The Mental Debt Struggle...

abaka

Wow Keedie! Just been reading through some of your last posts. I always followed your diary previously and have made a commitment to sorting my own finances again after falling off the path again.

So amazinf you got to be debt free though. I fell off the path but never actually got to be debt free. Can't wait to keep following youe diary!!!

Keedie

Ahh @abaka nice to see you back on the forum 🤗. Your diary is still in my bookmarks, how are you doing? Although our financial journeys are not straight forward or easy, the main thing is that we get back up. Sometimes that is a lot easier said than done, but at times it's not as arduous as others.

I became debt free via a cheat code, as I was gifted some money by a family member and used that to clear my debts. But I think if I kept the same discipline that I had whilst clearing debt, and used that approach to savings, some of my debt over the last year would have been avoided or reduced, as I would have had more savings. But, you live and learn 🤷🏾‍♀️. And things are getting back on track now.

I moved my £5 weekly payments into the savings challenge Stacking Cups. It's a great idea, as you set aside £5 into each of the envelopes, and once you reach £25, you can reallocate it to the £25 envelope, and then start again with the £5 instalments until you have another £25. At which point, you have your first £50. And you just keep going until you reach each cup milestone and eventually save £1,000. I will put each £250 saved into the bank so that I don't have too much cash in my safe, and I get a little interest. This challenge is visually appealing, and self contained, so it's way more fun that just transferring the money.

It's a game within itself, so more motivating. Knowing that next week, I will complete the first 5 cups, and I can cross of my first £25 and move the money over, is rather exciting (you can tell small things please me 😂).

Keedie

I forgot to say with the Stacking Cups challenge, you can also just put other denominations in the envelopes. So if I ever have say £20, I can put that straight into a £25 cup, or towards a £50 cup.

abaka

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82123492#Comment_82123492

Had a few ups and a fair amount of downs since I was last active. Started a new diary myself to try and really kick this debt away and hold myself accountable. I believe not posting etc was a gateway to driving the debt up again.

There's a few diaries I remember from here previously so good to get a catch up on yours!!!!

Keedie

I definitely find that I hold myself more accountable when I am posting on my diary @abaka, so I am trying to do it more often. I'll check out your new diary.

I put another £60 into my Rainbow Stacking Cups, so there's now £80 in there. I've managed to cross off one £50 cup, one £25 cup and there's a £5 cup completed, waiting to accumulate the next £25. So I now have £130 towards the moped debt, which is 7.22% of that debt. My son should hopefully be getting more jobs soon, as things slowed down over the summer.

I also put £20 into savings challenges that are for my expenses and £50 into my autumn challenges binder, that will run from September to November. When that binder is complete, it will save a minimum of £300, and that money will be split across debt, savings/sinking funds and fun money.

We're off to Toby Carvery this evening for my sister's birthday dinner, and I'm looking forward to that and I saved my belly for it 😋😂.

My little Worker Bees are coming tomorrow morning to do another shift of decluttering They really seem to be loving it I must say. And my decluttering pile is very rapidly disappearing, which makes me feel a lot better. I need to take the money out of the safe to pay them in cash, they get so excited for their wages. I reckon I'm a good employer as they get a paid 15 minute break (with snacks) and then they get lunch afterwards. I just have to figure out what to feed them …🤔.

Makingabobor2

Ooh,love a Toby Carvery .Our local one turned into a steak house, so not pleased. Have a good time.

Baileys_Babe

Your worker bees are very lucky to have such a generous employer 😁

It sounds like you have good plans to clear the debt and rebuild savings.

Enjoy your meal.

Makingabobor2

How was your carvery meal @Keedie ?

Keedie

The carvery was really good. My sister had a good time. But she refused to sit with the adults and so she sat on the other end of the long table with all the children and teenagers. I kinda overate (as you do), and so I felt a bit stuffed, but it was a good night.

On Sunday, I went to the Apple Store as my MacBook wasn't charging properly. I was a bit apprehensive that it would cost money to fix it even though I have Apple Care. But the guy told me that it was dust built up over years of use, and I was making the situation worse by pushing the charger lead into the usb-c port. He said that all charger ports get dust in them, especially if you use them in your bed which I do, as I spend the majority of my time in my bed. Anyways, he used some little tweezer looking tool and remove the dust. He said that I'd compacted it really tightly in there by shoving the lead in, and pushing the lead against the wall to hold it in place 😬. Lesson learnt. He said to always blow into the charger port and the lead, and that will prevent any dust settling in there. So there's some free advice for everyone. He said, the same applies to charging phones too.

My friend that owes me money, gave me £605 of the money that she owes me, which was great. I managed to put £120 into Stacking Cups, and so there is now £200 in that savings challenge and £50 in the back. And I put £285 into sinking funds and savings challenges. So that was £405 into debt, savings and sinking funds. I also set some money aside to get my hair done tomorrow at the hairdressers, which was £100. That's £70 for the hairdresser and £30 to buy the extensions. My eldest sister has a mobile hairdresser come to my mum's to do her hair, as she hates being in loud crowded spaces and would be overstimulated and on edge in a busy hairdressers. But that mobile lady wanted to charge me £95 for the same hairstyle, so in true MSE fashion, that was a hard nope. My nieces in East London sometimes travel to South London to get their hair done, and so I'm using their hairdresser as she's cheaper and I can see the quality of both of their work, on my sister and nieces, and the cheaper one is ironically the better one.

I bumped into my friend the other day and was complaining about the cost and she told me that £95 was actually cheap and sometimes people are paying at least £150 or £180 depending on what they want to have done 😳😳😳. Yeah, that won't be me. I've usually done my own plaits and extensions, but the rotator cuff issue in my shoulder means that's not an option anymore and I need to get my hair done as I can't go to the funeral on Monday in yeti mode and need to get my hair sorted,

I took my son's advice and put the last £100 aside for me to spend as I want. It's still sitting there, as I don't go anywhere or really do anything. But it's our birthdays soon, so I might get myself something or go out to eat or something. I'm admittedly very boring, and so I don't have an expensive lifestyle. But I may want to buy a book or something, so I won't spend it until I need it.

I dunno what rock I've been living under, but I finally figured out what Amazon's subscribe & save is all about. I've put Silver's litter on a monthly subscription and it was a £0.94 cheaper for each bag, and considering a lot of stuff comes out of someone so small, it's clearly something that I need to buy, so I might as well save some money on it. She's 1 next month, so when she transitions to adult wet and dry food, I'll put them on a subscription as well. My ex-sister-in-law told me that if you have 4 items or something on subscription, you get a greater discount. So I've created a savings space in Starling for Silver's expenses and added a virtual card, so that the recurring charges are contained to one location. And this way, I don't have to think about what is needed, and I've added the money into my budget.

abaka

welcome back Keedie!

Good tip on the charger. That’s happened to my laptops a few times. I wonder if it’s because I use it in bed a lot!