Speaker 1: Hello, my name's Santasha Nabananga Bamblet. I'm a proud yr
Speaker 1: the Order Kerni Whoalbury and a waddery woman. And before
Speaker 1: we get started on She's on the Money podcast, I
Speaker 1: would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land
Speaker 1: of which this podcast is recorded on a wondery country,
Speaker 1: acknowledging the elders, the ancestors and the next generation coming
Speaker 1: through as this podcast is about connecting, empowering, knowledge sharing
Speaker 1: and the storytelling of you to make a difference for
Speaker 1: today and lasting impact for tomorrow.
Speaker 2: Let's get into it.
Speaker 3: She's on the Money, She's on the Money.
Speaker 4: Hello, and welcome to She's on My Me the podcast
Speaker 4: Millennials who want financial freedom. Welcome back to another Shopback
Speaker 4: Money Diary Monday, where we get to chat to one
Speaker 4: of our beautiful community members to learn about them, their
Speaker 4: money story and all of the fun bits and pieces
Speaker 4: in between.
Speaker 2: Victoria, helloy going, I am excited.
Speaker 4: I've got a fun one for you today.
Speaker 2: I know because we've been speaking to her beforehand. I
Speaker 2: don't know what the story is, but she's got a puppy,
Speaker 2: so ten out ten.
Speaker 4: We're obsessed with her so let me tell you her story.
Speaker 4: She said, coming from a single parent home, financial trauma,
Speaker 4: and young care situation, I've flipped my life around. I
Speaker 4: now run my own business and only have eighty thousand
Speaker 4: dollars left on my mortgage after buying in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2: Sorry what By.
Speaker 4: Using a few savvy methods, I want to inspire people
Speaker 4: who have had a hard financial start or are doing
Speaker 4: it without help from their parents or a partner to
Speaker 4: know that if you keep working hard, eventually the seeds
Speaker 4: you plant will fruit. I'm twenty seven, single and one
Speaker 4: hundred percent self made, but still always learning and growing.
Speaker 4: I would love to share my story with the commuit
Speaker 4: need to help others.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, welcome to the show money Diarist. Are
Speaker 2: you kiddy? What a story?
Speaker 5: Thank you for having me. Yeah, it's a little bit
Speaker 5: of a rollercoaster ride, to be honest, but a good while.
Speaker 2: My gosh, let's dive straight in. I'm so ready. My
Speaker 2: first question off the bat, Can you tell us a
Speaker 2: little bit about your money story?
Speaker 5: Yeah? So basically it starts off positive. I was kind
Speaker 5: of that finance kid that would literally search the house
Speaker 5: for money and I would put all the money together
Speaker 5: and at the end of the year I would go
Speaker 5: to like the two dollars shop and buy my family,
Speaker 5: like just you two dollar pieces of rubbish super cute,
Speaker 5: and that was kind of my love language, I suppose. However,
Speaker 5: in two thousand and seven, this is where it all
Speaker 5: kind of changed into a negative attitude. I was just
Speaker 5: finishing primary school and my parents announced that they were
Speaker 5: getting a divorce. I knew that money was tight and
Speaker 5: there was always arguments over it, but it was getting
Speaker 5: even more tight now, and money was now being used
Speaker 5: to persuade, manipulate, control, and kind of rule my situation,
Speaker 5: and as a twelve year old I was just left
Speaker 5: feeling kind of a panic, extrass, sad, and kind of helpless.
Speaker 5: It took about one or two years when my parents
Speaker 5: divorced to kind of settle, and eventually Mum and us
Speaker 5: kids got a family home, which was great, but it
Speaker 5: came out of really high cost in terms of a
Speaker 5: high interest rates and high repayments, which were really hard
Speaker 5: for Mom to maintain as a single parent. So we
Speaker 5: seeked out a mortgage broker, which is the first time
Speaker 5: I heard about that, and basically this was the anly
Speaker 5: way that we could really keep the house with a
Speaker 5: lot of pressure on mom's shoulders to be mom dad,
Speaker 5: you know, the sole provider and all that. This experience
Speaker 5: for her was too overwhelming, so basically she kind of
Speaker 5: gave up and I kind of stepped in and took over.
Speaker 5: So at the age of fourteen and fifteen, I learned
Speaker 5: very quick clear out interest rates, deposits, equity offset accounts,
Speaker 5: terms and conditions of praise lenders, house valuations, credit scores,
Speaker 5: everything and one's situation was pretty complex at the time,
Speaker 5: so it took six to nine months, but I successfully
Speaker 5: financed the family homes at such a young age, which
Speaker 5: was crazy to look back on. So from then on
Speaker 5: I was very finance focused. I would work in retail
Speaker 5: and I would basically have my savings as a way
Speaker 5: to build mum's emergency funds, like I was her emergency funds,
Speaker 5: and that's how I kind of learned what that was.
Speaker 5: And then I kept a part time job throughout UNI
Speaker 5: and university just basically for my family's financial situation, just
Speaker 5: to kind of give a roof over their heads. But
Speaker 5: it did come at detriment to my mental health, as
Speaker 5: I would you know, work weekends to get maximum pay
Speaker 5: because of the penalties, but it stopped me from being
Speaker 5: a social life and kind of having a break from
Speaker 5: UNI or from school that I would work during the week.
Speaker 5: As time went on, the family situation got worse and worse.
Speaker 5: Things got more and more expensive, and kids grew up,
Speaker 5: so we got more expensive to look after. I did
Speaker 5: think about dropping out of UNI multiple times to help
Speaker 5: with money, but I decided to kind of keep going,
Speaker 5: and even though I was burning the candle at two ends,
Speaker 5: eventually would pay off. I graduated from university and got
Speaker 5: a job as a therapist. However, all first jobs were
Speaker 5: pretty rubbish, so the working conditions are pretty poor, and
Speaker 5: again my mental health started kind of declining, but the
Speaker 5: pay was good. So from kind of the financial trauma,
Speaker 5: I was so financially driven to just kind of get
Speaker 5: more and more better jobs for high and hire pay,
Speaker 5: regardless of what the conditions or environments were like to
Speaker 5: work in, just because I was so financially driven to
Speaker 5: succeed for my family. After a really big rinso and
Speaker 5: repeat cycle and numerous burnouts later, I decided this is enough.
Speaker 5: I need to flip the script. I need to stop
Speaker 5: my story from being such a negative story. That I
Speaker 5: had to make it positive. So the first way I
Speaker 5: did this was to use money to bring happiness enjoy
Speaker 5: And the first thing I thought was because I was
Speaker 5: only in my early twenties at this point, I thought
Speaker 5: I came going to travel, but COVID popped that dream,
Speaker 5: and so I turned to property, which I knew through
Speaker 5: and through had given my backstory, and so in twenty twenty,
Speaker 5: I bought my first apartment at two by one with
Speaker 5: river views. It was kind of the worst house in
Speaker 5: the best street approach. I spent years renovating it, saving
Speaker 5: freach Renno and doing as much as I could myself
Speaker 5: while spending all my money and Renno's I kind of
Speaker 5: wanted to get some profit back after I had finished it,
Speaker 5: so I airbm beat it and to my surprise, that
Speaker 5: took off, and so now I have full time airbnbit
Speaker 5: to help with my mortgage.
Speaker 2: Oh how good.
Speaker 5: I decided to change my employment story as well as
Speaker 5: my current job started cutting hours, I decided instead of
Speaker 5: getting another job and kind of popping that cycle, I
Speaker 5: decided to start my own business and have to have
Speaker 5: my mental health and work life balance as the main focus.
Speaker 5: And I also stepped away financially for my family because
Speaker 5: I felt like they're in a good enough spot now.
Speaker 5: So right now, it is a very positive attitude towards money,
Speaker 5: and I'm finally kind of reaping that fruit from those
Speaker 5: seeds that I've kind of sewn.
Speaker 2: Yeah wow, oh my gosh. Well, I want to know,
Speaker 2: now you said you flipped your employment script. What do
Speaker 2: you do for work? How much money do you earn?
Speaker 5: I am a therapist in the ndis realm oh cool?
Speaker 5: I earn about one hundred and eighty five K a year.
Speaker 2: WHOA one hundred and eighty five K? How epic? I
Speaker 2: feel like that is one you deserve every penny of
Speaker 2: that because working in that space is so special. But
Speaker 2: I feel like so many people wouldn't think that that
Speaker 2: was possible. I want to know, how do you earn
Speaker 2: one hundred and eighty five K in that role? Did
Speaker 2: you have to work up to it? Is there a
Speaker 2: like specialty that you have because I know it can
Speaker 2: be super varying.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean I do have a lot of year's
Speaker 5: experience under my belts, Like I'm not just fresh out
Speaker 5: of UNI. I've definitely got seven plus years of experience.
Speaker 5: But also I do work very very hard in terms
Speaker 5: of like, I do a lot of hours at the moment,
Speaker 5: just because we're kind of kids coming at me and
Speaker 5: I kind of keep accepting it. But it's one of
Speaker 5: those things where I think the Ndis Ray is very
Speaker 5: very good to us. And I don't have any overheads,
Speaker 5: so I don't work from an office, so I'm basically mobile,
Speaker 5: so I just go straight to my clients' houses. And
Speaker 5: I don't have any sort of like people like bigger
Speaker 5: bosses that kind of take out from that pie. So
Speaker 5: I just have my bookkeeper and then I can charge
Speaker 5: the full rate and just basically take that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Cool, all right, talk to me, what is your big
Speaker 2: money goal, because it sounds like you've done a lot already.
Speaker 5: My big money goal is just to basically create numerous
Speaker 5: streams of passive income by basically owning numerous properties outright dividends, shares,
Speaker 5: interests on saving accounts, just whatever means possible.
Speaker 2: Awesome, So talk to me. Do you have any investments currently?
Speaker 5: Yeah, so obviously my apartment is my biggest source of investment.
Speaker 5: I do have just some safe shares that I've had
Speaker 5: since I was about fifteen, so they pay me dividends
Speaker 5: every six months, which is great. And I do have
Speaker 5: a bit of crypto, and I feel like I'm educated
Speaker 5: enough in that realm, so I kind of just put
Speaker 5: my toe into it, but not very much there. And
Speaker 5: I also get like an interest from saving accounts, so
Speaker 5: I would like to think that's form of investment as well.
Speaker 2: I feel like at the moment everyone's talking about not
Speaker 2: getting good rates of return on their savings accounts, what
Speaker 2: are you using? Are you getting good rates of return
Speaker 2: at this point in time?
Speaker 5: It depends to me. In my previous retail jobs, I
Speaker 5: used to only earn like twenty dollars an hour, and
Speaker 5: so when I got like twenty dollars of interest, I'd
Speaker 5: be like, oh my god, that's a whole hour's pay.
Speaker 5: Who So, I think for me, I kind of look
Speaker 5: at it. It's more like how many hours is that
Speaker 5: free money? That makes sense rather than exactly like, oh
Speaker 5: I made this much or I made that much.
Speaker 2: Ye know, it's epic. Yeah, I love that. All right.
Speaker 2: I know that you've got a mortgage, but I want
Speaker 2: to know do you have any debts? If so, what
Speaker 2: are they?
Speaker 5: Yeah, so my mortgage is my good debt. My Okay,
Speaker 5: debt is my student loan, but that should be paid
Speaker 5: off by next year, and that's basically everything else has
Speaker 5: been paid in full.
Speaker 2: You spoke before in your email submission that you had
Speaker 2: eighty thousand dollars left on your mortgage? How much did
Speaker 2: you buy for? Because we're all pervy, we want to
Speaker 2: know how quickly you've smashed that down.
Speaker 5: Interesting sorry for my house was that they wanted it
Speaker 5: for three hundred thousands, but then obviously COVID here and
Speaker 5: no one was buying, and the house market was just
Speaker 5: absolutely crashy. So then they wanted two fifty and I
Speaker 5: negotiated it for one eighty three.
Speaker 2: Wow, one eighty three? What are money? I want to
Speaker 2: know so much about this circumstance without breaching your privacy, Like,
Speaker 2: how did you get an apartment for one hundred and
Speaker 2: eighty three thousand dollars? That's wild to me?
Speaker 5: Yeah, no, I think I was really lucky. Like I
Speaker 5: did go for another apartment, but that fell through, and
Speaker 5: I was pretty bummed about it. So I kind of
Speaker 5: knew that I had to act quite quickly if I
Speaker 5: wanted something. And basically I said to Mom, come with me,
Speaker 5: let's have a look at it. See what you think,
Speaker 5: and we'll go from there. And we walked in at
Speaker 5: like three o'clock on a Wednesday afternoon, and by five
Speaker 5: o'clock I had bought it. And it was kind of
Speaker 5: one of these crazy things that like it was just
Speaker 5: meant to be. So the realtor basically was like, look,
Speaker 5: there is someone looking at this property as well. You know,
Speaker 5: if you're serious about it, please put an offer in.
Speaker 5: The lady who sold it to me, I think she
Speaker 5: had had it for about twenty five years or something,
Speaker 5: so it was it's a pretty old complex and she
Speaker 5: just wanted to liquid eye, I think, and she just
Speaker 5: wanted it to go to a good home.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's really sweet.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And it was just kind of one of those
Speaker 5: things like when the realtor kind of spoke it was like, oh,
Speaker 5: you know, she comes from a good family, and she's
Speaker 5: worked really hard, and she has a big deposit because
Speaker 5: I had I had twenty percent at that point, this
Speaker 5: is what she's going to put down, blah blah blah.
Speaker 5: And she's like, Yeah, I just wanted to go to
Speaker 5: a you know, a good home and that someone's going
Speaker 5: to have a lot of good memories there. And I
Speaker 5: initially said I offered one hundred and eighty one, but
Speaker 5: then she was like, oh, I really want one hundred
Speaker 5: and eighty five minimum, So I was like one hundred
Speaker 5: and eighty three, was like okay, And then she wrote
Speaker 5: me a letter just saying like, you know, she wished
Speaker 5: me all the best and all the I have really
Speaker 5: good times there, and it was just it wasn't more
Speaker 5: like a profit sort of thing for her. I think
Speaker 5: it was just more about finding the right person to
Speaker 5: give them a start in life sort of thing. So
Speaker 5: it's a bit wholesome.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, No, it's so wholesome.
Speaker 5: Yeah. So I had a twenty percent deposit and my
Speaker 5: mortgage was one hundred and forty six four hundred, so
Speaker 5: I've paid off what is that like sixty thousand or
Speaker 5: something like that. God, I can't do quick math.
Speaker 2: No, that's so fine. All right. You sound like you
Speaker 2: are pretty good at money. Do you use shop back
Speaker 2: when you shop online?
Speaker 5: I do. I'm not a big online shopper though, but
Speaker 5: I do use it for like travel and flights and
Speaker 5: things like that when I can, and I do kind
Speaker 5: of recommend it to friends and family. But yeah, I'm
Speaker 5: not a big shopper.
Speaker 2: That's okay, love to hear it next ques and I've
Speaker 2: got for you. We want to know what is your
Speaker 2: best money habit?
Speaker 5: My best money habit is that I kind of save everything.
Speaker 5: So everything I kind of have bought, I try and
Speaker 5: like save in full and then I can pay it
Speaker 5: in full. So like all my reno's, like I saved
Speaker 5: and did it as I went, so then I didn't
Speaker 5: have a debt. And so like my car, like wanting
Speaker 5: a car, I was like, right, I have to save
Speaker 5: for it first and then pay it in full, so
Speaker 5: I didn't have any sort of those loans kind of looming.
Speaker 2: Epic and to flip that up on its head, what's
Speaker 2: your worst money habit?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 5: Okay, So basically I kind of focus on the want,
Speaker 5: like I want to save this much money a week,
Speaker 5: rather than I can save this much money a week.
Speaker 5: So even though I'm like I want to save like
Speaker 5: you know, two hundred dollars or something like that, so
Speaker 5: I can't because I've got like big bills coming in,
Speaker 5: I kind of get like really stressed and like it
Speaker 5: makes everything really confusing. So like that everyday budgeting is
Speaker 5: kind of really murky because I have like this sort
Speaker 5: of like I want to do this, but then that
Speaker 5: realistic I can only do this is tricky to manage understandably.
Speaker 2: So and last question before we go to a quick break,
Speaker 2: what grade would you give your money habits if we
Speaker 2: forced you to give yourself a grade.
Speaker 5: Or I would probably do a B plus just because
Speaker 5: of that worse habit, which is like the everyday budgeting
Speaker 5: is not super clear or realistic or automative. I would
Speaker 5: like for that to be more clear to decrease the
Speaker 5: stress I have around finance.
Speaker 4: Yeah, fair, fair, I like that, and I like that
Speaker 4: you told us why you would want it to change.
Speaker 2: That's really powerful. All right, I've got a lot of
Speaker 2: questions for you right after this really quick break. All right,
Speaker 2: Jessica Toacci, let's jump straight back into it. Money dist
Speaker 2: you have such an interesting money story. I feel like
Speaker 2: you have lived the lives of a thousand She's on
Speaker 2: the money community members. You've been in a care position,
Speaker 2: you have refinanced your family home at the age of
Speaker 2: like fourteen or fifteen, You've bought a home, you've paid
Speaker 2: off a significant percentage of the mortgage, and now your
Speaker 2: airbnb in your room's out to make even more profit,
Speaker 2: which is so savvy it's not funny. But I want
Speaker 2: to go back. I want to be a little bit
Speaker 2: more pervy. On your family circumstances, how did you find
Speaker 2: yourself in a position where you were fourteen fifteen and
Speaker 2: having to deal directly with a mortgage broker to refinance
Speaker 2: your family home, Like why do you think that you
Speaker 2: ended up being the driving force in that circumstance.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's a good question, basically, Like, I do have
Speaker 5: an older brother and two younger brothers, but I think
Speaker 5: when it came to responsibility, it always kind of felt
Speaker 5: on my shoulders. I always was one that I think
Speaker 5: my parents knew that I was really financially driven. I
Speaker 5: knew about the basic things. I knew how to say,
Speaker 5: I knew what interest was. When I found out about
Speaker 5: compound interest, I was like, what is this magic? I
Speaker 5: think that just when push came to shove and I
Speaker 5: could just see Mom not coping, and I knew that
Speaker 5: basically this was either sink or swim sort of thing.
Speaker 5: I knew that, all right, I don't know what I'm doing,
Speaker 5: but I'm going to give it a go. And I
Speaker 5: had a really really good mortgage brokeer like kind of
Speaker 5: identified the situation in my family and what was kind
Speaker 5: of happening. And my older brother was not at all
Speaker 5: savvy with money, he's only two years older. I guess
Speaker 5: it just kind of fell on my shoulders in terms of, well,
Speaker 5: this person knows what she's doing, I'll walk her through it.
Speaker 5: I'd run down and get mums sinnature and come back
Speaker 5: and then kind of thing. So it was kind of
Speaker 5: just something that I think always happened, like when Mum
Speaker 5: was ill, Like I said, I'm a young kerr, I
Speaker 5: would always be the one, you know, taking her to
Speaker 5: the hospitals or taking her to her medical appointments or
Speaker 5: making sure the family unit was still running. So I
Speaker 5: think because I had that responsibility on my shoulders, I
Speaker 5: think that it just kind of fell into my lap.
Speaker 5: And I think also like there's a part of me
Speaker 5: that just wants to sort of fix everything and save
Speaker 5: everything for my family's sake.
Speaker 2: So that sounds like a really big burden to carry.
Speaker 2: Are you okay now with that? Like? How do you
Speaker 2: feel when we reflect on that?
Speaker 5: It was really interesting to reflect on it at the
Speaker 5: beginning because I was getting quite like emotional about it.
Speaker 5: And I was like, Wow, I've forgotten that I did
Speaker 5: all this, and in a weird way, I kind of
Speaker 5: normalized it all. And so when when I was looking
Speaker 5: for an apartment, like, I already had lots and lots
Speaker 5: of experience behind that, so I already knew what I
Speaker 5: was doing. But then I talked to my friends and
Speaker 5: they'd be like, they wouldn't have the knowledge so that
Speaker 5: I had. And I kind of found that always really strange.
Speaker 5: But looking back, you're like, Oh, that's why you have
Speaker 5: that knowledge, and that's why that experience shaped you the
Speaker 5: way you are. And I guess I'm very determined on
Speaker 5: using hard experiences as a way to flourish. I suppose,
Speaker 5: you know, taking like, Okay, this whole situation happened to you.
Speaker 5: You know, you were forced to step into a kind
Speaker 5: of co parenting role and adult responsibilities, but you know,
Speaker 5: let's try and use that to your advantage, you know,
Speaker 5: later in life. So I can I answer your question.
Speaker 2: No, it totally answers the question. I always feel bad
Speaker 2: when I'm like asking really perfect questions that involve other people.
Speaker 2: It's so easy to be like, oh my gosh, money
Speaker 2: dires like you did X Y and Z tell me
Speaker 2: about it. But when there's a caring role in there,
Speaker 2: there's often a sense of obligation. And we're not saying
Speaker 2: that you had to, but like there wasn't anyone else
Speaker 2: in your circumstance, I'm assuming that could step up and
Speaker 2: take that role. You're usually thrown into that circumstance and
Speaker 2: obviously you didn't have any other option but to embrace it.
Speaker 2: But I think you did it beautifully.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And it's one of those things that I think
Speaker 5: that I have to always remind myself, you know, like
Speaker 5: you did that. You're amazing, Like that's incredible. And I
Speaker 5: think now that I'm getting older, I'm sort of really
Speaker 5: making sure that I do a appreciate myself and I
Speaker 5: do look after myself. And I think from your previous
Speaker 5: podcast like identifying, Yeah, you do have financial trauma, Like
Speaker 5: what you went through was not just your typical like
Speaker 5: you know, twelve year old life and kind of working
Speaker 5: through that and I do get psychological help and I
Speaker 5: do pack it a lot. And it's interesting because it's
Speaker 5: like a love hate relationship with money, Like I love
Speaker 5: kind of earning it and building it and you know,
Speaker 5: using it to travel and to build my investments and
Speaker 5: things like that. But then there's also like this trauma
Speaker 5: around do I have enough of it? Am I working
Speaker 5: hard enough? Is it all going to blo up tomorrow?
Speaker 5: Sort of things. So it's kind of like still work
Speaker 5: in progress, but definitely doing a lot better and just
Speaker 5: kind of taking those mental breaks when I need them
Speaker 5: to kind of be like, Okay, don't check the mortgage
Speaker 5: numbers today, and don't panex so much about only having
Speaker 5: this much in your savings, so kind of putting those
Speaker 5: boundaries around finance.
Speaker 2: Which which is really important, really really important. I want
Speaker 2: to know, at what point did you realize that the
Speaker 2: circumstances you had been through were traumatic? So obviously trauma
Speaker 2: carries a lot of different meaning for other people, but
Speaker 2: obviously on the podcast, as you said before, we've been
Speaker 2: talking a lot about financial trauma, and I don't think
Speaker 2: people realize how significant it can be. Was that a
Speaker 2: bit of a jarring experience when you're like, wait, no,
Speaker 2: that was a traumatic circumstance as opposed to just how
Speaker 2: you grew up?
Speaker 5: Yeah, well, I mean I kind of flagged financial trauma
Speaker 5: actually a couple months before I heard your podcast, and
Speaker 5: when I heard your podcast, I was like tic, tic,
Speaker 5: tick me, me, me me. And it's kind of interesting
Speaker 5: because when you look back on your behavior, you think, oh,
Speaker 5: that's just me, but then you're like, actually, no, there's
Speaker 5: a reason why I have a bookkeeper and I don't
Speaker 5: want to know anything about the financial so I'm just like, yep,
Speaker 5: you guys thought it. Oh God, just tell me how
Speaker 5: much tax to pay. It kind of like is one
Speaker 5: of those things where like I'm very big on kind
Speaker 5: of figuring out why things are making me feel the
Speaker 5: way I'm feeling. Like I do have anxiety, and I've
Speaker 5: been battling and managing that for many, many years, and
Speaker 5: I think that's what came first. So kind of that
Speaker 5: time that I said back in my money story around
Speaker 5: I didn't know whether I wanted to stay in UNI
Speaker 5: or if I should drop out and go full time
Speaker 5: and retail to help the financial situation. That was really
Speaker 5: where my mental health kind of broke, because it was
Speaker 5: like what do I do. Do I help myself or
Speaker 5: do I help my family? And I felt really uncomfortable
Speaker 5: with kind of letting my family down but also kind
Speaker 5: of pursuing me, And so then I started getting psychological
Speaker 5: help instead of managing that, and my anxiety grew into
Speaker 5: what you call generalized anxiety, which means that it's not
Speaker 5: just triggered. It means that you're in this general state
Speaker 5: of anxiety all the time. And I think I've worked
Speaker 5: really hard at kind of like understanding why. But recently
Speaker 5: I came around the topic of financial trauma and I
Speaker 5: was like, what does that mean?
Speaker 2: What is that?
Speaker 5: And I realized that my anxiety is very much built
Speaker 5: on that, and so that was really interesting to sort
Speaker 5: of be like, oh, here's a light bulb moment. A
Speaker 5: lot of your anxiety around finance is because of basically
Speaker 5: not having a lot of it growing up, and it
Speaker 5: always being used as a like way to sort of
Speaker 5: like control your situation or dictate your situation, and you know,
Speaker 5: if you don't have it, you're going to lose everything
Speaker 5: you and lose the house, You're going to lose this,
Speaker 5: that and the other, and always making sure that I
Speaker 5: had plentiful of it. So it was one of those
Speaker 5: things that when I kind of found out about it,
Speaker 5: when the light bulb kind of came on and I
Speaker 5: realized this is what I had, it was upsetting at first,
Speaker 5: because you know, no one likes to have trauma in
Speaker 5: their life, but as well. It was kind of like, right,
Speaker 5: how do I unpack this? How do I kind of
Speaker 5: grow from this? How do I use this as a strength.
Speaker 5: Now I can't undo the past, but I can't change
Speaker 5: the future. How do I sort of manage this? How
Speaker 5: do I use it as a strength? Basically?
Speaker 2: I love that. I think that's so important. What would
Speaker 2: you say to those people who are going through a
Speaker 2: circumstance you know that either replicates or feels a little
Speaker 2: bit similar to yours, but maybe hasn't reached out for
Speaker 2: help yet.
Speaker 5: Reaching out for help was the hardest thing that I
Speaker 5: had to do. It took me a lot of time
Speaker 5: for me to reach out and say, hey, I need help.
Speaker 5: Given the family situation that I was in, I was
Speaker 5: always the one that, you know, when stuff hit the fan,
Speaker 5: it was we go to me. And I never felt
Speaker 5: like I couldn't not be okay. And it took me
Speaker 5: a lot of time to like pick up the phone
Speaker 5: and call a counselor, and eventually I did, And then
Speaker 5: I kind of like got used to being like, you
Speaker 5: know what, I can askly help all the time, and
Speaker 5: I can always express my feelings and being a therapist.
Speaker 5: I'm very good at. I've kind of just communicating this
Speaker 5: is how I'm feeling, this is what I'm and doing,
Speaker 5: and soon to normalize that between my friends, like, hey,
Speaker 5: this is how I'm feeling today. Hey, this is what's
Speaker 5: going on. Hey, this is kind of where my headset
Speaker 5: is at. I think for anyone that's in a similar
Speaker 5: situation to me is to always value your mental health.
Speaker 5: Like there were times where I was like very financially focused,
Speaker 5: and it was like, keep working in this job, even
Speaker 5: though it's got rubbish conditions and you're shaking all the
Speaker 5: time and having panic attacks. Don't worry. You'll pay off
Speaker 5: because you'll get a bigger amount of salary in the
Speaker 5: next job. But I think, looking back, I really wish
Speaker 5: that I could just have a bit more patience and
Speaker 5: just be like, Okay, you need to sort of like
Speaker 5: just stop look after your mental health. It might take
Speaker 5: another six more months, or it might take another year
Speaker 5: to get where you want to be financially, but that's
Speaker 5: not the important thing. The important thing is your well being.
Speaker 5: Your important thing is that you know you feel okay
Speaker 5: when you wake up in the morning, and that you
Speaker 5: feel happy and that you don't feel like this heavy
Speaker 5: chest feeling. That's what is the most valuable thing, and
Speaker 5: that should always be your focus. So it's kind of
Speaker 5: one of those things of like just reaching out for help,
Speaker 5: but also reevaluating what's important to you. So I think
Speaker 5: like valuing finance is super important, but valuing your mental
Speaker 5: wealth being is going to get you everywhere. Finance is
Speaker 5: a long term game, you know, it's not a short
Speaker 5: term as much as you might be going through really hardship.
Speaker 5: It's a long term game.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, well, I think that that is a
Speaker 2: beautiful place to leave it. Thank you for that. Thank
Speaker 2: you for sharing your money story with us. We loved it.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much for having me. Guys. I very
Speaker 5: much appreciate it. And I hope that my money's theory
Speaker 5: can inspire other people or if anyone's going through that situation,
Speaker 5: that they can, you know, get some help or just
Speaker 5: know that there is a light at the end of
Speaker 5: the tunnel always.
Speaker 2: I am absolutely certain it will. My love see you
Speaker 2: on Wednesday, guys. Bye. The advice shared on She's on
Speaker 2: the Money is general in nature and does not consider
Speaker 2: your individual circumstances. She's on the Money exists purely for
Speaker 2: educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make
Speaker 2: an investment or financial decision. If you do choose to
Speaker 2: buy a financial product, read the PDS TMD and obtain
Speaker 2: appropriate financial advice tailored towards your needs. Victoria Divine and
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