4. Getting out of $135k Debt in 2 Years

What do you do when you're $135,000 in debt and feel like there's no way out?

In this episode, I'm sharing the full story of how my husband and I completely changed the trajectory of our family's finances and paid off $135,000 of debt in just two years.

It wasn't easy, glamorous, or quick. We sold nearly everything we owned and moved our family of six into a fifth wheel for a year and a half. I worked in a gym daycare with my four kids by my side, cleaned the gym after hours, and even coached gymnastics for a minute. I also became a gestational carrier, while my husband worked two jobs to help us reach our goal.

Along the way, we learned that getting out of debt wasn't just about making more money—it was about changing our habits. After eight years of trying (and failing) to stick to a budget, we finally found a system that worked. We chose to live on as little as possible, stayed committed to paying our tithing, and kept showing up even when the sacrifices felt overwhelming.

If you're feeling buried by debt, discouraged by your finances, or wondering if financial freedom is even possible, this episode is proof that change can happen. We're sharing the lessons we learned, the mistakes we made, and the mindset shifts that helped us build a life with more peace, purpose, and financial freedom.

Whether you're just starting your debt-free journey or need a little hope to keep going, this episode is for you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome to the Opinion Podcast. I'm Ashlyn, and I'm joined once again by my husband. This episode. It's gonna be a doozy. Alright, so we're gonna talk about our financial downfall, what do you want to call it?

SPEAKER_04 0:23

Our growing experience.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Our growing experience. So in the end of 2022, so the year Okay. In 2022, neither of us, we were a little oblivious to our financial situation. And then at one point, Waylon sat down, kind of went through it, and then called me, and we discovered we were in $135,000 in debt. No, we did not have nice cards. No, we did not have a mortgage. That was credit cards, loans, business loans, whatever. All the things. And it kind of that was kind of, I feel like our rock bottom moment. And I feel like rock bottom is different for everybody. It hits everybody different at different times and in different ways. But that was ours, and it really lit a fire under us to change. And so we're gonna talk about how we got out of $135,000 of debt in less than two years. So that's what this episode is all about. So I hope you stick around and uh buckle up for this wild ride.

SPEAKER_04 1:40

This is gonna be a good one.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Yeah, okay. So we want to start off by talking first about back when Whelan very first started his business. So we were living in Spokane, Washington.

SPEAKER_04 1:51

I had just graduated uh from college uh in 2019. We moved to Spokane in 2019. Uh I got a job with a disaster restoration company um through 2020, and then in the middle of COVID, he decides this is the time to quit everything and start a business. So I was doing it on the side and it was going really well, and so I decided to go full send, and so we did it.

SPEAKER_00 2:21

So in September of 2020, he quit his job, started his business, and then about a month later I found out I was pregnant with twins. And we were like, cool, you just quit your job, you started a business. We're about to have four kids under the age of four, but it's fine. I grew up with a very entrepreneurial dad. I very much understood what this was, and I was fine with it. So, anyways, he kept going with his business, he was building it, it was going really well.

SPEAKER_04 2:51

At first it was going really well. Um, I was doing handyman stuff on the side, it was just me. Um, and I felt like it started out going really well. Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

And then we took a trip to Utah in December, and we were like, Well, actually, what happened was my sister told my mom, Don't you want to live by your grandkids? And I was like, excuse me, she lives by me, she does live by her grandkids. Um, but then my mom was like, I think we might move to Utah. Or maybe we should move to Utah or something like to my dad. And I was like, Whoa, whoa, whoa. And then Waylon was like, I ain't living here if nobody else lives here.

SPEAKER_04 3:34

I w I He doesn't like Spokane. I I yeah, that's kind of where I was getting at. The only reason why I was okay living there is because there was family in the area. Um if and so I I definitely was more pro like prone to move to Utah and And I grew up there.

SPEAKER_00 3:50

I I just have a soft spot in my heart for Spokane. I love it so much. But um yeah, I mean the fact that my parents were were thinking about moving, we just decided, well, we'll move first then.

SPEAKER_04 4:02

We sure did too.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

And so I was still like, I'm not moving to Utah, I'm not moving to Utah. And then one night, I don't know, something hit me that I needed to move to Utah, and we moved about two weeks later. We started looking on Facebook, and mind you, we weren't just moving, we were also, he would have to restart his business down in Utah. So but for some reason we found this place online, and the lady was the nicest lady ever met on planet earth, and she saved this townhome for us because she was like, I just feel like you this is what like I need you guys in this place. She waited a whole month to have us move in, and crazy.

SPEAKER_04 4:47

It worked out very well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Yeah, Waylon went down there a couple weeks before I did, and then I came down with the kids because I had photo shoots and things I needed to finish up.

SPEAKER_04 4:55

And I wanted to I wanted to kickstart my business up in Utah. Um I mean at the time we were s I had just quit my job. We were strepped for money. I was I was working, so I I wanted to get down there and start making money. So I I went down to Utah and I was just working like a madman. Yeah. Just getting building client my client base, and I actually built it really quick in Utah. I was actually getting a lot of jobs really quickly, and then yeah, two weeks later you came down and and joined us.

SPEAKER_00 5:27

Yeah, so we moved down, he keeps doing his business, going great. He's getting great reviews because he's perfect at what he does. He's getting all this stuff, everything's going amazing. My and then he ends up deciding that he wants to take on bigger jobs, so he hires my dad, and then a little bit later he hired his brother, and they start working for him, and everything's going great, right? And I'm like, wow, this is awesome! Like, he just keeps getting more and more basements to do, they're working really hard. He's gone from like 6 a.m. to say 10 p.m.

SPEAKER_04 6:02

Keep in mind we didn't see each other at all. I was working six, sometimes seven days a week, from like 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. just you know, working non-stop. Yeah, nonstop.

SPEAKER_00 6:15

He was working a lot, and I, in my head, was like, and mind you, we moved in February of 2021, and I am six months pregnant with twins, and then we have our twins um six weeks early in April, uh, and they're in the NICU for a whole month, and at this point we have four kids under the age of four, and he's working 12 hour days. I mean, he took a little breather there while we were having the twins, right? But needless to say, it was just chaos, and in my head, I was I I actually like thrived that first year, I feel like, on my own. Because I I I just was like, I'm gonna take the kids everywhere, this is gonna be great, I was made for this, blah blah blah. I was feeling confident, I was feeling great. When the twins got out of the NICU, it was like they were already on a four-hour, like they would only wake up every four hours and they were on the same schedule. And um, I mean, obviously it was hard and I cried a lot and whatever, but it for the most part, I was like, for what we ha what our situation is, we're handling it pretty well.

SPEAKER_02 7:20

Right.

SPEAKER_00 7:20

And I also in the back of my head was like, It's all okay, like that when you start a business, this is how it goes. You have to work so hard for years before finally it pays off, and so I was like, one day it's gonna pay off, we're gonna have the freedom where he doesn't have to work this much, and he can help me homeschool the kids, and it's all gonna be just this magical like picture, right? Um so then fast forward and yeah, he calls me.

SPEAKER_04 7:51

Well, I guess uh I guess let's back up a little bit too and kind of get my perspective on it, right? So so you know, I mean you were with the kids 24-7, and I was gone 24-7. Um, and let's just say I had no idea how to run a business. I I was working my butt off, and I was I was getting these jobs and I was doing them myself. I was it was me, your dad, and my brother, and we were just going at it.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

And keep in mind my dad and his brother, like they don't like my dad has woodworking experience, and and his brother had a little bit of experience, but Waylon was basically teaching them how to do everything or a lot of things, I should say.

SPEAKER_04 8:31

And so, I mean, I was busy, and in my mind uh from what I thought I knew about business is I'm growing, like I've I'm I'm getting new employees, I'm getting bigger jobs, um I need to I'm growing, and because I'm growing, I'm not bringing in what I think I need to be bringing in because all the money's going towards the growth, and so I need to so I need to take out a loan, right? To help me with this growth. So I I'm not gonna go. So I took out a loan, all right. I'm growing, and then it's like, oh no, I'm I'm running out of money in the bank. Okay, I got a deposit from this other job. I wasn't keeping track of my finances. I wasn't like, okay, this money goes to this job. This I wasn't checking my profit percentages. I just I thought I was succeeding because I was growing and I was taking bigger jobs. My clients loved me. Yeah, I was getting good good reviews, and so I was uh oblivious, and I don't know if a part of it was just me just not knowing or me not wanting to know. I was just oblivious to the fact that maybe my business wasn't as successful as it I thought it was. Or hoped it was, or hoped it was, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:45

And at this point in our marriage, um, I didn't know anything about the finances. I we he would often make Excel spreadsheets or new uh budgets, but we never stuck to the never stuck. We never followed him. We would sit down and he would tell me stuff and I'd be like, sure, great, cool, that sounds good, and then I'd go spend whatever I wanted to spend. And that's kind of like how that so when he was taking out loans, he was like, Well, this is for my business, Ashland doesn't even know what's like going on with our finances, anyways.

SPEAKER_04 10:16

We were definitely separate in that aspect. Like, my business was my business, and had like I never involved her in any of the finances in that, and then we were never we never really connected on our personal finances either.

SPEAKER_00 10:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:28

Right?

SPEAKER_00 10:29

Yeah, everything would just go into one bank and then we would just spend whatever we wanted, and then occasionally we would get together and be like, we should budget, and then we'd build a budget, and then we wouldn't follow it. And that was basically how our finances went for the first eight years of our marriage. And so, um, so then in December of 2022, two weeks before Christmas, he calls me and he goes, Um, I think that I need to close my business. And I was like shocked because I was like, Wait, what? I'm like, why? Because at this point in my head, I was like, You're growing. You keep saying that like next year it's gonna get better, and and we're only gonna go up from here. And like, I I was buying Christmas gifts like months before this, and I would text him and be like, Hey, can you transfer this money? Do we have this money so I can buy this or whatever? And he'd be like, Oh yeah, I need to transfer it. And I'm like, Great. And I had no clue what was even in his business account. I didn't know what money he I didn't know. I was just asking, like, okay, great.

SPEAKER_04 11:29

And um so when he called me, it just caught me so off guard because I was like, wait, um, well, and keep in mind too, I so it was about a month before I called you that I had started to actually fully understand like I may be in trouble. And that's when I f like first, for the first time in my business, actually sat down and like crunched the numbers and looked at it holistically, and I think I was at the point where I could not keep cash flowing from jobs that haven't happened yet to support the jobs I was doing now, and it all it all just kind of came to a halt in December, all came crumbling down, and that's and so I was actually really stressed four weeks before even telling you like I don't know if this is actually gonna work. Like what am I doing wrong? Like I I s I thought I was doing everything right, but it's not working, and I'm I'm I'm not making the money I need to, and I can't pay the loans that that I got out, and yeah, and I I feel like that was that was the start of what was gonna be a probably one of the hardest moments of my life was I think telling you and con and coming to that realization for myself that I was actually in trouble.

SPEAKER_00 12:46

And I think I was like in a little bit of denial when he was telling me because I was thinking like I've just spent the last two years basically being a single mom because one day you were gonna have this business that was gonna be flexible and we were gonna be able to do whatever we wanted. So what do you mean? Like, no, no, no, no, like we'll figure it out, maybe we could do and and he just kept saying, No, I need to go get a full-time job, we gotta close the business down, and I didn't even know the full extent of it at that point. He had told me like uh a little bit.

SPEAKER_04 13:14

He had told me I didn't even full know the full extent.

SPEAKER_00 13:16

Yeah, he had told me, like, well, I have I don't I don't know if he told me on this phone call or if it was later, but like it f discovered that he had a job, a twenty thousand dollar job that he had taken a deposit from that he didn't even have the money anymore to finish the job, and I I didn't realize that all our credit cards were maxed out. He had taken out business loans, and I was like, Oh my gosh, and so then I was like, Alright, well we've gotta do something because you can't just not finish a job or not pay somebody back for a job that they've done. And we had just paid off our car, so we went in, we got our car refinanced, and so we rode to get that money, and then he we borrowed money from a family member.

SPEAKER_04 14:06

Well, that wasn't even I mean, those two weren't even the hardest part. I mean, it was during Christmas, and and that was I think probably one of the hardest things I had to experience was having to take back Christmas presents.

SPEAKER_00 14:19

Yeah, because I told him I said, I said, we're sending back all this stuff, and and he was so against it. He was like, No, we don't have to do that, we can figure it out, and I was like And looking back now, it's like our kids were so young.

SPEAKER_04 14:32

Our kids were like, like they don't they wouldn't remember it anyway. And so looking back, I'm like, yeah, that was the right thing to do.

SPEAKER_00 14:38

Yeah, they were all for and under, and we had bought a bunch of stuff that I was like, we don't need this, and so I was like, no, we're sending it all back. So yeah, we started shipping all the presents back, taking all the presents back, and yeah, that was a little, you know, like a little gut punch of like this sucks. And we refinanced our car, we got borrowed money from a family member.

SPEAKER_04 15:03

Um And the the money that I borrowed we borrowed from a family member was strictly to to finish the jobs that I currently had going on. I wanted to make right with all my customers, and and we did. We made right with all of my customers. We got we got to a point where I could actually breathe again, but I feel like from that point, from the moment I called you till probably probably March of the next year, I had this just pit in my stomach. I just I just felt so low. Yeah, I I never felt that in my life.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

And and from the moment you called me, it was like I cannot spend any more money because even if I visually saw money in the count, it was like he has a $20,000 job he has to finish with this money. That where is it gonna come from? Like I can't have him not finish a job and all our credit cards are maxed out and blah blah blah. And so, and I was like, We're not taking out more loans, we're not doing I don't even think we I don't even know if we could have. We we ended up getting the loan for the RV when we bought that, but I don't know We did, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 16:04

I don't know what it personal I don't know, but we were a lot of it a lot of it was through my business, they were business loans, and so you were able to personally Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

So Oh yeah, because you couldn't be on the because I couldn't be on it, yeah. But in in my head from that moment on, it was like we are not spending any more money, and so I didn't even buy food. And luckily at this time So a few years ago we had we were in college and we had gotten on Wick and then when COVID hit for some reason it was a state of emergency for years after that, and they didn't kick anybody off. So we still had Wick at the time, I'm pretty sure. And so I could go to the store and get like fruits and veggies and milk and certain things, but it still wasn't enough for a family of six. And so I'm trying to remember yeah, yeah. And I was used to like making a bunch of stuff, um, but like you don't get you can't get like flour on there's only very specific foods you can get on Wick. And so I couldn't get like flour or butter or all these things that like I was used to making bread and whatever. And so I remember sitting and kind of ranting to one of my neighbors at one point, and um then her and her husband, her husband worked at Costco at the time, and they showed up on our porch on Christmas Eve with this whole thing of like Costco food of chicken and butter and flour and just all the things that I had been like which uh when I was telling her, it wasn't like, oh please help me get it, you know, it was just kind of a moment of just like I just needed to vent to somebody. And so that was just like a I don't know, you know, felt like a Christmas miracle. And then on top of that, my sister and her husband, and then my brother and his wife like ended up bringing us over like gifts um because they knew that we had taken back all of our presents from Christmas, and there was just so many people that just like came to the rescue and helped us so much during that time. But we he like immediately started applying for full-time jobs, um, and he just knew that he was gonna have to work full-time while finishing his other jobs on the side.

SPEAKER_04 18:22

So so December, uh I think I told when did it it was like mid-December is when you first found out. Um and then from that point on I got I started applying, and within a week I got tons of interviews, and I would just I would I would go to interviews, and when I wasn't going to interviews, I was finishing my jobs, and I was just I was just bouncing back and forth. And so I I actually got a job offer in Springville, and I was pretty dead set on taking it. Uh and I go into this a little bit too in the last podcast. I don't know which one's gonna come out first, but the last podcast, but I got another uh I got another uh interview um opportunity up in Heber, Heber, Utah. And so I went to interview there. Honestly, didn't even know I applied to to interview there, but I went and I I'm like, okay, let's just do it. I already got this job offer, but I'm just gonna go see what they have to offer. Went there, interviewed, absolutely had a great feeling about it. I I I the internet interview went very well, and I remember calling Ashland after and just being like, I feel like I've already talked about this one. We did, yeah. Just like, and so I I mean, long story short, I we I ended up getting the job up in Hebrew, and that actually turned out to be actually a really big blessing because of our living situation.

SPEAKER_00 19:42

Yeah, and so if you want to listen to Living in a Fifth Wheel episode, we go way more into depth about our experience living in a fifth will or whatever. But as part of this getting out of debt series, yeah, we moved we bought a fifth will, moved into a fifth will in April of 20.

SPEAKER_04 20:00

Everything we own.

SPEAKER_00 20:01

Yeah, we literally had an indoor s yeah, we had an indoor garage sale and we posted it and had just a ton of people come walking through our house like buying stuff. I got so sick of posting stuff on Facebook Marketplace, I never wanted to post anything about this.

SPEAKER_04 20:16

To this day, you still dread it.

SPEAKER_00 20:18

I hate it so much because I spent just like weeks selling stuff on and my kids destroying my house. I had I had no idea what was gonna hit me when my twins started to be mobile. I that first year, like I said, I was thriving. All of a sudden they became mobile, and I thought I got hit with a train. I was dying.

SPEAKER_04 20:42

And I think also just the stress of the financial situation on top of them being mobile and and kind of just wrecking everything and trying to move and then all the things, but and I mean if we're being honest, during this time, I mean, this the stress of the finances and the stress of everything and and the kids and every I I mean it took a toll on us on our marriage for sure. Yeah. It really really uh tested our marriage and and us and our ability to move forward, right?

SPEAKER_00 21:15

Yeah, I mean we we avoided each other for months.

SPEAKER_04 21:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:18

And when we when we couldn't avoid each other, we were fighting because we I think there had been this like bridge that had just collapsed and we couldn't figure out how to rebuild it for a long time.

SPEAKER_04 21:29

I just don't feel like I mean, and the thing is I just don't feel like that bridge was really even fully built to begin with. Because I mean we were never fully aligned on on finances. We were never and I mean I was working 24 seven. You were you know, on your own with the kids twenty four-seven. I mean, we really never really had that full relationship for for you know.

SPEAKER_00 21:49

Yeah, so it was a lot. Um so then uh oh, the other piece of this was so after my friend had brought me all that food, I was talking to another friend Um, just about like, oh my gosh, we're literally just eating canned food out of our pantry and whatever. And she was like, You need to talk to your bishop because they have the bishop's storehouse. And in the LDS church, um, they have like these places called the Bishop's storehouse where you can go and get assistance on food. And so I think that was another like really low point for us because we just don't like asking for help and we feel like you know it we like to be independent, and but on at the at this point it was like what do our kids need? It wasn't about us, right? So we went in and we talked to our bishop about our situation, and at this time we lived in townhomes, and everybody in the townhomes were basically our age, and so our bishop was like not that much older than us, and it felt almost like we were telling a peer, and it was humiliating to be honest.

SPEAKER_04 22:52

It was we we we asked the bishop uh for the bishop's storehouse for the food for the food assistance, and then also the I went in and and talked to the bishop about helping us pay our rent even for the last couple months we were paying rent before we moved, and that was that was hard for me. That was that was extremely hard for me to do and very very humble humili humiliating, I guess I should say.

SPEAKER_00 23:18

And humbling. Humbling, yeah. Yeah, um, yeah, it was really hard. And we I mean even even like paying for gas, like I remember at Christmas we we ended up getting cash from a few different people, and then we got like a $200 visa card that Christmas, and all of that just went towards paying for gas because just the necessities we just what we needed to survive, right? Um, and then yeah, we I would drive to Bishop's storehouse, and how it worked is I would have to meet with the relief study president and we'd have to she'd ask me what we needed. They had like a list of food that they had available there, I'd have to say what we wanted or needed, and then I'd have to drive and go pick it up, and there's people there that like, hi, welcome, and like are so nice, but you're sitting there just like I don't know, feeling like at the bottom, like you're just like, Oh my gosh, like you know, these people are, and I have these four kids in the car right now, or I have to drag these four kids in here, and then these people help you shop for the things that are on your list, and it is just a really humbling experience to say the least. So I did that for a few months, and then when we eventually like he started his job in January, and we started getting paychecks from that, and so after we got caught up on things a little bit and we moved to the trailer, we were finally able to like be done with those things. Right.

SPEAKER_04 24:50

I I I don't feel like I ever truly felt like I could even breathe even an ounce until after all my side jobs, all my the business jobs were fully done, which I think was like end of February, is when we finished. So we went through January, February oh no, yeah, February.

SPEAKER_03 25:07

Wasn't March?

SPEAKER_04 25:08

No, it went into March, you're right. Because March, because April's when we moved in the trailer. Yeah. So it was just before we moved into the trailer that I finished.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

Yeah, because you were you were and Heber was an hour from where we lived, and this wasn't during the worst winter like Utah has had in years. It snowed so much, and he had to drive all the way up the canyon. It was okay. I would drive from an hour.

SPEAKER_04 25:29

Yeah, it wasn't over an hour. I would drive from Saratoga Springs all the way up the canyon. Um, and I would work overtime just to and I would any extra hours I could put in, I would put in. I'd help at the end of the day, I'd help assemble desks and just little things that weren't even part of my like job description, just to like get you know extra extra money to just help us. And then I'd drive all the way back down the canyon, and with the couple hours I'd have left, I'd go finish my jobs.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

Try to do some jobs, and then he would work weekends, and it took I mean, bless the people who he was doing jobs for at that time. They were very patient. It took him a lot longer than it normally would have. Um and those people probably I didn't definitely didn't know the whole situation, obviously. Um so yeah, we then moved into the trailer in April, and we uh like we said, we sold all of our stuff, and we just very much were in this mindset of we need to get we need to get it together, and we need to work our butts off, and we need to not spend money and I don't know, kind of make the best of it. And like we said, we fought a lot and it took a long time to rebuild those bridges, but that was also oh, I also decided I was gonna run a marathon in the middle of all of that, and bless all my neighbors and my sister and my parents who and everybody who watched my kids so many times so I could train, but in February of that year, so he called me in December, he started working full-time in January. In February, I decided I was gonna start training for a marathon. So I had to go on runs multiple times a week. A lot of times I would wake up at 5 a.m. or do it like late after he got home, or I would have my sister watch him or my neighbor watch him, and I would go for runs, and truly I think it kept me sane. I think that a training for that like helped clear my head during that time, and I am truly grateful for that. And so, yeah, I trained for that, ran my marathon in June, and then right after my marathon was over, I was like, I need to get a job. And mind you, I had four kids under the age of five, and I was also homeschooling, like none of them were going to school soon. I mean, I could have sent one of them to school, but it wouldn't have made a difference anyways, because I still would have had three kids at home. And I just decided I need to get a job. I'm gonna find a way to get a job, whether it's working from home, but we lived in a trailer, didn't have internet or any of that, or I was like, We'll find a way. And so I went into the gym um just to see how much a membership cost, and I learned that they were hiring for their daycare, and so I said, Can I apply for this? And they were like, Yeah, and they almost gave me an interview, like they called it Yeah, they were like, they were like, We'll do an interview like tomorrow or something, like it was so fast, and I was like, Amazing, and so I started working at the gym, and I would take all four of my kids to the daycare, and we I worked as many shifts as I possibly could. I feel like I lived there. Um, there was I think eight or nine shifts total, and I worked seven or eight every week.

SPEAKER_04 28:59

Um I was you worked a lot and then photography on the side, you were doing that still, and yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:05

And then it was it was a lot. I was doing photography on the side, and then at one point I started cleaning the gym. So I would wake up at 5 a.m. and I would or I would stay late and I would clean the gym um after it closed. Um I and then they switched me to Um front desk at one point and the gym opened at 5 a.m. and so I had to be there at 445, so I'd wake up at like 4.15 a.m. And then I would go and I would get terrible sleep because I'm the type of person who's constantly scared I'm gonna be late if I have to wake up early, and so I'd wake up 50 times a night, and then I'd wake up at 4.15 and I'd get ready and I'd have to get to the gym by 4.45. And I was the only one that opened, so it w if I didn't show up, the gym didn't open that day, so I was like constantly in this panic. Um I at one point was a gymnastics coach, which that's for a week or two, right? Yeah, I only did it a few times, but that's the funniest thing to me is I was like, wow, I was that desperate. But I but there was yeah, I just went into this gymnastics facility and and I was like, Can I do social media for you? Can I do this? And they were like, Can you coach? And I was like, I've never done gymnastics a day in my life, I know nothing about it. And they were like, That's okay, we can teach you. And I was like, To coach? Like, what? I was like, Alright! So he gave me this huge binder of all these different activities. It was for like five and six year olds or something, and he gave me this binder of all these things I could like learn and look through and like different techniques and wording, and I I did it a few times, and then I told Wayland, I'm like, I am so embarrassed doing this because you can tell these parents are looking at me, going, You have absolutely no clue what you're doing.

SPEAKER_04 31:05

And it and at that point, because I was working, because I was working two jobs. I I had gotten a second job as well. I was working my main job, you were working the daycare, plus you were doing photography. At that point, I think we're at a place, because that was a little later into the year. I think by May, I think we started feeling like we could breathe a little. By June and July, it felt a little better. At that point, it's not you didn't absolutely need to do that, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:32

Well, we I think it was because there was such a fire lit under us.

SPEAKER_04 31:36

Oh, both oh, the whole time. For the whole year and a half, we I mean we didn't eat out once that year. Oh yeah, we didn't go out to eat, we didn't everything was made from scratch, didn't eat anything expensive, we didn't do anything expensive. We for entertainment with our kids.

SPEAKER_00 31:56

That entire year. Where the year previous, like when Wylan was working construction, he was going out to eat like one or two times a day, I would almost say.

SPEAKER_04 32:09

Oh yeah. We didn't go out to eat, we didn't all our entertainment was going to the local park with the kids, or or I don't know, we hang out in our at the property and and do fires. Fight each other. Infight each other. We didn't spend a dime on anything that was unnecessary. Yeah. It was it was locking like locked down hard.

SPEAKER_00 32:30

And then Wayland got tell them about your second job.

SPEAKER_04 32:33

Yeah, so so I found a second job working evenings, uh putting up and taking down signs for uh home comp home companies, like um like when new homes would be built. Yeah, yeah. It's just like the home new new home builders. And so it's signs that directed people to the new homes and the showrooms and things like that. And so I just go through all around Heber taking those signs down and putting them up and sometimes you gotta stake these signs into like snow and frozen ground and freezing. It'd be like 20 degrees outside, and I'd be out there with the hammer trying to chisel out the st the ice so that I could put the stake into the ground and put the buttons Yeah. We we were busy at that time.

SPEAKER_00 33:17

Well, and we just I think that's how we were able to do it so fast. Is because the thing is, is was I making a ton at the gym? No, I was making like $12 an hour. I was not making some significant amount of money, but it was time where I wasn't like sitting at home having a pity party, wondering like uh I'm just gonna go spend money. Scrolling Amazon, yeah, scrolling Amazon or Instagram where I see ads and I want to buy things and I'm feeling sorry for myself. It was like we're gonna get to work and we're because the thing is is like people are probably thinking like, oh well, you charge so much for photo sessions, why didn't you just do that? And it was like, well, I I can only get so many photo sessions, and also like you think about one photo session, it's like geez, that's how much I made in like I don't know, two weeks at the gym. Which uh I mean I I I mean which honestly is impressive because the gym I worked so many hours that I was making like a thousand dollars a month at one point.

SPEAKER_03 34:15

Right.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

But um, but yeah, it was like it would I don't know, being able to have co-workers and talk to people and not just be having a pity party at home, I think, really saved me. And I loved my coworkers. I ended up like honestly, part of me was like, that was fun having coworkers again, and being able to just chat with them every day, and and the like my kids were always there, so I would sit and read them books, and some shifts like rare like some shifts like a lot of kids didn't show up, so then I could sit and do some of the homeschool stuff with my oldest, or you know, it so it was such a blessing to be able to do that job, and I think a lot of times we get stuck in our head of like well, I w I don't want my kids to go to daycare and or I want to be the one to raise my kids, and I don't want to I can't find a job or whatever, and it's like there's always a way. Like if if you want it bad enough, like you'll find a way. If you get to the point where you can't feed your kids and you have to take their Christmas presents back, you find a way.

SPEAKER_04 35:18

And I I feel like at that time in our lives, and we've talked about this too. Like, we I feel like we were on autopilot. We were just moving, we were just working. I I look back now and I'm like, how did we do that? Like, how did we go, go, go like that, non-stop, not not spending any money on anything that wasn't necessary.

SPEAKER_00 35:39

Like we're literal angels on the other side, like helping us. Because I I I seriously think about that too, because I think about doing that now, and I'm like, I'm tired just thinking about I think we're still tired from this experience, and that was a while ago. Uh, but actually on that same note, I do truly believe um even from the day he called me, I remembered that one of the first things I told him is we will not stop paying our tithing.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 36:04

And I said that to him. I said, and it in our church, and obviously, like from the Bible, and if you're not familiar with tithing, we pay 10% every month, and there's a lot of I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 36:16

Which ten percent when you're not making anything is not much, but it became a lot when we started working a lot, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:24

So And there's a lot of controversy obviously behind that whole thing, but at least for me in my life and my experience, like we never stopped paying it, and I think it really helped keep us in the mindset of like we are in control of this and we're gonna do something about it, and also kept us feeling like okay, we are able to give this to help other people. We also knew the blessings that came from other people paying their tithing and from paying our like because we went and the bishop helped pay for our for our rent and helped us with food, and a lot of that comes from tithing.

SPEAKER_04 37:02

So we had experienced firsthand the blessings of that, and so on a physical aspect, not even like even if you take the spiritual aspect out of it, like from a physical aspect, it's such a great uh tool to be able to help those around you, and yeah, um and uh we were talking about this in the car as well on the way here. Uh I I feel like changing your mind it being able to give and and whether it's tithing or whether it's through other means, like it really changes your mindset about money and about what it's used for. And I feel like I've I I grew up thinking like, oh, like I make money so I can have this materialistic thing or I can to to help me to better myself and to which yeah, I mean that's it's not a bad thing. Like m material things aren't bad, bettering yourself isn't bad, but um I feel like us paying our tithing constantly and seeing the blessings that came from tithing, helping us in our situation, really changed my perspective on that, and I was able to see money in a different in a different way. Like, okay, I can use money to better myself and those around me and utilize it as a tool to just overall like help the world become a better place, right?

SPEAKER_00 38:16

Yeah, and I think there is that biblical, like tithing is biblical, and I think that as we follow God's teachings, like we will be blessed, and maybe not like right now or in the ways, like it's not like oh you're magically gonna get your bills paid or anything like that.

SPEAKER_04 38:32

Stuff to put in the work.

SPEAKER_00 38:33

You still have to put in the work and have action behind it, but um I just I just felt so strongly about that, and we never we never missed we we well first of all when this all happened we finally stuck to a budget. We created a budget, my my crappy Excel spreadsheet budget, and we built one and we did not miss a single single years, and we would that was the first thing we always did was we would pay our tithing and uh and then the rest of it would follow. And we yeah, we stuck to it for two years. I mean, at the beginning it was easy because our budget was don't spend any money. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 39:12

It's like, alright, we need uh fifty dollars a person per month for food, and alright, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 39:20

Um but yeah, I I just wanted to emphasize that part of it for a minute. Um Okay, so then in July of 20 okay, no, back up. In May of 2023, um like the year this was all going down and we we had just moved into the trailer, um, I have always and that this is gonna be weird for me to talk about because I don't I don't necessarily want to do a whole episode or go into a ton of detail about this, but I have always had a desire to be a surrogate. I had or a gestational carrier. I had a friend when I was 10 years old whose mom was one, and it's always when I was pregnant with my first, I had these thoughts of being one, but it I wasn't done having my own kids, so I was like not yet, obviously. And then after I had my twins, and then after this happened, uh it just kept getting louder, this voice of like doing it, and I also knew that like we were in a financial situation, and this was the time when it could like bless us more than just me knowing I wanted to do this, right? And so I started applying to agencies, and I just didn't feel right about it. I felt like I I just want to meet somebody and I'll be open to the idea if I do. And then in July of that year, about a couple months later, or a couple weeks later, because I had been applying for a little bit, and then a couple weeks later, um, we met some people and I ended up being a gestational carrier for them. So that um I because it involves other people, I don't want to go into like specific numbers. Normally I'm a pretty open book. Um I do for the sake of the story want to say that because it was a um a personal, it wasn't through an agency and it was on a personal level, um we I wasn't making what you would typically make as a gestational carrier.

SPEAKER_04 41:30

Well and and let's let's be clear too, like, and we had talked about this quite a bit before we had decided to do this, and and we both had agreed that this was not going to be financially motivated. We were going to do this strictly I mean, obviously like that was part of it, but we wanted to help someone.

SPEAKER_00 41:46

We wanted to to make a difference, and and I so we both uh w with this couple, um, we went through the whole process for um I mean, let's see, we met them in July of 2023, and then the transfer happened in May of 2024, so it was almost a full year before anything even like was real. Um, and then I was pregnant for nine months after that. Um, but I anyways, I bring that up because obviously it's a huge part of us getting out of debt because it was like a good chunk of money, even if it wasn't the typical amount. I don't know how to say that without making it sound weird. Um but it was what we had all agreed upon, and it was um anyways, it was a blessing for both parties, and um it ended up working out so well. Um but yeah, I uh went through so then I was a gestational carrier, and then that same year in 2024, um, and I will say my pregnancy was not what I expected it to be, and it was actually a lot harder. And so another blessing that happened was Utah ended up coming out with this scholarship for homeschoolers, and it was called it's called the Utah Fits All Scholarship, but 2024 was the first year they decided to do it, and that year they ended up giving all the people who got it eight thousand dollars each to go towards their homeschooling, and at this point my two oldest were old enough, and because my um pregnancy was harder than I expected it to be, I was I was so stressed because I was like, I don't feel comfortable sending them to public school right now, but I also like am not in a good place to homeschool them. And so I with that money we were able to send them to a micro school. And then we were also able to they were able to do gymnastics and ball or ballet and soccer soccer. Soccer and each other things.

SPEAKER_04 43:53

They were able to get into their activities and and do things like that.

SPEAKER_00 43:56

So I didn't actually really feel like, oh, this is like I didn't have to have them not do those things because we were trying to get out of debt.

SPEAKER_02 44:04

Right.

SPEAKER_00 44:04

And so um and even before that, we had them in ballet, and I would go and clean the ballet studio to get credits, to pay for their ballet. Um, and we were just constantly trying to find ways to just anything we could to save, to make, to spend less, just everything.

SPEAKER_04 44:24

So they yeah, so I And it I I feel like it just over time, I think I feel like it was really hard that first year, but that second year, 2024, I feel like it just became part of our life. Like it just became normal to live that way. And I feel like 2024 was uh so much easier than 2023 because of that. And we were in a spot where we didn't have to worry about money as much. We weren't living, you know, uh at the the tight squeeze that we were living in 2023, so 2024 actually felt a lot better, but we just it just became normal. Well, and we just it's just part of what we did.

SPEAKER_00 45:02

We were so ready to be out of debt. We always talk about this, how we were like, had we not experienced that, I think we would still be in debt to this day.

SPEAKER_04 45:11

We our habits wouldn't have changed, right?

SPEAKER_00 45:13

Yeah, because we would have had no reason to change them because we were living fine before, but we had student loans, we had car loans, we had whatever, we had all those things, and it wasn't a big deal. We were like, well, this is what everybody has, this is normal, like you're supposed to have this. What do you mean? And and so when this all when it all hit, you know, the fan, we were like we're gonna we're gonna make a change and we're gonna do it fast. And so, yeah, we just got got to work and stopped spending money, and then yeah, so I became a surrogate. Then we finally moved out of the trailer in October of 2024 because I had told Waylon, I was like, I'm not about to give birth to this baby in a like I didn't fight that one bit in the trailer and recovering from giving birth in a trailer, it ain't gonna happen. So we moved into an Airbnb that winter, and then in February I gave birth, and a I kid you not, the day I got out of the hospital, we went and looked at a house in Oram.

SPEAKER_04 46:17

We we found the house while you were still in the hospital and called them and got the everything figured out. The day you left, we went down, looked at the house.

SPEAKER_00 46:26

I waddled into the house. I was like, sorry, I just gave birth two days ago.

SPEAKER_04 46:32

Crazy.

SPEAKER_00 46:34

And we looked at the house, it had this huge yard, and it had exactly what we felt like we needed at the time, and yeah, so we signed a lease and we moved into that in March of 2024, and we moved in officially debt-free, and it was 2025. So expensive to move.

SPEAKER_04 46:57

2025, not 2024.

SPEAKER_00 46:59

Yeah, sorry, 2024. Yeah, 2025 we moved in. Yeah, 2025 we moved in, and I mean, uh moving is just expensive, but we had so many blessings moving into that house because we were finally debt-free, but we did not have like a ton of extra money at the time. Because we were and we were like, we don't have furniture, we don't have like we didn't have weight.

SPEAKER_04 47:25

We were living we were living in a trailer, we had sold everything, and then we were gonna sell the trailer. So we literally had nothing except for a few boxes of toys and clothes that we had in the in the shop.

SPEAKER_00 47:37

We didn't even really have like pots and pans or like bright dishes, or we had been using paper plates for years. We were like, oh my gosh. So um, yeah, we we got so lucky that he had a co-worker that ended up.

SPEAKER_04 47:52

He so our company, it's always been two separate companies that were at that business. One of them moved up to Idaho, so Hugh's moving up to Idaho to work for that company, and so downsizing. Downsizing, so he's getting rid of all his stuff.

SPEAKER_00 48:05

So he gave us um free couches, a free bunk bed, a free table and chairs, a free oh my gosh, so many things.

SPEAKER_04 48:13

And then we And they were good, like they weren't run down, they were it was nice furniture.

SPEAKER_00 48:18

Yeah, it was good. Um and then we had a couple in our an old couple in our ward that were moving into a home and they did a yard sale, yeah. They did a yard sale, and we got bookshelves and couches and a treadmill and so many things from that um for a really, really good deal. Um and we I don't know how it all just came together, but I looked for I we got three rugs for like ten bucks. We seriously, when we moved into our house and set everything up, I just looked around and was like How did we get all what just happened?

SPEAKER_04 48:53

We got our life dramatically changed from trailer to like I don't know how it happened so smoothly.

SPEAKER_00 48:59

A lot of people buy furniture, people are just giving it away.

SPEAKER_03 49:02

Yeah, no kidding.

SPEAKER_00 49:04

But um, yeah, so all the stars aligned, everything it was it was a crazy time, but we lived in that house for six months, and then we ended up moving to where we live now, and you know, we didn't expect to live in three different places in one year, but we did, and moving is so expensive.

SPEAKER_04 49:25

Um, but we were able to do that all out of debt, and I can't even begin to explain the peace that you feel knowing that that money is your money, and you did that, and you we could pay the deposit and the extra month's rent and the all the things all like without Well and and I mean through this whole process we were able to develop the tools and the the know-how to be able to to to work as a team, to budget together, to to save money correctly, to I I felt so much more confident going into that house in 2025 with a clear plan, like, hey, like we know what we're doing now, we know how to how to do this to where we never get in this situation again, right?

SPEAKER_00 50:15

And uh Wayland touched on it a little bit, obviously, and we're not gonna like lie about our relationship during that time, like it was rough and it almost came to an end, like a few times. It was not good, but we look back on that and we like getting through that and getting to where we are now is just like I the you just you don't even understand how deep love can go, and I just can't even imagine 50 years from now um where our relationship will be and what we will have gone through. And I just I cannot help but think about like that scripture that talks about the refiner's fire and how like God is He's cutting us down to build us up, right? And like He um He's not doing these things um to us or or whatever He's trying to help us become better and to be the people that we're meant to be to fulfill this purpose in life And I just cannot think of all the thing all the lessons we learned through that experience And I I've really pondered on the thing of like Would I Would I change it if I could or would I go back to the U.S. We talk about this all the time. It's like I don't know that I would because I feel like we would be like we're in a better place now than I think we would have been had we not experienced that.

SPEAKER_04 51:36

Agreed, yeah. Yeah, I uh we we needed that refiner's fire. That that was something we needed in our life, and yes, it almost broke us, but in the end, like I agree. I and again, like we talk about this all the time now. We feel like that is one of those um moments in our lives that really brought us together in a way that we never probably would have otherwise, right?

SPEAKER_00 52:02

So it did break us, and then it built us even better.

SPEAKER_04 52:05

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 52:07

And I yeah, so I don't know if this is very very therapeutic to go through, and I mean, we've talked about this endlessly.

SPEAKER_04 52:16

Okay, so yeah, I I don't share this stuff, and I never have like this is the first time I feel like I've ever really shared this in like a public setting or even in a private setting, to be honest. I very I was very much closed off. Um there was a lot of shame and that was that came with and baggage that came with you know everything that happened on my end, and I I'm very private in my in my personal life as it is, and so sharing this publicly is not something I I want to do. Um, but I we did talk about when we didn't move into the new house, we did talk about wanting to eventually share this experience with others. I think the goal is to help people that may be in the same situation or a similar situation, give them the hope that hey, this is possible, it's gonna take work, it's gonna be hard, but it's something that anybody can get through, right?

SPEAKER_00 53:06

And two years are gonna pass whether you make the best of it or not.

SPEAKER_04 53:10

Right.

SPEAKER_00 53:11

And you would be shocked at how fast two years actually goes, because I'm like, I can't believe that was that long ago. Like it feels like a blip in our yeah in our life. And I not in the moment, it's I mean, to be fair, my nervous system is still recovering. Yeah. But um, yeah, we we really hope that this can help people feel less alone if they're experiencing something similar. I feel like there was a lot of before this happened, and while we were running our businesses, we had so many like neighbors and friends be like, Well, Ashley and Wayland are just so rich, and like assume that we were so well off because we owned our own businesses, and little did they know we were like drowning in in I mean, I think that's what's also hard about sharing all this is we do know that like there are people in our lives that we didn't open up about this at that time who probably were gonna be like, We would have helped you, you know, why didn't you tell us? Or like we even have family members that don't know this story yet. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 54:10

And very, very few people know the extent of what happened. I think most people just thought that we were crazy and wanted to go live in a trailer for two years.

unknown 54:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:19

And to be fair, I am crazy and did want to live in a trailer for two years.

SPEAKER_03 54:24

That's true.

SPEAKER_00 54:25

But yeah, I I think I think there was a piece where we left a lot of that out. And obviously, like, I don't feel like we needed to share that. I don't even feel like we need to share it now, but it is something that I do hope yeah, blesses people's lives and gives them kind of the like, oh, we can do this.

SPEAKER_04 54:43

The strength to keep moving. Yeah. Because, you know, it's it's hard. It takes a lot of work, and it's so easy just I mean, there's so many times when we had the opportunity in the middle of this to just be like, we're in an okay place. Let's just let's just give up. Let's uh we don't need to get to our to that 100% out of debt. Like, we don't need to get to that point. We're we're at a point where we can survive, let's just you know, and but we didn't. We kept moving forward and we kept pushing for those two years, and I'm so happy that we you know pushed through that and got to this point where we're at now.

SPEAKER_00 55:15

Yeah, yeah, and we still got a long way to go. I mean, we're still renting because Wirehouse is five million dollars. But but it I am so happy because now I can see the bigger picture and I yeah, I just and knowing that anything we're buying is with our money, we have an emergency fund. If one of our cars were to break down or something were to happen, we could take care of it, we wouldn't have to take out a credit card.

SPEAKER_04 55:46

It is just such a well just looking into the future too, like what what is retirement gonna look like? What I like all these things, like we don't have to oh I mean, obviously we're still in the thick of it, like we're still we're still working this buy a house and stuff, but it's it's the the peace that comes from that is unlike any other. And I mean they say uh it's very well known, like the hardest one of the hardest things on a marriage is is finances, right? One of the leading causes of divorce is finances, and so not having that weighing on our marriage is is something that can't be described with words. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 56:22

So and I would just like to say that also budgeting um together and doing that as a team build your marriage up more than you would you think like oh, like who cares? I think it's so important for couples to make those decisions together. Like I mentioned earlier, I was never part of the finances before, and being able to make goals and figure out where your money goals goes in order to meet those goals and figure out what kind of people you want to be, what kind of home you want to run, what kind of life you want your kids to have, whether you want to save up money for them for college or missions or for them to buy a house one day or what you want to do with that, it is it's so life-giving for your marriage, and I just really encourage people to combine finances and um budget together every month. And yeah, so I agree.

SPEAKER_04 57:20

I agree. She uh hold each other accountable too, help each other stick to the budget because it's not always easy. You get in those moments where you're like, you know, I'm hungry, I don't want to make food, I just want a door dash, or I just want to eat out, or or you know, there's so many things, and and having that person by your side that can help you stay accountable and help, okay. No, like we can we can make spaghetti. That's an easy thing, you know. Or and that's just a small example, but having that person next to you to help help you achieve the goals that you guys have made together is is is amazing.

SPEAKER_00 57:54

Yeah, actually, I realized we missed a huge part of our story. Um we did file bankruptcy on your business.

SPEAKER_04 58:04

Oh yeah, that was a huge thing. We got yeah, so 138,000. How much of that by the time? 135 by the time because I there was like we got to a point where it's like I I had like six different loans out. There was no way we were drowning.

SPEAKER_00 58:27

Well, and to be fair, like we could have, like obviously you could, but we were at a point where we just decided that was what's gonna be best. And so we yeah.

SPEAKER_04 58:36

So my yeah, so we've been encrypted to the business. Um it affected me, it did not affect Amazon in any way. And so that took our total debt down to 85. Yeah, so 85. And then from there we just chipped away that 85, and in two years we got out of the 85. So thank you for bringing that up. That puts things into perspective a little bit. I realized I'm like, wait, that's actually a big part of the still, still, I mean, that too is just a part that I just I still just have a hard time with, but I did not want to do that.

SPEAKER_00 59:11

And obviously that's affected like the bankruptcy is still on his record and all the things. And now we completely got out of debt, and and we are very much I think that's also a big part of why we don't have a house yet and whatever, is because we closed all of our lines of credit, so both of us my credit's undeterminable, I'm pretty sure.

SPEAKER_01 59:32

Minus two.

SPEAKER_00 59:33

Yeah, I think both of ours is undeterminable at this point, and so obviously that makes getting a house a lot more difficult because you have to manually underwrite or pay in cash or say that have a bigger down payment, which yeah, so you have to have a much larger down payment, all those things, but we just because of our experience and because of how debt negatively affected our lives, we we just decided that we just don't want to go down the road anymore, right? We might go into debt for a house one day, but other than that, unless obviously some crazy thing happens, we we just want to avoid it at all costs, and we can drive beater cars and we can whatever. We don't need to have fancy cars and fancy whatever.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:18

One day we will.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:19

But it will be in cash. It'll be in cash, yes. Um, and I'm actually gonna do a whole episode with one of my friends about my thoughts on credit cards and all that. So you can get excited for that because we have very different opinions. But anyways, uh yeah, that gives you a little bit more context for why we moved into a trailer kind of our journey over the back. You love the word journey.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:46

Our journey.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:48

He hates the word journey.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:50

Your mom journey, your pregnancy journey.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:55

Did anybody else hate that word, or is it just him? Couldn't everyone tell him that it's just him? Like, why do we do that?

SPEAKER_04 1:01:01

My motherhood journey. I'm like, no, you're just a mom. There's nothing wrong with it. I just I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:13

Okay. Anyways, you know more of our story. And uh yeah, thanks for listening. We oh, do you have an opinion that you've changed?

SPEAKER_04 1:01:25

Oh, yeah, I forgot we were doing that. Well, my opinion that I've changed is credit cards.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:32

You don't use them anymore. All right, well, thanks for being here, and we'll see you guys next week. Let's let some opinions change.