understand how you feel! Hang in there 🙂
I am currently in the managed care/PBM field. The most common RPh position within this field is usually some version of a prior authorization clinical pharmacist which is how I got my foot in the door starting with a contract position then moving into different roles within the field.
I was able to get a remote position due to COVID but keep it mind that remote positions aren’t always guaranteed in this field.
I would look into getting a managed care rotation for your P3 year to gain some experience and see if you are interested. I also have a coworker transition into a clinical liaison position in the pharma industry and he loves it so look into that as well!
Lastly, I would not discount retail just yet. I recently met my pharmacy school friend who has been doing retail for over 5 years now and loves it. Retail experiences vary drastically. She has a nice store and great coworkers and is perfectly happy being a staff pharmacist.
Hope this helps and good luck with pharmacy school!
Ahhh yeah dining out has gotten significantly more expensive due to inflation :/. $200/mo is insanely good imo, /Ispendmultipletimesthis. Glad your job will be less hectic going forward. Glad you’re going on vacation! Where to? And nice job getting a ton of it paid for using CC points =). Cars are sooo expensive. I’ve paid 8.8k this year for my 7 year old car incl repairs, gas (20k miles a year), depreciation, insurance and other fees. At 10 years tho, if you do decide to get a different car in the future, I think it would be pretty reasonable.
Hey Raymond!
I’d consider this a good month in terms of dining out. I know there were months where I’ve gone double or triple my budget so definitely not just you 😅.
I’ve never been to Europe so first time will be the typical London/Paris itinerary. Between the two of us, we were only able to coordinate 7 days there (+ 2 travel days) so not a lot of time unfortunately.
My car is still in a really good condition and has less than 100k miles on it despite being 10 years old. I actually can’t remember the last time it needed anything other than general maintenance. So I’m happy to keep it for as long as it still runs 😆.
London and Paris sounds good Avery =) 7 days doesn’t sound bad for 2 cities. Pretty cool that you keep in touch with a friend on the opposite coast too. And ohh <100k miles is not high at all, nice that your car expenses are low.