Laura's K.I.S.S DFW diary

laura2481

yay! Sold a book on Amazon, I will get £13.82 (was £17 odd to buyer). Now I just need the other book to sell as that is about £50! Will send that to my credit card when it clears.

laura2481

Well. today is my one year anniversary of being a DFW! And how am I celebrating you may ask. By having some kind of tooth abcess that's how. SUCKS :mad:

Lemon_Tree

laura congratulations on your anniversary, sympathy about the abcess. They are a killer aren't they

laura2481

Finally got the house to myself! BF went away on Thursday night to visit grandparents, so had Thursday night and Friday night to myself but last night I had a friend come visit for a pizza, films and drinks night which was nice and then today my mum, dad and grandma came to visit and I made a (mostly successful) roast dinner! So finally got to sit down and relax!!

Not exactly a DFW weekend though Spent money on food for saturday night, and for roast dinner today and money on renting 2 films to watch. Friend did pay half of food and film rental though- so at least it wasn't all out of my pocket!

On a happier note my toothy thing seems a lot better. On Thursday my wisdom tooth started coming through again (y'know- how they do it tiny tiny little bit at a time to make it last as agonisingly long a possible!!) but on Saturday morning my gum had all swollen up and I couldn't move my face even a tiny little bit without it hurting. When I got to work I looked at my tooth/gum and it was swollen and red and looked like it had an ulcer on it (white-ish patch) I touched it to check how swollen it was and (sorry about this next bit) it burst!! :eek: Totally freaked me out. But after that I could move my face a bit easier. I went to Boots and got some antiseptcy mouthwash for gum disease and some Boots own brand Bonjela (over a quid cheaper! that at least was a DFW decision!) and have been taking some ibuprofen. It was sore yesterday but seems ok today, just a bit twingy when the painkillers wear off, but less painful than it often is when the wisdom tooth is coming through.

So I think I'll ring the dentist tomorrow and book an appointment (due a check up anyway) but just keep a close eye on it and use my mouthwash. If it looks like it's gettin bad I'll go to the doctor's for some anti-biotics. I'm glad it looks like it's getting better- I was starting to envisage expensive dental work, not a happy thought!

laura2481

I did a bad thing I just lost £10 on a bingo site (stupid stupid stupid) so now I'm going to have to spend month or so replacing the £10 doing the free scratchcards. I am banned from playing bingo. I can't be trusted, obviously!

laura2481

Have managed a NSD today but think I will struggle to hit the target of 15 for the month. Well, i can but try. Only 9 to go!

laura2481

NSD again! Phew! Almost halfway to target

laura2481

Whilst on the way to work today I was reading the Metro on the bus. I happened to read my horoscope for the day. This is what it said:

'You seem to have lost your sense of purpose today. A little list making will soon get it back. Analyse for yourself where you are, where your going and what you need to do in order to get there'

So, suitably vague and could mean anything to anyone- regardless of your star sign! However, I don't think it's an entirely bad idea to take a short while to take stock of things and perhaps have a think about where I am and how to achieve my goals.

So here goes:
Where am I?
Ok, I'm currently sat on the sofa, laptop on my lap, glass of wine. TV on in the background. Oh 'Where am I?'

Well, the best place to start is probably 'Where was I?'
I the joined MSE on the 14th of March 2008. At that time I had no idea how much debt I was in, and had a lot more outgoings than I could control. I was up to the limit of my overdraft every month and usually spent 2 weeks of every month waiting desperately for the next payday and living with a few pounds left in my account. I hated checking my bank statements or balance and left statements and letters unopened. I had 4 credit cards and had run these up by using them to cover Chritmases and birthdays and surviving until the end of the month. I didn't make any massive prchases. I haven't got designer clothes, shoes or handbags or take expensive holidays (any holidays at all actually!) Basically I was living month to month. Sound familiar anyone? :rolleyes:

I had my first LBM when I deceided to leave my current job as I could no longer stand the working environment and I wasn't sure if i would have to take paycut if I found a different job. The thought of being unable to pay my credit card bill and direct debits etc was quite scary. I sat down and worked out my SOA and actually added up how much I owed.

This is what I owed back then:
Barclaycard: £977
HSBC Gold Card: £2275
Halifax CC: £1564
Overdraft: £200
BF: £230
Loan: £619
Total:£5865

This was my plan:

Credit Card Plan

1. Cancel CC2.
2. Move as much as poss from CC1 to other 2 credit cards
3. Concentrate on paying off CC1 by overpaying, only pay minimum on CC3 and CC4 until that is paid off. Then cancel
4. Then concentrate on CC4 (higher rate) over pay this until it's gone!
5. Then try to transfer CC3 to a 0% card (hopefully credit rating better by this time!)
6. Then get rid of CC3 balance!

Other Stuff

1. Reclaim bank charges. Should cover £200 overdraft
2. Sell bits and pieces on Ebay to put towards overdraft and/or credit cards
3. Ring LHF and see if it's not too late to claim money i spent on CL's last year (hopefully get back £90)
4. Find out what owe on loan, how long left to make repayments and if it's possible to make overpayments (I don't think it is )

Seems sensible? Yep, it was sensible. However, I was not. I managed to get another job. Unfortunately, the timing was such that I was only paid a three week wage from my previous employer and missed the cut off for pay day with my new employer so would have to wait 6 weeks until getting paid again (yes, it was a 5 week month too to be awkward!) Let's cut a long story short- the plan went out the window. I started using my credit cards again, I went over my overdraft limit and incurred some serious charges. I even spent some savings which I should have been putting to one side in order to pay a lump off of my mortgage. I reached my low on the 6th of November- these are some excerpts from some posts back then-

I don't know what to do. I can't afford the fees. I am already £78.42 overdrawn and my limit is £250 so now I have no money and no way to pay! And I still have my Barclaycard bill to pay!!!!

I feell totally alone. like everything I try goes wrong and i end up taking two steps backwards. I don't know how to go forwards, i don't know how to make my boyfriend understand how bad it's got and i need help because he doesn't help he just gives me a loan which makes things worse and gives me something else to worry about. i drink too much and right now all i wanna do is cry, and drink the red wine in the kitchen. point proved



So that was when I had my second LBM! At that point I was then £6814 in debt. I think I worked this out as an overspend of around £118 per month to rack up that extra £1000 :eek: I had a good long talk with my boyfriend and he loaned me some money to cover the fees. And honestly, since then I haven't looked back!

Since November I have paid £840 off my debt and have saved £450 to replace the savings I spent. I have also started putting money to one side in order to cover Christmas and my boyfriends birthday (around christmas time, so extra expensive time of year and one of the reasons I usually get in a mess around that time of year) I have £65 so far, and hopefully another £20 bonus on the way for opening an ING account. I know what they say about there not being any point in saving money while clearing debts but I would prefer to chip away at my debt steadily- whilst knowing that come Christmas time I am not going to have to resort to credit cards, or risk going over my overdraft.

So where am I? I guess I'm still taking it one day at a time, and some days I am very tempted to spend money I don't really have, but it feels good chipping away at the debts. It feels good knowing that by the end of September (if not sooner) I will have paid my boyfriend back everything I owe him ( I have owed him this money for over 2 years!) and there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Even if it does seem a long way away!

laura2481

Where am I going?
Long term is easy- I want to be debt free
Mid/Short term- by the end of the year I would like to have cleared £2000 (or more! )

How do I get there?
I have already cleared £840. That means I have £1160 to go. This means I will have to clear £128 per month.

I want to have saved £800 in order to replace the mortgage savings I spent last year (I am on track to have done this by the end of May!)

I want to have saved £250 to cover Christmas and OH's birthday. (I am trying to do this as much as possible via cashback sites and free scratchcards)

And (I know this is going to sound really stupid given the situation) but I really want to go away for a long weekend to Bruges. I have saved £80 from money I was given as a Christmas present in order to pay for a passport. My BF and I have been together nearly 9 years. We have never been away on holiday together alone. And we have never been abroad. I don't think I'm reaching for the sky or expecting too much to have one long weekend together. And why Bruges? Well, it's pretty much the place to go for chocolate and beer- why wouldn't anyone want to go!

shopaholic84

Hi Laura,

Sorry again if my avatar makes you want to eat my piggy lol, try not to look at it :rotfl:

I just wanted to pop my head in your diary and say you are doing really well, we all have our little set backs, it really is hard this money saving malarky, but it sounds like you have your DFW head on and sound very determined to become debt free, of which i'm sure you will hun!

Its funny that when i speak to friends about money issues, they have no idea, but when you read peoples diaries on here everybody is so alike in the things they do, and things they go through to become debt free. Reading your diary and the bit about living the last two weeks of the month having no money and waiting for the next pay day - exactly what i used to be like before i found this wonderful place called moneysavingexpert, with lots of wonderful people with great advice.

My OH and i went to Bruges last March via Eurostar and we both loved it, its truly a wonderful place to visit. Many people i'd mentioned it too wondered why Bruges, but it truly is a very pretty place with lots to see and do. We had a very reasonably priced hotel, i can send you the hotel details if you want, it wasn't a really big named hotel, but our room was on the lower level and we looked out our window onto the canal - it was lovely. The hotel staff were brilliant, and the breakfast in the morning was lovely
I really would love to go back, it was that nice, and the chocolate shops, to die for :EasterBun sorry i couldn't help but use that smiley :rotfl:
There is also a LOVELY Irish pub in the centre, live band playing most nights, really is a great place with great atmosphere.

If you want info on Bruges let me know. Have you seen the film In Bruges? if not, i really recommend it, such a great film.

xxxx