I feel very naive and young!

angelaf_3

Hi Roorosie. Nothing to feel foolish about it's not your fault that until recently there has been no financial education in schools etc. Somethings you may like to consider is going on a Christians Against Poverty Money course. They are on Martin's approved list of free debt counsellors and you don't have to be a Christian to attend their faith is why they do it for free. You don't have to be in debt to go on the course because the course was developed and is run on a prevention is better than a cure premise as CAP were shocked when they started debt counselling how little financial teaching people had received. The courses are free and there is usually free tea and coffee/cakes and is either run over 2 or 3 weeks. I felt it was so empowering that I trained as a money coach.

Something else you may like to look at is the Open University's free Money management course on OpenLearn
http://www.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/managing-my-money/content-section-overview
I did it as a module for my degree because I'd become very interested in money management and found it really interesting. The module I did was very interactive and you got to use different interest etc calculators.
Like someone else said love and enjoyment isn't about who can spend the most and there are loads of ways you can show you care without breaking the bank at Monte Carlo and those who think differently are very rarely worth knowing.
All the best. Looking forward to hearing how you get on.

theoretica

foxgloves wrote: »

What Christmas isn't is a horrible orgy of spending money we don't have,

It isn't? Are you sure about that?

Bobarella

Good luck clearing the ODs. You can definately do this. And in the scheme of things £1500 is not too much to clear with concerted effort.