I took my cousin to lunch today. We had a very good time. My treat.

My cousin will be losing her house (foreclosure)soon and will be moving in with her parents. She is a divorced mom of 3 older children (20,17 and 13). She was never good with money and after the divorce she kept refinancing the house. Her boyfriend at the time, encourage her to do this so that they could go out and have a good time. When the money dried up, he was nowhere to be found. The mortgage is now at a staggering 3,500.00/ month and then she has to pay 12,00.00 a year in taxes and that is just to maintain the house. Next are the utilities and everything else that goes along with owning a house. To think that before she got divorced she only had 16,00 left on the mortgage. SCAREY!. Anyway the appraisal that was done only a couple of months ago was poor. She would wind up still owing if she sold it. It just makes sense for her to go into foreclosure at this point. In addition to all this she just got out of a nursing home after a long illness. The doctors to this day do not have a diagnosis for her. She is trying to get disability and they are giving her such a hard time. And that is b/c of all the idiots out there defrauding the system. I want to help her out but I just don't know how to. If I were in her position right now I think I would be crying but she isn't, she is very matter of fact about her circumstances and is just plowing through. I was actually afraid about meeting up with her today. I didn't know what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised. She was able to laugh and joke and to have a good time. There wasn't any self pity in her at all. What I took away from today's visit is that your monetary belongings can be taken away in a blink of an eye but it is much harder to take away the spirit. I believe that my cousing will be alright... not great. My uncle is going to put an addition on his house and she and the kids will live there until circumstances change. I will be there for her if she needs anything else. As I've said I wish that I could do more but I don't really know how, at this point. This whole situation really makes me count my blessings. This could have been me!