I was in the same boat op.
Last year we were in the worst situation we've ever been in. Dh was made redundant and we set up our own business after lots of planning and research...but we severely overestimated the demand and it finally went tits up in April after sinking our finances into a black hole over the six months previous.
We just couldn't recover from it. I work FT but dh couldn't find work and our youngest is only 2 so we couldn't even afford the childcare for him to look properly. We'd completely built our lives and outgoings around two decent, full time incomes and no amount of cancelling Netflix or switching utilities could save us...we were a FT income down and we just couldn't manage. We missed mortgage payments, missed our car finance payments and had seven credit cards between us which we couldn't keep up repayments on. We fell behind on the mortgage so sold our house and moved into rented but got nothing back from the sale, just cleared the mortgage and arrears - we only just avoided a repossession. Our car was repossessed and we had to spend £400 on a banger just to see us through with work and school.
When we moved I sank my head into the deepest sand pit I could find and didn't update our address anywhere as I was terrified of bailiffs turning up for our defaulted credit cards. I know that feeling of dread you get all too well and ignored everything for months.
Gradually our debts found us and letters started coming again to our new address. I only pulled my head up last month and sat with a pile of post as tall as me and spent hours opening and sorting it. Then I called all our creditors one by one...and they were so disinterested it was amazing. Every call handler was clearly bored and all accepted a £5 a month repayment each, even for my biggest single card on which I had a £5k default. I've never felt such a sense of relief as the end of that day.
I think creditors are used to it more nowadays...times are hard and lots of people have fallen into the shit in the last year, probably more so than ever since UC etc.
The feeling of relief was immense when I got to the end of it and we're now back in a position where we're able to manage day-to-day and I can actually breathe without having a panic attack. The debts are still there but they're ticking away on £5 a month payment plans and I can finally answer the phone or the door without ushering the dc upstairs first in case it's a bailiff. Dh is a SAHD and we're claiming UC until dc3 is in school. The UC is less than half of dh's previous income but without the car finance and 100's a month on debt repayments, we can survive.
I've joined the £10 a day thread and have been slowly going at it for a week now, joining the better paying mystery shop panels and task apps as well as testing for some of the bigger project work available.
My aim for 2020 is for us to get off UC because I hate being reliant on it...and to build multiple income avenues around us like a fortress so that we're never in that position again if one thing goes pop. Never again will I take any type of lending or finance or live to the maximum of our incomings...it's been a shitty, shitty lesson but one i'm glad I learned now and not even later down the line.
Anyway, i'm rambling and not sure if that's been any help other than to let you know you're definitely not the only one...it's actually been quite cathartic to type that out! New decade and new beginnings!