My story, (it may help you)

I have been around this forum since last November, this is my first post so I will fill you in on my story, (sorry if it’s too long) but hopefully it will help some others who are in the position I was a year ago.

Due to OH changing job and cutting income by more than half, and I am now on benefits for life due to illness, I got into some debt…£42,500 to be exact, I say I as my husband knew nothing about it, I dealt with all the bills in the household, as the wages went down, I couldn’t afford to carry on paying the credit card bills and other household bills, so I started to use the credit cards to pay the each other, although I didn’t actually spend anymore money as such, the more I used one card to pay another card the more interest etc was added the higher the debt got, (hope this makes sense)

Anyway I had my lightbulb moment when I went to pay one of the bills and I was at my limit, that was in November last year, Christmas was approaching and I totally panicked, I broke down and told my husband everything, he was devastated, I was embarrassed and ashamed that I had buried my head in the sand and got us into this state of affairs.
My husband always said it wasn’t the debt that hurt it was the hiding it from him, I on the other hand I was trying to protect him from the worry and stress of dealing with it, after a lot of crying and talking, we sat down with pen and paper and started going through the bills and debts, even I wasn’t aware how much it was, I thought at most it was going to be about £15000 - £20000, I had been too scared to actually count it up, £42500 was the final count, we searched this forum went on the websites recommended on here, sourced out all our options, we had about £50000 equity in the house, and at this time I hadn’t missed a payment with any bill at all, everything was up to date, and our credit was still good, so we were contemplating on increasing the mortgage etc…but came to the conclusion a DMP with the CCCs was more appropriate, for our situation.
We phoned them and our interview was on the 11th January 2005, Christmas last year was a wash out new year was about the same we just couldn’t see any future or anyway out for us, my husband was worse than me as it had been thrown onto him within a month, I on the other hand had been living with it for years so I was in a state of relief that someone was now helping me and things were eventually now going to get sorted, I didn’t have to try and get to the post before he did, hide the statements etc.. after our phonecall with the cccs, it was like someone had just came in took over and sorted us out, it was a fantastic feeling just to have that support.
Anyone I am going on now, so taking you to present day, we are finished our first year with the DMP, and we are now down to £37, 876 and have just had our review with the CCS and raised our monthly payment by another £20 a month. It is still going to take a while to clear our feet, but we are working as a family, I have two teenage boys who we sat down and told them everything as well, they were also brilliant in helping us to cut down our budget and pay off our debts, they have also learned from our experience and hopefully will never get into the state I was in.
Christmas and New Year this year was the best I have had in years, although we didn’t spend as much as normal on the boys, I didn’t get into anymore debt, and it felt great!
If anyone out there reading this post who is going through similar, please don’t suffer in silence, the biggest fear for me was telling my family, and it turned out to be the best thing I ever did. The help and support on this board is tremendous, I would especially like to thank debtfreechick, although I never actually posted there was a lot of people who were getting advice on the board from her and we found her advice most helpful in making our decisions although she was never aware of it, so thank you from us! and keep up the good work you do on here