Well when I got out of college, I immediately had an amazingly well paid job. This was huge for an independent young girl. I lived by myself so I turned to shopping out of boredom but I am sure that having to wear a Catholic school uniform for 12 years of my life had something to do with that in addition to being college poor. I was finally able to afford what I wanted. So, I went out and bought, bought, bought. In the beginning, I would use a card then pay it off. Then came a change in my job. My boss had to make me a salary employee and drop my pay in order to stay working with him. I took the pay decrease so that I can get my year experience but that took a toll on my wallet. Now, I couldn't pay off what was on the card and I couldn't and didn't stop the shopping. So you guessed it, my debt grew and grew. In trying to make some changes, I took out a loan to consolidate and pay off the high interest cards but then fell into the credit card trap again when I had to buy a new bed. Believe me when I say that I needed a new bed. For two years I was sleeping on a twin mattress that had a majority of the springs sticking through the mattress. Now, I didn't need the exact bed and mattress that I bought but that is another story.
Anyway, before I got married I knew I had to make some changes in my financial status. Definitely did not want that as a burden to my hubby so we both worked together to kill our debts and not create anything new. We saved up a lot of money for the wedding and was able to not use any credit to pay for items (Yay us!). After the wedding, I worked hard in paying off my personal debt. I didn't get to save much but I have been able to start killing my unnecessary debt. So since then, I paid off that stinkin loan and two credit cards. So today I only have two more credit cards and my student loan. I can't tell you how great it feels to get rid of the crappy cc debt that I had incurred. I just wish I knew then what I know now. I would have been able to save more money for this house we will be buying in the next few months.
I have definitely learned quite a few lessons from this whole experience and am really excited for the future hence why I had to share my story. So the countdown is on to being credit card debt free! Wish me luck!
Have any of you had a smiliar experience? Are you working on being debt free or at least credit card debt free?
