I am in the process of filing Chapter 7 bankruptcy right now. As of January of 2013 I had an 800 credit score and didn't really have to worry about repaying my credit cards. Since then, I had let an old friend move into my house because he fed me a sob story about having nowhere to go, and since I am a single woman with a 3BR house, I thought that I could help.

After he got settled in and we got engaged (because of all the BS lines that he fed me), his true colors started to show. I was in denial when I went to take cough syrup and it was all gone, or when I had any sort of alcohol around the house and that was gone too. He never contributed to the household and told me that I was "petty" for suggesting it. He's get drunk out of his mind and break stuff around the house and blame it on the cats or whatever. I was stupid and paid off some fines for him because there were some warrants for his arrest. I even discovered that he had used my credit cards without my permission when I went to check my records. He yelled at me like I was somehow in the wrong. I let him use my car to drive 45 minutes one way for his supervised visits with his son. It got so bad that it took me a lawyer, three visits to the magistrate, I don't know how many times the cops came to my house, and a PFA to get him out of there. Then he violated the PFA and I had to go to court again.
Meanwhile I was taking off from work because of medical issues and I was diagnosed with bipolar after years and years of just thinking I had depression and anxiety. Then the changes in insurance. What used to be a $17 copay for my therapist is now $70. A $20 copay for my regular doctor is now $80. I used to have a $1000 deductible, but now it’s $2500 with no copays until the deductible is met. At the same time the overtime I was able to get dried up.
After talking to a financial coach, my employee assistance plan referred me to a law office once I exhausted all other options and the only thing was left was bankruptcy. I sent these people a bunch of documentation and then after a while I could no longer get a hold of the law office. Then I come to find out that they sent my file to a different law office. I sent them all sorts of documents: pay stubs, bank statements, 401k, you name it. Then I finally get some response that the filing was supposed to be done last month. Exactly a month later I get a response from an attorney that my file “slipped through the cracks” and I had to send my documentation yet a third time. I had to retake my pre-certification counseling because they took so long that it expired. I am so so tired of this. Is this supposed to be this damn hard?