First Steps to Solvency

RelievedSheff

I had a disturbed sleep last night. Woke up being rained on. I had left the over cab sun roof open 🤣🤣🤣

alt80

@RelievedSheff ha fml about the only thing that would wake my Mrs up too. 

getmore4less

RelievedSheff said:

I had a disturbed sleep last night. Woke up being rained on. I had left the over cab sun roof open 🤣🤣🤣

if the suns out does it count as a golden shower?

MovingForwards

I do have planned spending purges. I've given a lot of thought about what I'm buying, looked online, mentally done my shopping list, worked out what I'm replacing and still had the same excitement walking out the shops or paying online. The difference is everything has a purpose and it's not random buys where the tags will stay on them, never to be used, therefore no guilt or regret.

Your son is still young enough to have a change of mentality when it comes to possessions and tantrums over not getting things.

It's great you care about your staff and want to help, all you can really do is be very flexible with their hours and days for a period of time. Do they have access to wellness call centres and things like you do? 

Premier Seeds Direct is where I go for my seeds, get a lot more in the packet and they're cheaper than garden centres etc.

alt80

So much for wife self imposed spending ban. Been out with one of her mates for coffee (she paid of course. We are practically a !!!!!! free bank for 30odd year old women of Nottingham with low incomes 🙄). They raided tkmaxx and JD. Walked out with 2 RL shirts (one gifted to mate), another pair of AF1s 🙄🙄 and some leggings. £195 spend. She’s got more pairs of trainers than is acceptable for any 33 year old woman to have ha good bargain on the shirts @ £35 each full price for the AF1s and bit off the leggings at £30 - this all stuff she’s got so didn’t need. Apparently couldn’t resist the AF1s because they are new colours ha fml. Also apparently not really a spend because it’s under £200 so not ‘like a proper spend’. Might have to give her the nail jobs calc now lol. Lunchtime rant haha. 

@getmore4less 😆 I nearly spat my coffee when I read that. Fml and I thought I was bad for inappropriate crude comments lol. 

@MovingForwards you’re on the wishlists too then? I do still do the wishlists so does wife hers is a !!!!!! job though.

Re staff it’s a difficult balance sometimes mate. I’m not complaining it’s life iyswim just try to do my best by them. The ones who have taken up the med ins have. 

Will have a look at the seeds website thank you. 

MovingForwards

@alt80 I'm the total contrast from your wife!

I think nothing of looking on eBay and watching various things, while thinking over time whether it's really worth buying. Looking at various clothes shops for what I want and looking for where I can get it cheaper, whether I can find a discount code or get extra loyalty points.  

Don't get me wrong, by the end of this week I will have spent £200 on clothes and footwear, but that's a lot of items I've got and will last me for a few years. I'm not into fashion and brands, which keeps costs down.

My nice dresses and shoes I've previously picked up from eBay, less than £10 each and way less than 10% of the original prices, some with tags and they are worn when I do my nights out a couple of times a year with the girls.

I do my own hair and own nails, have a haircut once a year. I'm contemplating a monthly salon trip (eyebrows waxed and dyed, plus eyelashes dyed). Doesn't stop me missing my old salon where I paid a lot less 😃

It also doesn't mean I don't get lectured by my OH (my goodness that guy can nag!) that we have the money for me to go to the salon each month, hairdressers every other month and buy whatever I want, whenever I want.

Everything has a knock-on effect. Saving money in one area, frees it up for another and means I can pay the mortgage down while saving and doing all my day trips. 

Grumpelstiltskin

Alt Can't you get through to your wife that her 'mates ' are using her just the same as your AM  mate was using you?

How many off them would want to know her if she had no money?

How many of them would want to know her if she charged salon prices for their nails?

alt80

@MovingForwards I hear you however I suppose I’m reassessing what I want from life tbh. Problem with my wife I think in some ways is she’s never really had a proper job or needed to earn a living and I’ve spoilt her in some ways really. 

@Grumpelstiltskin she has got a lot of friends she didn’t really speak to over lockdown apart from them recently wanting her to get back into IG - they miss her videos lol so she gets a lot of messages. That’s just how girls of that age communicate I think; they post the IG videos up of their new makeup palettes or whatever it is idk I can’t keep up and their mates message them. Apart from that I don’t think they really tend to speak to each other that much. Whilst I don’t love paying for it and have had a whinge I think it’s just what these girls do - buy stuff and make a video about it. They’re a different generation.

RelievedSheff

They are not mates if they only speak on IG!

MovingForwards

She doesn't know the value of money as it's been available on tap for years and everything has been handed to her on a plate.

Proper friends are the ones she sees, speaks with on the phone, goes out with and they buy their own drinks, supportive and encouraging. Your wife is living in a fantasy bubble, nothing is real it's all fake (as you've pointed out before), how many of them popped round to see her when she moved out for a bit? How many called her to say it would be alright or dump his a--?

Have you sat her down and asked her what she's missing from her life to feel the need to keep doing it? Or ask the question during your joint counseling sessions, then she can't get in a strop over it.

The worst part is your wife could be making money doing the IG and YT fame she craves, let it fund itself after a while, but there's something stopping her, the same as what stops her working, charging for nails etc. Confidence? Fear? Something happen while she was at Uni or in her job? Get to the bottom of that and things might change, before the resentment and rot really sets in for you, stop making excuses for her.

If you want things to change then you will have to say, otherwise everything financial you are doing now will be on repeat for the rest of your life and that's not a viscous circle you want to get stuck in.