I think I'm going to cry!

I am new to taxes, I'm quite young and know little to nothing about them.  On top of that, I'm terrible at maths!

I've been scrolling through all of the official tax websites and many of the threads here and I can't understand any of it!

Basically, I am trying to move back to America with my British husband and new baby.  In order for my Husband's visa to go through I have to have the past 3 years tax returns ready for the visa (I have no idea why).  I have not filed the past 2 years, not knowing I had to.

When I try to look up what I need to do to get these 2 other tax returns I feel like my head is going to explode.  I don't know where to start, which forms to fill out or what any of the forms even mean!  Can anyone help?  Is there anywhere that speaks plain English to tell me what I need to do?

I just wanted to say I really empathize with you Pmacca01.  I have totally procrastinated and have not even looked at a single thread here or tax website because I am afraid I will cry, just like you, and that my head will explode, too. 

I hope a nice person here at UK-Y can help you.

Perhaps this thread might help?

http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=41268.0

Also, I'm not sure if an online program like TurboTax or H&R Block would let you do past years' taxes, but it wouldn't hurt to ask someone who works there!

If you worked & had a baby you may find you qualify for the refundable child credit plus the Bush stimulus refund.

Thus you may be paid by the IRS for filing these pieces of paper you didn't know you had to do!

There are provisions for filing previous years' taxes. You can get the forms you need at this IRS web page for "prior years forms, instructions and publications" (back to 1990):

http://www.irs.gov/formspubs/article/0,,id=98339,00.html

The most important thing will be to have all your records in order--particularly pay stubs and bank statements from the U.K.

The main form needed for each year is the 1040, which summarizes your income and the amounts from any other forms. After that is the 2555 for declaring and excluding "Foreign Earned Income"--because of this, you won't owe U.S. tax on what you earned unless it was a huge amount. Did you have self-employment income of any sort? If not, that may be about it for you!

I'm sorry, I don't know if there are arbitrary penalties for late filing, but I hope that since you should have no amount due, there would be nothing to penalize... ?

For exchange rates, there are UK-Y regulars who have a better handle than me on what is expected. It seems that the government may accept an annual average conversion in normal cases, which would simplify things for you a lot.

Good luck! I know it is the most appalling hassle.

Thanks for everyone's help.

Don't have the new baby yet, won't for another month or so.  That could be why I feel like crying!