Very long!
I've been pretty quiet since last weekend after my bridal shower. Why, you may ask? We have 42 days until the wedding, we have design meetings coming up for the house we are building.... And we got hit with a huge, HUGE totally unexpected financial burden. Thousands, totally unaccounted for.
We had to reorganize our savings and budget to cover this. Our down payment account was wiped out. Fi and I did everything possible to make sure this burden was taken care of immediately without my credit being harmed, and also to make sure that no bill got paid late, that we would have enough. We had to guarantee that my credit would not be destroyed by taking out credit cards or loans because if that happened, I would have probably lost our mortgage.
We spent every single day after work writing wedding bills down that still had to be paid, our own house bills, and when our paychecks would come in. We both just started new jobs since we moved and the paychecks don't come until after mid June.
I think I cried every single day, realizing how little we have now. We were so confident before, and then were hit suddenly. Please, always always have an emergency fund of as much as you can put in.
The next 6-7 months are going to be so so hard. But I am proud to say we will be debt free at the end of this. We will pay off thousands of dollars in expenses that had originally been saved for, and save a down payment of 45 thousand, in 7 months. The excel sheet proves we can do it.
I am proud to say that we can pay off all our bills without hurting my credit. We can pay half of our needed down payment if we save every penny and not spend it on frivolous gas and coffee and getting nails done for my wedding. We returned everything we could for extra cash. We sold things. We called companys and ended our contract with them or lowered our cell phone plan to save money. FI just got accepted for a second job to put all those extra hours over his salaried job towards our down payment. He will work after his job until closing, and then wake up at 5 to be at work at 7 the next morning. I, as a nurse, am working shifts that have higher pay and am picking up extra shifts for over time. It makes me cry to think of how little time I will see him. How hard he will work and how tired he will be.
There were moments I realized why finances are the #1 reason for divorce. Seeing red numbers in the thousands was beyond frightening. I was furious at FI, trying to blame him for things.
But at the same time, I realized how I would never have gotten through this without him. We are fighting for the next 7 months to make it and come out on top. Ive learned a lot about who we really are. You don't know a person until everything you have has been stripped away. We will get through this together, and I am proud to marry FI, who is taking a second job at a grocery store for minimum wage even though he has a college degree and a salaried engineering job.
I just need some cheerleaders, to tell us that we can do this. We can live like no one else so that we can live like nobody else. No driving around for fun, no buying healthy expensive groceries, no fun expenses. But we will be debt free when its all over.
And I did not do a go fund me. *high five