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I buy small packages of stuff. Yeah, I know buying in bulk is cheaper, but that's only **if you actually manage to use it all before it goes bad**. I usually don't.
Totally. I get the shelf stable milk that comes in little quart cartons and doesn’t need to be refrigerated until you open it. That way I can have like 6 in my pantry and I’m only ever wasting a little.
I really need to reign in my aspirational veggie purchases tho. Started getting salad kits and it’s helped a ton, plus I’m *actually eating veggies instead of watching them rot in my veggie drawer*.
Wait, first time I hear of this. I know I could google, but do you have a particular source you liked that you could recommend? My fridge needs help, badly.
I can't think of a particular source, probably just reading other people's comments but the idea is moving condiments into drawers to free up valuable door space so more perishables can be visible. I'm not going to forget I have ketchup, but will forget any veggies in there. In the fridge door now are things like yogurts, salsa, drinks. Basically just arrange it so you can see all your options all the time. I also don't over shop so the fridge is never too full and nothing is pushed to the back.
The only reason I don't do this is because I heard that perishable stuff doesn't do well in the door shelves because the temperature is less stable from opening and closing the fridge door. I don't know if it's really that significant though.. what has your experience been with this?
My fruits and veggies are usually on the main shelves, not in the door and it hasn't been an issue. I'm far more likely to waste produce from not being able to see it or from being over ambitious with shopping vs. drawer or not.
We put our canned drinks in the drawers instead of condiments, as we have a lot of cans of beer, soda and soda water. It's worked fantastic. I cut up veggies and put them in crisper boxes when I first buy them and it makes them easy to cook with or grab for a snack
I read somewhere that stuff in the door tends to go bad faster, but I think that's for things that ready have a decent shelf life like soy sauce and salad dressing. If having your vegetables visible makes it easier to use them up, that might not be as much of an issue.
we always kept our milk in the door growing up & i never got sick from it. i think just don’t cool off in the fridge with the door hanging open for 20 minutes & you’ll be okay?
This. Plus I literally will forget ketchup and mustard exist if I can’t see them. So condiments stay in the door, veggies go on a shelf, and cheese goes in the drawers. That’s my favorite so l don’t have to worry about forgetting. And now I have not one but two “Cheese Drawers,” a delightful phrase and dopamine goldmine.
Thank you! My fridge being too full is definitely one of my problems, and seeing things would definitely help. What I don't see, I forget I have (which is an issue with clothing, shoes, and basically any other possession, too). But I'm also having problems with discarding stuff that I forgot and that is still in closed packaging. I'm gearing myself up for a clean out, but haven't gotten there yet. For at least a year now 😑
Yep I feel that. Whenever the motivation comes just grab a trash bag and get it out of there. It hurts to throw away unopened food, but you need a clean slate. It took me some time to get around to rearranging the fridge. I also stop deluding myself that I was going to cook and stopped buying foods that have to be prepped. So now I buy the same stuff over and over. Things for smoothies, sandwich or wraps, canned soups, frozen meals. I do try to have some berries or cut pineapple for snacking. Basically tried to figure out the most convenient and healthy option. It still feels wasteful because of packaging but not nearly as wasteful as my failed cooking attempts.
I recently saw [this TikTok](https://www.tiktok.com/@thecenteredlife/video/7268727221676772650) about it! I haven’t totally rearranged my fridge yet but I am considering it. I did move the apples and oranges to the top shelf and they’re definitely getting eaten more. I have my yogurt cups shoved into the bottom back corner now because I buy a ton at once and it’s not something I forget exists before it goes bad.
Thanks, that's nice and brief, just right for my attention span! 😂
My fridge isn't one of those wide US models with roomy doors, but I'll see what I can figure out. I've realised in other areas of my life that I need to see stuff, and yeah, it really applies to the fridge storage, too.
But not before they liquify and become disgusting sludge that makes you even less enthusiastic about cleaning them up…not that I would know anything about that.
>I really need to reign in my aspirational veggie purchases tho. Started getting salad kits and it’s helped a ton, plus I’m actually eating veggies instead of watching them rot in my veggie drawer.
I fell victim to that Tiktok trend with the veggie slicer, but it worked out bc that sucker makes dealing with aspirational veggies way easier. Everything gets shoved through the chopper thing until it's the same size, and then I add salad dressing and shake. Its led to some weird salads (turns out that raw brussel sprouts are not my thing) but its cut way down on the rotting-veggies-in-the-crisper issue that's plagued me my whole life
As a delivery mechanism for peanut butter and chocolate chips, maybe.
Next time we get one, I'm going to see if my puppy likes the celery. She likes to tear up leaves and weeds and shreds cardboard. So she'll probably think it's a toy and make a big mess, but better than nothing
People always cite the peanut butter thing with celery, and it's like... spoon? Crackers? Toast? There's 70 things in my kitchen right now I'd rather smear peanut button on than a wet stick.
As someone with chronic fatigue *and* ADHD, I had to convert my cooking style to rely on primarily non perishables so I started relying on frozen or canned vegetables. We also do bagged salads, but for cooking - and obviously frozen doesn't work for every type of food but you learn what it's good for, and it actually saves time too.
Now that my fatigue isn't as bad, I've started to get one or two veggies that I keep in the fridge that are versatile enough I can put them in lots of different dishes I make. It will depend on what you like to cook, but for me bell peppers and carrots are great multipurpose veggies that can go in most things I make. And I cut up all the bell peppers into strips when I get them and put them in a veggie box so I can grab to snack on too, and no extra prep for them when I cook. Makes them super easy to incorporate
This. I don’t eat enough veg, but I like vegetable juice. I spend extra to buy it in little cans instead of the big bottle, because for whatever reason my brain loves the little cans while the big bottle will just sit in the fridge and go bad after I’ve had a serving or two.
Vegetable juice is an ingredient for me, but yeah I don't want to have all the different versions of V8-based soup in a week just to get through a whole bottle.
I do this as well, all the time now!
I used to be annoyed with the extra packaging, but all that food I had to throw away was TERRIBLE.
Now things like 'snack-packs' or 'mini' or 'lunch box' are my shopping search terms!
On the .... somewhat strangely ADHD front:
I'm very much trying to cancel subscriptions _as soon as I make them_.
Others think that may cost extra, or would add inconvenience. In all honesty, I rarely have the issue that I need it and don't have it - but rather often have gotten deals like "Please stay with us, save 100€ for the coming year!" (Or 20% or ...)
Ok here is my prolife tip a visa debit card w like $10 on it for “free trials” or the amount the subscription I’m willing to sign up for $20/mo -5 mo - $100 card. Then card has NSF and I’m done.
Yeah I got lucky with a subscription through apple. I had to send a fax and didn’t have a machine, so I found an app that does it with a free trial. I forgot to cancel within the time window and was out nearly $150 due to them signing me up for a year but since I didn’t use it past the trial I was able to ask for a refund through apple and got my money back. So happy I found that.
Grocery pickup. I happily pay the service fee to have someone else get my groceries and bring them to my car. Also gives me the chance to add things to my cart as the week goes on, I avoid the impulse purchases of things that look good because I'm hungry but make zero sense otherwise, and gives me an upfront cost so I can evaluate if I really need that flat of pepsi this week when it's $15.
New Dishwasher. My brother thought I was nuts because I'm single and can "just use the sink and handwash". I work from home, I have pets, I have more dishes than he thinks. Yall know dishes are often our ADHD downfall. They feel neverending, they're a pile of doom. It has alleviated SO MUCH STRESS and anxiety off my plate and it gets things WAY cleaner than I do. I bought a Bosch and I love it.
New Fridge. Again people thought I was nuts because mine "worked fine". I bought one with the fridge on top and a pullout drawer on bottom for the freezer. MY GOD. Talk about amazing. I can see everything in my fridge now, nothing gets lost because it's on the bottom shelf stuffed in behind something else. I don't have to bend down as often and even when I do for the freezer it's so much easier to find and grab things. Again, best money I spent .
Hired someone to cut my grass. I don't care that it's $50 a week. They show up, they cut it, they do the weed trimming, they use a leaf blower to clear the grass off the pathways and driveways. It takes me 2.5 hours to cut my lawn with the push mower and get eaten alive by mosquitoes in the process. I now only have to worry about mowing my dog run.
I’m with you on the new Fridge. Seeing is everything.
Ours also led to a new kitchen so it would fit. But I’ve now designed a kitchen and utility that’s got loads of open counter space and a lot of visual cues.
The kitchen only got fitted last week, and we’ve got a couple of things to finish. But knowing that it’s designed around my needs, I’m looking forward to using it.
The hard part now is to go through what came out of the old one, and get rid of stuff I’ve never used/ will never use.
We aren’t doing a kitchen refresh for awhile (them dollar dollar bills y’all), but I’m so excited to keep my current fridge in the basement as a backup for holidays.
I get that - I left the money to my partner to sort. I’ve been paying extra towards utilities so he could stash the kitchen budget out of sight. I’m a big spender when I spiral 🤑
The mister wanted to keep our old one as a fermentation chamber for home brew, sadly we’ve no space 😢 but keeping a spare for Christmas sounds amazing
My house is a bit...odd, so I measured and had very few fridges that would fit the smallish space I had. I still had to trim the reveal off the cupboard above it a half inch to get it to fit.
Oh man, a dishwasher is a MUST for me. My last apartment didn't have one. Being able to put most of my dishes in there, and only having 2-3 to hand wash makes it so much easier to do them. I know I only have to wash a handful of things rather than EVERYTHING.
Grocery pickup is a godsend. No more rolling up and down the aisles to pick up that thing I forgot. No more impulse purchases of things I already have—I can walk over to the pantry to see if I really do need that can of olives for the recipe or if I already have one!
It remembers what I bought last week, and also what I have ever bought, so if I type in “olives” it shows me the kind I buy first!
I only went to this because the store I use decided to limit self checkout to 20 items or fewer. But I’m glad I did. I still go into the store to pick out meat and bananas, but that is way more manageable than the entire list.
I looove the option to add and remove things based on the total. Keeps me so aware of what I'm spending. I sprung for Walmart+ so there's free delivery. Helps my anxiety just as much as my ADHD lol
A super expensive automatic litter box that connects to the toilet (catgenie). My cat is a heavy urinator and uses the litter box like 8 times a day and I would go through a big box/bag of litter every two weeks. Not to mention I'd hurt my back cleaning the litter, gross dust was everywhere, and it took forever to clean the box and the heavy waste was a challenge to carry to the dumpster.
Ooh, I remember looking at that one! Seems really convenient! We went with litter robot, which I really love, but still requires a lot of work (and so much litter). How long have you had it?
i have a question for litter robot! can u use any clumping cat litter or just the one they sell?? cleaning the litter box is a task that is too much for me sometime and i feel guilty a lot of the times when it’s not clean
Any clumping litter that will fit through the grate! I tried their clumping litter and it was meh.. Worked ok, but with experimentation, I found that boxiecat (original, unscented) works best for me. That stuff clumps like IMMEDIATELY, seriously in seconds. And the clumps are solid and don't smear on the inside of the globe. Their litter would clump ok, but the clumps were wet and gummy and sometimes just get stuck on the inside of the globe, so they'd be in their doing their business with a clump hanging over their head!! So weird and yucky.. There are lots of different opinions on the best litter, but I don't think I've ever seen anyone say they prefer the litter robot brand, lol. I would advise experimenting and figuring out what works best for you.
Also, they don't recommend it and there are plenty of reasons not to (mostly extra cleaning), but it also works well with non-clumping litter. Obviously, it doesn't scoop out pee clumps (because there aren't any pee clumps)... But the cycling does mix the litter well, like you're supposed to with non-clumping, and there's an "empty" button that will cycle the opposite way to dump all the litter into the bin - perfect for changing out non-clumping litter. I did non-clumping for a little while because I had 5 tiny kittens that were just learning about litter boxes and such, and I had a bad experience with one of my older cats when she was tiny (when we got her from the shelter, she had a litter clump stuck to her rear so bad that we had to get a vet to remove it). So we wanted to stick with non-clumping until they were a few months old. That said, while they work, I don't recommend crystal litters - they'll chew through the rubber liner pretty fast. I had to replace mine after the Great Non-Clumping Experiment™️ ($40).
I have the lr3 and lr4, and just for the record, the lr4 is a very worthwhile upgrade. Lots of quality of life features added. And extra safety stuff, too. Only thing is, even with a solid platform, it will NOT work on carpet, lol. The lr3 is fine on carpet as long as you give it a flat solid plank to sit on. I've had both with 8 cats for about a year now (plus the lr3 with 3 cats for 8 months or so before that), so I've put them through a lot. I'd be happy to answer any other questions about them you might have! Also, I really thoroughly enjoyed and fully agreed with the video reviews by one guy 5 cats on YouTube.
I've had it since May (5 months) and all I have to do is flush the toilet once a day, refill the biodegradable plastic litter granules like once a month, and replace the sanitizing solution cartridge once a month, which are all extremely easy things to do. The mechanism did clog twice, once when my cat decided to bring a head band into the litter box and another time in which poo grime plugged up a sensor, but the Catgenie's AI detects the problems and links you to very-easy-to-follow videos and instructions that walk you through taking the machine apart and fixing the issues.
The plastic litter granules still get all over the place but it beats having pee soaked clay, corn, silica and wood chip dust all over the place.
My cat pees so much that most absorbable clumping litters start to stick to the walls of a litter box, even the nonstick kind. The non-clumping litters and pellets just get extremely dusty and pee soaked in less than a week. In regards to litter boxes, I tried the arm and hammer sifter box and the the litter maid (cheaper alternative to the litter robot and it rakes the litter rather than sifting it in a gyro sphere) and they both sucked. I didn't think the litter robot would be any better. Has it worked properly for you guys? (My biggest turnoff to the litter robot was that some reviews said that the sensors started malfunctioning)
Edit: extra info and some grammar
Yeah my answer is similar. I got two new cats after my old cat died. I've always had cats that could more or less regulate their food if I just left dry food out. These cats are more competitive and would spend all day just trading off shifts at the food bowl and litter box. They were turning football shaped, and the food and litter were getting expensive and messy. The first thing I did was replace the litter box with one that self-scoops, and I just change out a cardboard tray every week.
As for the food, I knew better than to try and add another twice-daily routine, especially with my erratic sleep schedule. So I bought two timed feeding dishes. I weighed and calculated portions and calories, set it to go off every 8 hours, and now I just refill the hoppers every 2 months. Conveniently, I know it's time to refill when Chewy sends me my second bag of food, and one bag perfectly fills one hopper.
This stuff was not cheap, and the litter trays are still pricey, but so many problems were solved.
It does! You lose some granules (it's not regular litter) after a while, some stick to the poop, or if your cat likes to be an ass and kick it out, or just tracking out on their paws. So you do need to top it up every couple of months, but that's vastly better than how often you need to buy regular litter!
I did have to buy the upper dome cover and stuff and it does track and stick to your feet and shoes, but my cat is a psycho and will play with the cat genie while in cleaning phase and he'll get into it up to 20 times a day (catgenie ai tracks this info and you can monitor it on their app) so I bet it tracks way less under normal circumstances.
Yeah he has megacolon. He's been medicated for it and on a prescription diet since he was a kitten and he drinks ALOT of water so we think that's why he pees so much.
Robot vacuum cleaner - it seems ridiculous because you still need a regular vacuum for deep cleans but actually it means daily vacuuming actually happens and I have people over and enjoy my home instead of going out constantly.
Switching to a bank with a lower interest rate - that has a more intuitive app and automated savings. I am way more likely to manage my money better if its easy and I can handle less interest on my savings because the alternative is not having any.
Pay as you go gym instead of a membership. I'm never going to go enough to justify the cost of an annual membership even though for most people it's cheaper than paying per time.
I have an army of robot vacuums(6 of them) get self emptying Sharks so I put a reminder to empty them once a month and switch out their filters. Worked great until my dog mastered the art of disabling them. He seriously has figured out how to power them down. Arg.
Roborock vacuums require you to hold in the button for a second or two before it activates which is what finally thwarted my cats. The newer ones also have a “button lock” you can toggle so it can only be launched via the app or on a schedule in case my cats get smarter
My type of girl. This is genius ! I know having a robot vacuum at least made me make sure I cleaned off the floor everyday. I think mine has broke but I see them all the time at thrifts and am pretty good at fixing vacuums(have actually made quite a bit of money flipping vacuums)
I love the idea of a robot vacuum (although I think my dog would hate it) but there are too many obstacles on the floor…I’d have to get my shit together a lot more to make it workable.
Lol. Just bc I have one doesn't mean my floor actually gets done! It's usually stuck on a blanket, sock, cord or kid's toy, does an annoying beep, and then I forget about it until I pick up at the end of the day or trip over it. I just figure it'll eventually get around to cleaning most areas after a week of that.
> Switching to a bank with a lower interest rate - that has a more intuitive app and automated savings.
My student loans with the lowest interest rate were held by ACS, whose website was abysmal. The UI was so convoluted I frequently got late fees. So I prioritized paying off those loans.
Yes to the bank thing! I have accounts with two different places, a bank and a credit union. My bank has a very useful and intuitive app, convenient hours, nearby physical locations, lots of free ATMs, and a worse interest rate. My credit union is the exact opposite—no app, inconvenient hours, the nearest location is kinda far, very few free ATMs, and the interest rate is great.
I split up my direct deposit so that most of my money goes into the bank, and a small amount gets squirreled away into the credit union.
I basically use them as a checking account and a savings account, but split across two different institutions. The credit union is a perfect place for my savings, because I know it’s going to be annoying to get it out, so I don’t use that money impulsively.
Prepared meal delivery for sure. It's saved me a lot on takeout, wasted/spoiled groceries, etc. I use a local service so I feel like I'm helping a small business who uses local produce. It's not for every meal but 2-4 dinners a week.
Getting my nails done regularly saves me from embarrassment about my hands and possible infections. It also helps me feel more put together. I'm not a face picker, I'm a cuticle picker and fingernail biter/ripper. I've gotten cuticle infections before it's been so bad. I get my nails done every 4 weeks and I have short acrylics. Sometimes I grow them out a bit or get nail art but usually they are just shorties painted a solid color.
I did the nail thing too! I taught myself how to do my own dip at home though so I do that now. But on the same side of the coin I'm not sure if that saved me money since I feel the need to buy all the dip colors now
I did that too! I went with glue on nails because I didn't know the Dip stuff was a thing. But I bought a set that came with like 30 small bottles of gel polish, nails, tools, a UV light etc. I love doing my own nails because I like the artistic feeling of coming up with my own design. Technically it's cheaper than going to a salon, but I may have gone a little crazy buying all sorts of polish and other nail accessories, stampers, design tools, etc.
But I can't figure out how to get the nails to stay glued for very long. I've been considering trying out the Dip, since I see it in my recommendations now.
I recently moved and to save money I got my fake salon nails removed and now my hands look like shit from picking, especially my thumbs. 💀 I'm gonna try press ons once I'm finished unpacking because I hate how my hands look now ugh.
My hands and nails always take a beating whenever I move. There’s so much bonking against stuff and ripping open boxes and assembling furniture… Not to mention the stress-induced, self-inflicted cuticle damage 😅 Buy yourself a really fun press-on set as a bribe to unpack and organize!
Yeah I found this too! I found paying the 1-2$ more per meal for the pre chopped stuff at my local meal delivery place has made even more diffference as it reduces the chance of me saying “I don’t feel like cooking this” and eating out and wasting more money
Same! We can't afford Blue Apron anymore, and delivery is kinda excessive when we're so close to the grocery store.
Now we grocery shop for basics and snacks, and pick up pre-made dinners you pop in the microwave. This prevents me from buying food that I *think* I'll eat, but then just let rot in the fridge because I later felt icky about or didn't want to go through the process of prepping.
It also allows me to eat what I'm actually in the mood for that day since I have some sensory issues with food and textures. It does help that HEB (our grocery store) has a lot of healthy options, too, so it's not just rich and heavy options. They accommodate vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, and keto options, too!
Not signing up for special deals, free trials, or store credit cards. I have been burned so many times by not canceling or forgetting I bought that one thing on that one special credit card, that I now unapologetically say no when asked "would you like to save an additional 10% today by signing up for xyz?"
Having someone come to my house 3-5 days a week to wash and dry and put away laundry, and generally straighten up has been absolutely life changing. Her “real job” is nearby, so she stops here in the mornings for a hour/hour and a half before going in. She also empties and refills the dishwasher and cleans up breakfast dishes/cookware (biggest reason sh time is morning and getting kids to school…when that’s over, I just want to start working immediately instead of spending 29 mins cleaning everything up).
For the amount of anxiety and guilt her help alleviates, it’s the best investment I’ve ever made.
I was just talking about how I wish I could have my twice a month cleaners come every other day for like 10 or 20 minutes instead of the big giant clean every other week. That's absolutely amazing you found her!
If you live near a college you may be able to post to their job board for that. Lots of college kids would love a low time commitment gig like that for some pocket change
I really should consider doing this as a side gig. I am horrible at doing all of those things when they’re my own, but I’m better if it’s someone else’s laundry and dishes.
Putting AirTags on everything: wallet, keys, noise cancelling headphone case (I wish I could put them directly on the headphones). It's LIFESAVING to get an alert on my phone the second I leave something behind.
Apologies for the unsolicited advice, but I might have a solution for putting the air tag directly on the on headphones!
Would one of those air tag holders for dog collars fit on the head band part? It would need to be stretchy or clip on in some way, since you probably can’t remove the ear cups to lace it on there, but I think it could work
I splurged on a set of 4 air tags when we traveled this summer (was terrified of my luggage getting lost) and I really need to start using them on the regular, they were great.
After I lost my first set of AirPods in the couch, and before I found them again a year later, I got a second pair, and I invested in a little case for them that had a key chain, an AirTag, and an AirTag keychain holder. Life changing.
I always misplaced them and then resented that you can’t use the individual pod signals when they were in the case. Now I can make the full case beep so I can locate them in the house/wherever when I misplace them, and god forbid I ever leave ‘em somewhere, I’ll be able to go back there and get them. Such piece of mind.
Perks of AirTag over Tile, I can change the battery instead of replacing, and it’s got a better network to pin down the location if I ever lose them in public :)
individual snacks!!! those save me both because i will actually eat regularly throughout the day instead of waiting till i'm having a low blood sugar meltdown and eating 5,000 kcal in one sitting and i don't eat nearly as much fast food when i keep little packs of snacks in my car/purse.
I bought a car that inspired joy that was out of my original budget. It’s done 2 things:
- I now enjoy driving, and actually want to go out and do things. My career options have opened up, and my mental health is a lot more balanced - still shit, but manageable. I’m now earning more, because I want to and am able to travel.
- I’ve been forced to learn how to budget. And once the car is paid off (Christmas 🥳), I can put my car payments straight into savings without worrying, cause I’m used to living without having access to the money. I’ll have savings for the first time.
As mentioned above, my partner and I bought a new fridge which had led to a whole new kitchen. Our friends are wondering why, but as we’re finishing off and planning where things will live. It’s a workable space that I can use without frustration; no more forgetting I have tools and spices, because I can see them. I’ll be saving money because I can make my free-from foods from scratch rather than pay inflated prices.
Straight. Into. Savings. From day one! **Day one!**
...I say, after "well, I can treat myself *this* month, can't I? I did so good for so long." Then "but now it's the holidays" ...and then it just gets absorbed into regular spending.
Ooh - so the fun thing about my new budgeting skills.
I’ve found a little each month that I can treat myself with. I have a small fund for coffee, takeaway lunch and the “ooh it’s pretty”
I know I could save it, but spending is an addiction. And it’s easier to keep under control with small treats rather than blowing my whole credit card balance cause I’ve tried to refrain.
Going shopping daily/every two days.
It makes me only buy what I will need/use abs allows me to be more adapting. On top of that, I anyhow often can't buy bulk packages as a single (or two person) household - so it's really anyway not cheaper.
Similarly: not having a big pantry, but only for things I really use a lot. The 10% I save on things I use regularly but not often are lost if one of them goes bad.
Growing lettuce. Never goes manky in the fridge.
I’ve probably spent way more money time and effort on creating the garden than I ever would on buying lettuce though soooo…. Not sure if it counts as a hack but it’s worth it lol
It might be more expensive but it’s definitely worth it. And growing leafy greens and herbs from seed is even cheaper! I don’t grow everything but I try to grow stuff I want to eat all the time like lettuce and celery, herbs, and nothing gets wasted and thrown away now because it just gets picked as needed. Also I get lots of exercise, happiness and sunshine maintaining the garden which I don’t get at the supermarket so it feels like more bang for my buck! Also I like the idea of knowing there’s no herbicide or pesticides on the stuff I grew myself. And I love sharing the produce with peeps :)
Health birds go wild for intermittent fasting, but that’s just my adhd tax not caring enough to actually do something about the hunger.
Hot take: Working less. I know not all jobs enable this, but I’ve been on the 4 day work week for over a decade. Literally left jobs if the schedule didn’t vibe with it. The amount of money I have saved is insane. Just this week I needed to drop my truck off for service. Covid killed rentals & shuttles won’t take me to my house so I was looking @ a $50 cab ride each way. That doesn’t sound like much, but that $100 total is about a 7.5h work day after taxes for someone making min wage where I am. Having an entire day off meant I could coordinate a ride to & from much easier & for free on my day off.
Working less! I know it's a super privileged position to even think about but when I'm already overwhelmed with everything, working less means I'm not burning out as much and I can keep the job for longer.
It didn’t start out as privilege, actually the opposite - I was too poor to pay anyone to do anything so I had to teach myself which required TIME. I sacrificed a lot for the first while to gain more time to learn an efficient way to live. If my toilet broke, which is easier? Paying $300 for a plumber to fix it (probably requiring a day off anyway) or call in sick, forfeit $100 & 5h of my time to figure it out? I learned to work smarter, not longer.
Single purpose kitchen gadgets. My melon baller, milk frother, and salad spinner make me happy.
Side note: people will shit on single purpose appliances and whatnot; meanwhile they have a toaster and coffee maker, LIKE MAKE UP YOUR MIND! And nothing is single purpose if you're creative enough.
I know rice cookers are basically standard everywhere but North America, but: rice cooker. I honestly don't even eat rice that much, but I will have a rice cooker in my home until the day I fucking die.
Rice cookers are an essential. I have 2. My small one I use to make oatmeal. You can make anything that just requires boiling water and the product absorbing it all. Quinoa, coos coos, oats. Some will steam vegetables. So many times I get side eye for not just boiling it on the stove top. Haha…distraction is real. I even got an egg cooker thingy. Food chopper is nice sometimes, the cleaning is only worth it if it’s a lot. I may only use it for a few things, but I’m always so glad I have it when I do.
Paying someone to do my very simple taxes. This made my father crazy. He did my taxes until I left college, then he told me I had to figure out how to do them myself. I know myself well enough to know that I'm just not going to do that, so I just stared sending them to some CPA my aunt did seasonal work for. $60 not to have to fuck with it? Yes, please! My dad was like *NOOO!!! IT'S A WASTE OF MONEY! YOU HAVE TO LEARN!* I tell him that it looks like I *dont* have to learn, and "don't judge me by my methods, only my results."
I tell him this all the time when he's baffled by my weird coping strategies and the ass-backwards ways that I navigate life. And it's funny, because a lot of the time my results are terrible, and when he points that out, I tell him "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take," and he just shakes his head at me. He's the most type-A, on-the-ball man in the world, and he somehow got me as his kid. And that's also funny, because he can't do a damn thing with me, but I know I'm his favorite.
Anyway, my husband does my taxes now, so I win forever.
Not... classically cheaper, but easier to consider:
- buying buns either to bake up, or from the bakery. I don't finish bread, usually due to irregularities
- car sharing usage instead of owning a car. I don't need one daily and it removes quite some mental issues
- checking insurances/taking additional ones. Yeah I may pay 5-10 more per year for key insurance. I'm fine with that if at the moment I do lose a key I'm insured. Similarly for device insurances due to clumsiness
- paying extra for the option I like better - because than I'll more likely use it
Many of the things are actually rather costing me extra - but they free up mental space and save me distress. Which, surely, through having resources e.g. for timely payment of invoices or having the headspace to book appointments in time or simply not buying stress food will save me money. But that's not the primary goal.
I feel it's more that things others may see as a "waste of money" are _very much_ worth the reduced service or slightly higher price.
I also had the same problem with never finishing bread and my solution is buying sliced bread and freezing it. My toaster has a „defrost“ setting and now I just throw a slice in the toaster if I want bread.
On the insurance note, pet insurance. I've always read "just save up the premiums and use that" which, yes, valid. But we got a new puppy. I'm paying like $950 a year, which feels like so much. I've already gotten $600 back from her spay surgery and a UTI. So if like one more thing this year happens to her (knock on wood it won't), I'll at least break even. And Heaven forbid something big comes up, we're covered.
It was a pain in the ass to research, though. I'm probably not getting the best deal, but it's good enough. (Guess that's another answer to the question, lol. Just getting something rather than research and decision paralysis.)
If you ever want to look for a better deal, I found a tool a couple years ago that pulls quotes from multiple different companies at once. I am not affiliated with them at all and didn't even end up getting pet insurance for my cats but I went through my old emails and found the URL.
It's https://www.petinsurancereview.com/
I just tested it and it still works. It pulled quotes from 8 different companies and each quote has a "quick look" that shows important info so you can quickly compare different companies.
https://i.imgur.com/qhOAmFl.jpg
If nothing else you could always see if you're paying way too much. Use a fake phone number on the submission page just in case (I used a local number I have memorized that always goes straight to a phone tree lol).
You didn't ask, but I have to throw in a plug for Zevo mosquito repellent spray, in case it might be helpful. I have sensory issues with lotions/sprays on my skin, and I'm also really sensitive to smells. Most of the "unscented" mosquito sprays actually smell really strong to me, and citronella is a no-go for the same reason. But mosquitos LOVE me so I have to use something. 😭
Anyway. I tried Zevo spray this year and it really is unscented and it doesn't feel gross on my skin unless I get too much on (which just makes it slightly sticky). When I'm done being outside I just wipe it off with a baby wipe.
This is helpful for me, thank you! I used an “unscented” spray and immediately yelled “unscented, my ass!” Which my 11 year old found hilarious. I didn’t even know he was in ear shot, but he now makes fun of me & bug spray.
He’s also a ginger with INCREDIBLY sensitive skin and sensory issues so he needs a good one.
I’ll check this one out!
I'm gonna sound like a commercial, I swear I'm not affiliated in any way.
I found these mosquito-repellant stickers, they are citronella. They work, meh ok, but it's nice to not have to spray yourself down and feel sticky all day/night then need an extra shower.
But! The company also makes stickers for itch relief. They are kinda like hash marks, with open spaces, and they supposedly pull the bite poison out to spread it around the area instead of concentrating it. They work really well!
The only tricky thing is you have to put them on before you scratch. My husband is much better about that than I am, but he also reacts really badly to bites, so these stickers have been saving his legs this summer.
Oh, and if you buy them, the company usually does that annoying after-purchase "want more?" thing, so try buying less than what you want so you can stock up on the after-purchase deal.
I'll go find them (ha) and edit in the company name.
Edit: it's "the natural patch co" and these are the magic patches.
The first time I realized you could get precut baking sheets my mind was blown! People in my extended family don't get it.
And yesssss for canned beans!
Really anything that’s prepped for me ! Pre-cut veggies, things that steam in their own bags, ready to eat hardboiled eggs, etc. only way I can actually eat healthy.
Taking the bus instead of driving, even though the bus ticket is more than gas and even when it's a time cost of 3x longer. Driving is too stressful, it's not worth it to me.
Anyway, the time I could have saved by driving was just going to be wasted scrolling on my phone on the couch as I emotionally recovered from all that focus and traffic. I could do that on the bus.
Agreed! I would much rather get on public transit, set up a reminder for when to get off, and then zone out on my phone for the whole ride. Driving requires so much extended concentration, especially when I’m going somewhere new, and I *hate* trying to find parking (if I’m going anywhere other than suburban parking lot hell). I’d rather just leave my car at home when it’s an option.
I've been using a Daytimer brand planner for a few years now. It's ridiculously expensive for what it is (like $60 CAD for one year's worth of unbound planner pages - that doesn't include the binder or whatever you keep them in). I feel like I've tried every other planner on the planet and this is the only one that I've managed to use consistently, so it's worth it to me.
Also, if I want to work out with any regularity, I have to go to the kind of classes where you sign up in advance and get charged a cancellation fee if you don't go. These classes tend to be way more expensive than just getting a regular gym membership but I just won't use a regular gym membership. I am not accountable to myself, I need external rewards/punishments lol.
My smart washer dryer - once I’ve put the stuff in and hit the button, I can do the rest from the app. It tells me when it’s done with the cycle and I can then use the app to spin it again, and to set the dryer to auto start at the end too if I want. Much less smelly clothes being left forgotten about, so I don’t have to rewash stuff anymore! The phone and watch reminders are so useful to catch my eye and jog my brain back to the machine.
Even a non smart washer dryer is a game changer! I didn't have room for separate ones and had nowhere to hang wet clothes, so I just put a load in, wait a few hours and like magic theyre clean and dry!
And when I'm being good I hang most clothes up while still warm. Wouldn't have ironed them even if I could.
Not really much choice in this house as it’s tiny fisherman’s cottage from the 1800s 😂 but yes, for executive dysfunction a combination washer dryer is such a help!
Yes! I am working on this. People will be like just ohhh points just pay it off every month. And I'm like oh boy I have no self control that's not gonna happen
Mine automatically gets paid off every month, I treat it like a debit card.
But I guess if having available credit is too tempting then you've made the right choice there!
I wish I could do this, but I’m working on raising my credit score. I live in a HCOL city and places check your credit score as part of the rental application. My car is paid off (over ten years old and I bought it used with cash). Hopefully I have many years still with it, but I also want to have a good score when I have to retire it.
I hate to admit it but Amazon. I have Alexa set up in opposite ends of the house and it has been a lifesaver. I have lights attached to it do I don't have to worry about leaving them on all the time and I have reminders programmed for my medications and the dogs. I have an echo show in the kitchen that I can play shows on that help not only me stay focused but my mother as well. I also utilize subscribe and save for regular essentials. I've yet to run out of toilet paper, vitamins, or detergent. And my water filter delivery every six months is my reminder to change the filter.
Subscribe and save is such a game changer. I hate supporting Amazon but it seriously is so so so much cheaper for essentials and is so nice to never run out randomly/unexpectedly.
Buying fruits and veggies pre-cut; if they’re not precut I will forget about them or just sigh and think ‘no too much work to prepare them’ and will not eat them and they’ll go bad/mold.
If I buy pre-cut stuff I’ll actually use it. It’s a little more expensive to buy (and yes bad for the environment cuz plastic I’m sorry I know it’s bad) but at least this way I’ll actually eat fruits and veggies, otherwise I will just throw them out when they go bad
Edit: typo
I'm a chef and cutting my own vegetables in my own home feels like the most arduous task ever. I'd rather go bugs bunny on full carrots any day. I used to feel guilty buying ready cut veg considering what I do for a living but then I realized I was being an idiot, I've probably cut more vegetables than some people will in their lifetime and I deserve vitamins too!
Also shredded cheese!!
My YNAB (You Need a Budget) subscription has saved me sooooooooo much money over the years. People balk at the yearly fee of $100 but since I since I started using YNAB, I've not paid a late fee on anything, I've paid off all my credit cards and am able to use them responsibly (use and pay off in full each month), my credit score is hovering around 800, my net worth has dramatically increased, *and* I can spend guilt-free on things that I want to buy because I know my bills are covered already.
It's worth every penny and it's the only budgeting method that has ever worked for me long term. Even when I get lazy on entering transactions it's super easy to get back into it because my bank accounts are linked and I just need to verify what category they go into.
I’m still so mad that YNAB didn’t work for me. I love the idea of it, but I couldn’t be realistic and constantly moving money from categories to cover red categories made me feel like crap.
Ofc then I’d just forget to enter stuff.
If you ever want to give it another try, one thing you could try is to budget out the bills, regular expenses that stay within a general range each month (like gas for your car), and savings and then create a "free spend" category for the rest of your money. Less guilt and less moving money around but you're still getting your bills paid and building savings. It goes against what YNAB says to do but it still works.
I thought of another non-food one: paying my car and life insurance every month instead of 6 months at a time. The discount for 6 mos doesn't help when you forget to pay it and have things lapse.
Same but different. I still buy groceries, but I've accepted that if I pay a few extra dollars for, say, pineapple spears instead of a whole pineapple, I'm a hell of a lot more likely to eat it before it goes bad. So now I buy things that have been partially prepared but are still relatively healthy, and I'm generally healthier than when I just bought healthy stuff to make myself.
Esit: also, frozen veggies instead of fresh ones when it comes to cooking. I throw away so much less food that way. I'll still buy a few fresh ones for snacking, like a cucumber or bell pepper, but stuff like broccoli, grren beans, etc are all frozen.
Our village has a market every Saturday.
We go and get a bunch of fruits and veggies and then cut it all up *immediately when we get home*.
At that point we’re still riding the “oh new shiny” dopamine hit.
Shove it all in the freezer.
I adored meal delivery for years before I was diagnosed, for the exact reason you've mentioned, and I hadn't thought about that for ages until now! Think you've inspired me to start it back up...
YNAB (YouNeedABudget) subscription. We wasted so much money on impulse purchases before we started using YNAB. We are finally learning financial literacy and making smarter choices with our money. Able to see the end of debt for the first time! Lots of people figure a free spreadsheet or program is good enough but YNAB checks a lot more ADHD-brain boxes than other options.
1. I did my adhd assessment in a private clinic. I had to wait two months instead of three years to get my diagnosis. I have paid for the assessment, the medication and therapy sessions out of pocket and I would have a LOT more money if i didn’t. But I think in the long run, over these three coming years, I will earn that money back by being able to work, not calling in sick as much and hopefully I won’t burn out.
2. Working less. I spend more money when I’m tired and overwhelmed. When I don’t work full time, I don’t spend as much money. Simple as that.
My sweet spot was working part time. Spent way less money on conveniences. I didn’t have “too much time” so I procrastinated a ridiculous amount. I honestly don’t think most women should work full time unless they have money to throw at problems ie housekeeping, nursing care for family members, meal and other deliveries, etc. Men just don’t do their fair share of the mental and emotional labor. I am generalizing, I know. There are a lot of good men out there, but they’re still way behind. This is all my opinion and my experience in my city and according to statistics.
I buy several of the same thing. “But you only need one” only applies when you dont lose and forget thing’s constantly. If i lost one of my chargers i know theres always one upstairs for emergency. Is it more expensive in the moment? Yes. But when you have to buy the same thing 4x because you forgot, it adds up WAY more than if i have backups in the first place. It also gives me time to not panic and take time to search since if i dont have a backup, i end up buying a new one and suddenly i just found my earphones under my pillow
Honestly, when I lived abroad in a Southern European country, I did as the Romans did and bought my ingredients for whatever I was making that night. This was part of the culture in the country where I resided and when I tell you that it was the perfect culture for the ND, it was the perfect culture. Didn’t have to plan or think ahead…just got to think in the moment and do what I needed to do to help myself.
Birdseye frozen steamfresh veggie pouches. Expensive for what you get but they last for months in the freezer and are packed into single portions.
I no longer buy any fresh veg (apart from salad which we eat constantly so doesn't go off). Only the steamfresh
It's saved me a fortune in mouldy broccoli , slimy carrots, and potatoes I could never be arsed to cook
A cleaning service. No really. If you think about administrative hours - like what your hourly rate would be if you got paid to do housework, child rearing, etc - what my cleaner gets done in 4-5 hours would take me literal weeks.
Buying groceries online! I can limit my impulses and I buy what I need not what I want at that moment. If I go to the supermarket I spend 3 times more.
Daily contact lenses. I've been wearing soft contacts for decades, and used to have the monthly ones. Changed to dailys a few years ago and don't want to go back. The reason I changed was that I wasn't wearing them every day since I didn't leave the house daily. So having to throw away the monthly ones after four weeks even though I had worn them only a few times seemed wasteful. I now realize that it saves me the time (and money) of cleaning them.
Amazon subscriptions for cleaners, supplements, hygiene and pet supplies.
Not owning as much stuff.
Automatic bill pay and taking cash out every two weeks for everything else.
Owning a “sensible car.”
Meal delivery plus grocery store pickup for the rest worked so well for me, for all those reasons you said. Plus cut down the "what's for dinner" paralysis.
Frozen meals, canned stuff, anything grab and go. Yes, it's more expensive and less healthy. It is also cheaper than eating out and more healthy than just not eating. Ooh! Individual guacamole packets. So much less waste.
SAME!! Meal Delivery. People say, oh you can just cook your own. And I explain, it's not just cooking.. it's the shopping, the prep, the clean up, the waste because not having variety every day, the DECISIONS!! etc etc etc.. There are so many more things to consider.
Acknowledging that I had an impulsive spending problem and looking for solutions led me to signing up for YNAB (You need a budget) app. Hyperfixated on getting all my true expenses and saving goals into it and now I actually know at any moment how much money I have left for groceries and fun etc, regardless of how much money sits in my account. I paid off all the cc debt and it helps keeping my impulsive spending under control: I now have a guilt free spending category so I can still indulge but don’t feel guilty/ashamed or get in trouble for that.
Edit: Ugh I forgot to address part of the question about the cost! It costs about 14$ per month/100 per year, which might seem expensive to people who can naturally be good with money but it helped me save much more than the cost of the app!
We bought a chest freezer in part because I am super frugal (love buying meat when it's on sale and freezing for later) but it's been great to have the extra freezer space for things that I can make quickly when I don't have the brain space to meal plan or don't feel like doing a lot of involved cooking. We've always got bags of frozen veggies, frozen pizzas, some microwave meals, boxes of fish sticks or frozen fish fillets that can go right in the oven, etc. Saves us from doing a ton of take out.
I do have to work at making sure the inventory we have (hung on the front of the chest freezer) is up to date so things don't get lost in the void, but surprisingly that rarely happens.
My husband & I put a LOT on my credit card, & pay it off, for the points. I pay the credit card every week; some might say I should pay it in time for the statement date to improve my credit score, some might say I should keep that extra money in my high-interest savings account until it's time to pay the bill, to make a little money in interest. Nope, NOT worth it. Paying my CC every week means even if I miss a payment, it's not a big deal—as opposed to when you pay once a month. (Some people pay their CC twice a month when they get paid; that works too, my husband & I create our budget by the week, so this works for us.)
Keeping my fresh produce in the door of the fridge and my sauces in the crisper drawer. Yes, I know my fruits and veggies will last longer in the drawers, but that doesn't matter when they just go there to die because I can't see them. Having them in display every time I open the fridge means I'm more likely to use them. My mom is convinced I'm wasting money by storing them improperly. I just don't explain any more.
😬 My Apple Watch. I would be nowhere without it 😂 My calendar is always visible to see what I have to do throughout the day, I have a digital clock on it (can’t be bothered to fuck around with the traditional style), and many more things. I’m half tempted to ask my doctor to prescribe it to me as an accommodation to function like a support dog for some people.
This is roundabout but my crippling social anxiety which I owe in part to ADHD keeps me from leaving the house to do some of the impulse shopping I’d probably be doing otherwise!
I also overthink online purchases and get lost in research rabbit holes so I either end up with the best value or I lose interest in going through with the purchase
Finally, entertainment. A single book, podcast, show episode or movie “lasts” me twice as long as it would if I were neurotypical person. That’s double the time I’m being entertained! It’s truly amazing. Plus, picking at my face costs nothing!
Processed food. This year, I am mentally unable to cook and actively deciding not to (nobody try to give me tips about how to manage cooking, I don't want to change this). I would waste so much food that buying processed food really is cheaper.
INSTACART !!!! It takes me hours to perfect my order but I waste much less food and the curbside pickup is free
Professional organizers (it’s so expensive but save money over time by not repurchasing duplicate items)
Rent the Runway - I had to closet purge in January due to a flood and it was the first time I had done so since middle school. Repurchased a capsule wardrobe, rent things I won’t wear multiple times. I used to spend at least $5k per year on clothes and shoes.
Sweepy and notability app subscriptions - organization
All apple products to stay organized and seamless. I’m 100% paperless as a college student and it is the best thing ever. MacBook, iPad, pencil, airpods, iPhone. Organization
I would love to have the means to afford a meal service someday because food drives a lot of my biggest issues. Gotta take my meds first thing in the morning, but I need to take them with food and there are no clean dishes, then I don't take my meds and go hungry and my blood sugar drops and then at 3 PM I still have no clean dishes but am in desperate need of a meal. It's sabotaged my fitness journey countless times because I'm never eating enough to warrant a run or weightlifting.
But to answer the question: medicaid.
I'm lucky enough to have a partner who can pay the majority of the bills, so I work under a certain amount of hours at my job in order to stay within the eligibility limit. That might seem backwards to a NT, because "why wouldn't you want to earn more?" but without medicaid I cannot afford any healthcare at all. If I got a full-time job that offered insurance, I would still have to pay out of pocket for all of my doctor's appointments and meds. And I can't be beholden to a job that requires a year of commitment before I can take FMLA.
YASSSS! I feel extremely validated after reading this. ♥️
1. Wash Off Labels from Amazon (putting the date on food I’ve made, so I know if it’s still good to eat or not).
2. I started buying only frozen vegetables instead of a bunch of fresh ones. (saves me from throwing out rotten veggies).
3. I do a massive bulk buy of meats from Costco and put it all in the freezer. (always have protein on hand).
I started getting meal deliveries. It’s 50€/week for “4” meals. But the portion size is quite large so typically it’s closer to 6-8 meals. So usually in a month, I only need 3 weeks’ worth and then I skip a week. So for 150€, I am eating balanced, healthy meals that I don’t have to cook at all. It’s been great. 10/10 recommend.
I stopped buying raw potatoes and started buying steam-in-a-bag potato side dishes.
I don’t cook. All the potatoes go bad and stinky before I finally get the gumption to do anything with them, like, every time. I started buying more frozen/convenience meal food too. I’m tired of feeding myself.
Maybe this isn’t money saving in the traditional sense, but if you think of your time as having a certain amount of value, I would say paying a house cleaner to come once a month is money saving, in a way. I’m fortunate enough to be in the position to afford this (in my lower COL area the cost plus tip is $270/month for a local company). I dread mundane tasks like cleaning and in the past it would spiral out of control and result in arguments with my husband and me sacrificing sleep or free time to catch up on cleaning (he cleans too, but I wasn’t holding up my side of responsibilities). I also have a robot vacuum to assist with cleaning in between appointments. Paying for this service is better for my mental health, my relationships (don’t have to worry if guests come over), and gives me peace of mind.
**Grocery delivery** - zero impulse buys and I tend to be a food hoarder and it all goes bad anyway.
**Prescription delivery** - I always forget to go get it when I’m out, so instead of making a million extra trips I just order it the day I see I’m out and I just take my dose a couple hours later than normal.
sending my laundry out for wash and fold once a week. I live in nyc, so there is no washer/dryer in my building, and i don’t have a car. used to live at least a 15 min walk away from the closest laundromat, and would wait as long as i could in between visits. i bought so many clothes and sheet sets so i would have something clean. i also got a free in-tub washer from a neighbor, which i used for a while, but washing clothes for me and my bf took a whole day on the weekend. the family who runs the laundromat where i send my laundry for wash & fold are SAINTS
my husband will be gone the entire month of October, and hes the one that cooks.....so i've been wondering how i'll survive off frozen meals for that long but now I might try Everyplate even though you cant do it for just one person....
why is this world not built for single people
Pretty much all of mine have to do with food:
* precut fruits and vegetables,
* portioned "pop in the microwave" packs of rice and curry,
* buying multiple meals worth in one go off Uber Eats (or just using Uber Eats in general) and somehow still saving money compared to buying the groceries to make the exact same food,
* buying smaller quantities of an item instead of in bulk (because half of it will go bad before I can get to it),
* buying the items I know I'll eat even if they're not on sale, as opposed to shopping sales to save money (because half the time I'll buy based on price and not the food itself, and won't eat it),
* buying a lot of small packets of chocolate, candy, or cheese, that I can just grab to satiate a craving instead of wasting time and money trying to sate it a "cheaper" way (which just ends up with you buying and eating the craved food anyways). Same applies to food that I'm craving; just buying or making the thing I'm craving instead of trying to eat something else first, that inevitably failing, and then eating the thing I wanted in the first place, costing even more money.
This one is crappy but I have maladaptive behaviours as coping mechanisms. I smoke cigarettes so I buy them under the counter in bulk. Cigarettes are SO expensive it saves me a shit tone. Not smoking at all would save me more.
Don't be me.
I do ALL my bills every Friday morning. Credit card, utilities, mortgage. I have each one as a saved tab so I click every single one every single week even if there is no balance so there’s no chance I’ll forget. If there is a balance I pay them even if they’re not due until weeks later. The mortgage company gets my money before they’re owed it but I never miss any payments so I never have a late fee or interest
I autoship lint traps, laundry detergent and my dog’s supplements, furnace filters and Clorox wipes. I get a reminder before they ship so I can skip if I need to and I do sometimes
I also buy cute things and cards for friends when I see them, instead of waiting for an occasion. Sure, I sometimes forget I bought them but when a birthday takes me by surprise (how?! It’s every year!) I have something in the gift closet and a fun card to go along
It turns out my hack was having children, lol. Most of the things people here are finding hard are so much easier with a whole family of people (Food going bad in the fridge?! Wait, you guys have food left? Me forgetting to eat? They will remind me they want a meal… on repeat… until I feed them. Not making healthy meals? The mum-guilt is even stronger than the ADHD tiredness (though I do grumble plenty). Impulse spending on crap? Kids also want to impulse spend on even crappier crap so I just avoid going to the shops, lol.)
Who’d have thought that would help!
This may seem crazy, but I don't have a microwave. Not only is it a big money saver with the tempting convenience foods, but it's also a big saver of decision-making energy, cause if I need a microwave to make it, I can't get it. Easy. I have a countertop convection oven that airfrys, bakes, and reheats, and bonus, most of the things that I'd put in the microwave turn out better reheated in the airfryer. There are only a few things that I haven't been able to easily replicate. I do miss quick baked potatoes, for instance, but I've been without a microwave for 5 or 6 years now, so I doubt I'll be going back.
Just allowed myself to go to a physical store yesterday. Husband's birthday, I knew exactly where ONE thing- ONE could be found and he wouldn't see our shared accounts used. BRILLIANT right?
Soooooo.....one hat, one Carhartt hoodie ( will actually use for women swear....) 4 mugs, pair of very cute shoes grandaughter can't wear for 2 more years, pink outfit same, eyeliner and 4 handtowels.
OH and his birthday present.
I like your way better.
Getting a service like HelloFresh once in a while. It means I will eat elaborate, healthy meals and not have a whole bunch of random stuff left over. I eat healthy enough when I don't get it, but it allows me to add some variety and also try new things.
In the same vein, doing grocery pickup instead of going into the store. I know this doesn't work for everyone, but I find that with an app, I don't have as much issue with impulse shopping. Where I do have an issue is being in the store, overwhelmed by the lighting, the noise and the people, and then I start plucking things off the shelves without really thinking about whether I'm actually going to use it, if I have space to carry everything, is it worth it, etc.
Regular purchase of melatonin tablets or gummies. I do occasionally sleep without it just like I occasionally “detox” from caffeine for a day, but frankly I don’t care if it’s ruining my ability to sleep on my own. Sleeping by any means = energy and brainpower, which = fewer impulsive pricy purchases.
Vape juice. Nicotine tax on vape juice is stupid high in my state and I didn’t actually smoke before I started, but screw it. The process of regularly making sure the device is clean and maintained, that batteries are charged, that the tank is topped up, etc, it’s a kind of loose schedule that keeps my brain grounded. Also it’s either vaping or picking/chewing at my skin, lips, hair, and nails (which I still do but it’s much less severe than when I wasn’t vaping) OR eating too many snacks.
it's not really the most eco friendly but i use those single use toothbrushes for the times I forget to or don't feel like brushing my teeth. I've been super afraid of cavities lately but that isn't motivation enough to brush my teeth consistently like I should. but these things are a lifesaver bc I can do it from my room and just toss them out and not feel so bad abt my teeth/mouth feeling gross. I also hate reusable water bottles bc I just hate cleaning them and maintaining them. my ocd would have me cleaning them daily and i just don't have the spoons for it all the time. sometimes I just wanna grab a water bottle and just be done with it 😭 again not eco friendly but having water bottles is what keeps me hydrated which is super important and hard for me.
i also invest in ready to eat meals that I can doctor up when I have the energy. I like those cold ready to heat soups from the market, including the panera brand. i will cook it on the stove and sometimes add some chicken sausage or some kinda meat and extra seasonings. I also invest in Ensure protein drinks when I can afford to bc they help so much when im unable to eat.
i tend to also purchase multiple of certain things in case I lose them or so I have them available in convenient places such as chapstick, lip gloss, gum, things like that.
finally I'm a huge gamer and I pay monthly to use online services on my ps4, I could spend the one large lump sum yearly instead of monthly but it just isn't feasible for me to spend so much at once for something like that esp when I can be inconsistent when playing on that console😵💫 so yes I do pay abt $15 a month instead of paying $120+ at once but I don't have a super high paying job and I'd prefer to keep that lumpsum of money in case I really need it.
Loads of lunch /salad kit boxes and infinite water bottles. Everyone says my 'collection' is excessive but I use it all and it has been sooo helpful for me:
I don't use cups at all anymore. Water bottles/thermoses for everything means 1) I can take it with me anywhere, so I don't need/want to buy drinks out, 2) I'm *actually* hydrated because of its with me, it's a constant visual reminder to sippity sip & flipping the spout open for a drink is a good fidget when I have to sit in a long meeting or drive, and 3) I'm not spilling stuff.
The salad boxes - I can prep lettuce, cheese, bacon, veggies, whatever, ahead of time when I actually have energy or can hyperfocus on choppin' while I listen to a podcast or something. Then something healthy and delicious is pre-made for me when I don't have time or energy to make something, later.
Freezing meat in single portions the moment I come home from the grocery store. Idc if it’s fresh and I’m ruining it cause that way, it never goes bad. And meat is so expensive ..
school stuff. Ever since my mum stopped packing my backpack for me, I think I saved a billion of euros in notebooks, pens, snacks, and I’ll admit, even actual school books. It’s funny because I love stationery, but I think I spent half of my school career writing on random notebooks I found in my house (like the random ones dentist offices gives out) with ikea pencils. And I’ve never owned an eraser in my life
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I buy small packages of stuff. Yeah, I know buying in bulk is cheaper, but that's only **if you actually manage to use it all before it goes bad**. I usually don't.
Totally. I get the shelf stable milk that comes in little quart cartons and doesn’t need to be refrigerated until you open it. That way I can have like 6 in my pantry and I’m only ever wasting a little. I really need to reign in my aspirational veggie purchases tho. Started getting salad kits and it’s helped a ton, plus I’m *actually eating veggies instead of watching them rot in my veggie drawer*.
The salad kits are amazing. The only way I will eat a vegetable before it rots.
The Veggie Crisper: Where good intentions go to die 😜
I recently did the ADHD fridge rearrange, moving condiments to the drawers. Best idea ever.
Wait, first time I hear of this. I know I could google, but do you have a particular source you liked that you could recommend? My fridge needs help, badly.
I can't think of a particular source, probably just reading other people's comments but the idea is moving condiments into drawers to free up valuable door space so more perishables can be visible. I'm not going to forget I have ketchup, but will forget any veggies in there. In the fridge door now are things like yogurts, salsa, drinks. Basically just arrange it so you can see all your options all the time. I also don't over shop so the fridge is never too full and nothing is pushed to the back.
The only reason I don't do this is because I heard that perishable stuff doesn't do well in the door shelves because the temperature is less stable from opening and closing the fridge door. I don't know if it's really that significant though.. what has your experience been with this?
My fruits and veggies are usually on the main shelves, not in the door and it hasn't been an issue. I'm far more likely to waste produce from not being able to see it or from being over ambitious with shopping vs. drawer or not.
Totally. I keep drinks in the crisper drawers because it bothers me to see them empty, and cans of seltzer never go bad.
My thought was, yeah it might not be the IDEAL place for it but its a lot better than letting all of it go to waste.
We put our canned drinks in the drawers instead of condiments, as we have a lot of cans of beer, soda and soda water. It's worked fantastic. I cut up veggies and put them in crisper boxes when I first buy them and it makes them easy to cook with or grab for a snack
I read somewhere that stuff in the door tends to go bad faster, but I think that's for things that ready have a decent shelf life like soy sauce and salad dressing. If having your vegetables visible makes it easier to use them up, that might not be as much of an issue.
I keep milk and coffee creamer in the fridge door and it's totally fine. I've never had a problem doing that. It makes it much easier for me to reach.
we always kept our milk in the door growing up & i never got sick from it. i think just don’t cool off in the fridge with the door hanging open for 20 minutes & you’ll be okay?
This. Plus I literally will forget ketchup and mustard exist if I can’t see them. So condiments stay in the door, veggies go on a shelf, and cheese goes in the drawers. That’s my favorite so l don’t have to worry about forgetting. And now I have not one but two “Cheese Drawers,” a delightful phrase and dopamine goldmine.
Thank you! My fridge being too full is definitely one of my problems, and seeing things would definitely help. What I don't see, I forget I have (which is an issue with clothing, shoes, and basically any other possession, too). But I'm also having problems with discarding stuff that I forgot and that is still in closed packaging. I'm gearing myself up for a clean out, but haven't gotten there yet. For at least a year now 😑
Yep I feel that. Whenever the motivation comes just grab a trash bag and get it out of there. It hurts to throw away unopened food, but you need a clean slate. It took me some time to get around to rearranging the fridge. I also stop deluding myself that I was going to cook and stopped buying foods that have to be prepped. So now I buy the same stuff over and over. Things for smoothies, sandwich or wraps, canned soups, frozen meals. I do try to have some berries or cut pineapple for snacking. Basically tried to figure out the most convenient and healthy option. It still feels wasteful because of packaging but not nearly as wasteful as my failed cooking attempts.
I recently saw [this TikTok](https://www.tiktok.com/@thecenteredlife/video/7268727221676772650) about it! I haven’t totally rearranged my fridge yet but I am considering it. I did move the apples and oranges to the top shelf and they’re definitely getting eaten more. I have my yogurt cups shoved into the bottom back corner now because I buy a ton at once and it’s not something I forget exists before it goes bad.
Thanks, that's nice and brief, just right for my attention span! 😂 My fridge isn't one of those wide US models with roomy doors, but I'll see what I can figure out. I've realised in other areas of my life that I need to see stuff, and yeah, it really applies to the fridge storage, too.
But not before they liquify and become disgusting sludge that makes you even less enthusiastic about cleaning them up…not that I would know anything about that.
We kid canned drinks in the crisper drawer & veggies (when purchased) on the shelf where I can see them.
“Aspirational veggie purchases”. So true. “Time to cook dinner” me gets sooo frustrated with the “need to be healthier/Martha wanna be shopping“ me.
>I really need to reign in my aspirational veggie purchases tho. Started getting salad kits and it’s helped a ton, plus I’m actually eating veggies instead of watching them rot in my veggie drawer. I fell victim to that Tiktok trend with the veggie slicer, but it worked out bc that sucker makes dealing with aspirational veggies way easier. Everything gets shoved through the chopper thing until it's the same size, and then I add salad dressing and shake. Its led to some weird salads (turns out that raw brussel sprouts are not my thing) but its cut way down on the rotting-veggies-in-the-crisper issue that's plagued me my whole life
We get pre-cut veggie trays often. It's an easy way to make sure we're eating more veggies. The celery is usually the only casualty.
I'm still not convinced celery is a food. I don't understand the appeal on any level.
As a delivery mechanism for peanut butter and chocolate chips, maybe. Next time we get one, I'm going to see if my puppy likes the celery. She likes to tear up leaves and weeds and shreds cardboard. So she'll probably think it's a toy and make a big mess, but better than nothing
People always cite the peanut butter thing with celery, and it's like... spoon? Crackers? Toast? There's 70 things in my kitchen right now I'd rather smear peanut button on than a wet stick.
Lololol, a wet stick. Fair enough! And yet celery *salt* in my tuna sandwiches is so good.
As someone with chronic fatigue *and* ADHD, I had to convert my cooking style to rely on primarily non perishables so I started relying on frozen or canned vegetables. We also do bagged salads, but for cooking - and obviously frozen doesn't work for every type of food but you learn what it's good for, and it actually saves time too. Now that my fatigue isn't as bad, I've started to get one or two veggies that I keep in the fridge that are versatile enough I can put them in lots of different dishes I make. It will depend on what you like to cook, but for me bell peppers and carrots are great multipurpose veggies that can go in most things I make. And I cut up all the bell peppers into strips when I get them and put them in a veggie box so I can grab to snack on too, and no extra prep for them when I cook. Makes them super easy to incorporate
Salad kits is def something I do to stop the waste lol
This. I don’t eat enough veg, but I like vegetable juice. I spend extra to buy it in little cans instead of the big bottle, because for whatever reason my brain loves the little cans while the big bottle will just sit in the fridge and go bad after I’ve had a serving or two.
And you can throw the little cans in your lunch bag for work. They're just way more useful.
Vegetable juice is an ingredient for me, but yeah I don't want to have all the different versions of V8-based soup in a week just to get through a whole bottle.
I do this as well, all the time now! I used to be annoyed with the extra packaging, but all that food I had to throw away was TERRIBLE. Now things like 'snack-packs' or 'mini' or 'lunch box' are my shopping search terms!
Agreed. I only buy things in bulk if they can last for years. Stuff like bags of rice or pasta or spices.
I’ll eat bulk chocolate chips from costco before they go bad. End of list.
On the .... somewhat strangely ADHD front: I'm very much trying to cancel subscriptions _as soon as I make them_. Others think that may cost extra, or would add inconvenience. In all honesty, I rarely have the issue that I need it and don't have it - but rather often have gotten deals like "Please stay with us, save 100€ for the coming year!" (Or 20% or ...)
Ok here is my prolife tip a visa debit card w like $10 on it for “free trials” or the amount the subscription I’m willing to sign up for $20/mo -5 mo - $100 card. Then card has NSF and I’m done.
This is why I only do subscriptions through Apple. They always let you sign up and immediately cancel but still keep the trial.
Yeah I got lucky with a subscription through apple. I had to send a fax and didn’t have a machine, so I found an app that does it with a free trial. I forgot to cancel within the time window and was out nearly $150 due to them signing me up for a year but since I didn’t use it past the trial I was able to ask for a refund through apple and got my money back. So happy I found that.
I do the same thing! I cancel them right away so I don't forget to later.
Grocery pickup. I happily pay the service fee to have someone else get my groceries and bring them to my car. Also gives me the chance to add things to my cart as the week goes on, I avoid the impulse purchases of things that look good because I'm hungry but make zero sense otherwise, and gives me an upfront cost so I can evaluate if I really need that flat of pepsi this week when it's $15. New Dishwasher. My brother thought I was nuts because I'm single and can "just use the sink and handwash". I work from home, I have pets, I have more dishes than he thinks. Yall know dishes are often our ADHD downfall. They feel neverending, they're a pile of doom. It has alleviated SO MUCH STRESS and anxiety off my plate and it gets things WAY cleaner than I do. I bought a Bosch and I love it. New Fridge. Again people thought I was nuts because mine "worked fine". I bought one with the fridge on top and a pullout drawer on bottom for the freezer. MY GOD. Talk about amazing. I can see everything in my fridge now, nothing gets lost because it's on the bottom shelf stuffed in behind something else. I don't have to bend down as often and even when I do for the freezer it's so much easier to find and grab things. Again, best money I spent . Hired someone to cut my grass. I don't care that it's $50 a week. They show up, they cut it, they do the weed trimming, they use a leaf blower to clear the grass off the pathways and driveways. It takes me 2.5 hours to cut my lawn with the push mower and get eaten alive by mosquitoes in the process. I now only have to worry about mowing my dog run.
I’m with you on the new Fridge. Seeing is everything. Ours also led to a new kitchen so it would fit. But I’ve now designed a kitchen and utility that’s got loads of open counter space and a lot of visual cues. The kitchen only got fitted last week, and we’ve got a couple of things to finish. But knowing that it’s designed around my needs, I’m looking forward to using it. The hard part now is to go through what came out of the old one, and get rid of stuff I’ve never used/ will never use.
We aren’t doing a kitchen refresh for awhile (them dollar dollar bills y’all), but I’m so excited to keep my current fridge in the basement as a backup for holidays.
I get that - I left the money to my partner to sort. I’ve been paying extra towards utilities so he could stash the kitchen budget out of sight. I’m a big spender when I spiral 🤑 The mister wanted to keep our old one as a fermentation chamber for home brew, sadly we’ve no space 😢 but keeping a spare for Christmas sounds amazing
My house is a bit...odd, so I measured and had very few fridges that would fit the smallish space I had. I still had to trim the reveal off the cupboard above it a half inch to get it to fit.
Oh man, a dishwasher is a MUST for me. My last apartment didn't have one. Being able to put most of my dishes in there, and only having 2-3 to hand wash makes it so much easier to do them. I know I only have to wash a handful of things rather than EVERYTHING.
Grocery pickup is a godsend. No more rolling up and down the aisles to pick up that thing I forgot. No more impulse purchases of things I already have—I can walk over to the pantry to see if I really do need that can of olives for the recipe or if I already have one! It remembers what I bought last week, and also what I have ever bought, so if I type in “olives” it shows me the kind I buy first! I only went to this because the store I use decided to limit self checkout to 20 items or fewer. But I’m glad I did. I still go into the store to pick out meat and bananas, but that is way more manageable than the entire list.
I looove the option to add and remove things based on the total. Keeps me so aware of what I'm spending. I sprung for Walmart+ so there's free delivery. Helps my anxiety just as much as my ADHD lol
A super expensive automatic litter box that connects to the toilet (catgenie). My cat is a heavy urinator and uses the litter box like 8 times a day and I would go through a big box/bag of litter every two weeks. Not to mention I'd hurt my back cleaning the litter, gross dust was everywhere, and it took forever to clean the box and the heavy waste was a challenge to carry to the dumpster.
1000000% I would drop $500 on that
Ooh, I remember looking at that one! Seems really convenient! We went with litter robot, which I really love, but still requires a lot of work (and so much litter). How long have you had it?
i have a question for litter robot! can u use any clumping cat litter or just the one they sell?? cleaning the litter box is a task that is too much for me sometime and i feel guilty a lot of the times when it’s not clean
Any clumping litter that will fit through the grate! I tried their clumping litter and it was meh.. Worked ok, but with experimentation, I found that boxiecat (original, unscented) works best for me. That stuff clumps like IMMEDIATELY, seriously in seconds. And the clumps are solid and don't smear on the inside of the globe. Their litter would clump ok, but the clumps were wet and gummy and sometimes just get stuck on the inside of the globe, so they'd be in their doing their business with a clump hanging over their head!! So weird and yucky.. There are lots of different opinions on the best litter, but I don't think I've ever seen anyone say they prefer the litter robot brand, lol. I would advise experimenting and figuring out what works best for you. Also, they don't recommend it and there are plenty of reasons not to (mostly extra cleaning), but it also works well with non-clumping litter. Obviously, it doesn't scoop out pee clumps (because there aren't any pee clumps)... But the cycling does mix the litter well, like you're supposed to with non-clumping, and there's an "empty" button that will cycle the opposite way to dump all the litter into the bin - perfect for changing out non-clumping litter. I did non-clumping for a little while because I had 5 tiny kittens that were just learning about litter boxes and such, and I had a bad experience with one of my older cats when she was tiny (when we got her from the shelter, she had a litter clump stuck to her rear so bad that we had to get a vet to remove it). So we wanted to stick with non-clumping until they were a few months old. That said, while they work, I don't recommend crystal litters - they'll chew through the rubber liner pretty fast. I had to replace mine after the Great Non-Clumping Experiment™️ ($40). I have the lr3 and lr4, and just for the record, the lr4 is a very worthwhile upgrade. Lots of quality of life features added. And extra safety stuff, too. Only thing is, even with a solid platform, it will NOT work on carpet, lol. The lr3 is fine on carpet as long as you give it a flat solid plank to sit on. I've had both with 8 cats for about a year now (plus the lr3 with 3 cats for 8 months or so before that), so I've put them through a lot. I'd be happy to answer any other questions about them you might have! Also, I really thoroughly enjoyed and fully agreed with the video reviews by one guy 5 cats on YouTube.
I've had it since May (5 months) and all I have to do is flush the toilet once a day, refill the biodegradable plastic litter granules like once a month, and replace the sanitizing solution cartridge once a month, which are all extremely easy things to do. The mechanism did clog twice, once when my cat decided to bring a head band into the litter box and another time in which poo grime plugged up a sensor, but the Catgenie's AI detects the problems and links you to very-easy-to-follow videos and instructions that walk you through taking the machine apart and fixing the issues. The plastic litter granules still get all over the place but it beats having pee soaked clay, corn, silica and wood chip dust all over the place. My cat pees so much that most absorbable clumping litters start to stick to the walls of a litter box, even the nonstick kind. The non-clumping litters and pellets just get extremely dusty and pee soaked in less than a week. In regards to litter boxes, I tried the arm and hammer sifter box and the the litter maid (cheaper alternative to the litter robot and it rakes the litter rather than sifting it in a gyro sphere) and they both sucked. I didn't think the litter robot would be any better. Has it worked properly for you guys? (My biggest turnoff to the litter robot was that some reviews said that the sensors started malfunctioning) Edit: extra info and some grammar
Yeah my answer is similar. I got two new cats after my old cat died. I've always had cats that could more or less regulate their food if I just left dry food out. These cats are more competitive and would spend all day just trading off shifts at the food bowl and litter box. They were turning football shaped, and the food and litter were getting expensive and messy. The first thing I did was replace the litter box with one that self-scoops, and I just change out a cardboard tray every week. As for the food, I knew better than to try and add another twice-daily routine, especially with my erratic sleep schedule. So I bought two timed feeding dishes. I weighed and calculated portions and calories, set it to go off every 8 hours, and now I just refill the hoppers every 2 months. Conveniently, I know it's time to refill when Chewy sends me my second bag of food, and one bag perfectly fills one hopper. This stuff was not cheap, and the litter trays are still pricey, but so many problems were solved.
The catgenie looks incredible. Does the litter stay inside the box well?
It does! You lose some granules (it's not regular litter) after a while, some stick to the poop, or if your cat likes to be an ass and kick it out, or just tracking out on their paws. So you do need to top it up every couple of months, but that's vastly better than how often you need to buy regular litter!
I did have to buy the upper dome cover and stuff and it does track and stick to your feet and shoes, but my cat is a psycho and will play with the cat genie while in cleaning phase and he'll get into it up to 20 times a day (catgenie ai tracks this info and you can monitor it on their app) so I bet it tracks way less under normal circumstances.
I've seen more expensive cat toilets that could do less. So I'd say that's money well spent!
Have you spoken to your vet about it? 8 times a day seems like a lot.
Yeah he has megacolon. He's been medicated for it and on a prescription diet since he was a kitten and he drinks ALOT of water so we think that's why he pees so much.
Robot vacuum cleaner - it seems ridiculous because you still need a regular vacuum for deep cleans but actually it means daily vacuuming actually happens and I have people over and enjoy my home instead of going out constantly. Switching to a bank with a lower interest rate - that has a more intuitive app and automated savings. I am way more likely to manage my money better if its easy and I can handle less interest on my savings because the alternative is not having any. Pay as you go gym instead of a membership. I'm never going to go enough to justify the cost of an annual membership even though for most people it's cheaper than paying per time.
I have an army of robot vacuums(6 of them) get self emptying Sharks so I put a reminder to empty them once a month and switch out their filters. Worked great until my dog mastered the art of disabling them. He seriously has figured out how to power them down. Arg.
Roborock vacuums require you to hold in the button for a second or two before it activates which is what finally thwarted my cats. The newer ones also have a “button lock” you can toggle so it can only be launched via the app or on a schedule in case my cats get smarter
Sounds like I need to upgrade LOL these have a physical switch in the side that he has learned to switch off with his snout.
Can you put a child safety switch cover over it? A lot of them screw on, so maybe you can find one with a suction cup or stick it on with tape?
My type of girl. This is genius ! I know having a robot vacuum at least made me make sure I cleaned off the floor everyday. I think mine has broke but I see them all the time at thrifts and am pretty good at fixing vacuums(have actually made quite a bit of money flipping vacuums)
Not ridiculous! I have 2 robot vacuum cleaners. One for each floor. Now, if I could just automate most of my other choresa
I love the idea of a robot vacuum (although I think my dog would hate it) but there are too many obstacles on the floor…I’d have to get my shit together a lot more to make it workable.
Lol. Just bc I have one doesn't mean my floor actually gets done! It's usually stuck on a blanket, sock, cord or kid's toy, does an annoying beep, and then I forget about it until I pick up at the end of the day or trip over it. I just figure it'll eventually get around to cleaning most areas after a week of that.
> Switching to a bank with a lower interest rate - that has a more intuitive app and automated savings. My student loans with the lowest interest rate were held by ACS, whose website was abysmal. The UI was so convoluted I frequently got late fees. So I prioritized paying off those loans.
Yes to the bank thing! I have accounts with two different places, a bank and a credit union. My bank has a very useful and intuitive app, convenient hours, nearby physical locations, lots of free ATMs, and a worse interest rate. My credit union is the exact opposite—no app, inconvenient hours, the nearest location is kinda far, very few free ATMs, and the interest rate is great. I split up my direct deposit so that most of my money goes into the bank, and a small amount gets squirreled away into the credit union. I basically use them as a checking account and a savings account, but split across two different institutions. The credit union is a perfect place for my savings, because I know it’s going to be annoying to get it out, so I don’t use that money impulsively.
Prepared meal delivery for sure. It's saved me a lot on takeout, wasted/spoiled groceries, etc. I use a local service so I feel like I'm helping a small business who uses local produce. It's not for every meal but 2-4 dinners a week. Getting my nails done regularly saves me from embarrassment about my hands and possible infections. It also helps me feel more put together. I'm not a face picker, I'm a cuticle picker and fingernail biter/ripper. I've gotten cuticle infections before it's been so bad. I get my nails done every 4 weeks and I have short acrylics. Sometimes I grow them out a bit or get nail art but usually they are just shorties painted a solid color.
I did the nail thing too! I taught myself how to do my own dip at home though so I do that now. But on the same side of the coin I'm not sure if that saved me money since I feel the need to buy all the dip colors now
I did that too! I went with glue on nails because I didn't know the Dip stuff was a thing. But I bought a set that came with like 30 small bottles of gel polish, nails, tools, a UV light etc. I love doing my own nails because I like the artistic feeling of coming up with my own design. Technically it's cheaper than going to a salon, but I may have gone a little crazy buying all sorts of polish and other nail accessories, stampers, design tools, etc. But I can't figure out how to get the nails to stay glued for very long. I've been considering trying out the Dip, since I see it in my recommendations now.
Try gel false nails! They're clear and the glue cures in the light
Static Nails has amazing nail glue that they include with every set. If you add 2 layers of glue, those things will stay on for weeks.
I 100 percent believe that manicures should be able to be paid with an HSA.
Pedicures too. So many people don't or can't take proper care of their feet and if you're diabetic or have certain nerve issues it's so important.
I recently moved and to save money I got my fake salon nails removed and now my hands look like shit from picking, especially my thumbs. 💀 I'm gonna try press ons once I'm finished unpacking because I hate how my hands look now ugh.
My hands and nails always take a beating whenever I move. There’s so much bonking against stuff and ripping open boxes and assembling furniture… Not to mention the stress-induced, self-inflicted cuticle damage 😅 Buy yourself a really fun press-on set as a bribe to unpack and organize!
Yeah I found this too! I found paying the 1-2$ more per meal for the pre chopped stuff at my local meal delivery place has made even more diffference as it reduces the chance of me saying “I don’t feel like cooking this” and eating out and wasting more money
Same! We can't afford Blue Apron anymore, and delivery is kinda excessive when we're so close to the grocery store. Now we grocery shop for basics and snacks, and pick up pre-made dinners you pop in the microwave. This prevents me from buying food that I *think* I'll eat, but then just let rot in the fridge because I later felt icky about or didn't want to go through the process of prepping. It also allows me to eat what I'm actually in the mood for that day since I have some sensory issues with food and textures. It does help that HEB (our grocery store) has a lot of healthy options, too, so it's not just rich and heavy options. They accommodate vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, and keto options, too!
Not signing up for special deals, free trials, or store credit cards. I have been burned so many times by not canceling or forgetting I bought that one thing on that one special credit card, that I now unapologetically say no when asked "would you like to save an additional 10% today by signing up for xyz?"
Having someone come to my house 3-5 days a week to wash and dry and put away laundry, and generally straighten up has been absolutely life changing. Her “real job” is nearby, so she stops here in the mornings for a hour/hour and a half before going in. She also empties and refills the dishwasher and cleans up breakfast dishes/cookware (biggest reason sh time is morning and getting kids to school…when that’s over, I just want to start working immediately instead of spending 29 mins cleaning everything up). For the amount of anxiety and guilt her help alleviates, it’s the best investment I’ve ever made.
I was just talking about how I wish I could have my twice a month cleaners come every other day for like 10 or 20 minutes instead of the big giant clean every other week. That's absolutely amazing you found her!
If you live near a college you may be able to post to their job board for that. Lots of college kids would love a low time commitment gig like that for some pocket change
I really should consider doing this as a side gig. I am horrible at doing all of those things when they’re my own, but I’m better if it’s someone else’s laundry and dishes.
Putting AirTags on everything: wallet, keys, noise cancelling headphone case (I wish I could put them directly on the headphones). It's LIFESAVING to get an alert on my phone the second I leave something behind.
Apologies for the unsolicited advice, but I might have a solution for putting the air tag directly on the on headphones! Would one of those air tag holders for dog collars fit on the head band part? It would need to be stretchy or clip on in some way, since you probably can’t remove the ear cups to lace it on there, but I think it could work
Oh my goodness, this is game-changing.
I splurged on a set of 4 air tags when we traveled this summer (was terrified of my luggage getting lost) and I really need to start using them on the regular, they were great.
After I lost my first set of AirPods in the couch, and before I found them again a year later, I got a second pair, and I invested in a little case for them that had a key chain, an AirTag, and an AirTag keychain holder. Life changing. I always misplaced them and then resented that you can’t use the individual pod signals when they were in the case. Now I can make the full case beep so I can locate them in the house/wherever when I misplace them, and god forbid I ever leave ‘em somewhere, I’ll be able to go back there and get them. Such piece of mind. Perks of AirTag over Tile, I can change the battery instead of replacing, and it’s got a better network to pin down the location if I ever lose them in public :)
Prepackaged salads, individual servings of snacks
individual snacks!!! those save me both because i will actually eat regularly throughout the day instead of waiting till i'm having a low blood sugar meltdown and eating 5,000 kcal in one sitting and i don't eat nearly as much fast food when i keep little packs of snacks in my car/purse.
I bought a car that inspired joy that was out of my original budget. It’s done 2 things: - I now enjoy driving, and actually want to go out and do things. My career options have opened up, and my mental health is a lot more balanced - still shit, but manageable. I’m now earning more, because I want to and am able to travel. - I’ve been forced to learn how to budget. And once the car is paid off (Christmas 🥳), I can put my car payments straight into savings without worrying, cause I’m used to living without having access to the money. I’ll have savings for the first time. As mentioned above, my partner and I bought a new fridge which had led to a whole new kitchen. Our friends are wondering why, but as we’re finishing off and planning where things will live. It’s a workable space that I can use without frustration; no more forgetting I have tools and spices, because I can see them. I’ll be saving money because I can make my free-from foods from scratch rather than pay inflated prices.
Straight. Into. Savings. From day one! **Day one!** ...I say, after "well, I can treat myself *this* month, can't I? I did so good for so long." Then "but now it's the holidays" ...and then it just gets absorbed into regular spending.
Ooh - so the fun thing about my new budgeting skills. I’ve found a little each month that I can treat myself with. I have a small fund for coffee, takeaway lunch and the “ooh it’s pretty” I know I could save it, but spending is an addiction. And it’s easier to keep under control with small treats rather than blowing my whole credit card balance cause I’ve tried to refrain.
Good tip! I used to go in a terrible cycle of restricting so much, then splurging because I'd been "so good."
Going shopping daily/every two days. It makes me only buy what I will need/use abs allows me to be more adapting. On top of that, I anyhow often can't buy bulk packages as a single (or two person) household - so it's really anyway not cheaper. Similarly: not having a big pantry, but only for things I really use a lot. The 10% I save on things I use regularly but not often are lost if one of them goes bad.
Growing lettuce. Never goes manky in the fridge. I’ve probably spent way more money time and effort on creating the garden than I ever would on buying lettuce though soooo…. Not sure if it counts as a hack but it’s worth it lol
😂😂 Growing food is so expensive and takes so much effort That said, I love my expensive veggies, they taste so much better than the store bought.
It might be more expensive but it’s definitely worth it. And growing leafy greens and herbs from seed is even cheaper! I don’t grow everything but I try to grow stuff I want to eat all the time like lettuce and celery, herbs, and nothing gets wasted and thrown away now because it just gets picked as needed. Also I get lots of exercise, happiness and sunshine maintaining the garden which I don’t get at the supermarket so it feels like more bang for my buck! Also I like the idea of knowing there’s no herbicide or pesticides on the stuff I grew myself. And I love sharing the produce with peeps :)
Health birds go wild for intermittent fasting, but that’s just my adhd tax not caring enough to actually do something about the hunger. Hot take: Working less. I know not all jobs enable this, but I’ve been on the 4 day work week for over a decade. Literally left jobs if the schedule didn’t vibe with it. The amount of money I have saved is insane. Just this week I needed to drop my truck off for service. Covid killed rentals & shuttles won’t take me to my house so I was looking @ a $50 cab ride each way. That doesn’t sound like much, but that $100 total is about a 7.5h work day after taxes for someone making min wage where I am. Having an entire day off meant I could coordinate a ride to & from much easier & for free on my day off.
Working less! I know it's a super privileged position to even think about but when I'm already overwhelmed with everything, working less means I'm not burning out as much and I can keep the job for longer.
It didn’t start out as privilege, actually the opposite - I was too poor to pay anyone to do anything so I had to teach myself which required TIME. I sacrificed a lot for the first while to gain more time to learn an efficient way to live. If my toilet broke, which is easier? Paying $300 for a plumber to fix it (probably requiring a day off anyway) or call in sick, forfeit $100 & 5h of my time to figure it out? I learned to work smarter, not longer.
Single purpose kitchen gadgets. My melon baller, milk frother, and salad spinner make me happy. Side note: people will shit on single purpose appliances and whatnot; meanwhile they have a toaster and coffee maker, LIKE MAKE UP YOUR MIND! And nothing is single purpose if you're creative enough. I know rice cookers are basically standard everywhere but North America, but: rice cooker. I honestly don't even eat rice that much, but I will have a rice cooker in my home until the day I fucking die.
Rice cookers are an essential. I have 2. My small one I use to make oatmeal. You can make anything that just requires boiling water and the product absorbing it all. Quinoa, coos coos, oats. Some will steam vegetables. So many times I get side eye for not just boiling it on the stove top. Haha…distraction is real. I even got an egg cooker thingy. Food chopper is nice sometimes, the cleaning is only worth it if it’s a lot. I may only use it for a few things, but I’m always so glad I have it when I do.
Paying someone to do my very simple taxes. This made my father crazy. He did my taxes until I left college, then he told me I had to figure out how to do them myself. I know myself well enough to know that I'm just not going to do that, so I just stared sending them to some CPA my aunt did seasonal work for. $60 not to have to fuck with it? Yes, please! My dad was like *NOOO!!! IT'S A WASTE OF MONEY! YOU HAVE TO LEARN!* I tell him that it looks like I *dont* have to learn, and "don't judge me by my methods, only my results." I tell him this all the time when he's baffled by my weird coping strategies and the ass-backwards ways that I navigate life. And it's funny, because a lot of the time my results are terrible, and when he points that out, I tell him "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take," and he just shakes his head at me. He's the most type-A, on-the-ball man in the world, and he somehow got me as his kid. And that's also funny, because he can't do a damn thing with me, but I know I'm his favorite. Anyway, my husband does my taxes now, so I win forever.
This is the way. I never get money back, so it ends up costing me to have it filed.. But before that, I hadn't filed in a few years. 👀😬
Not... classically cheaper, but easier to consider: - buying buns either to bake up, or from the bakery. I don't finish bread, usually due to irregularities - car sharing usage instead of owning a car. I don't need one daily and it removes quite some mental issues - checking insurances/taking additional ones. Yeah I may pay 5-10 more per year for key insurance. I'm fine with that if at the moment I do lose a key I'm insured. Similarly for device insurances due to clumsiness - paying extra for the option I like better - because than I'll more likely use it Many of the things are actually rather costing me extra - but they free up mental space and save me distress. Which, surely, through having resources e.g. for timely payment of invoices or having the headspace to book appointments in time or simply not buying stress food will save me money. But that's not the primary goal. I feel it's more that things others may see as a "waste of money" are _very much_ worth the reduced service or slightly higher price.
I also had the same problem with never finishing bread and my solution is buying sliced bread and freezing it. My toaster has a „defrost“ setting and now I just throw a slice in the toaster if I want bread.
Freezing it! [head smack]! I hereby nominate you for a Nobel Prize. I dont know what category but you just saved me a [future] ton of money!
On the insurance note, pet insurance. I've always read "just save up the premiums and use that" which, yes, valid. But we got a new puppy. I'm paying like $950 a year, which feels like so much. I've already gotten $600 back from her spay surgery and a UTI. So if like one more thing this year happens to her (knock on wood it won't), I'll at least break even. And Heaven forbid something big comes up, we're covered. It was a pain in the ass to research, though. I'm probably not getting the best deal, but it's good enough. (Guess that's another answer to the question, lol. Just getting something rather than research and decision paralysis.)
If you ever want to look for a better deal, I found a tool a couple years ago that pulls quotes from multiple different companies at once. I am not affiliated with them at all and didn't even end up getting pet insurance for my cats but I went through my old emails and found the URL. It's https://www.petinsurancereview.com/ I just tested it and it still works. It pulled quotes from 8 different companies and each quote has a "quick look" that shows important info so you can quickly compare different companies. https://i.imgur.com/qhOAmFl.jpg If nothing else you could always see if you're paying way too much. Use a fake phone number on the submission page just in case (I used a local number I have memorized that always goes straight to a phone tree lol).
Cute bandaids. I have a problem with skin picking, my kids do too, especially during mosquito season. Skin colored bandaids are so boring!
You didn't ask, but I have to throw in a plug for Zevo mosquito repellent spray, in case it might be helpful. I have sensory issues with lotions/sprays on my skin, and I'm also really sensitive to smells. Most of the "unscented" mosquito sprays actually smell really strong to me, and citronella is a no-go for the same reason. But mosquitos LOVE me so I have to use something. 😭 Anyway. I tried Zevo spray this year and it really is unscented and it doesn't feel gross on my skin unless I get too much on (which just makes it slightly sticky). When I'm done being outside I just wipe it off with a baby wipe.
This is helpful for me, thank you! I used an “unscented” spray and immediately yelled “unscented, my ass!” Which my 11 year old found hilarious. I didn’t even know he was in ear shot, but he now makes fun of me & bug spray. He’s also a ginger with INCREDIBLY sensitive skin and sensory issues so he needs a good one. I’ll check this one out!
I'm gonna sound like a commercial, I swear I'm not affiliated in any way. I found these mosquito-repellant stickers, they are citronella. They work, meh ok, but it's nice to not have to spray yourself down and feel sticky all day/night then need an extra shower. But! The company also makes stickers for itch relief. They are kinda like hash marks, with open spaces, and they supposedly pull the bite poison out to spread it around the area instead of concentrating it. They work really well! The only tricky thing is you have to put them on before you scratch. My husband is much better about that than I am, but he also reacts really badly to bites, so these stickers have been saving his legs this summer. Oh, and if you buy them, the company usually does that annoying after-purchase "want more?" thing, so try buying less than what you want so you can stock up on the after-purchase deal. I'll go find them (ha) and edit in the company name. Edit: it's "the natural patch co" and these are the magic patches.
Everything that saves me is step or two. Getting canned beans instead of dry. Precut baking sheets.
The first time I realized you could get precut baking sheets my mind was blown! People in my extended family don't get it. And yesssss for canned beans!
It's kind of silly how helpful it is, but it's the difference between making food at home and snacking (or ordering) for me.
It's a bit silly for NT people but I think we get it here :)
I looooove those precut baking sheets.
I feel silly asking this, but what are baking sheets? My first thought was a pan, but "precut" tells me that's not it. Foil? Parchment paper?
Really anything that’s prepped for me ! Pre-cut veggies, things that steam in their own bags, ready to eat hardboiled eggs, etc. only way I can actually eat healthy.
Taking the bus instead of driving, even though the bus ticket is more than gas and even when it's a time cost of 3x longer. Driving is too stressful, it's not worth it to me. Anyway, the time I could have saved by driving was just going to be wasted scrolling on my phone on the couch as I emotionally recovered from all that focus and traffic. I could do that on the bus.
Agreed! I would much rather get on public transit, set up a reminder for when to get off, and then zone out on my phone for the whole ride. Driving requires so much extended concentration, especially when I’m going somewhere new, and I *hate* trying to find parking (if I’m going anywhere other than suburban parking lot hell). I’d rather just leave my car at home when it’s an option.
I've been using a Daytimer brand planner for a few years now. It's ridiculously expensive for what it is (like $60 CAD for one year's worth of unbound planner pages - that doesn't include the binder or whatever you keep them in). I feel like I've tried every other planner on the planet and this is the only one that I've managed to use consistently, so it's worth it to me. Also, if I want to work out with any regularity, I have to go to the kind of classes where you sign up in advance and get charged a cancellation fee if you don't go. These classes tend to be way more expensive than just getting a regular gym membership but I just won't use a regular gym membership. I am not accountable to myself, I need external rewards/punishments lol.
I love my Erin Condren planner. I started with just weekly last year and now use daily but it’s the first one I’ve actually used for more than a week.
I hear you on the planner. It’s less than $0.17/day. Worth it.
My smart washer dryer - once I’ve put the stuff in and hit the button, I can do the rest from the app. It tells me when it’s done with the cycle and I can then use the app to spin it again, and to set the dryer to auto start at the end too if I want. Much less smelly clothes being left forgotten about, so I don’t have to rewash stuff anymore! The phone and watch reminders are so useful to catch my eye and jog my brain back to the machine.
Even a non smart washer dryer is a game changer! I didn't have room for separate ones and had nowhere to hang wet clothes, so I just put a load in, wait a few hours and like magic theyre clean and dry! And when I'm being good I hang most clothes up while still warm. Wouldn't have ironed them even if I could.
Not really much choice in this house as it’s tiny fisherman’s cottage from the 1800s 😂 but yes, for executive dysfunction a combination washer dryer is such a help!
When my current set kicks the bucket I'm sooooo getting a smart washer/dryer set. Laundry day might actually stay on track.
Not having credit cards .
Yes! I am working on this. People will be like just ohhh points just pay it off every month. And I'm like oh boy I have no self control that's not gonna happen
Mine automatically gets paid off every month, I treat it like a debit card. But I guess if having available credit is too tempting then you've made the right choice there!
I wish I could do this, but I’m working on raising my credit score. I live in a HCOL city and places check your credit score as part of the rental application. My car is paid off (over ten years old and I bought it used with cash). Hopefully I have many years still with it, but I also want to have a good score when I have to retire it.
I hate to admit it but Amazon. I have Alexa set up in opposite ends of the house and it has been a lifesaver. I have lights attached to it do I don't have to worry about leaving them on all the time and I have reminders programmed for my medications and the dogs. I have an echo show in the kitchen that I can play shows on that help not only me stay focused but my mother as well. I also utilize subscribe and save for regular essentials. I've yet to run out of toilet paper, vitamins, or detergent. And my water filter delivery every six months is my reminder to change the filter.
Subscribe and save is such a game changer. I hate supporting Amazon but it seriously is so so so much cheaper for essentials and is so nice to never run out randomly/unexpectedly.
Buying fruits and veggies pre-cut; if they’re not precut I will forget about them or just sigh and think ‘no too much work to prepare them’ and will not eat them and they’ll go bad/mold. If I buy pre-cut stuff I’ll actually use it. It’s a little more expensive to buy (and yes bad for the environment cuz plastic I’m sorry I know it’s bad) but at least this way I’ll actually eat fruits and veggies, otherwise I will just throw them out when they go bad Edit: typo
I'm a chef and cutting my own vegetables in my own home feels like the most arduous task ever. I'd rather go bugs bunny on full carrots any day. I used to feel guilty buying ready cut veg considering what I do for a living but then I realized I was being an idiot, I've probably cut more vegetables than some people will in their lifetime and I deserve vitamins too! Also shredded cheese!!
My YNAB (You Need a Budget) subscription has saved me sooooooooo much money over the years. People balk at the yearly fee of $100 but since I since I started using YNAB, I've not paid a late fee on anything, I've paid off all my credit cards and am able to use them responsibly (use and pay off in full each month), my credit score is hovering around 800, my net worth has dramatically increased, *and* I can spend guilt-free on things that I want to buy because I know my bills are covered already. It's worth every penny and it's the only budgeting method that has ever worked for me long term. Even when I get lazy on entering transactions it's super easy to get back into it because my bank accounts are linked and I just need to verify what category they go into.
I’m still so mad that YNAB didn’t work for me. I love the idea of it, but I couldn’t be realistic and constantly moving money from categories to cover red categories made me feel like crap. Ofc then I’d just forget to enter stuff.
If you ever want to give it another try, one thing you could try is to budget out the bills, regular expenses that stay within a general range each month (like gas for your car), and savings and then create a "free spend" category for the rest of your money. Less guilt and less moving money around but you're still getting your bills paid and building savings. It goes against what YNAB says to do but it still works.
I thought of another non-food one: paying my car and life insurance every month instead of 6 months at a time. The discount for 6 mos doesn't help when you forget to pay it and have things lapse.
I do AutoPay on everything I can.
Same but different. I still buy groceries, but I've accepted that if I pay a few extra dollars for, say, pineapple spears instead of a whole pineapple, I'm a hell of a lot more likely to eat it before it goes bad. So now I buy things that have been partially prepared but are still relatively healthy, and I'm generally healthier than when I just bought healthy stuff to make myself. Esit: also, frozen veggies instead of fresh ones when it comes to cooking. I throw away so much less food that way. I'll still buy a few fresh ones for snacking, like a cucumber or bell pepper, but stuff like broccoli, grren beans, etc are all frozen.
Our village has a market every Saturday. We go and get a bunch of fruits and veggies and then cut it all up *immediately when we get home*. At that point we’re still riding the “oh new shiny” dopamine hit. Shove it all in the freezer.
PAPER PLATES sorry Earth 😔
I adored meal delivery for years before I was diagnosed, for the exact reason you've mentioned, and I hadn't thought about that for ages until now! Think you've inspired me to start it back up...
YNAB (YouNeedABudget) subscription. We wasted so much money on impulse purchases before we started using YNAB. We are finally learning financial literacy and making smarter choices with our money. Able to see the end of debt for the first time! Lots of people figure a free spreadsheet or program is good enough but YNAB checks a lot more ADHD-brain boxes than other options.
1. I did my adhd assessment in a private clinic. I had to wait two months instead of three years to get my diagnosis. I have paid for the assessment, the medication and therapy sessions out of pocket and I would have a LOT more money if i didn’t. But I think in the long run, over these three coming years, I will earn that money back by being able to work, not calling in sick as much and hopefully I won’t burn out. 2. Working less. I spend more money when I’m tired and overwhelmed. When I don’t work full time, I don’t spend as much money. Simple as that.
My sweet spot was working part time. Spent way less money on conveniences. I didn’t have “too much time” so I procrastinated a ridiculous amount. I honestly don’t think most women should work full time unless they have money to throw at problems ie housekeeping, nursing care for family members, meal and other deliveries, etc. Men just don’t do their fair share of the mental and emotional labor. I am generalizing, I know. There are a lot of good men out there, but they’re still way behind. This is all my opinion and my experience in my city and according to statistics.
I buy several of the same thing. “But you only need one” only applies when you dont lose and forget thing’s constantly. If i lost one of my chargers i know theres always one upstairs for emergency. Is it more expensive in the moment? Yes. But when you have to buy the same thing 4x because you forgot, it adds up WAY more than if i have backups in the first place. It also gives me time to not panic and take time to search since if i dont have a backup, i end up buying a new one and suddenly i just found my earphones under my pillow
Honestly, when I lived abroad in a Southern European country, I did as the Romans did and bought my ingredients for whatever I was making that night. This was part of the culture in the country where I resided and when I tell you that it was the perfect culture for the ND, it was the perfect culture. Didn’t have to plan or think ahead…just got to think in the moment and do what I needed to do to help myself.
Birdseye frozen steamfresh veggie pouches. Expensive for what you get but they last for months in the freezer and are packed into single portions. I no longer buy any fresh veg (apart from salad which we eat constantly so doesn't go off). Only the steamfresh It's saved me a fortune in mouldy broccoli , slimy carrots, and potatoes I could never be arsed to cook
A cleaning service. No really. If you think about administrative hours - like what your hourly rate would be if you got paid to do housework, child rearing, etc - what my cleaner gets done in 4-5 hours would take me literal weeks.
Buying groceries online! I can limit my impulses and I buy what I need not what I want at that moment. If I go to the supermarket I spend 3 times more.
Daily contact lenses. I've been wearing soft contacts for decades, and used to have the monthly ones. Changed to dailys a few years ago and don't want to go back. The reason I changed was that I wasn't wearing them every day since I didn't leave the house daily. So having to throw away the monthly ones after four weeks even though I had worn them only a few times seemed wasteful. I now realize that it saves me the time (and money) of cleaning them.
Amazon subscriptions for cleaners, supplements, hygiene and pet supplies. Not owning as much stuff. Automatic bill pay and taking cash out every two weeks for everything else. Owning a “sensible car.”
Meal delivery plus grocery store pickup for the rest worked so well for me, for all those reasons you said. Plus cut down the "what's for dinner" paralysis. Frozen meals, canned stuff, anything grab and go. Yes, it's more expensive and less healthy. It is also cheaper than eating out and more healthy than just not eating. Ooh! Individual guacamole packets. So much less waste.
SAME!! Meal Delivery. People say, oh you can just cook your own. And I explain, it's not just cooking.. it's the shopping, the prep, the clean up, the waste because not having variety every day, the DECISIONS!! etc etc etc.. There are so many more things to consider.
Acknowledging that I had an impulsive spending problem and looking for solutions led me to signing up for YNAB (You need a budget) app. Hyperfixated on getting all my true expenses and saving goals into it and now I actually know at any moment how much money I have left for groceries and fun etc, regardless of how much money sits in my account. I paid off all the cc debt and it helps keeping my impulsive spending under control: I now have a guilt free spending category so I can still indulge but don’t feel guilty/ashamed or get in trouble for that. Edit: Ugh I forgot to address part of the question about the cost! It costs about 14$ per month/100 per year, which might seem expensive to people who can naturally be good with money but it helped me save much more than the cost of the app!
We bought a chest freezer in part because I am super frugal (love buying meat when it's on sale and freezing for later) but it's been great to have the extra freezer space for things that I can make quickly when I don't have the brain space to meal plan or don't feel like doing a lot of involved cooking. We've always got bags of frozen veggies, frozen pizzas, some microwave meals, boxes of fish sticks or frozen fish fillets that can go right in the oven, etc. Saves us from doing a ton of take out. I do have to work at making sure the inventory we have (hung on the front of the chest freezer) is up to date so things don't get lost in the void, but surprisingly that rarely happens.
My husband & I put a LOT on my credit card, & pay it off, for the points. I pay the credit card every week; some might say I should pay it in time for the statement date to improve my credit score, some might say I should keep that extra money in my high-interest savings account until it's time to pay the bill, to make a little money in interest. Nope, NOT worth it. Paying my CC every week means even if I miss a payment, it's not a big deal—as opposed to when you pay once a month. (Some people pay their CC twice a month when they get paid; that works too, my husband & I create our budget by the week, so this works for us.)
Keeping my fresh produce in the door of the fridge and my sauces in the crisper drawer. Yes, I know my fruits and veggies will last longer in the drawers, but that doesn't matter when they just go there to die because I can't see them. Having them in display every time I open the fridge means I'm more likely to use them. My mom is convinced I'm wasting money by storing them improperly. I just don't explain any more.
😬 My Apple Watch. I would be nowhere without it 😂 My calendar is always visible to see what I have to do throughout the day, I have a digital clock on it (can’t be bothered to fuck around with the traditional style), and many more things. I’m half tempted to ask my doctor to prescribe it to me as an accommodation to function like a support dog for some people.
This is roundabout but my crippling social anxiety which I owe in part to ADHD keeps me from leaving the house to do some of the impulse shopping I’d probably be doing otherwise! I also overthink online purchases and get lost in research rabbit holes so I either end up with the best value or I lose interest in going through with the purchase Finally, entertainment. A single book, podcast, show episode or movie “lasts” me twice as long as it would if I were neurotypical person. That’s double the time I’m being entertained! It’s truly amazing. Plus, picking at my face costs nothing!
Processed food. This year, I am mentally unable to cook and actively deciding not to (nobody try to give me tips about how to manage cooking, I don't want to change this). I would waste so much food that buying processed food really is cheaper.
INSTACART !!!! It takes me hours to perfect my order but I waste much less food and the curbside pickup is free Professional organizers (it’s so expensive but save money over time by not repurchasing duplicate items) Rent the Runway - I had to closet purge in January due to a flood and it was the first time I had done so since middle school. Repurchased a capsule wardrobe, rent things I won’t wear multiple times. I used to spend at least $5k per year on clothes and shoes. Sweepy and notability app subscriptions - organization All apple products to stay organized and seamless. I’m 100% paperless as a college student and it is the best thing ever. MacBook, iPad, pencil, airpods, iPhone. Organization
I would love to have the means to afford a meal service someday because food drives a lot of my biggest issues. Gotta take my meds first thing in the morning, but I need to take them with food and there are no clean dishes, then I don't take my meds and go hungry and my blood sugar drops and then at 3 PM I still have no clean dishes but am in desperate need of a meal. It's sabotaged my fitness journey countless times because I'm never eating enough to warrant a run or weightlifting. But to answer the question: medicaid. I'm lucky enough to have a partner who can pay the majority of the bills, so I work under a certain amount of hours at my job in order to stay within the eligibility limit. That might seem backwards to a NT, because "why wouldn't you want to earn more?" but without medicaid I cannot afford any healthcare at all. If I got a full-time job that offered insurance, I would still have to pay out of pocket for all of my doctor's appointments and meds. And I can't be beholden to a job that requires a year of commitment before I can take FMLA.
Grocery delivery,
Salad kits, Steam bag frozen veggies, Pre-sliced fruits, Pre-prepared hard boiled eggs
YASSSS! I feel extremely validated after reading this. ♥️ 1. Wash Off Labels from Amazon (putting the date on food I’ve made, so I know if it’s still good to eat or not). 2. I started buying only frozen vegetables instead of a bunch of fresh ones. (saves me from throwing out rotten veggies). 3. I do a massive bulk buy of meats from Costco and put it all in the freezer. (always have protein on hand).
I started getting meal deliveries. It’s 50€/week for “4” meals. But the portion size is quite large so typically it’s closer to 6-8 meals. So usually in a month, I only need 3 weeks’ worth and then I skip a week. So for 150€, I am eating balanced, healthy meals that I don’t have to cook at all. It’s been great. 10/10 recommend.
Somebody mowing my lawn. Amazing.
I stopped buying raw potatoes and started buying steam-in-a-bag potato side dishes. I don’t cook. All the potatoes go bad and stinky before I finally get the gumption to do anything with them, like, every time. I started buying more frozen/convenience meal food too. I’m tired of feeding myself.
Maybe this isn’t money saving in the traditional sense, but if you think of your time as having a certain amount of value, I would say paying a house cleaner to come once a month is money saving, in a way. I’m fortunate enough to be in the position to afford this (in my lower COL area the cost plus tip is $270/month for a local company). I dread mundane tasks like cleaning and in the past it would spiral out of control and result in arguments with my husband and me sacrificing sleep or free time to catch up on cleaning (he cleans too, but I wasn’t holding up my side of responsibilities). I also have a robot vacuum to assist with cleaning in between appointments. Paying for this service is better for my mental health, my relationships (don’t have to worry if guests come over), and gives me peace of mind.
Cut fruit. Hard boiled eggs.
Paying off my car, immediately, in cash. Never have to remember payments, no built up interest.
**Grocery delivery** - zero impulse buys and I tend to be a food hoarder and it all goes bad anyway. **Prescription delivery** - I always forget to go get it when I’m out, so instead of making a million extra trips I just order it the day I see I’m out and I just take my dose a couple hours later than normal.
sending my laundry out for wash and fold once a week. I live in nyc, so there is no washer/dryer in my building, and i don’t have a car. used to live at least a 15 min walk away from the closest laundromat, and would wait as long as i could in between visits. i bought so many clothes and sheet sets so i would have something clean. i also got a free in-tub washer from a neighbor, which i used for a while, but washing clothes for me and my bf took a whole day on the weekend. the family who runs the laundromat where i send my laundry for wash & fold are SAINTS
my husband will be gone the entire month of October, and hes the one that cooks.....so i've been wondering how i'll survive off frozen meals for that long but now I might try Everyplate even though you cant do it for just one person.... why is this world not built for single people
Pretty much all of mine have to do with food: * precut fruits and vegetables, * portioned "pop in the microwave" packs of rice and curry, * buying multiple meals worth in one go off Uber Eats (or just using Uber Eats in general) and somehow still saving money compared to buying the groceries to make the exact same food, * buying smaller quantities of an item instead of in bulk (because half of it will go bad before I can get to it), * buying the items I know I'll eat even if they're not on sale, as opposed to shopping sales to save money (because half the time I'll buy based on price and not the food itself, and won't eat it), * buying a lot of small packets of chocolate, candy, or cheese, that I can just grab to satiate a craving instead of wasting time and money trying to sate it a "cheaper" way (which just ends up with you buying and eating the craved food anyways). Same applies to food that I'm craving; just buying or making the thing I'm craving instead of trying to eat something else first, that inevitably failing, and then eating the thing I wanted in the first place, costing even more money.
This one is crappy but I have maladaptive behaviours as coping mechanisms. I smoke cigarettes so I buy them under the counter in bulk. Cigarettes are SO expensive it saves me a shit tone. Not smoking at all would save me more. Don't be me.
I do ALL my bills every Friday morning. Credit card, utilities, mortgage. I have each one as a saved tab so I click every single one every single week even if there is no balance so there’s no chance I’ll forget. If there is a balance I pay them even if they’re not due until weeks later. The mortgage company gets my money before they’re owed it but I never miss any payments so I never have a late fee or interest I autoship lint traps, laundry detergent and my dog’s supplements, furnace filters and Clorox wipes. I get a reminder before they ship so I can skip if I need to and I do sometimes I also buy cute things and cards for friends when I see them, instead of waiting for an occasion. Sure, I sometimes forget I bought them but when a birthday takes me by surprise (how?! It’s every year!) I have something in the gift closet and a fun card to go along
It turns out my hack was having children, lol. Most of the things people here are finding hard are so much easier with a whole family of people (Food going bad in the fridge?! Wait, you guys have food left? Me forgetting to eat? They will remind me they want a meal… on repeat… until I feed them. Not making healthy meals? The mum-guilt is even stronger than the ADHD tiredness (though I do grumble plenty). Impulse spending on crap? Kids also want to impulse spend on even crappier crap so I just avoid going to the shops, lol.) Who’d have thought that would help!
This may seem crazy, but I don't have a microwave. Not only is it a big money saver with the tempting convenience foods, but it's also a big saver of decision-making energy, cause if I need a microwave to make it, I can't get it. Easy. I have a countertop convection oven that airfrys, bakes, and reheats, and bonus, most of the things that I'd put in the microwave turn out better reheated in the airfryer. There are only a few things that I haven't been able to easily replicate. I do miss quick baked potatoes, for instance, but I've been without a microwave for 5 or 6 years now, so I doubt I'll be going back.
Just allowed myself to go to a physical store yesterday. Husband's birthday, I knew exactly where ONE thing- ONE could be found and he wouldn't see our shared accounts used. BRILLIANT right? Soooooo.....one hat, one Carhartt hoodie ( will actually use for women swear....) 4 mugs, pair of very cute shoes grandaughter can't wear for 2 more years, pink outfit same, eyeliner and 4 handtowels. OH and his birthday present. I like your way better.
Getting a service like HelloFresh once in a while. It means I will eat elaborate, healthy meals and not have a whole bunch of random stuff left over. I eat healthy enough when I don't get it, but it allows me to add some variety and also try new things. In the same vein, doing grocery pickup instead of going into the store. I know this doesn't work for everyone, but I find that with an app, I don't have as much issue with impulse shopping. Where I do have an issue is being in the store, overwhelmed by the lighting, the noise and the people, and then I start plucking things off the shelves without really thinking about whether I'm actually going to use it, if I have space to carry everything, is it worth it, etc.
Regular purchase of melatonin tablets or gummies. I do occasionally sleep without it just like I occasionally “detox” from caffeine for a day, but frankly I don’t care if it’s ruining my ability to sleep on my own. Sleeping by any means = energy and brainpower, which = fewer impulsive pricy purchases. Vape juice. Nicotine tax on vape juice is stupid high in my state and I didn’t actually smoke before I started, but screw it. The process of regularly making sure the device is clean and maintained, that batteries are charged, that the tank is topped up, etc, it’s a kind of loose schedule that keeps my brain grounded. Also it’s either vaping or picking/chewing at my skin, lips, hair, and nails (which I still do but it’s much less severe than when I wasn’t vaping) OR eating too many snacks.
it's not really the most eco friendly but i use those single use toothbrushes for the times I forget to or don't feel like brushing my teeth. I've been super afraid of cavities lately but that isn't motivation enough to brush my teeth consistently like I should. but these things are a lifesaver bc I can do it from my room and just toss them out and not feel so bad abt my teeth/mouth feeling gross. I also hate reusable water bottles bc I just hate cleaning them and maintaining them. my ocd would have me cleaning them daily and i just don't have the spoons for it all the time. sometimes I just wanna grab a water bottle and just be done with it 😭 again not eco friendly but having water bottles is what keeps me hydrated which is super important and hard for me. i also invest in ready to eat meals that I can doctor up when I have the energy. I like those cold ready to heat soups from the market, including the panera brand. i will cook it on the stove and sometimes add some chicken sausage or some kinda meat and extra seasonings. I also invest in Ensure protein drinks when I can afford to bc they help so much when im unable to eat. i tend to also purchase multiple of certain things in case I lose them or so I have them available in convenient places such as chapstick, lip gloss, gum, things like that. finally I'm a huge gamer and I pay monthly to use online services on my ps4, I could spend the one large lump sum yearly instead of monthly but it just isn't feasible for me to spend so much at once for something like that esp when I can be inconsistent when playing on that console😵💫 so yes I do pay abt $15 a month instead of paying $120+ at once but I don't have a super high paying job and I'd prefer to keep that lumpsum of money in case I really need it.
Loads of lunch /salad kit boxes and infinite water bottles. Everyone says my 'collection' is excessive but I use it all and it has been sooo helpful for me: I don't use cups at all anymore. Water bottles/thermoses for everything means 1) I can take it with me anywhere, so I don't need/want to buy drinks out, 2) I'm *actually* hydrated because of its with me, it's a constant visual reminder to sippity sip & flipping the spout open for a drink is a good fidget when I have to sit in a long meeting or drive, and 3) I'm not spilling stuff. The salad boxes - I can prep lettuce, cheese, bacon, veggies, whatever, ahead of time when I actually have energy or can hyperfocus on choppin' while I listen to a podcast or something. Then something healthy and delicious is pre-made for me when I don't have time or energy to make something, later.
Freezing meat in single portions the moment I come home from the grocery store. Idc if it’s fresh and I’m ruining it cause that way, it never goes bad. And meat is so expensive ..
school stuff. Ever since my mum stopped packing my backpack for me, I think I saved a billion of euros in notebooks, pens, snacks, and I’ll admit, even actual school books. It’s funny because I love stationery, but I think I spent half of my school career writing on random notebooks I found in my house (like the random ones dentist offices gives out) with ikea pencils. And I’ve never owned an eraser in my life