So it is 9 months later and I thought I would check into my old blog and compare.

The numbers are way down, yay.

Currently, I owe $12,941 to credit card companies. This means I have paid off about $15,000 since August. It was really hard. I still think of things on the 12 step model and I will be honest that I have had many many slips along the way. I don't have selfless stories about how I have only eaten Ramen for 9 months or counted every penny. I did not cut back on some things. But I cut back on A LOT of things.

It was funny to see about how I was working on my Emergency Fund in September, as if there actually was one. I didn't have one until TODAY.   Basically, my ER Fund was me budgeting money that we actually used for other things each pay period. There has never been an Emergency Fund. It has been zero basically forever.

I got a surprise bonus and the first thing I did was put 1000 into the Emergency Fund.  The pay structure at my job is influenced by bonuses, and I have never done this before. So this is new.
I was always skeptical about the 1K Emergency Fund mentality, because I wanted to put that money towards debt.  When I had an expensive car repair and unplanned travel expense (for a funeral) I had to pull out the old credit card. And I felt what a slippery slope it was. I need to have an ER Fund. I have to change what I am doing with regards to this.

I budgeted the rest of the bonus towards speific things, and am going to stick with our regular weekly budget. I don't want this bonus to get "lost."

It feels a little like cheating, that I got the bonus and put it in the ER Fund instead of creating the fun  saving little by little. But I have to do something different because slow saving was not working for me.

I was hoping I would pay off my BankofA card this July, but due to the funeral trip it is looking like August. Then I will just have one credit card and I will snowball the hell out of it. If things go close to as plan, I will be out of credit card debt by February or sooner, depending on the size of my holiday bonus and tax refund.