Coming Clean

misstara

Sorry to hear work has been pants recently, really hope it gets better soon. Good luck with your ebay sales.

Dalradian

Paying off your debts and having an emergency funds really helps - it allows you to leave a job if you have to, but often having it allows you to feel you are milking the company until you get your dream job, rather than struggling and resenting every day.

You seem to have a good plan of action, good luck with the journey.

rainbowskies

misstara wrote: »

Sorry to hear work has been pants recently, really hope it gets better soon. Good luck with your ebay sales.

Thank you! Posting them up today so keeping my fingers crossed! x

Dalradian wrote: »

Paying off your debts and having an emergency funds really helps - it allows you to leave a job if you have to, but often having it allows you to feel you are milking the company until you get your dream job, rather than struggling and resenting every day.

You seem to have a good plan of action, good luck with the journey.

The sensible part of me completely agrees with that. Priorities! Smoosh the debt and build up a savings fund - ideally three months salary's worth and then consider my options but then there is that little part of me that just wants to run away from that company and that type of work.

I absolutely love the part I have highlighted above. I think I shall write that on a post it and stick it on my mirror! Thank you! xx :)

rainbowskies

So winter's finally here. I can't believe how much the weather has changed in a week! It really makes me glad that I'm spending another weekend in. I don't think I'd want to venture out in the wind and rain. Not even one of the Christmassy Starbucks drinks could tempt me. Brrrrr!

Thursday and Friday were both NSDs which I'm really pleased me. In an entire week, I spent £3.15 and that small amount was due to my midweek much fest. Spending only £3.15 in one week is fab! I feel like I have come a long way. Should I take you through what I USED to spend during a week?

Monday:
£2.35 Neros coffee. (as much as I love Starbucks, Neros is closer to work)
90p Greggs Sausage roll for breakfast.
£3.49 Subway for lunch
£12.70 Magazines and chocolate for the week ahead.

Tuesday:
£2.35 Neros coffee.
90p Greggs Sausage roll for breakfast.
£4:50 lunch deal from canteen at work.

Wednesday
£2.35 Neros coffee.
90p Greggs Sausage roll for breakfast.
£4:50 lunch deal from canteen at work.
£26.70 post work drinks We have this thing at work where we ALWAYS go out for drinks of Wednesdays. I'm not the only one who hates my job. There are a lot of us and after a gruelling day and to perk ourselves up, we go out for drinks! Drinks are very expensive. £8.90 a cocktail. I have three. I know. I was practically throwing money away!
£7.35 takeaway And what better way to soak up all that alcohol than with a nice kebab and chips?!

Thursday.
£2.35 Neros coffee.
90p Greggs Sausage roll for breakfast.
£3.49 Subway for lunch.
More money spent after work. This varies a lot as I always hit the stops and buy myself either clothes, perfume, make-up, etc. I have now realised I didn't really need this stuff and only used to shop to make myself feel better.

Friday FAT DAY.

I am so ashamed of this (this is what we actually call it at work) but here goes.

£3.49 McDonalds breakfast meal
£1.25 Cheeky mid morning brownie from work canteen.
£5.90 lunch (we order Chinese take out from work)
£15.30 Tescos ready meal, dessert and bottle of wine. The prices vary depending on what I choose but I have worked out the average price from old receipts.

I am not going to tot the amounts up because I have a feeling I'll be very disgusted with myself. Doing this and cutting back has made me notice that a lot of people are in the same boat as me during work. I never used to be an emotional eater until I started working there. We all tend to eat and drink an obscene amount which is really quite sad. I have been taking healthier packed lunches in and will try and encourage my work mates to do the same.

With a crazy amount of exercise, I have kept myself a size 12. I am determined not to gain any weight and hopefully, I can tone up now and be healthier as well.

That was exhausting listing all that down. I can't believe I managed to eat all that! It was tiring just typing it out!

rainbowskies

Money wise, can't wait until next payday. They are actually paying us slightly earlier due to Christmas. We're getting paid on the 21st! As soon as that pay hits, I'm going to make my payments towards my debts. I really do get satisfaction from seeing the numbers go down!

Another nice thing is when your balance shifts from X thousand to one lower. For example, in my original post, the balance of my loan was £8'169.14 and now, after November's payment, the balance is £7'813.96. Even though only £355.18 has been paid off, psychologically it's nice to see it drop from EIGHT thousand and something to SEVEN thousand and something. It makes me feel like I'm actually getting somewhere!

rainbowskies

Okay, slight change of plan.

I have just done a balance transfer from my Natwest credit card (which was costing me in interest each month) to a Barclaycard.* 0% interest until December 2016. Very happy about that. So now I have both credit card debts on 0% and as soon as I pay off my overdraft, I won't be paying ANY further interest on my debts.

*And did you APPLY for a Barclaycard(?), I hear you ask. Nope! I signed up and checked my Noddle credit report today and guess what, it told me I actually had a Barclaycard. That came as a shock. So I checked my usual places where I hide - or rather, keep cards I'm not using and I found the Barclaycard. Rang them up to ask if it was still active (it was) and whether they could offer me any balance transfer deals (they could!) and managed to shift my debt over. Or at least, I started the process. It should happen sometime next week. I did work out what would be more expensive. Just paying the interest on the Natwest credit card or the B/T fee. The B/T fee was less expensive!

Once the Natwest credit card is clear, I will give it another month or so and pay the trailing interest then close it down. Debt's not really diminished but I have saved myself quite a bit of interest. So very chuffed about that. Also managed to post quite a fair bit on eBay and sold more books/CDs to We Buy Books, earning £17.92.

Not too shabby for a Saturday.

prosaver

hi. welcome..
Ive been reading your stuff and it looks like you got a load of bad habits ..i read this book and it really changed me it was about habits good and bad...heres an example of something i got of the internet
trying to change habits (bad)
Taking on two or more habits at once. We’ve all done this. I want to learn to wake early, and to start running, and to eat healthier, and to be more organized, and to write every day … all at once! But no matter how much enthusiasm we have for all of these goals, taking on even just two habits at once is setting ourselves up for failure. I’ve tried it. Many times. It’s certainly possible, but it’s not for those of us who have difficulty changing habits (I think that’s nearly all of us). I would estimate that you triple or even quadruple your chances of success if you focus on one habit at a time, for one month at a time. Devote all of your energy to that habit change, and once it’s on autopilot, move on to the next one. Knock ’em down one at a time.
heres a good link http://jamesclear.com/how-to-break-a-bad-habit

rainbowskies

prosaver wrote: »

hi. welcome..
Ive been reading your stuff and it looks like you got a load of bad habits ..i read this book and it really changed me it was about habits good and bad...heres an example of something i got of the internet
trying to change habits (bad)
Taking on two or more habits at once. We’ve all done this. I want to learn to wake early, and to start running, and to eat healthier, and to be more organized, and to write every day … all at once! But no matter how much enthusiasm we have for all of these goals, taking on even just two habits at once is setting ourselves up for failure. I’ve tried it. Many times. It’s certainly possible, but it’s not for those of us who have difficulty changing habits (I think that’s nearly all of us). I would estimate that you triple or even quadruple your chances of success if you focus on one habit at a time, for one month at a time. Devote all of your energy to that habit change, and once it’s on autopilot, move on to the next one. Knock ’em down one at a time.
heres a good link http://jamesclear.com/how-to-break-a-bad-habit

Yes exactly. I have spent the last 6 years with these bad habits. It's going to be tough breaking them. I think I've made a little progress already but I should be doing more. Setting yourself up for failure by tackling a bunch of bad habits at once makes sense. It's not something I thought about before. I'm going to take each bad habit and concentrate on breaking it and turning it into something positive before I tackle the next one. One step at a time. The book sounds like an interesting read so I'll have a look.

Thank you so much for the link and the suggestion. x

rainbowskies

Good evening, diary-land.

Had a very lazy, non-eventful type of day today. It was a NSD which I was happy about. Managed to get a few bits done - listed a few more items on Ebay, tidied up around the house and made a lunch plan for the week ahead. I get so easily bored of sandwiches. So I'm planning on taking leftovers for most of the week. I'll make a little extra when I make dinner and pop the extra portion in a lunch box to take to work the next day. If I do it the night before then it would make it easier to pop into my bag before I leave the house as I'm always in a rush in the mornings! I may throw in a sandwich or a wrap every so often as well just to mix it up a bit.

I may leave Friday as treat day though.

I can't believe it's just two more weeks until Christmas week! Sadly I only have Christmas Day off. I'm so grateful that Boxing Day is on the Saturday. Sunday is a rest day and then I'm back to work on Monday - which I'm not looking forward to at all.

Then even worse, I'm working New Year's Eve and New Year's Day! It really does make me feel even more resentful of my job. Not everyone at work is in on these days. I was just one of the unlucky ones to get picked.

Not going to the work Christmas Party or taking part in Secret Santa. It makes me feel a little bit like the Grinch but the last thing I want to do is waste money on a tacky present for someone I don't even know very well. If Secret Santa was just between the lovely handful of people that I actually speak to and get on with then it would be different. However, we're doing a department Secret Santa and there are about 20 people. No, thank you.

As for the Christmas party, I'm just not feeling it and the last thing I want to do is trawl around the shops, looking for a dress I don't need nor want to buy. The parties at work are just an excuse to get dolled up and get horrendously drunk. It's just a popularity contest. I went to the one last year and ended up leaving earlier with two other people. We ended up having a nice, quiet dinner at Zizi's which was much preferred.

I'm going to log off and settle down with a nice cup of tea and my kindle. Hoping to go to sleep by 11 PM, so I can wake up nice and rested. Have a good week, everyone! xxx

Florence_J

Hi There,

I joined MSE yesterday after hovering around for a few weeks trying to pluck up the nerve/energy to join.

I've enjoyed reading your diary. I am a very emotional eater too and have put on three and a half pounds this week (i go to slimming world) through comfort eater as a result of being ill, stressed, tired, emotional, angry and pretty much every other bad emotion.

It looks like you have made some very positive steps. I am also a bad one for spending on breakfasts/lunches and dinners when i have food in the house. I never used to have this habit. In fact when i was at University i can count on one hand the amount of times i bought food in the canteen in my whole three years there as i refused to buy food when i lived on campus and could go to my flat and eat a sandwich there. I have made a packed lunch for tomorrow, and i am hoping for a NSD.

Good luck and keep going!