First, I’d like to thank Michael at It’s Your Money. I emailed him to thank him for such a fantastic website and he encouraged me to start my own debting blog. I debated for a while, and decided one that was a little anonymous is OK for now. I’m still a bit hesitant about putting this all out there as I’ve made some not-so-smart decisions in the past.

I’ve always had a bad relationship with money, which is why the title of this blog is “Healing My Relationship with Money.” Like all relationships, there are issues that need to be fixed. To be honest, if this was a relationship with a person, I would have called it quits long ago as I’ve always been bad with my money, since I was a kid. Even when I was making my own money I spent it without really knowing what I spent it on. However, money is a fact of life and I need to have a relationship with it, so I may as well make it a healthy relationship.

I grew up without a lot of money and as I got older always felt poor, even when I knew I really wasn’t. I wasn’t making a lot of money but was working two jobs for quite some time. Of course, I still hadn’t gotten to the root of my problem and was still struggling. Now I’m working at a job that pays a decent salary — not a huge amount, but the amount I always told myself, “If I can make $x a year, I’ll be fine.” Well, after a year of making that amount I was no better off than when I started, so took my New Year’s Resolution seriously in 2007. I decided to start paying attention to where my money was going and to stop putting my head in the sand and deal with the problem.

Since January, 2007, I’ve made quite a bit of progress. Some of it is financial, but much of it is my attitude. I have paid off 16 small accounts under $200. I have also been paying all my bills on time since then and sticking to a spending plan that also allows for going to a movie once in a while, buying a DVD, etc. If I’m too strict I tend to go on a splurge and give up, which is part of my problem from the past. So, I learned my lesson and realized I need to figure a little money into my budget for these items so I don’t go nuts all at once and blow the whole thing.

I do have several financial goals that I will be posting, but thought posting about why I’m doing this would help. It’s something I should have done sooner, but I’m trying to live my life not thinking about what I did wrong but acting on what I know to be right and moving on.