My Story
My, Mr. SSC’s, Background:
I grew up in Western Kentucky, a middle child in a lower middle-class family with no sense of money. You can read about my lack of financial sense or training in my “bad decisions” posts, but needless to say, I never learned how to manage money effectively. I was the best “saver” in my family, so I thought I was doing well financially. I had a job, a 401(k) at 23 yrs old, and even some emergency savings. However, I also racked up a lot of student loans since I covered school on my own, and I didn’t budget well, so I also ran up credit card debt. When I went back to grad school, it was the first time I wasn’t working full time and going to school full time. To subsidize my lost income, I greedily accepted more student loans and more credit card debt to help enhance my lifestyle. My student loans totaled about $64k and there was ~$16k of credit card debt to go along with that. Plus, I thought it would be a great idea to cash out my 401(k). Yep, I did that.
To contrast that, when we met, Mrs. SSC had a nice nest-egg, no student loans, and enough to put 20% down on our house and still pay off my high interest credit card credit card debt. It would take us years to pay off my student loans. But they are now non-existent!
The Family Background – Pre-Divorce
We were a fairly laid-back family with 2 young kids. Mrs. SSC and I met during an internship at “megacorp” while we were still in grad school in our late 20s. We both took jobs at an Oil and Gas megacorp just outside New Orleans, LA and lived and worked there for 5 years. Then, we moved to the suburbs of Houston, TX, where we both continued to work in the petroleum industry as geologists, but we wanted something better.
We stumbled upon some early retirement blogs, but soon realized that we didn’t necessarily want to retire, but rather create a Fully Funded Lifestyle Change (FFLC). To do that, Mr. SSC, left megacorp for a different O&G company. Mrs. SSC left megacorp to follow her passion for teaching. The change in companies and careers opened up our schedule and began slowing down the crazy pace of the life we’d built for ourselves. This was our first step towards achieving FFLC.
Our goal was to initiate our Lifestyle Change and become stay-at-home parents in May 2019. Things change and goals change. Having the freedom to go along with those changes is awesome. Mrs. SSC accepted a tenure track position teaching at a large university, I became a full-time Stay At Home Dad (SAHD) and we relocated to Oklahoma.
That was nice, until we divorced. Whoops! Didn’t plan for that, but then, who does? Psychopaths, that’s who, lol.
Now it’s just me, Mr. SSC. Jay, if you will… Yikes! I’m squarely in control of my finances again, double yikes!, I’m working on figuring out life, finances in a way that won’t put me back into mega-debt, and more. I’m looking for work, except for when I’m not and I’m working on getting some passive, or not so passive income ideas going as well. Stick around, it should be entertaining reading at the very least, lol.
I look forward to sharing my stories with you, and hearing about your stories and struggles!
- Mr. SSC, aka Jay