Having received my Form 5 and discharge from my TD, I thought I'd share a little about my experience for those at the start of the process...

In January 2013 I had a melt down brought on by years of dealing with high levels of debt and a large amount of negative equity. What was the lowest point in my life in actual fact became the catalyst for turning it around.

Now three and a half years later, I am debt free and able to fully move on with my life. For anyone in the depths of debt right now and thinking there is no end in sight, the first step is the hardest you may ever take, but once it's taken the burden is already lighter. My first step was admitting to my partner and those closest to me my situation and with a lot of advice and help from them and through this forum, I signed my TD in September 2013.

The process involved accumulating 6 months arrears in my mortgage so I could trigger a repossession, legally extracting myself from a third share of my parents home as well as holding off my unsecured creditors. All through this I was guided by Kevin Mapstone and others on this forum. Back in early 2013 this all seemed a monumental task but by September 2013 the TD was signed and I just kept my head down and stuck to the task at hand.

Now, having been discharged, I am debt free and able to start getting on with normal life. I guess that at the darkest points in the process it felt like it was never going to end, and though it may be easy for me to say now, the three years have actually passed fairly quickly. And why.....well 3 years is a relatively short time compared to the many years I had dealing with spiralling debt, struggling to make payments and juggling finances all over the place.

The sooner the process starts the sooner its over, and there is light at the end of what may often seem like a long tunnel. I remember reading a similar post back in 2013 thinking, "well that's easy for you to say" however, few people on here will have recently got into debt....it's more usually a slow process that snowballs and goes back years and years, and thats why relatively speaking it is a short period of time.

I think a TD now has to run 48 months, but its all relative. Take the step forward and don't give up hope.