Gambling / Hoarding / Debt / Depression

Just2Ashamed

I'm a long-term user of the site and forum, but am just far too embarassed by my behaviour to post under my own user name. It's basically come down to debt, hoarding and compulsive gambling - all of which I'm hiding (with varying degrees of success) from the outside world.

I finally managed to clear all my debts, with a lot of help from family, last year. Since then I have had a lot of illness and have spent time off work. During this time I've felt very lonely, and I have experienced very low mood and anxiety. Unfortunately I started to gamble a lot as I enjoyed the company of 'people' in their chat rooms whilst I was experiencing insomnia. I quickly spent our savings and am now around £5000 in debt.

I can't tell anyone, my husband would be so disappointed in me and I can't ask for help from family again - they already struggle to see how someone who is apparently so intelligent could make such stupid life choices A family member is offering to help us with a deposit to buy a house, but obviously we're not going to get a mortgage due to my stupidity and I'm terrified all this is going to come out in the open.

I'm 6 months pregnant and desperately wanted to raise my baby in better circumstances and wanted them to have more than I did when I was growing up. I feel as though I've ruined everything with my stupid and selfish behaviour and some days am so low that I can't see any way out. I'm so overwhelmed by the amount of financial and cleaning work to be done, and end up doing nothing at all.

Capital One: £750
Vanquis: £1750
Overdraft: £2500

Total: £5000

Buffythedebtslayer

Hey,

1. MASSIVE HUGS.

It took a lot to admit that XXXXXXXXXX

2. 5000 is not an impossible amount to pay off. Not at all.

you know - as you posted, you know what you are doing and you can get out of this. remember any debt problem can be solved.


so what are your plans? what can you sell? can you earn money online? Any questions answered? ebay? surveys?

please don't spend the evening feeling bad. You have made the decision to change this and so you will

Love Buffy xxx

beanielou

Just remember that Martin says that there are no debt situations that are not able to be solved.
Keep posting.

Just2Ashamed

Thank you so much for your kind and welcoming words. My plans are to eBay and car boot as much as possible, which should hopefully help with the housework too. I'm already working on boosting my income with things like textbroker / clickworker and survey sites. In an ideal world I would really like to be debt free before the baby is born at the end of December, so this should be hard but hopefully do-able with some discipline.

Just2Ashamed

Things I need to do this week (will update as they are completed):

• Sort out DH's uniform allowance, tax rebate and NI issues - DONE :j with the exception of NI which is more complicated and needs his help - I think we're going to end up owing money there :eek:
  
• Cancel Orange contract - DONE :j
• Attempt to downgrade Sky
  
• List 10 items on eBay (and actually SEND them!) 3 DONE
• Find out the date for the next car boot and book a table - DONE :j (it's on Sunday :eek:)
  
• Complete at least 3 articles for Textbroker (presuming they have some)
• Make sure DH has cancelled LoveFilm DONE :j
• Check Clickworker each day - DONE :j
  
• Clean the kitchen and bathroom - Kitchen DONE :j
• Check bank balance each day and PAD - DONE :j
  
• At least 1 bin bag for tip / charity shop / cash 4 clothes - DONE :j
• Go to the market for fresh produce, use cupboard supplies for everything else DONE :j
• Make sure all gambling sites are restricted - DONE :j
• Talk to work about maternity leave plans - DONE :j
• Meal plan for next week DONE :j
• Revision for October's exams
• Rearrange hospital appointment
• Ask the HA to sort out the garden - DONE :j
  

DreamerHelen

Hi There, I didn't want to read and run....and I have subscribed so I can keep up with your Journey....

I too have felt very ashamed at my Debt....but the thing is hun - you are getting yourself out of it!! It might be slowly....but you ARE doing it....and that list looks VERY positive...so keep on going....

Please do come back on here to let us know how you're getting on....and we can then encourage you and help you to keep going when you have down days....

Many Many Hugs to you...xXx

scholesfan88

Place a scan photo of your baby by your PC, if your ever tempted to gamble again just look at that.

I hope it all works out for you. Getting out of debt is like dieting, it's easy to put on but very hard to take off, if your determind enough u'll do it. Tell your partner, he'll find out sooner or later.

JustSmile_2

Huge hugs to you

The best advice I would say is to tell your husband about the gambling. Yes, its hard but its so much harder to keep the secrets & deciet going. Unloading the burden takes alot of courage but the relief it brings is priceless.
You need to put steps in place to stop the gambling. Self exculde from the sites. You can put Gamblock on your pc which wont allow you to enter the sites or there is a programme called K9 which is free I think to stop the access.
By telling your husband you can explain that there may be times when you are more vunerable to gamble & ask him to help you through them.

I know from personal experience the destruction gambling causes, however, whats done is done. You wont get the money back & you will never win it back. No point in anyone being angry, it wont change the situation now.

You seem to be focused now on moving on & sorting things out, which is great! I have every confidence in you that by the time baby is here you will have turned this round

Good luck xx

Just2Ashamed

Thank you for all the lovely advice. I think I may tell DH at some point, but ideally I would like to make some progress first so I can say "I messed up, but I'm sorting it" rather than it seeming like "I messed up and now I need you and your family to bail me out again". I know it doesn't seem like a massive distinction, but it seems important to me, and I think he'll appreciate the difference, even if he's still disappointed in what I've done.

In the longer term I think I need him to take a bit more responsibility for the family finances - I may be great 90% of the time, but when I'm ill then I'm just a liability really and I can see mistakes happening again. I know I will never return to gambling, but to be honest this isn't the first mental-health-related financial stupidity and I can't 100% guarantee that there wouldn't be another in the future. I need him to be a bit more involved rather than leaving everything to me, otherwise we could well end up in a mess again.

I hope that the above doesn't read as though I'm abdicating my responsibility because it's quite the opposite - I've come (eventually) to realise that the responsible thing is to admit my failings and work to try and negate these. I have a bit of a tendency to think I'm Superwoman when I'm well, and to not seek help fast enough when I'm not, and this can be a dangerous combination financially.

Just2Ashamed

Well, there has been *some* progress, and while it may not be as quick as I'd like it should be sustainable in the long term. Feeling a bit more positive now :-)

Capital One: £550
Vanquis: £1750
Overdraft: £2000

Total: £4300

diamond_sky

I completely understand you wanting to make progress before telling your husband, as you say, it shows that you are making changes. I really do think you need support and help with him from this, you've made mistakes but you don’t deserve to suffer in silence, and lets face it, you’re pregnant-you don’t need more stress!

Wish you the best!