The Smart Princess

I have always nurtured an Inner Princess. Perhaps that's why I managed to blow every cent I've every earned? From my first real job at KFC to jobs in my "career", money burned a hole in my pocket. I grew up in a small town, so blowing every paycheque took some skill. We only had a few worthwhile stores: the Bargain Shop & a drug store were two of them. I could spend an entire paycheque on useless items from the drug store: make-up, bubble baths, magazines...whatever random stuff made my heart race at the time.

I'd love to say I grew up, went to college and learned some money savvy. That would be a lie. My first semester away in college, I managed to blow through my entire Student Line of Credit - a whopping $15,000! Scary, especially considering my first semester was merely general studies. The majority of that money was used for booze, cabs, on restaurants and bar clothes. A piddly amount of it paid tuition, books and rent (yeah I didn't even have a vehicle). After three years of college, I emerged with a Business Diploma in Marketing, $40,000 in debt and little for job opportunities. Apparently, with a Business Diploma I was qualified for becoming a Sales Person &/or an Entrepreneur - neither of which appealed to me at the time.  I earned a minimal amount of money for the next five years and slowly chipped away at the debt.

My Prince in Shining Armour (hubby Tyler), went into the Electrician field and managed to earn a very nice wage, especially with all the overtime he worked. With very few fixed expenses and a strong sense of frugality, he managed to hold onto his money much better than I ever did. Eventually, after we got married, we decided together to use "his money" to pay off "my debt".

Awesome right? A clean slate. Well, Momma must have raised a fool because I fell into the debt trap again. I was getting used to a nice disposable income when I got laid off. After working for several years for the government and feeling unfulfilled, I decided to "ride the EI train" and try to purse some passions. Instead I racked up my credit cards. Then I "consolidated" them to a Line of Credit with a lower interet rate (smart), but instead of closing the credit cards I re-racked them up again (not smart). Now, I had a $20,000 Line of Credit maxed, and three credit cards maxed at about $15,000.  I was even more shame filled about this debt than my educational debt because I should have leaned better and I had absolutely nothing to show for it this time (it's amazing how the little things add up).

I hid my debt from my hubby (which was pretty easy to do as I was in charge of the finances and he never opened my mail). It was so out of control, I felt horrible and yet the thing that made me feel better was to keep shopping.  Somehow, I can't even remember how it went, but Tyler found out the whole debt story. For other reasons, we decided to sell our house and buy another and when we did that, we basically used our equity to move my debt into our mortgage.

After we paid off my debt, I cancelled all my cards, leaving one with a $500 limit open (I still feel its important to have credit in my name but with a limit that's not too difficult to pay off). I'm still not sure that I've really LEARNED the lessons yet as I still very much want to spend, Spend, SPEND. But I'm trying to keep myself in check and not indulge as much as I used to in frivolous things. That being said, I still love feeling like a princess.

So how can I live like a Princess without ending up a Pauper?  It's my goal to figure it out, so that I can teach other woman how to treat ourselves well without  the guilt and shame of bad debt...