Tuesday, April 12, 2011

If I'm gonna judge, I better come clean

So every week as I sit in judgement of the Real Trainwrecks of Bravo for being in foreclosure and getting plastic surgery and there generally ridiculous behavior.  I myself have been having a break down of bad behavior and it really is time to come clean because perhaps I can get some help from the great void.

So here goes.  I am bad with money, real bad with money.  Always have been.  I'm not talking like I have more debt than assets or anything.  But I don't like paying bills, I never have liked doing it, and I most of the time pay things late.  Everything eventually gets paid but late. I don't know why, I really don't and that is where I need the help.  I don't know if I got a screwed up gene from my dad, or if I just hate having to part with money.  Or if having to hear about this family money for the last 40 years of my life has just short circuited that part of me.  But regardless, I really do need to fix what is ailing me in this area, quickly.

My husband and I worked in the mortgage industry in the hey day, and made a ridiculous living.  We were able to buy a great house in a great neighborhood, we had our kids and then things went hay wire.  We saved a lot of money, and bough just a regular house, we didn't do the mcmansion or anything.  But with the market crash we are now upside down.  We saved a lot of money and our deficict was covered from our savings, and 4 years later we are almost out of savings.  I've cut my lifestyle to the bare minimum.  No haircuts, no nails, no vacations, we don't eat out, we just get by and enjoy our kids.   In the past 2 years I feel like I have been in a catatonic state of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and basically just threw bills that I didn't want to pay into a drawer hoping they would go away.  Autism, Cancer, Alcoholism pretty much paralyzed me.  Sometimes I would rather go buy a shirt at Target to make myself feel better than pay that doctor bill or lab or the bug man.  I have struggled and am still struggling with this.


I know that this is huge and I need help, when someone pointed it out to me today that I was stealing from my kids by wasting money.  I almost fainted.  I do not ever want to do anything that would hurt my kids.   I never thought of it that way because I felt like I always care for them.  It is so important to me to be a good mom, and I know I am.  And shallowly I for the most part I didn't go and spend money on myself, or anything like that, I just kept the money or spent it on the kids.  I'm not out getting spa days or in the cutest clothes.  I have been full of fear for the last couple of years because the economy has hit us hard.

We are both especially my husband working so hard and I am not helping us get out of the hole.  SO that is my part in this little nightmare of my husbands.  And it's not fair of me to do that, no matter what resentment I'm holding on to with him, I have no right to not help the "team".  I need to do my part, and I have been putting a wrench in the mechanism.

So I am struggling with financial insecurity and never getting the income back or even half of the income back that we had prior to the housing market crash.  I have buried my head in the sand and hoped that a lot of things will just go away.  We are not in jeopardy of losing our house, but we do not have an extra cent, and me accumulating late charge debt and spending money at Target because I need to feel better, is no longer acceptable.  There is a little bit of debt and a lot of work that needs to done to pay that stuff down and get better.

I don't want this to get worse, it is damaging my marriage, my kids, and my mind. I don't want to lose family and friends over this and I know I need to get help and get better so that I can be a good mom and good person.  I've gotten myself physically healthy (for the most part), not I need to work on that emotional and mental health.  So here I go and embark on a new journey of spiritual awakening.  Who's with me?

Rebecca

3 comments:

  1. Rebecca,
    I just started reading your blogs a couple of days ago, and this particular topic just blew me away. Your honesty and raw emotion are both humbling and scary for me to read. Scary because, I have some personal introspection to do as well. It is so easy to play the blame game and then soothe my hurt feelings with shopping etc. I think of myself as a team player for doing "damage" control in other ways, but I am not always 100% committed to our team. I too, bury my head in the sand or justify my actions by tucking away a piece of a resentment, my so called "ace in the hole".
    Thank You for your honesty, it is only by looking at ourselves and being honest about our actions that we grow to be the people we are capable of being. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly and always with God's Grace.
    <3 Mary

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  2. I'm not sure how I found your blog, but I've just recently started reading. So, hi! :-)Oh, and I'm blog-comment-dumb, so my name is Gretchen.

    My suggestion: Read Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover. It wasn't until I'd read the book that I realized why I was doing some of the dumb money stuff I was doing. It has truly changed my life. It is a very easy read and has steps you can put into practice immediately to get a handle on things.

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  3. I commend you for putting that out there. In my opinion, that's huge and you seem to have good insight which really speaks volumes. So first...don't be so hard on yourself! We do what we can do, when we can do it. Accept yourself as you are. Then you can address those spending issues with the right frame of mind, ya know? Hey, Im 30 years old and I have one kid, a 4 year old daughter...will I have more kids? Probably not. I know what I can handle; I always say anybody with more than 1 kid has my vote, I know its tough!

    As for your money situation, I do have some suggestions. Any healthcare bills, call and ask for a payment plan. As long as you pay something monthly, even if its $5, most doctors and hospitals are fine with that.

    And I have a set night of the week I sit down and do bills, get it all out of the way so you don't have to worry about it.

    Where I live, (outside of Nashville, TN) we have discount grocery stores such as Aldi and Save a Lot; I shop at Aldi quite frequently, and spend half as much as I would at Kroger or Publix. And clip some coupons!

    Hang in there girl, take it one day at a time!

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