attn:money is a community forum for people with attention problems related to managing their bills, debts, and planning — and the family members who try to help them.

Why use this forum?

Nick Kaye learned the hard way, the basic truth Mr. Micawber summed up for David Copperfield in Dickens’s novel two centuries ago:

“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure sixpence under twenty pounds, result: happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure sixpence more than twenty pounds, result: misery.”

Every step toward financial responsibility was a major challenge for Nick. With the best of intentions, he overspent (or under-earned). His mother and I came to the rescue with grants and loans, but soon became frustrated.

Nick is a talented graphic artist and musician; intelligent, personable and kind. Maybe he’s had some attention problems; surely he paid more attention to partying, at times, than to his bills and bank balance. A few years ago, he hadn’t collected some of the checks clients owed him, he didn’t have the money to repay a family member he’d borrowed from, yet he needed to move to a better apartment. I helped Nick out—some would say “enabled” him—on condition that he let me act as his “bookkeeper” for a while. I managed his online bank account, made sure the monthly bills got paid on time, and pressured him to collect from his clients. We talked frequently about his precarious situation, and this helped enough so that after a year I turned those responsibilities over to him again, at the age of 23. He’s self supporting at 25.

As an offshoot of the book Nick and I wrote to share what worked for us with other parents and young adults, we’ve created this community blog. Please join us!