Did you ever have a time that you had struggles for money? How did you get by? How did you get back into good financial standings?

I have known different ones that have struggled at different points in their lives are who are now very well off financially. People who have had health issues, people who have filled for bankruptcy, divorce, etc. Just issues in life that we all can experience at different times. But these people bounced back ... if you have one of these experiences, are you willing share? I thought it might be kind of uplifting to those who currently are experiencing a financial downturn, for whatever reason.

Oh, how I remember those days. They were before internet was as popular as it is now.

Anyhow..been thru bankruptcy, had numerous medical bills after bankruptcy (that weren't included in the bankruptcy), bought a house with an arm mortgage....

Before the bankruptcy, we weren't living paycheck to paycheck. We were literally getting paid, paying the past due stuff and had nothing left over. We got paid once a week, so it was so easy to tell myself, "Oh, I just got to get to next Thursday". I remember cashing a check at the grocery store and putting it in my cking acct to cover any charges. I remember doing a lot of payday advances. I hated all that, but we never had enough to break the cycle. We payed only the min. on cc. We took every deferrement available on the car. Paid the electricty and water before the disconnect date.

The bankruptcy only came after a bad real estate move. Still, the bankruptcy didn't really help. It took some of the stress off, but we still had 2 car notes, rent, water, elec, phone and groc. There was never enough to do it all, so we went back to the payday loans.

We did that for awhile and back to the grocery store to cover cks. I got pregnant and it was then that I really figured out that it all had to stop.

I was not proud of it, but "I let the cards fall where they may". I went and opened a new cking acct that had none of the payday loans attached. I basically started over. Everything that had hit the old bank acct, I tried to pay of with what I had left of everything from the good act. I paid what I could, and sometimes, it was only $5/week. Eventually, the act was charged off.

I had a ton of medical bills with my 1st child. We didn't have the best insurance, but in the end, I worked out a deal with the hospital. I could only pay $50/month. Not what they asked for, but that was what I sent and they took it! They eventually wrote off the act and sent my payment back with a letter explaining why.

When we bought our house, because of the bankruptcy, we got an ARM mortgage. That was horrible! For 2 years- that darn thing would change every 6 months. We had 2 credit cards that went to 30% interest! I finally had to decide was I going to salvage my so-so credit, or loose my house.

I kept everything prestine in my husbands name (he was the one working), and I let my 30% cc go. I tried to work with them and had no luck. After 1 year of no lates on my husbands credit report, he qualified to refinance the house. he got an awesome rate and lowered our payments $600/month.

He also took a chance on a new job, that gave us a raise of over $1200/month and more stable and better ins and benefits.

All of this happened over a 10 yr time period. I thought we would never get it together. What I realized thru all of this is that at the end of the day, a credit report is just a number. You have to make decisions, and although sometimes, they are not what you want, it is the best thing to do at that time. Time heals all wounds!

We were pretty much completely broke when we married. My brother gave me $ for my last semester's tuition for Christmas, and I had to live off my husband (then fiance) while I did an unpaid internship to graduate. After that, I started bringing in income, though only part time and we scrimped and saved. We saved every penny earned by whichever of us earned the least. We did that for 3 1/2 years until M was born, so that gave us a good foundation.

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I consider our family financially secure right now (it's a feeling more than it is a number), but we were completely broke when we first got married; plus dh had some student loans. We lived in a one-bedroom apartment and our "nights out" included going to fast food for dinner (w/coupons) and then browsing books at Barnes & Noble for free.

The best advice is to think long-term. Even when we were struggling to put food on the table we still managed to save for the future. Ten years ago, when my dd was born, things were tight again because I quit working full-time. I worked part-time nights, clipped coupons and matched to grocery sales, and we both went without cell phones and cable just so we could make ends meet. However, even though times were really tight, we never decreased our 401k contributions and continued adding to our emergency fund. That has made a huge difference.

Plus, another important thing we've done is to not upgrade our lifestyle when we got pay increases. That enabled us to save an even bigger portion of our income. Sometimes it can be tempting when I see someone driving a new vehicle or move into a nice house. I think to myself, "Hey, I'd like one of those too!" but then I realize I wouldn't trade our financial security for them.

Now that we've been married 16 years I can definitely see that over time saving even a small amount on a consistent basis really does pay off.

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For us, the scariest time was when my youngest kid was just 1 and my husband was laid off from his IT job in the post-911 era. I had been a SAHM for a year at that point (had worked PT after my first was born, stopped completely after my second). For us this was a turning point where we decided that from that point on, we would always, always try to live below our means. I was motivated by fear more than anything. Fortunately, my husband did find employment within a couple of months and about a year after that, I was able to return to work full-time but doing it from home. It coincided with my kids being school all day, so somehow God was really looking out for us. Nowadays, we are better off than we have ever been but we still live way below our means and try to save as much as we can.

LOL, I love the premise ... for those that are financially secure right now. I think the operative term is 'right now'.

Seriously, though, we're doing okay - probably better than others. I have definitely had times when I worried about money LESS and times when I felt like we had lots of extra money to burn, but were still financially secure.

And there have been lots of time when we weren't.

Fortunately, my husband has always been employed although there were times when we never knew if his paycheck was good to cash - or if it would even arrive. I've been laid off a couple of times and, back when we depended on my income to cover some expenses, that was a struggle. And there have been times when our expenses (such as child support) out-stripped any income that was coming in.

How did we survive? Smoke and mirrors

Seriously! There were times when the bills got paid and I had no idea how we managed it because the numbers between income and outgo didn't add up but it happened anyway.

And all the stuff that I advise here comes from real life experience. Hubby and I would work a second job (hubby would do consulting and I'd go to retail). We'd cut every fixed expense we could. Re-finance the house or, when we were still renting, move to a less expensive space. We'd sell off stuff. We'd buy NOTHING (sometimes not even food - we'd eat whatever we already had around the house and that can take c-r-e-a-t-i-v-i-t-y!) I'm serious about the nothing - we'd not watch TV because it took electricity. We'd refuse to turn on lights so used candles (from emergency storage) or lived in the dark. I even showered at work and would cook on a wood fire in the backyard sometimes. For a while I refused to spend over $5 for any article of clothing - and that included coats and shoes.

I used the envelop system. I kept a price book. I tracked every penny spent and planned, planned, planned. Back in the old days you really could take a cash advance from MasterCard to pay the Visa bill. I begged for a lower interest rate and would get it. I opened new accounts with zero interest for 6 to 12 months then transfer all the debt there while trying to snowball the balance downward. Those days are gone.

We'd keep our spirits up by reading frugality books from the library or re-reading the books we had at home. We snuggled a lot. Hubby and I have always been good at rallying together when times got tough. We got so good at doing things that were completely free and having fun. We challenged each other on who could arrange the best 'date night' on the cheap (dinner at Costco and a dollar theater movie afterward?) Yes, there were times when it was all incredibly sad, lonely and hopeless. Extreme financial troubles can make it seem like there is an dark cloud over your entire life. Like I told a girlfriend, "I usually have fun looking for great finds in thrift stores but when you HAVE to shop at a thrift store for something you need, it isn't fun anymore."

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We started out with nothing, almost right out of high school and bought our house with our savings (it was an old repossessed rental and cheap, but it it was what we could afford - a DUMP! lol), borrowed to remodel it (just so it was livable), DH also needed a truck so he traded in his beloved sports car to get one but we also needed a loan to cover the rest.

While we were paying on those loans, we were stretched SO thin. DH made both loan payments and the insurance payments out of his check, which cleaned him out completely, and I paid for utilities, groceries, etc. out of mine, leaving less than $50 in my checking account each month. We only lived that way for a year before becoming proactive about our debt: We both started working part time jobs (DH doubled up on his loan payments and I saved more), and while I don't anymore because I am in school part-time, DH still has his second job and he saves every dime of the money he earns from it. When we got married, we used all of our monetary gifts to pay off our house (DH had managed to pay off his truck about 6 mos. earlier). Not a fun way to use the gifts, but definitely smart and I don't regret it one bit.

We have never bought on credit unless we could pay the CC bill online as soon as we returned home from making whatever purchase it was. We ALWAYS pay ourselves first - via contributions to retirement accounts, to build up our emergency fund, or now that the e-fund is good to go, we are just saving more in retirement and saving up to purchase an acreage outside of town. We both upped our contribution this year on our 401k's. We have also always lived within our means: after our savings is taken out (I save 50% of take home pay now, DH saves about 75% because our loans are done with, though we started out saving like $5 a week if that), bills must be paid, and after that we can do whatever we want with what's left. We also used our change jar to finance new windows for our entire house, insulation for our attic, any home improvements, etc. It's also used for fun money - this year we decided DH could finally get a flat screen for the living room. He will have enough in the change jar by the time Christmas rolls around. Basically, aside from the initial remodel and truck loans, we don't buy anything we can't pay for in cash.

To sum up for those in a not-so-great financial situation:
Hard times are hard, but keep your head up and do what's necessary to make them better. Getting down about the situation doesn't help anything. We never realized how bad things were until we looked back a couple years later. We have worked hard for our entire independent adult lives (not that long - 6 years) and we have had a great payoff so far (no debt, no payments, good savings). We are also considered a pretty low income household (we are way below the national and state averages), so I believe that anyone can become financially secure, you just have to be smart and disciplined about it. If you get down, just think of the future, because it can and will get better if you keep working toward it.

Financially we are doing very well right now but there was a time when I was a single mom with 2 young kids, I had been a sahm mom until I divorced my first husband. I had to work 1 fulltime job and 2 part time jobs just to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table. It was tough but I learned a lot about myself and how to handle money during that time. There was no money to do anything, the kids and I spent a lot of time at the park and library.

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I don't know if I would classify us as "financially secure," but we are a lot better off this year (surprising w/ the economy, I know!) than in years past. We direct deposit into two savings accounts-emergency fund and an "irregular spending" savings account (ala Dave Ramsey). The irregular acct. is for vacation, camping trips, Christmas, home insurance, property taxes, and personal property taxes. Most of these are one time larger payouts that were really killing us coming out of one paycheck. Now, so much is auto deposited twice a month from my paycheck and we consider the remainder of my paycheck what I get paid. This year, instead of worrying about how we're going to afford Xmas, taxes, etc. I will simply go to the bank, withdraw the funds, and pay the bill! No stress and no big dip out of one or two paychecks. Our emergency fund is now to the point we can move some out to a money market account. Hope this helps you, too!

I wouldn't say that I am financially secure at this time, but I am stable and thriving right now.

July 2003 - I was in bad relationship, and I was unemployed again (contract work) with $30K in consumer debt and $4K owed to the IRS. I was broke, broke and credit was pretty much tapped out. I was swimming with sharks and it was either going to get real bad, or I had to make a change. I made some big changes in my life and in April 2004 sent a letter to an old employer, 1 month later had a new stable job.

Still with that job today. I have suffered a loss of work-life balance, but it's allowed me to grow in other ways, so it is a trade off.

May 2004 - Sept 2006, I got caught up on all my bills. Some credit cards were nearing no payments for 5 months; it took a while to get caught up and make purchases that were delayed for house and home, I even stocked my pantry full of food, I made token payments above and beyond minimum due.

Jan 2007 - I was serious, slashed my spending, got on a Dave Ramsey styled budget. I still gave "wiggle" room in budget to make life a bit more enjoyable, but I buckled down.

Sept 2008 - Debt free with a $3K emergency fund! Success on one battle, but now am freaked about next steps...... financial security.

Nov 2009 - 9 month emergency fund in place that is growing with $15K in a 401K.

Far from my ideal, but I feel stable for now.

Also, considering that in May 2009, I had a 10% salary reduction due to company I work for starting to really feel recession setting in. Followed by Nov 2009, when I have now gone from full time employment to 4 days a week with an additional 20% pay cut. That's a 30% paycut this year alone and I have survived 3 rounds of layoffs, but I am sheltered as I am now my department.

So no, not yet secure, but am stable, and I can still send about 20% of my take home to savings, even with recent pay cuts.