In the Press: Tips from Healthy Minds NYC on Finances and Mental Health for Teen Vogue
Are you experiencing debilitating financial stress? You’re not alone. Millions of Americans feel like they are drowning in debt. According to the Federal Reserve Board, the amount of debt US households hold increased by $184 billion in just the first quarter of 2024 alone. If you’re feeling isolated in managing your own debt from student loans, credit cards, or otherwise, check out this viral story from Teen Vogue writer Mandy Velez who held a funeral for her student loans after she paid off over $100,000 in debt.
Velez recently connected with Healthy Minds NYC Co-Founder Chanel Dokun, to discuss financial therapy and supporting your mental health around financial stress. Check out an excerpt of the article below or hop over to Teen Vogue to read the full article. Be sure to share with a younger friend or family member who is currently feeling the weight of student loan debt.
“My Student Loan Funeral Went Viral — Here’s What Life Has Been Like Since”
By Mandy Velez for Teen Vogue
I’m eating lunch at my desk again. It’s a textbook-sad office meal of salad and half-mushy grapes, but I find I'm feeling grateful just to have this time to myself. I recently stopped one of my side gigs, writing freelance articles, so that I could focus on my full-time job and spending time with my family. It took years to overcome the fear of losing that extra income, but after I got this new job, and a raise along with it, I cut the cord. The cost-saving act of bringing cheap lunches from home, though, I would need to keep doing. At least that’s what I told myself.
After I take a bite of lettuce, I notice my coworker smiling at me. “You’re so cute,” she says with a chuckle after eyeing my DIY meal. “You packed your lunch!”
“Old habits die hard,” I respond with a smile, proud of a disciplined habit I learned in my youth and solidified in my 20s, when I graduated with $75,000 in student loan debt. But I'm also a little embarrassed.
A few days later, I’m staring at a Zoom screen, my forehead and eyes scrunching in unison, the way they always do when I feel anxiety. I’m in a therapy session, sharing what’s causing me the most stress lately. For this session, one of the topics is money, as it was the week before, and the week before that. I create a budget each month and know I have some money left over, but I made a purchase I wasn’t expecting, and it has left my stomach in knots.
Packed lunches aside, I haven’t been very disciplined. My purchases are relatively inexpensive — a Facebook Marketplace chair here, some things from HomeGoods there — but having recently moved, these purchases seem more frequent. Even before moving, though, I struggled to spend, and then felt like crap when I did — and by crap I mean I felt overwhelming guilt and a sense of looming financial ruin. Sometimes I’d even feel bad for not spending on something that was financially inconsequential because of what I had missed out on: a chai latte on a sh*tty work day or going to a friend’s event because of what it would have cost to get there.
I don’t remember exactly what money issue triggered me during this Zoom session, but here we are again, I thought. Feeling this financial anxiety made sense when I was paying off my loans, but now being in a much better financial place, my internal money stress confused me. I’m debt-free, aside from a mortgage, and have been for a while.
In the fall of 2019, I went viral for “killing” $102,000 in federal and private student loans and celebrating the occasion with a spooky photoshoot in a Manhattan cemetery. After spending the six years since I graduated college in 2013 paying what was essentially a second rent ($1,000 monthly payments on loans that had interest rates as high as 12%), I sped up my journey, finishing off the last $30,000 in under a year. “Ding dong, my loans are dead!” I wrote on the Instagram post alongside a photo of me clad in black and a birdcage veil, holding balloons that spelled out my loan amount. I was beaming, for good reason.
I no longer had to work my more physically taxing side gigs, like babysitting and dog walking, that literally kept me up at night and made my feet bleed as I attempted to speed up the payoff date that estimated I’d be paying for my University of Pittsburgh degree until I was over 50 years old. (And yep, that is a state school.) I no longer had a debilitating fear of getting laid off or had to make dangerous commutes to work from the only neighborhood I could afford. I wasn’t saddled with an overwhelming sense of helplessness and shame because I had the audacity to want a college education and be born to a family who couldn't pay for it. I was finally free.
So why, five years later, does money still deeply stress me out?
According to financial therapists I spoke to, financial fears are common, no matter where you are on your debt journey. “Money strain can affect anyone,” says Chanel Dokun, cofounder of Healthy Minds NYC and author of Life Starts Now: How to Create the Life You’ve Been Waiting For, via email. “This is because when we talk about money, we’re not just discussing dollars and cents — money is about everything else. Money is the physical manifestation of some of our deeper beliefs, hopes, and expectations for life. What is often triggered when we face financial stress is the stress we hold about other aspects of our life (fears about our security, potential, image, status, etc.).”
Ready to get started with therapy in New York City?
If you’re ready to get started with a financial therapist today, Healthy Minds NYC is accepting new clients. We are also happy to provide you with a free consultation with one of our Care Coordinators to help you in your search for mental health care. Contact our office at (929) 399-7120 today or click here to get started with a quiz or free consultation call.
