When my 20-year-old daughter, Ashley, asked me to watch Confessions of a Shopaholic with her, I told her to pick the time and I’d be there. I hadn’t read the book, but the movie sounded like an amusing way for us to spend some time together.
If you haven’t seen it, the movie’s heroine, Becky Bloomwood, is a shopaholic in serious credit card debt. She’s hounded by threatening phone calls from debt collectors, one smarmy guy in particular. Becky’s afraid to open her mail because of all the credit card bills. Oh, she’s also a finance journalist, of all things. The idea that she was supposed to know about finances made it even more entertaining.
During the movie, I’m laughing at Becky’s debt dilemma, thinking it’s all wildly funny. But about 20 minutes into the movie, I stop laughing. My brain is suddenly flooded with bad memories and it hits me like a lightning bolt. A few decades ago, I was Becky Bloomwood. I hadn’t thought about it in forever. It’s like I’d completely blocked out an entire decade of spending the likes Atlanta probably hasn’t seen since.
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It All Started Innocently Enough…
After I graduated from college, I got a good-paying job as an accountant for a petroleum company. I worked my way through college and felt proud to have landed this job.
Every night I’d go home and check my mailbox. And there, waiting for me, were letters telling me how special I was and how I’d been “pre-selected” for all these credit cards. And they all promised me high spending limits (and instant happiness, too).
At the time, I only had a Rich’s Department Store credit card because that was my favorite store (it later merged with Macy’s) and it had been easy to get while I was in college. But I started thinking about how convenient it would be to have a card I could use everywhere. So I applied for a Citi card because that bank had sent me an especially flattering letter—You deserve this card! was plastered all over the envelope—and I got approved in no time.
When it came in the mail, it was such a rush to hold this shiny card with my name embossed on it. I decided to apply for another. And another. I got approved for every card I applied for. At this point, I had seven cards. When I reached my limits, the issuers kindly raised them.
Honestly, I never even read the fine print on any of these cards. Okay, I confess that I had no idea there even was fine print because I didn’t look for it. All I focused on was the offer letters and how much the issuers wanted me as a cardholder.
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One Spending Binge Leads to Another
My job paid pretty well, but not well enough to pay for all the things I needed. My credit cards paid for my power suits, which I thought I needed to be taken seriously. But that meant I also needed power handbags, power shoes, power jewelry, power makeup, power lunches, power cocktails. You get the idea.
It didn’t take long before my minimum payments exceeded my income. One month, I bounced 12 checks. Yep, I said 12. With the NSF fees for each check, I was deep in the hole that month. I stopped making credit card payments for a few months, convincing myself that my cash flow would have a chance to catch up to my monthly expenses.
You know what happens when you stop paying your credit card bills? You start getting mean phone calls from the credit card company. This was before Caller ID, so my only option was to let the calls go to my answering machine. I got very adept at listening to a message just long enough to figure out if it was about my credit card debt before deleting it. Hey, at the time I was young and single, so I was making sure I didn’t miss calls from anyone I deemed important.
The credit card bills had become overwhelming. I took the only course of action that made sense to me. I stopped going to my mailbox.
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Image: Annie Mole, via Flickr.com
Beverly Blair Harzog Credit.com's Credit Card Expert, Beverly focuses on credit card issues and provides insight about current news that affects the credit card industry and consumers. She's a nationally recognized expert on credit card issues and is also the co-author of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Person-to-Person Lending. Reach Beverly at beverly@credit.com.
{ 14 comments… add a comment }
BTDT. We carried our debt for 10 years and I finally got sick enough to work my way out of it through a combination of sacrifice and working for every penny I could get my hands on. Today, debt is one the things that can still give me nightmares.
Julie–Thanks for sharing your experience. And congratulations on digging yourself out of the debt hole. I agree that debt can give you nightmares! It’s something you never forget.
Thanks for sharing this Beverly! I am sure there are many of us who can see some of ourselves in your story.
Thanks, Gerri. I certainly could’ve used a debt expert like yourself back in those days!
It’s great that you can be open about your experience. Thanks for sharing!
Debt is a subject that people sometimes feel uncomfortable dealing with.
Thanks! I’ll be honest. This was a hard decision. But in the end, I hoped it would help others in this situation to know it’s possible to survive it!
Congrats on sending out this message, made powerful by being personal.
Letitia–Thank you! I appreciate that.
sounds just like my late teens/early 20′s.
like you, i got my head out of the sand and worked hard to get everything paid off. i can’t say it was pleasant at the start, but I sure was glad at the end!
I’m saving your story for my son, when he’s old enough to learn that lesson.
tk–Thanks for sharing! And I’m honored to be an example for your son. I’ve made sure both of my kids have read this!
Beverly,
Thank you for writing your story. Something similar happened to me last year. I was 3 cards deep in debt and I’m a student in grad school. I was snapped back into check when my loans were denied and I had to use my dad as a reference. It was humiliating. I closed my accounts and finally paid 2 of them off completely last month. I’m still working on my biggest card, but you’re right. The weight lifted after having paid those 2 cards was amazing. My parents had always told me to control your spending and spend within your limits, but I wish they had given me this kind of example. The real nitty gritty of what happens if you lose control.
Thank you.
Erika–I’m so glad this was helpful to you. And thanks for sharing your story. You’ve already paid off a lot of debt and you should be proud of yourself. Keep going! You can look forward to a giant feeling of relief as you get closer to having it paid off completely.
Beverly,
Wonderful article! You gave me hope as I find myself in my mid-twenties starting the overwhelming debt-reduction process. Now I see that IT IS POSSIBLE to reduce (hopefully, eliminate) credit card debt if you work hard to do it!
Diana-I’m so glad my story gave you hope. It is totally possible to get out of credit card debt with persistence and discipline. Once you get started and your debt starts decreasing you’ll feel so much lighter. Good luck and I’m rooting for you!