A Problogger Mom

I just read a great post on the Get Rich Slowly blog titled You are Your Own Worst Enemy. It was like a glimpse into my past, right before I had my “lightbulb” moment. I was Gillian in that post, so dead tired of always being broke all the time, but looking for a quick fix instead of truly working on the problem, because it does require work, and lots of it.

My husband has always been fairly tight with the purse strings where as I was always happy to go shopping. Wether it be a few plants for the garden here, a few scrapbook items there, a few special grocery items now and again, or eating dinner out more than we should, my mentality was, we deserve it, why not? It was the one thing we constantly argued about. We didn’t have a budget, I never felt like I went overboard. It wasn’t like I was coming home with new furniture or expensive Coach purses or jewelry for goodness sake. But last summer, we had credit card debt that we couldn’t seem to shake. Every time we felt we were making headway, something would break and or need repairs and it would go right back on the credit card again. It just seemed to be getting worse and worse, every month.

Finally, I saw the light. It would require some serious change in our spending, OR, a serious influx of more income, to get us in a happier, healthier financial situation. We are working on both, cutting our spending, and also trying to bring in a few more dollars each month, primarily by making money online via Ebay, blogging, PTC type sites, affiliates, etc. I can finally say that we are making some real progress. We only have a very very small balance remaining on the CC and it should be paid off in a month or two at most. We will also be paying off my husbands car loan by the end of this year, and plan to start saving seriously for my next car as mine is 10 yrs old now and a gas guzzling SUV.

I just wanted to share my story with anyone in similar shoes, and hope that maybe I can be a part of getting some people to “see the light”. Yes you work hard and deserve nice things. However, if you are in a similar state as so many people these days and in credit card debt, you have also lived beyond your means up to this point, and now you have to FIX the problem, and that takes WORK. No one else will fix it for you.

We basically followed the Dave Ramsay plan, but on our own. We made a budget, trimmed a lot of things back. We have a small savings set aside for those emergency’s that come up, instead of relying on the CC’s. Once our last CC is paid off, we will start saving more, with our first goal being to put down as much cash as possible on my next car, so that we have as small a loan as possible so that we can pay it off faster. We will also be raising the amount we invest in our retirement plans, as soon as that CC is taken care of.

As you can tell, this is a passion of mine. I’d love to hear from others on this subject, wether or not you are a “Gillian” and need a kick in the pants or if you are working hard on your debt. Please share any tips or ideas that you think others may benefit from and good luck!