right my turn can you comment on my cause of br please

lisamummytoarchieplusbump

just tell me if it sounds ok please

I was working full time as a catering assistant/supervisor when I fell pregnant. I then took a year off maternity leave on February 2006 my son was born 15 may 2006 and was due to return to work February 2007.

while i was pregnant, me and my childs father separated completely but he was going to take care of our child while i returned to work. We then began having lots of arguements just after my son was born and in the end decided to have no contact with each other.

When my maternity leave was coming to the end my employers contacted me to tell me they was closing down the department and if they was unable to relocate me to a suitable placement I could accept redundancy. They was unable to relocate me on reduced hours as I was unable to afford full time childcare costs plus the cost of travel so I had to take redundancy. I did try looking for jobs closer to home to reduce the cost of childcare and travel as I had no family or friends to look after my son as they all worked full time but the childcare in my area starts from £35 a day which would have been my total earnings.

With my only income being benefits I started to use the credit cards, at first for emergencies , but then with the interest adding up on the cards the minimum payments went up. I was scraping together the minimum payments just so I did not get charged late fees but that then left me with not enough money to get through the month so I ended paying bills on the credit cards which I know didn’t help the situation but I just didn’t know what else to do. I was going round and round in circles and getting deeper and deeper in debt but I could see no way out of this endless cycle I had created . So I just carried on trying to cut back on everything to pay my creditors hoping I could manage till something else come up.

I couldn’t ask my family for help as I felt ashamed of the mess I was in. I kept trying to convince myself that everything was ok and something will come up, but began leaving the bills unopened and basically burying my head in the sand and hoping it will somehow go away. I had endless nights of no sleep worrying how I can get myself out of this mess. I then became pregnant again and knew I had to do something I couldn’t go on like this with the price of everything rising I was going to struggling even more so I finally found the courage to contact the CCCS and the Citizens Advice and ask for help, and come to the conclusion that bankruptcy was my only option to be able to get myself out of this mess. I fully understand the seriousness of bankruptcy but with little income and no assets I am unable to pay back the amount of debt I owe.





shall i include that i suffered form post natal depression after having my son or will that sound like a cop out?

DON79

Hi lisa, just wanted to say, i can feel for what you have been through. it does help to write it all down and get it out of your system. I think that if the post natal depression contributed to your not being upto dealing with your debts then you should mention it. It's not a cop out, it is being honest about what happened and why you are now in this situation. take care. xxx

lisamummytoarchieplusbump

thanks don79 just didnt know if it sounded like a crap excuse.

i also havnt put dates on it apart from maternity leave as being a mum sort of melted my brain, all days seem to merge together as it is so dont even know what i spent the money on or when

LilyBart

It's very honest and brave, Lisa. Put in the PND too if you feel it contributed to the situation.

DON79

I am certain that becoming a mum melted my brain. my memory is so shocking!

and i still find it difficult to cope with some things. but it gets better. dates aren't important too much either, it just all popped back in my head with dates etc. and I can't remember too what the money has gone on, when it asked me on the forms, I just had to put living expenses for the most part because I have nothing else to show for it. So it must have gone on food and petrol and i did balance transfers to keep the payments going too which would be what caused the balances to increase too.

If you can't remember, there is not much that the OR can do.

LilyBart

Donna's right. General living expenses or consolidation/balance transfers, that's what it tends to boil down to once the spiral starts, and it is really hard to remember the details and dates when it wasn't big one-off luxury purchases or fancy holidays. Lisa, when was Lily born? Or is she still a bump/Lily-to-be? Pop her date (or due date) down there, and the (rough) date of when you spoke to CAB/CCCS, and it will look as tidy as a police report.

lisamummytoarchieplusbump

lillie was born 6/9/08 so cant really blame her to much for the money trouble lol. i only spoke to the CCCS about a month ago. the only thing ive got to show for my debt is a trampoline i bought in april for my sons 2nd birthday. so out of the 7k i owe i can only account for £100 of it.

lilybart thats why i said i love your name i just spell it different as i like to be different lol

DON79

am sure though that you did have extra things to get for the baby? clothes, cot, new pram? things you needed.

edit: congrats too on lillie arriving. sorry, should have said that first!

LilyBart

Well, that's a lovely spelling. And we all know how easy it is to run up debts on stuff that isn't big, so stop beating yourself up about that.

You could put something along the lines of "Shortly after the birth of my daughter in September 2008, I finally found the courage to talk to the Citizens Advice Bureau and CCCS and was advised that bankruptcy was my only option." But keep your last line as it is. It's good.

lisamummytoarchieplusbump

lilybart that sounds great. see thats why i always get my mum to write proffesional letters for me as shes great with grammer and wording. shes also great at threatning letters to the council but makes them sound proffesional it always gets things i need done

my daughters nickname is lilliebum so everytime i used to look at your name i red it as lilliebum first of all lol

lisamummytoarchieplusbump

thanks don79. poor little bubba mostly had her big bro hand me downs. well apart from the clothes that is, all i bougt new for her was a new matteress and bouncy chair.

but by this time the credit cards was maxed out so opened up some cataloge accounts