A couple of years ago, when I was home on maternity leave, and my credit card debt was somehow about half of what it is now , I called a credit counseling agency to see if they could help me manage my debt. Despite all my silly mistakes with my overactive spending habits, I always managed to keep my head above water. I always made my payments on time, minimum payments at the very least. I was (and still am) obsessive about checking my balances and watching due dates and paying attention to any promotions that come in the mail for my credit cards. With a lot of love and hard work, my credit score was, and still is, quite good. The credit counselor told me that I have something called an R1 rating, and the advice he gave me was to stop paying my credit cards for a few months. When the red warning letters started coming in, I was to contact the credit counseling agency again and let them handle it from there. He told me, after much questioning and prodding on my part, that this course of ...
Mama's in debt, but the kid is alright