What made you realise you needed to do something about your debt?

KipKip_2

what a great thread!

the penny dropped for me around May 2009, I'm 25 in a few days and i have been in debt since i was 18 and the first credit card application dropped thru my door! at it's height, i would guess my debt was about £22k, but at my LBM it was just over £16k.

The force behind my LBM was the realisation of a dream career as a Midwife, which meant college and university. I was in a dead end meaningless pen pushing job that i absoutely hate! unfortunately I am still here for the next 8 months to pay off rest of debt! but it's good pay :-/

It's been a hard tough journey so far, OH at first didnt understand the extent of my debt problems as I never told him the figure at first and was wondering why i was refusing to plan nights out or buy things or plan holidays, I confessed all to him and explained all about how i want to clear my debts to embark on a midwifery career and he now completely backs me and is extremely encouraging. it was quite embarrasing at first coz he's got savings, 100% credit score etc, but i dunno what i would have done without him.

Friends were confused why i weren't going out and rejecting invitations but they udnerstand that this is my future and this is the career i want and i have wasted too much time in a rubbish job that is slowly destroying my soul!

So, in all, the reason for doing something about my debts is so that I can become a midwife!

System

ms_london wrote: »

Ultimately I had no choice to deal with my debts when my bank, credit card, store card, etc etc - stopped letting me use them and would not increase my credit limits etc. I probably would have carried on had this not happened, but I am happy I did wake up and smell the coffee at £19,000 and not any higher.

My bank wouldn't even trust me with a cash card for a while, so every time I wanted money out I would have to go into a branch. That was fun! Not!

xx

My LBM was similar to yours, Ms London, in that I sort of had no choice due to having maxed out all of my credit cards and overdraft and being unable to get any credit elsewhere. I knew things were bad for quite some time, but hid my head in the sand and continued to spend like there was no tomorrow. Too much of an 'I'm in thousands of pounds worth of debt already so what will a few hundred more matter?' attitude. The worst thing is that I don't really have much to show for it all. I must've wasted a lot of it on clothes, DVDs and having a good time.

Maxing my cards out was the best thing that ever happened to my debts though, as they've been going steadily down ever since. Everytime I pay another £100 off a card, I reduce the limit by £100. It takes away any temptation to spend again, as I know my willpower is so rubbish.

lamarsi

KipKip i can relate to your story so much, I've just gone back to uni in september to do nursing and i worked blummin hard to lower my debts before hand ,good luck in your new career, I absolutly love every minute of it