Well, I am wondering if I have to give up on the part of my long-term goal that's going to Europe in 2015. It's a small thing, and it's largely symbolic...but symbolic targets matter, you know? I've been telling myself that we can do this, we'll be out of debt by 2013 or so and have time to save for the trip, that the debt is tough but I'm tougher, and (because I'm such a big history DORK) the debt is Napoleon but I'm Wellington, etc.

I don't think you have o give up on the dream - who knows where you'll be in 2015? Maybe something will matter more. Maybe it can only be a 10 day trip instead of 15. I think you'll know better in 2013. and I think having a big fun goal makes it so much easier to sacrifice now.

and my bathroom cleaning has come to a halt because I need a third hand. DH should be home soon. I could keep cleaning and just hang stuff up when he gets here, but the internets and tv are more fun.

Maybe it can only be a 10 day trip instead of 15.

Heh. I've only recently downgraded the dream from "stay all summer" to "maybe 4-6 weeks would still be a good trip."

ha. You dream bigger than I do. But then vacations are always GOGOGOGOGO for me - so I get tired. Our Dream of the Hadrian's wall walk would be wonderful at 4 weeks. I wonder if I could get DH to slow down that much

I thought we'd finally found the solution, and I took for granted that I had a good credit score, because I'd always paid on time, never missed a payment, etc. I knew it wouldn't be perfect because of the debt, but I'd still thought it would be around average.

I don't know which credit bureau you're looking at but keep in mind that your credit score can fluctuate wildly from month to month and from company to company. I have two credit cards that let me see my TransUnion credit score every month. In 18 months, I've watched my score soar to all time high, plummet almost 100 points (transferred balance to a new card and took out a short term loan) and then rebound. My Experian score has remained constant (and higher than the TU number). And my Equifax number is higher than both of them.

It's almost become a hobby for me. Like following the stock market.

Well, my idea of a long enough trip is tempered by the fact that I lived in England for a year and still feel like I barely scratched the surface of all there is to see in the UK.

I'm sorry for blowing up like I did before, and I'm going to go back and edit a little now that I've calmed down. I've really got to work on this catastrophizing thing that I do. It's not good for me or anyone around me, but I don't seem to know how to achieve a balance between bottling up my emotions and exploding completely. Probably something I should bring up with a counselor.

After Christmas. Everything is after Christmas now.

Note also that Fair Isaac is changing its scoring formula for 2008 and your score will likely change under it. [link]

I just have a hard time not freaking out over the unknowns.

This will eventually eat you alive. I had some behavioral therapy to deal with that sort of panic that worked pretty well. I don't feel as sick about what may happen tomorrow, next week, or next year and kind of enjoy the serendipitous things that occur to iron things out. Plus I learned how to go through a list in my head, when I started feeling panicky about being a loser with no husband, kids, little in the way of financial planning...

I used to assault my friends with that particular worry, that I was all alone, and owned nothing, and in case of zombie attack, I'm screwed.

I work out the mantra of calm this way: I will never be homeless, I will never be hungry, I will always have a warm bed to sleep in, I don't have to be lonely, I am loved...all the way down to: there's bacon in the fridge, I have enough money to cover at least a month's expenses, my education is paid for, I can jump in my car and go get a pizza whenever I want, Noah and Grace are right here if I want to hug someone who won't tell anyone I was feeling crappy and needed to hug someone...

So you know, credit score will get ironed out. It just will. You're a responsible human being who manages to pay her bills and get out of bed every morning to ensure another human being is fed and comforted and healthy. It's no small thing.

Try and coast on that for exactly fifteen minutes without worrying about anything else in your world.

Then you can worry for five minutes.

It doesn't work for me all the time, but I'm less likely to find myself whipped into a frenzy of panic about shit like, "I WILL NEVER OWN A HOME AT THIS RATE."

I feel your pain, Susan. We were hemorrhaging money this year, and while that particular financial drain is stopped up, we've had unavoidable expenses that made me not even look at how close we were to our credit limits for a while because I would still have to spend the money and not looking kept me from being too stressed.

Well, yesterday I started paying attention again and it is not pretty. Thinking about how long it's going to take me to get out of debt makes my brain hurt. But I will get there, and so will you. You are doing everything right.

It doesn't work for me all the time, but I'm less likely to find myself whipped into a frenzy of panic about shit like, "I WILL NEVER OWN A HOME AT THIS RATE."

Allyson, you are awesome. I mean that very sincerely.