OK, I'm going to try to address almost all of those explanations (complainypants?) with some hopefully helpful suggestions to reduce spending while still addressing those needs.
1) What can you do now to maximize your earnings come tax time? Will networking or marketing now help? Gaining more skills / knowledge?
2) There is a difference between splurging on food you eat and spending $$ on food that gets thrown away b/c it spoiled before you ate it. If you do weekly meal planning, and only buy for those meals, you can avoid wasting food -- which may be running up your bill? You could even do it monthly by freezing some meals, although it may not work if you're just now getting into shopping sales/couponing. Freezing / portioning meals will also help YH avoid takeout, because his meal will be planned in advance.
3) You don't have to compromise on the type of dog food, if it's one that has coupons. You can probably still buy exactly what you want, but for less, if you shop sales with coupons. Keep a price list where you track the price per unit that you can get at various places, during various sales, and with various coupons. Pay attention to your best price per unit and strive to only buy at that time. Stock up and store in a cool, dry place.
4) Do you see a theme here? While you don't have a side hustle, I highly encourage you to learn how to "extreme coupon." It is a thrilling experience for numbers-crunching, frugal people with a little extra time on their hands. I learned how to do it on
www.hotcouponworld.com and use the weekly match ups on
www.livingrichwithcoupons.com. I also liked Stephanie Nelson's book
The Coupon Mom's Guide to Cutting your Grocery Bill in Half. We don't compromise on the quality of the food that we eat, and have really cut down our groceries bills from my pre-couponing levels. Each week, we save 30-40%.
5) Do you have central AC or a window unit? If you have central, try installing a window unit just in your bedroom. Turn the central AC off at night and just use the window unit (and close the door to your BR or put up a curtain so the dogs can still get in/out but the AC air won't)
6) Sit down with the hubs, get him on board, and see what suggestions he has.
Anything there you can use?