Messed up...!

elaine12022

I think the £10 a day challenge is people trying to make that amount of money a day through various means, either by saving, doing surveys,selling stuff or whatever.

As for gas/electric, not sure whether it's worth ringing to see if the company had any actual readings after you left to amend the bills, only thing is if it turned out higher it might not help you..:( also some rented properties dont' have reads for years. :eek:It's always good to take meter reads when you move in or leave a property so you know you're paying for your usage not somebody else's.

If you like chips you could try getting oven chips (you can even fry them) which is much cheaper than buying chippie chips all the time. An egg doesn't take much cooking or something like fishfingers. You can start cooking proper meals slowly.

Sorry to hear your mother's not well either - is there anyone else that can help out to save you travelling so much? Also give you more time for job hunting, looking after yourself.

younganddumb_2

Thanks for the heads up on the challenge! I've decided to start and try the £1 a day challenge - see how I get on with that one!

Don't really think there's anything I can do regarding estimated readings as I no longer live in the property and didn't take any readings when I left or anything. Will bare this in mind for next time I move out though! Thanks.

Yeah i've been talking to my other half again tonight and i'm going to try and cut out at least the takeaway every night except maybe a Saturday night when we can watch a DVD and a takeaway or something like that. It's not good for my health never mind my pocket! Also I buy a hell of a lot of bottles of pop, so i've made the decision that the one I bought earlier today is being kept, and i'm just going to keep on filling it up with fruit juice, as I must spend an absolute fortune on that too at £1.08 a go these days!

Unfortunately there is nobody else that can look after my mam as both my dad and my brother work full time. My dad is going to be working offshore soon, so me and my fiance will be staying there every night while he is away, and when he's home, I won't need to go to my mam's as he'll be there to look after her as he's planning 2 weeks on 2 weeks off trips, so this should greatly decrease the fuel costs! Hopefully this happens sooner rather than later as my parents need the finance relief that him working away will have too!

We are not able to move in there permanently as my dad does not agree to anyone staying over on "school nights" (haha!) and would not allow him to move in permanently, as he sees it - his home is his own, and he should not have to share it with others. I have never bothered discussing this further as until lately the arrangement hasn't been a problem financially.

Coming on here today has really helped give me the kick up the backside i've been needing for a while now. After all, if I make an effort to get my life back on track, with my debts and my eating habits etc, it can only relieve me of some of the stress and upset I have!

I'm planning on starting reasonably small by cutting out the takeaways (and pop as I forgot to mention earlier!), and driving as little as possible!

I will still go to the doctors on Tuesday to enquire about stopping smoking, but I feel if I do too much at once I will be setting myself up to fail.

Thank you so much to everyone who has given advice today, and I look forward to any more tips I may receive from you lot (who are all such a helpful friendly bunch!)

Goodnight!
Young&Dumb! X

telboyo

By cutting out the pop and takeaways you are half way to a decent diet.

rising_from_the_ashes

younganddumb wrote: »

Again, thank you for the replies!

I am planning to book an appointment at the doctors on Tuesday (as I have a lot to do on Monday!) to see the smoking nurse and enquire about which NRT would be most suitable for me. My fiance is also going to do the same.

Petrol is an area that I don't feel we can change at the moment. We will be trying to save on journeys where we could walk instead etc. Public transport would probably save a lot of money on fuel, but, at least for the time being, I cannot cope in crowds and / or public situations like that.

Young&Dumb!X

Well done for having your LBM and posting on here.

If you're caring for your mum, do you not get a carers allowance?
If not, can she not contribute to the petrol costs of you having to go everyday?

Re smoking, good luck!

yorkshire-lad

I have done research into healthy living over the past few years especially when I used to exercise and I guarantee you will feel 110% better about yourself if you change your diet.

Don't take this personal or anything but eating take aways 4/5 nights a week is a sure way to life-threatening illness.

When you go shopping buy lots of fruit,and when you get up make yourself a smoothie,stick about 4 or 5 different fruits in a blender with some ice (highly recommend blueberries and bananas),drink one of these every morning for about a month and you will start to notice an improvement,even after a week no doubt.

Also increase your daily intake of water to flush all the bad stuff out, You will feel loads better about yourself and it's healthy!!
You don't really need to see a dietician there a plenty of free,helpful websites on the net about healthy living.

I can't really comment on the smoking as it's something I've never done, but please try and cut down,not just for money but for health.

Good luck with getting deft free.
I'm only 22 and been in debt since I was 19, but only had my lightbulb moment last year.
It is such a good feeling knowing you are heading in the right direction to be debt free.

riverboat2001

I see that you play on the PS3 a bit.
I'm an avid gamer myself and know i'm quite happy on the xbox 360 instead of going out.

A very small suggestion, instead of having to buy the latest game, or have loads of games you don't play, you could try lovefilm games rental.
£5 per month, and you can always be playing something new and fresh without having to pay a fortune.
And there's always some free trials knocking around.

younganddumb_2

I'm not entitled to carers allowance as she only receives lower rate care DLA - We had a total faff on trying to get her any of her entitlements, and after the tribunal she thought it best (for her health) that she just accept and be grateful for what she has been given and not to try and increase the rate paid. Also, at the moment they are not in position financially to contribute towards the cost of petrol.

"Yorkshire-lad" thanks for the advice regarding my diet - I know I could get all the advice and tips online but it's mainly for a bit of reassurance, also to make sure I don't get sucked into some sort of unhealthy diet that I want to see a dietician!

"Riverboat" Thanks for the tip with lovefilm - might try it! Although at the moment my fiance and me tend not to spend a lot of money on the games, usually just play "Call of Duty" and I bought him a few for christmas which will keep us going! (Good thing I suppose as I know his best mate spends at least £50 a week on a new release game or two!)

Thanks for all the tips, I'm aiming to start my life overhaul on Monday! So will keep posting to update you all of how i'm doing!

Young&Dumb! X

elaine12022

Good luck, Younganddumb, You have a lot on your plate. Your mum is lucky to have you. It sounds like it will be easier with your dad away.

Re diets - the one diet that has helped me has been the Blood type diet (and nowthe Genotype diet). It helped pinpoint things that i was eating that were no good for me(and what is) and how my body works. I have never done it 100% (it's an ongoing journey) but it has helped me loads ( as opposed to a dietician I saw who kept trying to get me to drink milk when it didn't agree with me :mad:) Everybody has different needs regarding food. Hope your dietician is open minded.

DLA - what a nightmare - I applied myself a few years ago, got turned down and my OH has just got turned down too. Both of us have different disabilities. It's not fair that you have to have a certain level of DLA to get carer's allowance, as caring is a much broader role than comes under DLA needs. Is there a carer's group in the area? It doesn't matter whether you get carer's allowance or not for that, and they may be able to offer some support.

xxx

sp1987

If you must must, must go out for something to eat, Pizza Hut's weekday 'Happy hour' (which is like 3 hours?!) is a good bet. £5 each for a pizza, side and drink. Plus that is a trip 'out' rather than a take away where you are still in the house.

If you did a happy hour a week (or a similarly priced buy one get one free offer thing) that would equate to £40 a month instead of £120. It will be against the advice some will give of cut it out completely but you are 19 so the last thing you want is to be too strict then rebel against it again and end up spending £120 anyway.

Can you cut down on smoking whilst you are quitting? I don't smoke so I can't see how many the costs represent but even if you could cut a couple out a day it would make a lot of difference per month.

As for the fizzy drinks, if it is stuff like Coke the caffeine in it plays havoc with some people. If you suffer from mental health difficulties anyway you could really do without any of that rubbish filling up your insides. But again, keep it as a treat once a week, with your take away/meal out.

Is the car your boyfriend has as economical as it could be? Would he consider a smaller engined/more economical one?

If you could shave some money off every expense whilst you are trying to make headway it will make a difference even in the short term.

Plus, I couldn't cook oven chips when I went to university in 2006 (I was 18). I hated the idea of doing anything related to making food (that's what take aways were for!). Now I don't want to eat anything I haven't made too often as I don't like the idea of not knowing what is in it. Believe me when I say you can get a lot of good feeling from making some food. I'm only 23 so please don't think I'm too old to understand how boring it is to start bothering with.

younganddumb_2

Just to say thanks for mentioning the blood type diet, i'd never heard of it before so will have a look into that!

My main issue with food is that i'm an extremely picky eater, and i'll only eat certain things. For example, I won't eat meat if I can tell what it was before hand, i.e. meat on a Sunday roast, etc. It's not that i'm a vegetarian just I can't stomach knowing where it comes from, it makes me feel sick and so I can't eat it anyways! I'll eat things like lasagne and stuff though!

The pizza hut idea is a good one also as we're always trying to think of places that were reasonably cheap to go out for a meal, but can never find any where that is half decent value, (the ideas always tend to be places like Taybarns etc.) but we will have a look into that! Thank you

I used to be a huge fan of Cherry Coke, until I read a story about someone who used to drink it and the amount of weight they had piled on... I cut this out completely and started drinking diet coke, and I lost 1st 7lb in a month after doing this! I realise the diet coke is still worse for my health than say, a glass of juice / water, and am aiming to cut this out too. Going to start by cutting down firstly though as I had withdrawal symptoms when I attempted to cut out the cherry coke "cold turkey"! This probably sounds pathetic to you lot lol but it's true. I felt totally ill! Which is why I replaced it with the diet.

My oh's car has a 1.4 engine and it's a 97 model car so it isn't the best economically but he's just got it for Christmas and so I don't see us changing it any time soon as he used to have quite a habit of buying a car and having it for about 2 months and then changing it... I've told him he's not allowed to do that anymore as we always spend more on the new car than we make from the one we sell!

Also, with regards to the smoking i'm trying to cut down as of Friday, and in that time I have bought 40 cigarettes and still have about 10 left, which means i've cut down 5 a day (usually smoke 20-30 a day).

Thanks for the advice everyone

Young&Dumb! X