I'm afraid.

[selina_z]

It seems that your baby spends much money every month. Is there any tips or efforts to low down? Or I think your saving plan won't pratise well.

[Angelynne]

Hello all, I've been lurking for a little while and I'm finally ready to dip my toe in the water here.

I am 28, married, with an 8 month old daughter. My husband and I are nearly 30k in CC debt. God that hurts to type out.

We were married 4 years ago, and both came into marriage with small amounts of CC debt, maybe 5k combined. He grew up in a household that constantly lived beyond their means and where debt was normal. My husband aquired his fathers taste for expensive electronics. I on the other hand grew up in a very financially responsible household- my Father was a serious saver and taught me all about financial planning. My parents lived very frugally my entire childhood, always saving for the future. Well, for my mom that future never came, she died of Colon cancer when she was 35.

Her death (I was 15) set something off in me that I've never been able to shake. I have a VERY hard time sacrificing now for future stability, because I'm terrified that there won't BE a future. I've gone to counseling and it helped for a while but not long term. My H and I aquired 10k of CC debt in the year planning our wedding- intending to pay it off ASAP but then other things that we wanted to do won out. Since then, we've spent money on travelling, a cross country move (I was promoted at work) to a high cost of living area (furthering our problems), and general crap like concerts and eating out.

I KNOW that this is wrong and that we need to get real about paying down our debts. I KNOW how to do it. I create amazing budgets that would get us out of debt within 2 years but can never stick to it because I seem to be completely unable to save. It would have been SO easy to get out of this debt while we were DINKs but now we pay 1300/mo for my daughters day care and only have $400 extra every month (that is gone-always- by the end of the month).

I control our finances becuase my husband knows that I KNOW how to do it and sees the amazing budgets that I make, but he doesn't pay attention otherwise. I tell him that we can't do this or that but then I end up letting him because I feel like a failure because we SHOULD have the money to buy him some shoes or visit a friend but we don't because I suck at controlling our money like I should. I'm afraid to tell him the sorry state of our savings account (nonexistant right now). I'm not hiding anything- he just doesn't ask. As far as he's concerned, if the bills are paid on time, and we're making min. payments, we're OK.

I don't know where to start. How to get out of the hole. I don't know how to tell him that no, actually we can't do this this and this even though it's already been "budgeted" because we need to get out of debt. It doesn't seem to matter much to him though he would begrudgingly go along with it.

Oh, and another issue I have is that I KNOW that if an emergency ever came up, my dad would help me with no questions asked, so I don't ever really have to worry about being homeless or anything like that, but I KNOW that this is a very bad frame of mind.

I'm sorry I wrote a book. Congrats if you made it though! I just needed to get all this off my chest.....

like what you've said you know how to sort things out. but it doesn't seem to me that you're doing things as planned. there are things that are always coming up that you don't expect or something like not included on the plan.

First, you have to accept that you're not being responsible with the budgeting thing. you would not have gone through such situation if you handled it well.

Secondly, it's not entirely your fault that you and your husband are in a mess without him knowing what's the real score. you should tell him immediately such things cause sooner or later, he's gonna know them eventually. and i'm sure you wouldn't want him yelling at you for not telling this and that. you have to tell him that he should also cut down expenses that aren't really necessary.

Third, Obviously you need to come up with a new strategy how to budget your expenses. it's not enough you get to pay the minimum amount everytime. it'll be bigger soon than you expect.

[Eric80]

one of the things you should do is reassess what you really want to achieve? By paying of your debt you will in such a better place. I went to a debt advisor where i managed to consolidate my debt and it has made such a difference, like you i also went home when an emergency can up but it was time that i took responsibility for what i had done - i highly recommend what you are doing and totally understand that it is not easy.