Climbing Out Of This £45,000 debt

Jophi2b

Scloud said:

I find the credit club such a brilliant resource. It can look bleak at times as it's so in depth but I think it really helps me. I'm look forward to my score creeping up each month. It's currently slow progress as I have a similar amount of debt to you that I am just starting to climb out of. Good luck with everything! I too started by paying off my overdraft - it feels so good once it's gone. 

Thanks Scloud. I literally can't wait to get paid next month so that my overdraft will be gone, it is really motivating me right now. How I will feel about moving on to my next debt (which is over £15k) I am not sure, that feels like a long hard slog just thinking about it. I'm toying with the idea of skipping over it to the next highest interest debt (a much less daunting £3,700 ish). I think I will wait til the overdraft is gone to see which one I am going to focus on next!

Jophi2b

Thanks @thriftyish I do need to change my SOA a little bit as I completely left out petrol costs and a couple of other bits, so I think I might edit it a bit later. 
I am hoping to avoid having any clothing budget for myself for quite a while as I am currently doing intermittent fasting (mostly in order to lose weight - am just over a stone down so far) as I want to fit into all of my 'old' (aka smaller size) clothes which I haven't been out of the wardrobe for quite a while!  Having said that, I was SO tempted to buy a couple of dresses in a 70% off online sale earlier today, but talked myself out of it.
Thanks for the cashback site reminder, I have Quidco and mostly remember to use it, but will have a look at some of the others as well to see what they are offering. 
Really loving making my way slowly through the other diaries on here. Not only does it make me feel less alone (none of my friends and family know about my financial circumstances), but I am finding out so much and finding inspiration everywhere! 

Jophi2b

lynneee said:

Hi, sounds like you are off to a good start! Perhaps try looking at the monthly grocery challenge, there are lots of cheap recipes and ideas on there, if you think this is a way you could save some money. Good luck on your journey to sorting your debts 😊

Thank you lynneee. I haven't come across the monthly grocery challenge, but it sounds good, will see if I can find it now.  I've collected together a few Jack Monroe recipes which I am definitely going to try out this weekend when work doesn't get in the way. Thanks for the tip!

Jophi2b

We had our first venture out wearing face masks today to go and collect our Too Good To Go Box. It was warm out anyway, but I found the face mask made my face awfully hot. The kids loved wearing their face masks though, and using the hand gel!
I was excited when we won the box yesterday (from Morrisons) and I was absolutely delighted today when we collected it - there was LOADS of goodies! All yellow sticker stuff, but what a haul for £3.09! We had - 
A loaf of bread, 6 brown rolls, 6 paninis, a fritatta, a pot of chargrilled veg, 6 Muller corner yoghurts, 2 chicken kievs, hash browns, 3 steak and kidney pies, 2 stir fry sauces, fresh dill, 1kg carrots, 1kg potatoes, packet of ham, 2 chicken samosas, sliced chopped pork and 2 Finest Salmon, haddock and prawn pies. 
I couldn't believe it when I was handed this box full of food!    I will definitely be trying for one of these again, but I will wait until we have eaten this lot and have some space in the fridge and freezer again.

thriftyish

That does like an amazing box, it is exciting, isn't it! I think the most exciting bit for us is that before I would never buy anything 'finest', bread would be a bog-standard 50p loaf, and with tgtg we are honestly eating like kings, it can be 'hit and miss' with the boxes, as some can be veg or bread heavy, but mostly they have been fab! 

Good work avoiding the sales, and good luck dropping that dress size. I am in a similar position, my clothing is telling me to avoid dessert, and I have loads of clothes in smaller sizes - a stone so far is amazing! With the cashback, I've found that one is usually offering something slightly different to the other site, so it might be worth checking both.

I feel the same, the community spirit is amazing here, and like you, most of my friends don't know or wouldn't understand. It's nice to have a safe space among like-minded people, and the ideas and inspiration make a huge difference too. 

storybookgirl

Jophi2b said:

 Doing these little things is really helping me to feel like I am a bit more in control of my situation and finding a way out of this mess. 

I'm the same, it's the little things that make me feel I am achieving something and keeps me motivated.  I like having small goals to work towards on my way to a bigger goal x

Jophi2b

Had a very unproductive morning, struggling with my motivation today, but will need to get moving shortly as we have to go and pick up another Too Good to Go box, this time from a local cafe which should be interesting. It's not a familiar cafe (I am not a cafe frequenter), so will be a new experience! It is across the road from a Lidl's, which I never knew existed either as we are fairly new to the area, so I may take the opportunity to pop in there to see if they have any of the cheap veg boxes I have been reading about on here.

I had some unexpected money go into my account yesterday, so I was delighted to see this morning that my overdraft is now down to £947! That means if I can keep being really disciplined (it does NOT come naturally to me, sadly) then I should definitely be able to clear this when I get paid at the end of August.

I have been trying to come up with ideas on how I can stay motivated and on track. I do have a tendency to be impulsive and flit around from one thing to another and I also have difficulties with organisation of things (including paperwork, bills, money...) These things have always been problematic for me, although my (self) awareness of them has only become clearer in recent years. Perhaps I should not have been surprised when my son was diagnosed with ADHD a few years ago, but I was! To me, he wasn't 'different', he was just like me!  So, staying on track is usually a task in itself, but I am determined to get to my end goal (owning my own house again), so these are my ideas so far -

• Having a picture(s) of my end goal within every day sight.
• Chunking my debts so I work on a bit at a time (mostly done for me, as my debts are spread over a number of cards, but I can see the big ones (15k and 12k) being hard for me to work on. I may have to try to split them at some point.
• Celebrating every time I fight the impulse to 's*d it, just do it'! (buy that dress/cake/hot tub etc!)
• Obviously, keep writing in here.
• I am quite competitive, so I am trying to view this getting out of debt journey as a game (not meaning to sound flippant at all, I know debt is a serious problem). I like to win, so the thought of winning against the debt is appealing to me, I just need to make it more appealing than that hot tub now.

Struggling to think of anything else that I can use to keep me on track, but willing to try anything out, so any suggestions welcome.

Jophi2b

Our magic bag from the cafe contained 2 slices of banana bread (already eaten) and 2 scones (kid's puddings after dinner).
 
I have just been looking at how much food we have in the house. Our freezer is pretty full, as are our (very small) cupboards and fridge, so I am going to see if we can go the whole of August without doing a big food shop. The kids did get some sweets and treats in Lidl's today (£2.90) so we will see how much money we can avoid spending for the next 4 weeks or so!

August food spend so far = £2.90

enthusiasticsaver

Great news that you will hopefully be out of overdraft at the end of this month.  
Keeping motivated will be tough with a fairly substantial chunk of debt to get rid of.  You have a decent income though so it should be possible.  It has already come down by £2400 but I think budgeting is the way to go to avoid you going back into overdraft in December say when you have £4500 of rent to find as well as money for Christmas. I think I would be tempted to put at least £500 every month away towards that huge 6 monthly rent bill much as I am sure you would like to pay it off debt there is no point if you just have to increase the debt again as soon as you have to find rent. Budgeting is all about planning and foreseeing what you need  to pay out for whether it be school uniform, rent or a car service. 

Impulsiveness is difficult to curb if you have that sort of temperament but it often is a reason for debt in that people who act impulsively do not have the sort of thought process that makes them stop and think if they can afford something before spending. Putting curbs in place may stop that so taking credit cards out of your purse or off websites may help with that as will having only one food shopping day a week and a financial planning day once a week where you record spends and plan for the week ahead. Having smaller targets like paying off a debt or getting down a bracket may help so you could aim for being below £40k by Christmas.  

Mummy_bear

Just come across your diary and have subscribed. I started with a similar debt so love reading other people's diaries with similar original debt figures.

You've had a brilliant start. 

MB