Written By Amy Beardsley
This essay is from a finalist for the 2019 Student Loan Planner® Scholarship.
Defiantly happy has been the mantra of our new marriage. Four months ago, my husband and I stood up in front of our friends and family and pledged before God to love each other “for better,
for worse, for richer, and for poorer.”
And with those words, I took on joint responsibility for his six-figure student debt – a daunting number that now belongs to both of us.
It’s hard to describe the feelings of despair and desperation that attend a debt of such magnitude.
Marrying Into Student Loan Debt
When I met my husband, I was financially secure and debt-free save my mortgage. Then I met him, and we fell deeply, madly in love. He told me early on in our relationship about how his original loan for graduate school had tripled due to years of forbearance and snowballing interest.
“This is the worst thing about me,” he said, on the night that he brought me into the picture and laid his finances bare before me.
I started to cry because I knew that it was a watershed moment for us as a couple because saying yes to this man would mean entering into his financial pain. But I said yes, because I couldn’t see myself with anyone else.
We held each other in gratitude for fresh starts, and the series of fortunate, unlikely events that had led our paths to cross.
I made a choice that night that he would not face the debt alone, and that I would share his burden. It was a painful, difficult choice – but I made it and then swore it again on our wedding day, and now remind myself constantly that we are a team, and that we are in this thing together.
Looking for a Sliver of Hope
Since then, I’ve spent hundreds of hours researching our options and have tried repeatedly to drum up the courage to face these daunting numbers that we need to understand.
I’ve listened to multiple podcasts and combed countless blogs and online forums for slivers of hope. But I can’t get away from the fact that, come next year, when we recertify for IBR as a married couple in a community property state, we will struggle to afford the steep increase in monthly payments calculated on our joint income.
And yet – I have chosen to be defiantly happy.
I learned this from my new husband, who wakes up every morning with hope. He could easily choose to let past regrets and mistakes destroy him, but he doesn’t.
He reminds me that we’re lucky to be alive, that we’re blessed with a precious chance at happiness not to be squandered, and that we have found an extraordinary love that neither of us was expecting at this stage in our lives.
His simple, resilient optimism pulls me out of my anxiety and fear, and reminds me that I can either live with a scarcity mindset that is consumed with the lack in our lives, or embrace a perspective that deliberately sees and appreciates the abundance of joy available to us, even in the midst of snowballing debt.
Life is More Than Numbers
So, against my natural impulse to spiral into worst-case scenarios or resentment, I am learning slowly to hit override and to choose joy.
This means putting down my phone after midnight when I feel myself freefalling into the rabbit hole of what the internet thinks we should do – I acknowledge that my compulsive late night researching is feeding the stress, and deliberately break the pattern by closing my eyes and practicing gratitude instead.
It means biting back harsh words when my husband comes home from the grocery store excited about the fancy cheese or chocolates that he bought for us to enjoy – I acknowledge that a few extra dollars here and there won’t make a difference to the debt and that I can either spoil his gift with my displeasure, or join him in celebrating these small treats.
When I begin to feel that starting a family will be impossible given our financial situation, I acknowledge that giving up our chance at parenthood to pay down the debt more quickly could be missing the forest for the trees – life is about more than numbers.
At the end of the day, we don’t have a grand, detailed plan for how to tackle the debt, beyond accepting that we will have to say no to a great many things in the coming years in order to make the payments. We haven’t got much further than that.
But what we do have is a plan for caring for our souls during this time.
We are committed to facing the debt in a proper perspective, in the context of the entirety of life. Yes, our financial situation is tenuous – but we have so much more to celebrate.
We’re more than just numbers on a Navient summary page. And while the quality of our life together is impacted by the debt, it is not solely determined by it.
We believe that the future is bright and beautiful – for loving each other, for sharing everyday life alongside friends and family, for caring for our local community, and for raising children in a home that may be sparse on things but filled with joy, peace, and laughter.
We may owe six figures in student debt – but we have chosen to be defiantly happy.
