A Story of Debt

By Ashley Riordan

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 Ashley Riordan

astoryofdebt.com

INTRODUCTION

October 2012

In November of 2009, I decided to get out of debt.  It was really as simple as realizing that I could do it myself.  I could stop waiting for a miracle or a disaster, and I could take control of the situation I had created.

It makes sense that I was overwhelmed, because I was not in a little debt.  I was in $20,500 of credit card debt.  Even three years later, that number still seems unreal to me.  But it was real and it was crushing me and limiting my future.

I knew that after several half-hearted attempts, I was serious about getting out of debt this time, so I did what any blogger would do and registered a new domain.  I called it A Story of Debt, because I knew I was beginning something important and I wanted to share my experiences. I had never written about money before, but I had a lot to say about how I had gotten myself into debt and how I was going to get out.

There is very little you need to know about how to get out of debt.  I would suggest only that you visit Dave Ramsey’s website (daveramsey.com) and look up his Seven Baby Steps.  The rest is all about doing the work, and I think that’s the value in reading about the personal experiences of others.  This book is the 14-month story of how I paid off $20,500 in credit card debt.

It didn’t occur to me until much later that it was bold to start a story like this without knowing the ending. I was determined.

It’s important to me to continue to make this story available for free, because I got out of debt for free.  I educated myself with the free information available on Dave Ramsey’s website.  For motivation, I listened to the free section of his podcast.  I read personal debt blogs.  I didn’t transfer balances around or use a service to consolidate my debt.  It was free, because I did it the hard way.  I didn’t look for any tricks.  I just stopped in place and changed my behavior.  

Doing it the hard way meant that I got the satisfaction of paying off every dollar, and I permanently changed my relationship to money.  There were people who offered me all kinds of advice and tips, but most of them are still in debt and I am not.  I know how that goes, because I did the same thing for a long time.  It wasn’t until I was serious about really doing the work and making sacrifices that I was finally able to get myself out of debt.

To give you some background on my life at the time I was writing this blog: I was 25 when it started and had just turned 27 when it ended.  I was a full-time PhD student in coursework, which meant that I was spending 9 hours a week in class and at least double that on homework.  I worked swing shift in a library, so I went to work at 3pm and got off at midnight every night.  I also worked 15 hours a week at a research center on