Financial journalist in financial trouble

Meghan Casserly of Forbes Women talked with Washington Post business reporter Nancy Trejos about how she overcame her personal finance troubles.

Here is an excerpt:

As a financial journalist, how did you decide to come clean about your messy finances in such a public forum?

It was a really difficult decision. I’d spent many years in denial about my problems, but I got to the point where I needed to be honest with myself, my friends and my family. My job as a finance writer actually helped me to get there, because I spent every day talking to people who were literally on the brink of bankruptcy. I realized they weren’t bad people, they weren’t dumb people, they just didn’t know how to make things right. And what I came to see was that I wasn’t alone, and that it was OK to talk about it. I had a story to tell, to let other people know that they weren’t alone, and that there were livable steps to getting your life and your money back in order.

When did you realize that your debt was beyond your control?

I was living in a rental in D.C., because I’d had to sell my condo at a major loss. I had credit card debt, student loans, car loans–basically every kind of debt possible. I hadn’t even been looking at my bank account because I was too scared to see the balance. I finally had to go online and check out what was going on, and it was worse than I’d imagined. It was out of control, and I knew I needed to ask for help.

Read more here.