Letters to the Editor
-
You have to get un-frozen.
So you didn't do something. You had a good reason for it, at the time. And then you keep on not getting it done, and it stretches out awhile longer, until it's really late. Then it's really incredibly late. Then... you have the capacity to do it, but you stare at it for awhile like a deer in headlights and you can't bring yourself to move.
Welcome to the club! It's not an uncommon reaction and you're not a horrible person for it. It's happened to me several times just recently, and I think the rule is that it never happens with anything that's really life-or-death, just things that you're really, really embarrassed not to have done already. To do them now would draw attention to the fact that you haven't done them already, which would be even more embarrassing... so I don't. Er, that is, you don't.
The key is baby steps, at least for me. If I sort of take small steps towards the thing in a sort of sideways direction, that works. Approaching it head-on does not. "How" really depends on you. I would definitely ask my husband, if I were you, to lay off on it for a specific period of time--two months, say, because his asking makes you more anxious and makes it harder to do what you need to do. Then make a commitment to fixing it before he asks again, perhaps by first moving the money into a savings account, then sending it back to them once you've gotten used to it not being with the rest of your money. Spend a few days or a week reminding yourself that this balance no longer represents your money, it represents the loan company's money. Once you're accustomed to that, you can start sending them checks, in whatever way is most comfortable for you to do.
The key is to work at it from an angle that can temporarily avoid the scrutiny of the people whose opinions you care about, so you can stop caring about their opinions on the matter and do what needs doing. That's always helped me, anyway, to move past the paralysis on to doing what I needed to do.
-
Buy your freedom
You've just got to it get it over with. Don't think about it, don't assume the loan office or the debt collector is thinking bad things about you when you call. First, they deal with people who have done exactly the same thing all day, every day. They will not listen to your situation and think you are a horrid person. Most likely, they will not think of you at all except as an amount owed that is about to be re-paid.
And so what if they did think you were a bad person? Who cares about them! You are not the same person now you where then. You've grown. You've moved on and taken more responsibility. You've reached the place where you need to be to become even more.
Do this not to get your husband from asking you about it again, do this for you. So you don' t have to be afraid to answer the phone or get the mail in case it's a reminder of your situation. You're lack of action. Do this so you don't have the weight any more. Buy your freedom from your past!
If you can't do it for you, then you need to do it for your kids. When I was a senior in high school, a friend of mine was denied student loans - because her mother didn't pay hers...
Do it for yourself, but if you can't, then do it for your kids.
-
So YOU'RE the one!
I'm sorry - I can't help laughing. I've always been so indignant about people who didn't pay their student loans back. I paid my way through school - a similar hard luck story to yours, just different details..and a different ending, in that I promptly paid my loans back on the eminently fair interest free schedule they set up. I made $18,000 a year at the time and lived in a crappy apartment with no furniture, with a car that had no AC in the broiling midwest. I went without a lot to pay those loans back. It has always outraged me that so many people just got away with not paying them back. Or maybe what outraged me was that it never occurred to me that I too might get away with not paying them back!
But LW, seriously - reading your letter, I'm glad I paid them back. You clearly know it's the right thing to do. It sounds like you're procrastinating because actually doing something about it now is admitting, out loud and irrevocably, that you haven't lived up to your end of the loan bargain; in short, that you have failed your own integrity test. Try looking at it this way: the fact that it troubles you is a sign your great work ethic and integrity are alive and kicking and want you to right this wrong. It's only a big deal if you don't take care of it - once you do, you'll see it's a blip, and be able to move on older, happier, wiser...and honestly debt free.
-
It's pay back time
Perhaps you could refuse to repay the loan until you have spent years in therapy integrating the hidden meaning of this resistance, or you could just pay the money back and see what feelings arise. Please do the latter.
Maybe you like the drama of unfinished business in your life. Perhaps you are clinging to a past self that this exchange of money will kill off. Who knows? Is it possible you want to prove to yourself that for all the good in your current life there is still that troubled teenager lurking inside, waiting to sabotage maturity. Could you be rebelling against grown up values and the middle class comfortable life by remaining the hostage of your irrational fears? Perhaps you feel you worked so hard to get to where you are now that you have paid a high enough price and won't pay another cent.
In short, it's time for closure. Time for action and a letting go of the student days. A lot of psychic energy goes into warding off the demon studen loan collectors inside your head, and this combined with the associated external hassels is too hefty a price to pay for any gain you may be receiving from stagnancy. You must free up parts of the self by paying for the release of this burden.
It is unlikely you will feel worse after discharing your obligation. So just do it!