A “Financial Meterorite” Doesn’t Necessarily Mean the End of the World
August 10, 2012My friends have told me for a long time that I just might be one of the nerdiest, geekiest people they know. I’m starting to believe that they might just have a point. I was absolutely fascinated earlier this week (who says fascinated anymore?) when I read a story about a massive meteorite crater that was found in the Canadian Arctic. Somewhere between 130 million and 350 million years ago (when I was a young man according to my children) a meteorite crashed into Earth and left a crater that is 15 miles wide. 15 MILES!!!! That thing came falling out of the sky at a ridiculous rate of speed and created a huge dent in the Earth’s surface. There was also one found earlier this summer that was 62 miles wide and 3 billion years old. The photos of these craters are absolutely amazing. When you think about how something falling out of the sky, completely unexpected, can have significant disruption to the Earth’s surface, it reminds me of some of the stories I’ve heard from people about how they’ve rebounded from severe “financial meteorites”.
Just like the Earth’s surface was only dented, not broken, by the meteorites, I’ve met some people lately who have been severely tested by an unexpected event and they have rebounded after struggling for a period of time. One person experienced a major health crisis (she said it felt like some illness came and crashed into her world and left a permanent mark) and was left with tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills. While she had health insurance, it only covered 80% of her bills and she was responsible for the remaining 20%. Her medical bills in total were nearly half a million dollars, and she didn’t have the financial resources to cover the 20%, so many of the bills were left unpaid and either went to a collections agency or remained with the medical provider’s office, where a payment plan was started.
Many people advised her to simply declare bankruptcy and walk away from all of the debt. Legally, that may have been the best strategy for her. She chose a different path. Her reasoning was that these were debts that she legitimately owed; the doctors and medical care that she received saved her life and allowed her kids to have a mom who is still alive. She could not walk away from those debts and vowed to pay every single one of them off.
Through her sheer force of will, determination and spirit (along with some sound financial habits), she began to work toward paying her medical bills off one by one. She went through her budget and scrutinized every expense. She gave up a few comforts (HBO, manicures/pedicures, and frequent restaurant meals) and worked to minimize her expenses every month. When she was back to being healthy, she even started to work a second job (as a waitress / bartender at a friend’s pub) to generate more income. Her friends were so inspired by her willingness to scale back her lifestyle, they they held a local fundraiser to benefit her and help her pay off her medical bills. Within a few years, she had paid off 90% of her debt and when I met her, she was approximately 3 months from getting the balances down to $0. She now volunteers her time to talk with people who are in severe financial crisis brought on by medical bills and coach them through ways to recover both medically and financially.
When a financial meteor hit her life, she responded with force. With determination. With a plan. It would have been very easy for her to accept the easy path and follow the advice of the people telling her to declare bankruptcy. She wouldn’t have been able to live with herself had she made that choice. She made a difficult choice and then put her plan into action. And, it worked! She survived her illness and the financial devastation that it created. In a world filled with “bad news” stories, it was an absolute pleasure meeting someone who created her own “good news” story. I hope that if a financial meteorite hits my life that I can respond as well as she did…..