Jutros sam morala otići do bankomata jer sam htjela podići novac prije posla.

Croatian often leaves out subject pronouns when they are not needed. In sam morala and sam htjela, the auxiliary sam already shows I, so ja is understood.

You could say Ja sam jutros morala..., but that would usually add emphasis, like I had to...

Sam is a clitic, an unstressed word that usually goes in the second position in the clause.

So:

• Jutros sam morala... = natural
• Morala sam... = also natural if morala starts the clause
• Jutros morala sam... = not natural

Croatian word order is more flexible than English, but clitics like sam follow special placement rules.

Those forms show that the speaker is female.

In Croatian past-tense forms with sam, the active participle agrees with the subject's gender:

• morala, htjela = feminine singular
• morao, htio = masculine singular
• moralo, htjelo = neuter singular

So this sentence was said by a woman. A man would say:

Jutros sam morao otići do bankomata jer sam htio podići novac prije posla.

Jutros means this morning.

It refers specifically to the morning of the current day or the most recently relevant morning.

Compare:

• jutros = this morning
• ujutro = in the morning / mornings

So:

• Jutros sam morala... = This morning I had to...
• Ujutro idem u banku. = I go to the bank in the morning.

After morati (to have to / must), Croatian normally uses an infinitive:

• moram ići = I have to go
• morala sam otići = I had to go

Here otići is the infinitive of a perfective verb, meaning to go off / to leave / to go and complete the action.

That fits the sentence well, because the idea is that she had to make a specific trip to the ATM.

Do means something like to, up to, or as far as, and it requires the genitive case.

So:

• bankomat = ATM
• do bankomata = to the ATM

In this sentence, otići do bankomata means to go to the ATM.

It does not mean going inside the ATM. It is just the normal Croatian way to express going to that location.

Because this sentence has two clauses, and each clause has its own verb phrase in the past tense:

1. Jutros sam morala otići do bankomata
2. jer sam htjela podići novac prije posla

Both clauses are in the past, so both need their own auxiliary sam.

English does the same in a different way:

• I had to go... because I wanted...

Jer means because.

It is a very common and natural conjunction in everyday Croatian:

• ...jer sam htjela podići novac... = ...because I wanted to withdraw money...

You can often also use zato što, which also means because:

• ...zato što sam htjela podići novac...

Both are correct. Jer is shorter and very common in speech and writing.

This is an idiomatic expression. The verb podići literally often means to raise, to lift, or to pick up, but with money it means to withdraw.

So:

• podići novac = to withdraw money
• podići gotovinu = to withdraw cash

Here podići is also perfective, which suits a one-time completed action such as making a withdrawal from an ATM.

Novac is the direct object here, so it is in the accusative case.

However, for many masculine inanimate nouns, the accusative singular looks the same as the nominative singular.

So:

• nominative: novac
• accusative: novac

That is why the form does not visibly change here.

Because prije (before) requires the genitive case.

So:

• posao = work, job
• genitive singular = posla

That gives:

• prije posla = before work

This can mean before going to work or before the workday/job started, depending on context.

Only the gender-marked past participles would change:

• morala → morao
• htjela → htio

So the full sentence would be:

Jutros sam morao otići do bankomata jer sam htio podići novac prije posla.

Everything else stays the same.