Budgeting, balancing checkbook, track spending.

[oak]

Hi friends.

Many of you know I’ve been struggling with underearning.

I’ve also struggled/suffered living paycheck to paycheck.

I get paid twice a month, and this pay I decided to try again to budget, track my spending, and balance my checkbook.

A report, three days (ordinarily I’d be broke by now):

Budget: it is holding up okay. I have some categories I hadn’t considered. Mostly I want to go from paycheck to paycheck towards a monthly budget (I have rent one pay, and my expenses in the other, leaving me without a dollar to my name something like 27 of 30 days of most months).

Track spending: this is actually the easiest, thanks to my experience in Debtors Anonymous. In practice I just fill in the actual spending next to the projected spending in the budget. Yay!

Checkbook balance: this is incomplete, and I have some unclarity about my true balance. But I am doing much better than previously.

Most boldly of all, I budgeted $100 in savings for this pay.

Considering I’ve had zero, and to be honest, overdrawn accounts every month for 2018, this is audacious.

[brownblob]

good luck oak

[oak]

Thanks Brownblob!

In the first time since I got sober I am not broke within a day or two of getting paid.

I am within a few dollars of my budget, and to my surprise I still have the $100 I budgeted for an emergency fund. (This is a big deal for me.

I have also not overdrawn my account, which is an accomplishment. I even have a good idea of coming recurring automatic withdrawals.

All of this is progress for me.

I am still crushed by loneliness on Thanksgiving, but for today I’m not broke.

Thanks to this forum I am lonely but not alone.

[oak]

Rip savings (lifetime savings) of $100

Rip budget

Good news:

1. I have balanced my checkbook

2. I have tracked my spending, so I know the reasons why my budget is destroyed (main reason: groceries).

3. All of my needs are met for today and I am okay