Am I Really That Bad With Money?

In a short answer yes I am really that bad with money! I want others to see that I am no expert, just a mom learning as I go.

Money is something I always thought was there just wasn’t enough of it, I clearly would always live poorly and not able to pay bills because there wasn’t enough money. Obviously more money isn’t a bad thing but lets be honest if I cant manage the money I already have I wont be able to manage more. After having kids and moving out on my own I thought budgeting was paying my bills and then doing whatever I wanted with the leftover money. I bought anything I wanted, I used credit cards as if they were also an income, and I ate out whenever I felt like it (which was all the time). Before the next payday I was out of money, I didn’t understand where all my money went and clearly my only problem was I didn’t have enough income.

Well more money wasn’t the answer either! After a tragic loss in our family we actually got a small inheritance, well with our bad money habits that was gone in about a year. the only thing that came from that is we put a decent down payment on a house we could barely afford with our income at the time. But still our money habits didn’t change and I still felt we just needed more money coming in.

A little over a year after buying our house my husband lost his well paying job and in the last 2+ yrs jobs have continued to come and go but it wasn’t until April of 2019 that I saw a YouTube video of The Budget Mom and the whole world of budgeting opened my eyes. I’ve now read all of Dave Ramsey’s books, listen to his podcast and follow The Budget Mom. They both are amazing but I feel my life is different from theirs, I’m a stay at home mom who cant afford daycare no family around and my husband is our only income. My oldest son has a genetic disorder called Angelman Syndrome which complicates me working outside our home even more. But since finding budgeting and tweaking it to work for us I’ve found that even though we have a small income compared to our expenses I can still stretch every penny to end our paycheck to paycheck cycle. I am still not great with money but over the last 8 months I have learned how to change my behaviors to manage it better.

Next week will be a post about how I do our budget every month. Feel free to leave any questions or email me at kerithatfrugalmom@gmail.com