I’ve been dealing with financial stress for the past few years, and it’s been an immense strain on my mental health. For a while there, I felt completely overwhelmed and helpless. I found that the harder I tried to get out of this financial situation, the more hopeless it seemed.
My day-to-day life was incredibly stressful, since I was constantly worrying about bills and debt. I would go to bed most nights worrying if my finances were going to be able to cover my living costs in the coming month. It was a never-ending cycle of worry and fear around making payments on time, or worse yet, not having enough money at all.
The emotional toll this took on me was huge - feelings of guilt, inadequacy and even shame were very common. Even worse still, these negative emotions had a direct impact on my relationships - family members felt distant and friends struggled to understand why I couldn’t just “snap out of it”. It saddens me that this period put such a strain on me mentally as well as financially.
Thankfully, with some hard work and lots of effort over time, I am now in a much better position financially. This has made an enormous difference in terms of relieving stress and feeling better emotionally too. It’s not always easy navigating through financial hardship but I can be grateful today that things are looking brighter than they have been recently!