Answers - Part 3

Why not go back and get your degree or an associates to make yourself more marketable?

Three main reasons:

#1) Cost- even if I get a LOT of financial aid, I still won't be able to cover the difference. Books, materials, lab fees, gas to and from campus - you get the idea.

#2) Time - I work 50+ hours a week, and I can't afford to lose the time. Consider this:

I have 45 credit hours. I would need about 75 more hours to graduate. If I take one 3 hours class per semester, I'll graduate in 25 semesters, or about 12 years. Figure school would be in session for 25 weeks a year, so I'd lose 75 hours a year. At a piddly $10 an hour, I'd lose $750 every year for the next 12 years, or a total of $9,000. That's just what I'd lose making jack squat, and doesn't even begin to factor the cost involved.

#3) In the end, it's still a gamble. Will it make me more marketable? Probably, but is it a guaranteed job when I graduate in 12 years? No. Am I at the point in my life where I can invest that kind of time and money? No - I'm not. I have to deal with the hand I have now.

Have you looked into how much financial aide you would be able to receive??

Nope.

The best piece of advice we ever received when paying off debt was to start with the smallest first.

We're doing that, but we're having to factor survival as the first priority. We tithe first, then get food, then gas so I we can get to work. After that comes utilities, then trying to keep the car from being repo'd, and then we have to insure them. If we can get past that, we're trying to keep the IRS from levying our bank accounts for a third time. If we can get past that, we try to pay off debt.

I hope that puts some of where we are in perspective.