3 years ago, my wife and I entered our trust deeds, today the last payment left our account to them. I'll not lie, it's been hard at times, very hard, but I still think it was the right, probably the only decision we could make at the time. I have used this forum as a resource throughout, under a different username to this one as I forgot my login 🙂

When we were entered into the early stages of the process, I used to hate reading posts like this. 36 months seemed like a such a long period of time, the not knowing what was going to happen, being unable to speak to anyone about it (we only told a few people that we needed to tell about our situation), then when you read about people who had completed their obligations, I'll admit there was a touch of jealousy.

For me, the worst part of the whole process was at the beginning, speaking to CCCS, writing down just how much of a mess our finances were, the legal jargon, the feelings of shame that we were having to go down this route, then the stress of waiting to see if our TD's would become protected, knowing the alternatives if it didn't.

Once it became protected, it was as if a huge weight had been lifted, but the 36 months that lay ahead seemed like a lifetime. Initially it wasn't too bad, we started to budget in a way we had never done previously, we checked our account almost daily, keeping a tight reign on our ins and outs. The next stressful bit came after only a month or two, where the Co-op bank closed our account, despite me going into a local branch and telling them we were about to enter a TD, they sold us an account which we weren't entitled to, so direct debits and standing orders got rejected, but we got that sorted and got a cashminder account with them.

The rest of the time, money has been very tight, especially when our 2nd child arrived halfway through the deed, as anyone with kids knows, there is a lot of expenditure required, but this wasn't taken into account by our trustee and we had to get a lot of 2nd hand stuff and borrow from parents for stuff we needed new, we had to sacrifice a lot at this time. Christmas and Birthdays were tight, we feel terrible about giving smaller presents, not spending as much as we would have liked on our kids, but we survived.

But, the end of the tunnel has now been reached, we have learned some very important lessons on budgeting, we will never be in this situation again, and our kids will be educated about money in a way we never were.

One of the hardest things was not having anyone to talk to about it, my accountant knew as he had to, but it wasn't like I could call him up for a chat about it, and being honest, it wasn't something he was overly knowledgable about. This forum has probably been responsible for saving my sanity on more than one occasion, it's such a great resource, and knowing that you're not alone gives great strength.

If anyone is in the process of considering a TD, and the advice they get is that it's the best thing for them, I would encourage them to go for it. Yes, it's hard, but at the end, the 36 months don't seem as long as they did at the beginning, and the feeling of relief is incredible.

We are now looking forward to starting again financially, this coming Christmas we are looking forward to spoiling the kids and make no apology for it, they suffered the past 3 years through no fault of their own, but we won't be getting into debt to do it.

R