Foreclosures are way up. gas prices are almost unfordable, inflation is creeping up and our financial lives are just getting tougher.

Bankers and creditors paint debtors as callous or foolish individuals that intentionally got themselves in over their head but if that was the case, then way do so many feel so bad and desperate about their situation? Is it regret, remorse or just another set of emotions.

Until you've lived through the reality of not being able to make ends meet and worried about how to make next months payments, you can never fully understand what it is like to be in debt, without hope, without solutions, without any apparent options.

Are debtors laughing at their condition? Are people with mounting debts trying to take money they can't repay? What is going through their heads at this moment?

This description of what it feels like to be in debt will help you to understand.

What It Feels Like to Be In Debt, Today.

A dark feeling rises from the pit of your stomach and a wave of heat courses over your face. Every time you think about the bills, your financial situation or the phone rings, this homegrown dread makes itself known. Your stomach churns, the heartburn begins, again.

You're having problems thinking clearly, you're tense, on edge and can't make a clear decision. Forget thinking about the future, how about just getting through tomorrow.

All sorts of thoughts race through your mind. You wonder how you are going to make the car payment, pay for food and if you'd be better off dead than alive.

The creditors are calling, demanding and threatening you for money you just don't have. You had some and sent it to them to keep them happy in the past but now the savings is all gone and there is no money left.

Rather than thinking clearly or investigating all of your options on how to deal with this, you really can't think much further ahead than getting to work, getting home and making it through another day.

But work has become a painful task. With your tossing and turning, waking up in a panic about your situation, and not being able to really drift off to sleep till dawn, you're not rested. Every little thing causes you to clench your jaw; the kids, the cat, the commute, and the co-worker.

Forget having a easy relationship with your spouse these days, now it seems like every thing is about tension and conflict. There is no rest, no sex, less love, more stress. It all feels like it is cascading down on you without hope and without solutions.

The weeks roll by, the car may be gone soon, foreclosure looks like it might be in the future. But how did you get here you ask yourself.

It all started innocently enough, a card here, a deserved vacation there and when cash got a little tight, you used the credit cards for necessities to make the short month stretch just a little bit farther. You're not really sure how it happened but one day you woke up and the balances were just more than you could believe. A number so high that the thought of ever being able to pay more than the minimum payment seemed impossible.

The transition from hopeful to hopeless went rather briskly. By the time you saw the reality of your situation it made you want to vomit, and angry. Now you're angry at the world, your family, the kids, the pet, the job, the spouse and you feel like God has abandoned you. You feel fear, vulnerable and afraid. You just want someone to wrap you in a warm hug, rock you back and forth and say it is going to be all right. You just need to find a way to put these bad feelings away so you can get back to living again.

That's what being in debt is like for many.