I have been declared bankrupt + had my house repossessed, AMA

[HirogenHunter]

Was a few years ago now, but it was a very tough time in my life and has mentally scarred me. I have panic attacks if i have to buy something large, eg. A new washing machine, etc. I check my bank every day and never spend anything on myself, even clothes, i feel i dont deserve it

Not many peple know in real life, one family member was awful to me so am now NC

How did it come about business loss , spending day to day stuff or something else ? Did you have kids at the time ?

We're your family poor or rich when you were growing up?

Do you have dependant family/dc?

How did it get so bad? (No judgement by the way. I've been on the brink of bankruptcy before)
Are you okay now?

Oh gosh, that must've been really difficult. What was the most frightening thing?

Maybe you can budget. Give yourself a set ammount each month to spend on yourself Transfer the ammount into a seperate bank account. That way, if you don't spend all of it it rolls over. You could even save up for more expensive things for yourself. Without touching your central cash. Baby steps. Nobody is saying you have to go spending crazy. But if your financially solvent now you're still punishig yourself for something that happenned years ago

It wasnt business loss. I had 3 children and got married when very young, didnt have any childcare around so i ended up being a SAHM. DH works fulltime. We rented a council house but they were going to knock it down, we decided to buy a small terraced house. Everything was going OK but then we got the neighbours from hell, they really affected us and the children mentally so we decided to sell but were in negative equity. Stupidly we got a loan to cover it. We rented for a while but then got the chance to buy the house we were renting. We got a secured loan to consolidate debt. We realised we were in over our heads with repayments and decided to sell that house but that was also in negative equity! We ended up getting advice from CAB and leaving the house to be repossessed and then going bankrupt.

We never lived beyond our means, (flash clothes, hols, etc) I suppose we just ended up using credit cards for essentials like food, etc because most of DH wage went on debt repayments. We never received any benefits apart from child benefit when the children were young. DH's wage was JUST over the limit for anything.

I am very ashamed of the events and never tell anyone.

I still dont sleep well and now have an autoimmune illness and fibro and arthritis and unable to work even now. I think the prolonged stress has affected me. I panic now if the telephone rings, my heart races.

We are ok now, no debt at all, very lucky to get a council house.

Its my awful secret

To answer some questions:

My family were quite poor growing up, single parent

To avoid it, we did try an IVA but was rejected

Most frightening thing was worry about the future and being homeless with children

Not sure if I will ever get over it, I now have GAD and bad nightmares and am a terrible worrier

So sorry to hear what happened. It definitely sounds like utter bad luck and not at all your fault. You did the only thing you could and things will get easier x