The Vault with Financielle - “Should I Sacrifice My Mental Health to Save Money?” | The Vault Episode 101

Episode Date: January 29, 2026

“I haven’t asked for a pay rise because I feel guilty”… jail or no jail? 🚨This week, we’re diving into these money dilemmas:💸 “I Was Scammed Out of £4k… What Do I Do Now?”💸 ���Should I Sacrifice My Mental Health to Save Money?”Got a money win or (totally anonymous) dilemma? Share it via the Financielle app community or email [e-mail] 💌You’re not alone in figuring this stuff out. Get honest, helpful reads at financielle.com 💖💸Connect with our Partner🫶 Protect yourself and loved ones with our friends at Lifesearch*The above is a tracked link, which tells our partner we sent you and may in future result in a payment or benefit to our site.

Welcome to the vault with finite child. This is a safe space where we talk all things live and money and no topics are off limits. Bonjour. Bonjour. Oh, how continental. Love your jumper, Lucy. Thank you. Can you describe it for our audio listeners?

Audio listeners, it's blue. There's ducks flying in the air. There's two ducks. Imagine picturing this jumper right now. It's blue, there's ducks flying in the air. The bottom bit of the jumper itself and the sleeves are green with what are those things called? I'm looking.

Oh, I don't know. Reeds. Reads. It reminds you have, do you know, when you're in prime school and you, bear with me.

And when you're in primary school and you do a scene and you do grass at the bottom. Always. Yeah, it literally is. And it's all the way around. And then the rest is blue.

I'm disappointed. There's no sunshine in the top corner. That's me. Oh, do you know my friend Sam that's got the property with the duck house on it?

The ducks keep getting killed. And she doesn't like the chickens, but she likes the duck by fox. Oh. that does happen. Think something's going to happen with the fox. Circle of life. We used to have chickens and we'd get them in pairs.

So we'd rescue old battery hens. Oh. And they were really cute. And they... Not funny. I don't know why I'm laughing. Oh no. She's going to go down.

No, I'm laughing. It's an awkward laughing moment. Something bad. Go on. We bought them in pairs in every... It was like a thing every three months. They'd get eaten by foxes. It's really weird.

The problem with Sam's has been... the water's frozen. So he's got the he or she fox has got to them and the ducking on the water. Because the ducks can usually obviously typically fly off or like hide in the middle

and go, no, no, no, no, no. Like a moat. It is a moat. It is a moat. It's one of the things

that her husband prioritised over. So I can imagine Andy now every night breaking the ice so the fox can't go do you know what I mean? It's a result. He's going to get hypothermia.

He's going to get hypothermia. Well, there's no duck sides. It's warm. Your jumper's nice. What did you specifically ask for? What did you say to us that you asked for Alex's mom? It was a Christmas purchase, isn't it? Oh yeah, I asked for this specifically.

I just wanted like a nice, ugly jumper. Yeah. Because I was looking at my wardrobe and like, oh, my wardrobe is black and grey. I was like, I need some fun. Okay. So I saw this. I was between this and one of this ski scene.

Yeah. I think this one carries you more out of Christmas. So now at the end of Jan, you don't want a Christmas jumper on. Yeah. What? Yeah, you could spring that. Yeah. Definitely.

Shorts. We've rolled up. I've got these red gingham shorts. There you go. Clash, yeah. 100%. We need to know every time you wear it. It's amazing listeners.

Thank you. Meanwhile, black and cream over here. Well, I will be back. With the before and actor. Should I glow up. Okay. Jail or no jail time. Are we ready?

Yes. I'll tell myself, I'll sort my money out next month. Good. To jail. Jail. It's like the healthy eating, isn't it? We'll start on Monday.

Monday. Oh my God. That was like everyone's dry January or like health and fitness journeys is if the new year, I remember when it falls on the day that's like a Wednesday, it's like Monday is the real. You've got another nearly week. Monday's the real. Yeah. First of January.

Okay. I haven't asked for a pay rise because I feel guilty. Jail. Oh. Go on. Explain why no jail. Well, I think it's, I don't know, well, it's normal to think about it more. Like, you should think about it and like the reasons you would be asking.

Like I remember you said in the past, like, you've heard of people being like, well, I can't afford a mortgage. So can I have a pay rise? This is true. So you're only going to jail if you're worthy of a pay rise and you're not asking for one. So if you're just doing what your job description, says, you're doing bare minimum. You're doing good,

but you're delivering on your contract. Yeah. Why would you get a pay rise because you want one? Yeah. Not fair. Don't feel guilty. No.

Guilt's not the feeling, but you can't credibly go and sit across from your direct report and say, well, I deserve a pay rise because they'll go, okay, why? Explain to me, fine. Imagine they're like really receptive and they're like, I understand, right,

let's talk through it. What can you possibly say to get you that pay a rise? and it can't be that, well, you know, my rent's gone up. That's not the business of the company or... No. It's not for them to look after. But if you are going above and beyond, like, they have promised a pay rise.

There's been like a carrot dangled, all that stuff that we've gone over before. Because you feel guilty, then you have to go to jail. Okay, we're doing this then. Half and half. I avoid checking my bank balance when things feel tight. Jail. Jail. I feel like all the ones this week are like,

but I empathize and I understand. Like not real jail. Go to, Fanishell jail. Open prison. So I'm going to let you out for the day. Or are you on like a suspended sentence where you're not in, but one small mistake and you go in.

Slop your wrist. I don't have sinking funds and just deal with things as they come. Jail, unless you're absolutely minted. Yeah. You've got 100 grand in your bank account. sloshing around and something comes up. You still probably should, but like...

The thought of a multimillionaire being like, so, car insurance this month is 200,000 pounds. How do you think they became a millionaire, Holly? They had sinking funds. Well, our friend Claire has just become mortgage-free, which is like an amazing achievement. Still so young as well.

This isn't like a retired couple. Like, they're absolutely smashing it. And the other day we're in the gym and she was like, oh, I'll put my Spotify on. And every 20 seconds, it was an advert. And I went, why the hell have you not got a Spotify premium? You're mortgage-free?

And then to be fair, two of our friends said the reason she's mortgage-free because she never paid for Spotify premium and I was like, fair play. Do you know, over Christmas, it was before Christmas weren't on holiday. Like my dad, also holidays, he loves YouTube.

So that's his TV. He loves like planes and boats and trains and different channels and has done for years. Like before it was a thing for our age. Like he has always never had previous. before adverts every five minutes every not even five minutes like more than that yeah and I was like why have you got youtube premium anyway I wanted some things to download for the plane for me and the

kids for when we went on holiday so I just thought said I'm going to get YouTube premium and you got five the family one wasn't that much more when you got five so I was like give me email address so I got my dad YouTube premium and now finally there's no it's like there's no and I can't live for that have you got YouTube premium yeah I've got YouTube premium from the same thing because I downloaded stuff for the plane. And I was like, oh, I'll just get it for the month. Can't look back. And now on the TV, I basically just watched YouTube.

Yeah. It used to show annoying me when the ads, come on. Well, like, Alex doesn't have YouTube premium, but I won't let him watch certain things on mine because it will ruin my algorithm. And I don't want like eight out of ten cats clips on my YouTube. And I'm like, oh, we're on peasants YouTube tonight, all we? I got a tip.

I think it's an I think tip. I think on your profile, you could create another. profile. There's not a separate login so he could have like a sub profile of yours so that it doesn't spoil it. But maybe let's have a look because the premium is connected to an email address. But I'm sure because I'll be spiling my algorithm at the moment. So I'm going to see if I can do something about it as well. But I went to Albi's dance class and her teacher had the dance on and it kept going on adverts. I was like, are you kidding me? You're a dance teacher. It's annoying, isn't it? We upgraded Ruth by our auntie to Spotify premium, didn't we? Because

She was like, I quite like the adverts. I was like, I don't. For like Christmas, like get together in every two minutes. It was like, if you want your windows and doors, I was like, who's talking? But didn't you then say to her, how do you, how has you, how a Spotify premium going? She didn't even notice. Oh. Oh, yeah.

There's been no adverts. I'm like, for three weeks you've not noticed. Anyway. I can't remember what the question was. Sinking funds. Thinking funds. How have you come in Malina, Claire? And then.

Spotify and that's how you do and then... I love retracing our steps. I'm like, how did we get here? Okay, time for our first dilemma. Oh, okay, well, Jill, I know, Jill, Paddles down. Should you lend money to family and friends? What is an F-Off fund? How do I build my emergency fund?

Well, we're so glad you asked. Head over to financial dot com where we tackle the money topics you actually care about. I was scammed out of 4K. What do I do now? Hello, I'm writing in to ask for your advice. I currently have around 10k in debt, not including my car finance. The majority of this is my own doing, which I'm taking full responsibility for. However, 4K of this debt is the result of me being a victim of an investment scam. I won't go into the details, but unfortunately, I'm not able to recover the money. This has been causing me a huge amount of stress. Not only do I have my existing debts to manage, but I'm now also dealing with this additional amount that was scammed from me and still needs to be repaid. Before this happened, I was really starting to take control of my finances and overpaying my debts each month since learning how to budget. Thank you, financial. I've explained my current situation to my bank and they've given me a payment break on my credit card until the beginning of February. This credit card does have interest and I'm also already in a repayment plan with another one of my creditors. I'm now worried that I won't be able to afford the minimum payments once interest is added back on. I'm considering whether I need to go down the

of a debt of a debt management plan. Please could you advise me on whether this might be the right next step? So sorry that she was a victim of an investment scam. They are rife. But you don't share, you don't hear a lot about people in the, I guess in our community sharing it on Morning Live on BBC. I hear this all the time because they're very, very big on scams. Typically it's older people that are more vulnerable to some scams,

but actually investment scams are massive on Instagram. I got a message that I shared with you guys yesterday. A friend said, is this you? and someone had quickly created a financial Instagram copy, DMed them and said, I'm creating a WhatsApp group sharing stock and ETF tips, which could be viable. Like, we absolutely could do that.

And I was like, absolutely not. And more often than not, anyone that's inbound to you, I think what did they say on BBC? If it's out of the blue, it's not for you. Oh, that's good. That's good. Because usually that wouldn't happen that way unless you are literally expecting or arranged or,

and there's lots of different ways you can verify it. So for those people listening, if you suspect anything, you can report it to action fraud, if there's anything that you ever get offered or that seems a bit interesting, and you get carried away because we're all likely to, share it with someone else. So I'd say sense, check it with someone. Anyone else, someone else just has that because they're not down to benefit from the opportunity, they're going to be more objective. Yeah, they're not emotionally involved.

They're much like to go, hmm. It's like, if it's like romance or... Like brin off Gavin and Stacey and he's like, so I know this, I met them, I was supposed to meet them at the petrol station, but they broke down and then they needed money for the thing. So I now pay them direct debit every month. And they're all looking at him.

They'd say, oh my God, you're literally, I got the wool pulled over your eyes, but it's just so easy to do. So easy, so easy. So please be aware of that. And I'm so sorry, this person has fallen guilty, it fallen foul of that and now it sounds like they can't do anything about it and often you can't. Sometimes you can report to bank and sometimes if they haven't followed steps they should

have done, you can recoup some money but it is what is. It's now her debts. So she's got 10. Car finance, you know, when she says not including car finance, it's dangerous to exclude mentally car finance from debt because it's also potentially an option to not have car finance. If you don't have car finance, you have more money. So, for example, if this person had have had a car that had in cash that was owned, had this happened, her budget would have been in a better place to handle these debts. And so I hate, by the way, using you as an example for this, but we always like to do that for dilemma is because someone else listening, sometimes I get asked, well, car fight is affordable.

Like, I can afford it. It's a monthly amount. Why wouldn't I have it? until you can't. And so at the moment, you've got a car on car finance. It's on the table, by the way,

it's an option. Is it a boojy car, big car, something that could, you could come down in a car, that could save you a bit of money, have a little thing about that. But otherwise,

$10,000 isn't a huge amount where I'm surprised you can't make the minimums. It's a big enough amount, but I'd be really interested to know what the minimums are generally because to suddenly feel like, because things are frozen, payments are frozen, you can have to start making them from February on one of them.

But you should be able to find room in your budget to try and tackle these, at least make the minimums and then we go right, okay, what can we do? And then can we move forward? Now, a debt management plan, they are not IVA. So an IVA is a regulated arrangement

that a regulated debt provider puts together and credit score obviously is, impacted. Sometimes you don't pay the full debt back. But a debt management plan's won up from that. So it's not as kind of serious. It does like, you know, impact credit, but I'm never about credit scores. If you're already missing payments or already getting stressed, it's impacting your mental health, like kick it down the line, don't care about it. Let's deal with the debt. They can be helpful. So ringing people like step change and national debt line, debt charities, they don't charge for a debt management plan. And basically, they will speak to your creditors. Usually about reducing the monthly payments,

It doesn't always reduce the debt amount. It sometimes reduces interest rates. It combines it into one payment. And it should be free if you use one of those charities. I'm not sure it would do loads. And that's what I'm thinking. So I would definitely be worth wringing a debt charity. If you genuinely feel like you can't handle this,

this is perfect for a debt charity to help you. Citizen Vice is also really good. They could run through your, they'll probably run through your budget with you. So make sure you've got your budget in full. Make sure that that is a, as leaning as tight it can be. I would love the idea that actually you can navigate this 10.

And do it. Tens like, listen, there was one last week or the week before that was, you know, in the tens of thousands and we've had people in the community, you know, 50,000 pounds worth of debt. It feels big until you start breaking it down. And I think you really need to focus on your budget. Like your goal is to create is to do a very thorough, honest budget with yourself and come up with a plan, get all your debt.

gets listed out into the debt tracker, smallest to largest snowball and let's start kicking these debts. I really think you can do it. I just think you think that you can't. Yeah. Like you've got to get momentum and you just, you've not got any momentum at the moment. It sounds like because you've got things frozen.

You feel like you can't meet minimums. I feel like you need to get it all out on paper even and then put it into the app and just you need momentum. I think sometimes we definitely think that we've done something if we've done some of these actions. I don't know about you. Like, Syke and I've got a to do list. And you go through.

the ones that are a little bit less painful. And so a debt management plan for some people seems like an easy way out. And it's not a bad thing, but it is a serious step to take. And it can negatively impact you. And I don't know if it moves the needle enough in this scenario. But sometimes I like to think, right, draw a line under it, start fresh. I think this is going to be bold, but I want to really inspire people and challenge people. Most people, if they were forced to, could pay off 10 grand in the year. Find a way. They find a way.

Let's talk about high level, a few ways. You work more. So can you get an extra job? We're all talking about a period of time. Can you get weekend work? I think if I needed to find 10 for my family, what would I do? And I would sit down with my husband.

I go, right, okay, I could potentially work Friday, Saturday, Sunday night. It's like, where could I get a job? I could work. I could do Uber. I've got a car. I have to have a car. I could do Uber. I do delivery.

I wouldn't do Uber. I don't want people in my car. But you want the KFC in your car. Oh my gosh, yeah. But sneaky chip. Oh my God. But it's easier said than done. So I don't want to make it feel like you could do that.

Yeah. When you break like 10 grand across a year down, you know, that's 8.50-ish. Don't quite my last. But like a month, that's hard to find in like your budget. But if you suddenly throw income into that, Could you make five, six hundred pounds a month over a period of time? Yes, I think you could for a period of time. I also think that's where we go to Vinty.

That's when we do our Facebook marketplaces. Bank switches. I would do bank switches. I would sell some clothes. I would look at my budget as well. Because again, if you can reduce expenses where you can, it sounds like she's pretty lean, but then you can make more money. Ten can go in a year on your own, I think.

I really do believe that. Your car finance must be, you can't get a car finance now for less. and I would say 250 quid a month. No. So go to your car finance company. There was a dilemma years ago where, and it was a new one, so this won't be the same for you.

But a friend, someone wrote in about a dilemma, her friend literally signed on the dotted line a car finance agreement. The friend found out went straight to the dealer and was like, you are irresponsible. She cannot afford this.

You need to cancel that. Like, that's a good friend. Like, stick close to those. But it could be going to the car finance company saying, I cannot afford these payments. What can I do? That's going to be minimum. £250 a month.

So what can we do to help reduce that or change that? That's probably a big outgoing of yours a month. I think so. And I think what helps is seeing this as like life changing. You have to change. You have to change your life. You have to change something. And getting a debt management plan and tweaking the payments doesn't change something in

you and how you live your life. When you decide to walk away from things like car finance or when you decide to go and get a second job for a period of time, You are, that is life-changing. It's brave as brave. It is bold as brass. It is absolutely high-fiving. That is hard. People don't like doing hard. No, they don't. But I tell you what, when you've done hard. Smug ass. Oh my God. And it like changes you. It's like a bit of a war wound. Yeah, I think to, for me now to go, I'm going to go and work at Sainsbury three nights a week. That's brave. To do that on top of your full-time job, it's hard. You're going to be tired. You're going to have to

explain to friends why, like, and it's all fine, but it's so bloody brave. And it will honestly be like Laura said, it will be life change. It sounds so simple and so small, but to literally get up and go, I need, I need an extra job to figure this out. And with car finance, to be brave enough to say, I'm going to walk away from that shit. I'm not because it, that was a thing that stopped me from being able to handle my basic payments. I'm not going to care what I look like in a car. I'm going to go and get a two grand run around. I don't care. It's not about the car or the payment.

It's something deeper. It's that you're willing to do the best for you and you're willing to not care what someone thinks. That changes you. That's what, like, when you hear these, like, inspirational stories of, like, entrepreneurs that have overcome adversity and they didn't care about failing,

like they did three, four businesses. You know, they're now in, like, you know, they might be driving a ranger over now where they might have exited multiple businesses or whatever, they did something to get there. Most of them were happy to sacrifice and willing to do something that other people weren't. And when I see winners in the finance world

and when I see winners in the financial community, it's people that have finally gone, I'm going to rip the plaster off and I'm going to, like, you just get this from it. It's not the end of the journey. Like it's not, so that's me. It's like, no, no, you get rid of that debt and then you can start to do this

and then go on those holidays and have your weekends off and you do get a reward at the end of it to go and do all this stuff just the start of your money journey which is so exciting because it's like where you're going to be no I still laugh at like wearing grow

and we talk about it but we laugh all the time Neil's car is like hilarious and all our friends driving around they're like Porsches and Rangers and this and Neil literally pulls up and he's like Mercedes it's like I don't even know how old it is it's Rogers I've filled you the story before maybe but it's Rogers from next door

and it's like it's like really old fact in fact it was that old like part doesn't exist for it because it's sort of, and then everyone jokes that Carl's is like a hearse. Yeah. It's a really old crap. But I'm sitting smug knowing that we don't have 500 plus, maybe 800 pound monthly at a minimum car finance payments.

So we can go on holiday. We can invest. We can buy new windows when we need them. Like, we've just got that level of stress. And Neil could not care less his friends take the pace out of him all the time. And he's like, Lance, I literally don't care. I will pick you up in my taxi, that's what it's called.

Yeah, I will pick you up in the taxi. But... He loves it. The time when you decided to sell your car and go down to one car was a big deal and you thought about it for a long time. Yeah. And overthought about it. And then the minute we did it, I was like, oh, it wasn't that big of a deal.

Like, you think, oh, we're going to look like what we're looking, like just a family with one car. It's like, what are we talking about here? And that was like probably COVID times. And I'm so glad I did before COVID because everyone else had cars sat on the drive for two years paying an absolute... for them and I'm literally like, I'll walk to the shop like everybody else. I think go drastic.

I do. But if you're at a point where you think you need help, the debt charities are amazing. And even it's just to chat through it with someone else who handles this every single day. But head to the community. Ask to other people that have done similar things. They've got so many case studies of people that have done exactly what you need to do. You are not the first in this community to tackle well. seen people tackle much higher ones on this. And it's taking years. Don't get me wrong. This is not

an overnight thing. I guess it just feels a little bit more bitter because of the scam. Yes. Because it seems before the scam, she was like on track and she'd accepted it. Oh, it's awful. She was doing a financial budget. But I feel like she wasn't on. So one thing I'm going to pull up on a little bit. I'm really sorry. Because she had six. I don't feel like you were in control before this scam. So I don't want you to. She was overpaying. But she was in debt. It wasn't like she was sitting pretty. had an emergency fund, was debt-free, and all of a sudden I would be really pissed off

if a scam came into my life and it absolutely altered the course of my amazing financial wellness, you weren't. I think this scam is a thing that's going to piss her off so much that she's going to change. Use the energy. Let's use it as a plus. Actually, this scam is going to change your life

because what it could have been was something that would have helped you, because she was on a debt-free journey, it would have cleared it, but you are now going to go so intentionally you'll never be in a position where, you know, you fall victim. That might be easier said than done. Because you will be careful now, but you won't need any like investment offers.

You won't need any quick, get rich, quick stuff. This is the thing that you're going to use to your advantage. Do you know when we talk about one good thing of refre, we need to like reframe the scam is that when we've lent money to family and friends and we always go, you've just got to let it go. You've got to shut the chapter and not feel bitter that they're not paying you back or that they're going out for dinner and they're not paid you

minimum payment that you kind of agreed on because it really hurts and it can eat away at you and it can change your, it can really cloud how you're feeling. Like you've literally got to see it

and all we talk with family we go, it's a gift because I'm never going to get it back. You have to just be like that money is never coming back to me so what we're going to do about it and like Laura says you use that positive energy

to get rid of it as quickly as you can. I like it. Yeah. Okay, time for our next dilemma. Struggling to me. it's a payday, the financial app helped me track my money, pay off debt and finally feel in control. I've built savings, I've started investing, and I actually feel financially well. Download the Fanichel app and start your money comeback today.

Should I sacrifice my mental health to save money? Hi, I'm writing in with a bit of a dilemma. First, I just want to say I've been listening to your podcast for around six months now, and it's genuinely been so helpful. You make finances really digestible and learning about sinking funds. in particular was a complete game changer for me. Here's my situation. I'm 22 years old and currently a second year medical student. I started university at 21 and during my first year I moved out because my home environment was quite toxic. While it was the right decision for my mental health,

financially it's been difficult. Between the cost of living, trying to save and paying for things like car insurance, it's been a lot, especially alongside the demands of a medical degree. It's hard to work enough hours to make a meaningful difference without it impacting my studies. Logically, moving back home would make the most sense financially and would allow me to save more. However, I don't have a good relationship with my parents. When I'm at home, I feel like I'm constantly pretending everything is fine. And when I moved out, they barely contacted me. But when I was living at home, it felt very controlling and almost like I'm being monitored all the time. I'm also thinking about the long-term picture. With junior doctors currently being paid relatively poorly, I feel I feel pressure to be financially

sensible as possible now. I also wanted to ask how serious I should be about worrying about student finance debt, especially in a career like medicine. Is it something I should actively be stressing about at this stage or is it more manageable than it feels right now? My overall question is, how would you weigh up financial stability versus mental and emotional well-being in a situation like this? and if you were in my position, what would you do? It's a really good question. And we do weigh up a lot of the time maths versus like financial wellness and the balance between the two.

It's really difficult, but if you're managing as you are, which it sounds like you are, it's hard, but you are managing. You're not going into debt. Obviously you've got student debt, but first of all, I would put that to one side because everyone is... You don't need to actively stress about it. No. That's not going to do anything.

No, literally. I would kind of put that to bed if I were you. I keep seeing junior doctors kind of post that their debt is going up and up and up. And they're not even adding to it in that they're not taking any out anymore debt. The interest is just at an incredible rate that they're never going to catch up.

And I feel so sorry for people that are working a career where it's to help people and they're being punished for it. So really that one, you have to absolutely put that to bed and all your friends around you will. It will be the talk of the town like student loans when you're in universities that all people kind of talk about.

but especially when it comes to medical, because you're in it for such a long time as well. You're in education for much longer than an average person doing it and what I would say, like a standard degree. I feel like there's times in our life financially where you've just got a hold on. And there's a few examples.

Like one of them is if you are, you know, saving up for fertility treatment or you're on maternity leave, one of them might be navigating death or divorce. One might be health issues. So like, you know, you might need time of work for health reasons. So you're caring for someone. Caring for someone.

There's different moments in your life where you hold on, you tread water. And you may not make progress in terms of savings. And you may, some people may end up building up debt. Like we obviously say where possible, like try not to go backwards, but you might not go forwards. And if that's your one goal and we get it a lot with, like, toxic family. and like gentle toxicity or intense toxicity but it could just be that you would go backwards mentally and you would go back personally

and your health is more important and to some people it's just just because it's on the table doesn't mean you should do it. Some people don't have the option to be able to move home but just because you do have doesn't mean you have to

and I love that they would put themselves in their health first and they are in a position where what we would hope is at some point income does increase. I am trying to think, oh, would our answer be, I don't think it would be different on the health level if it was like I'm in a marketing degree or I'm trying to make something up that's not like,

who knows what you're going to earn or like a physio or what. I'm using really bad examples, but if it's a degree, like we know what a doctor will learn at some point. Yeah, the earning potential is there. It is there. Again, parking student loans to one side, but more in terms of being able to save, been able to hopefully build up emergency savings,

being able to rent effectively, maybe buying the future like pension, that will all come from that career. So I feel like you just need to get through it, not making it worse. But, you know, I don't think, especially the earning potential of a doctor over your life, what are you going to save, like 12 extra grand a year maybe,

like a bit more, like, who are you living with? Could you roommate? Could you do things that help you now? What other other options? Can you do a flat share? Are you living on your own? Could you do a flat show with someone?

Could you do a house share with other junior doctors that are going through a similar thing? And they're looking to still live a nice life but reduce their outgoings. Like that's not your only option. And like Laura said, even if it was another profession, would still be saying the same thing. If you can hold on through this period of education, being paid poorly as a junior, whatever it might be, not at the risk of your health. We'll always give you permission.

to pause your financial journey to, like, optimize your health. Because there's some people, there's some people who might just be like, God, my mum's annoying. Yeah, and that's very different. They're annoying, but it's okay. My kids would be like, she's really annoying me. Laura, can I come live with you? I'm like, go live with her, like, crack on.

But some people, it's a different type of, like, suffocation, which is, God, the cookie matty, or they're making me a cup of tea, or they're in my business, they're asking me what I'm doing. or they watch all it feels on horses really noisy or there could be some things but actually I still wouldn't I don't think you have to but you could suck it up you'll know whether it's toxic and not good for your health and you've got to focus on studies and focus on some really hard work and stuff and whether it's bearable and it's for a period of time and so you have to be the judge of that and I think you know you can't go back yeah I don't

I think she, I don't think you. The damage, if you did go back, the damage that would be done to, like, you're mental. Yeah. Like, yeah. It's not worth it. So, no, permission to tread, I call it a treading water. It's holding out of the water. It's because it's for a finite period of time. Yep. Yeah. Right. That's not the only option. Let's think of other options. Yeah. Because there might well be to make you feel more financially well. Because you want to look after that as well. And if that's then going to cause financial distress. Yep. Distress. Not justress. distress, distress. Distress. Because we say that about people in like bad room shares. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, we've had it. So, I mean, I'm sorry to feel like, like, her boyfriend's really annoying me and I don't like that they don't do that. And it's like, yeah, you can I live with someone else.

Or you may want to live on your own. And it's just understanding. Maths is always maths and we always say that. So there's what we'd like to happen and how we'd like to live. And then what the baths of that is. And so can you afford that? Is it, you know, is it affordable? Is this something you can do to make it more affordable?

the share or get more money or there's always there's variables that are maths and then there's overlaying like our health on top of it and seeing if we can come to a balance. I'm excited for her doctor. I think just this is so easy to say obviously but like really romanticise and like you're in your grind get your head down like you're not going to be hitting big money goals for the next couple of years but that's okay because you've got a good life trajectory ahead of you. You're going to be like a consultant and I'm just picturing crazy an ass me. Like, I just can't.

When you said romanticised and I was like, oh yeah, that's exactly what's happening. Okay, that is all for this episode. The Vault is now closed. And just a quick disclaimer, The Vault is just a chat around life and money topics. We're not giving financial advice.